Tangled Branches: Cultivated

happenings in and around my zone 6b gardens in northern Virginia and in central Virginia

Thursday, March 06, 2008

&%@# Squirrels

Just saw this ~~annoying~~ ~~frustrating~~ amusing sight at my bird feeder.

Notice the rat-like tail beneath all the fluff.

Labels: critters, squirrels

Wednesday, January 23, 2008

What Squirrels Think About

How to get into so-called squirrel-proof feeders.

Most of the time it isn't necessary to actually get into the feeder, but this little overachiever managed just that, as shown here in a classic shot from this blog in April of 2004. That particular feeder has been retired.

Currently, I have 2 feeders in the backyard in northern Virginia. The squirrels know at least a couple of ways to get seed out of both of them. Both feeders are suspended from tree branches using long hooks. The easiest way for the squirrels to get a small amount of seed out of them is to climb down the hook and then jump to the nearest tree trunk. This gets the feeder swinging and generally spills some seed out onto the ground.

Here's another technique they recently developed. This is one of those feeders where the perch is attached to a spring which closes a door over the seed if there's too much weight on the perch. Ah, but what if we ignore the perch?

Just climb down the hook and suspend yourself from the roof.

Oops, stay away from the perch, remember?

Now we can get down to serious eating.

They've determined that the spring on the side of the feeder has something to do with the door, and occasionally they pull it out. They did it again yesterday afternoon, causing me to go out, cursing, to put it back together.

Below, we have something I saw today for the first time. The suet feeder was added last week, replacing a different style of suet feeder. I thought the roof on the suet feeder would be slippery enough to keep the squirrels from getting a toehold. Wrong! I watched as this squirrel jumped from the nearest tree trunk onto the suet feeder and then grabbed hold of the seed feeder. Chow time! The dome over this seed feeder had been one of my most effective squirrel-deterrents.

Oh, there are birds too. More pictures later.

Thanks Frances, for planting the idea for this topic.

Labels: critters, squirrels

Friday, November 09, 2007

Miscellany and Oddities

I should amend the title of the previous post to "I Was Half-Right". The subfreezing temperatures were enough to kill off the least cold-hardy plants, but the tough ones are left standing. This introduces oddity #1: A 90% frozen Alternanthera with one perfectly fine branch. The only thing I can think of is that the unfrozen branch was protected by some nearby zinnias, which then collapsed in a heap the morning after the freeze? Either that or there is some very strange microclimate stuff going on.

Today's pictures are from central Virginia, where I found the lettuce and spinach green and happy under a double layer of Agribon-19. On the way to the undercover greenery, I spotted oddity #2: one of my supposedly deer repellent plants - a nice little rosemary - was broken and chewed. Just last weekend I was admiring how nicely the 4 rosemarys anchored the corners of the potager. All spring and summer I fretted about how I was going to keep the deer away from the edibles, and all spring and summer they didn't bother much of anything. And now, when the tomatoes and peppers are frozen dead and gone, the critters come back to eat the "critter-proof" plants. I tell you, there's never a dull moment in gardening. Some of bronze fennel had the tops chewed off too. Apparently whoever did this was just tasting because the chewed-off pieces were left on the ground. BTW, something also chewed off the top of an Illicium earlier in the year - another reputed deer-proof plant.

There are foot-(hoof?)-prints all over the newly planted garlic beds too, but I can't see that anything was dug up. The soil is so sandy there that the prints are indistinct.

Maple leaves
from the November album
It's kind of a gray, ugly day today, but we have a bit of fall color in the woods, even though a lot of the leaves just turned brown and dropped during the drought. The black gums and sweet gums were pretty a few weeks ago and now have shed their leaves, but the wild blueberries and the maples are looking spectacular.

We've been busy lately and I've been neglecting my blog reading. I opened Google Reader this morning and found 150+ unread gardening posts. I'm almost hoping for a rainy weekend so I can sit around and drink tea and read blogs....

But then again, I need clear skies to look for Comet Holmes. Have you seen it? I didn't even know about it until this morning when I was blog surfing and found it on a birding blog, of all things. I started at A DC Birding Blog, where I learned that this year may bring large numbers of winter finches to feeders in the US. More on this later. From there, I read his Friday roundup, and went to check out the Harris's Sparrow on Mike's Birding and Digiscoping Blog. I noticed there a recent post on Comet 17P/Holmes. I think I need to set a timer to limit my internet time.

Anyhow, the reason I was interested in the winter finches was because yesterday I think I saw a small group of pine siskins in the tulip tree in front of the house. I've never seen a pine siskin before, so I'm not 100% sure, but they were streaky all over with wing bars and very pointy beaks. I didn't get a real good look. This site claims that they eat tulip tree seeds, and I think that's what they were doing, so it makes sense.

So in keeping with the season, my gardening activity is moving indoors to books, catalogs and the internet, and my outdoor activities have more to do with the sky than with the earth.

Labels: astronomy, birds, critters, frost, seasons

Wednesday, July 11, 2007

Tame Your Passion (vines)

Get more bunnies.

After they've finished the sweet peas, morning glories, dill, rudbeckia, and asters (a favorite), they'll turn their attention to the passion vines. But they're so cute when they're little.

Labels: critters, NoVA, passiflora, rabbits

Tuesday, March 06, 2007

Spring or Winter?

Every time I declare spring, it snows. I was just thinking of declaring spring after last weekend in the country, so snow is in the forecast.

Last weekend in Central Virginia, the weather was warm enough to open the windows and air out the house. The sound of spring peepers (or something) drifted in on the breeze (more like a gale, actually). I wandered around the woods looking for wildflowers or fiddleheads, but it was still too early. The maple trees are starting to bud out. The birds were singing noticeably more than the previous weekend. Our well-fed suburban birds have been singing for weeks, but I think the rural birds were still just trying to stay alive. Now the bugs are starting to come out and they can think of other activities. I didn't see any deer, but did find their tracks in the mud, however those were nowhere near the recently planted woodies. So far, so good.

Back to those spring peepers for a moment. According to what I've read on the internet, spring peepers are nocturnal. So then, what was I hearing during the daylight? They started about 10:30 in the morning and went until late afternoon. The sound was coming from the brushy side of the stream. I tried to look for the critters, but could see nothing. I found a site with sounds of a dozen frogs and toads, but none of these sound like what I remember. So the identity of the croaking creatures remains to be discovered.

In Northern Virginia, a few more crocus flowers popped open yesterday. I do mean popped open. Sunday I swear there was nothing there - hardly even any leaves; Monday - flowers. And some of the very early narcissus are open. Pictures soon.

A rare bird stopped by this afternoon - a pine warbler. I guess they really aren't all that rare, but this is only the second time I've seen one in the backyard. Not rare at all, but very welcome, a large flock of robins was rummaging through the leaves in the woods late in the afternoon.

Did I mention there's a snow advisory for tomorrow?

Labels: birds, critters, crocus, narcissus, snow

Tuesday, February 13, 2007

Herbal Essence

About this time of year I start to crave green/resinous/herbal fragrances. In the drawing-in season of autumn, I like the warm spicy scents of pumpkin pie, cinnamon rolls and molasses cookies, but now I'm ready for a wake-up call. Especially today, when all the outdoors looks like a black and white photograph, I want to be surrounded by rosemary, lavender, mint, citrus, juniper... Does this sound like the old original 1970s Clairol Herbal Essence shampoo to you? The remembrance of that scent has been driving me crazy all day. If they brought it back, I'd buy a lifetime supply.

Parallel to this, and thinking about spring plant shopping, I've been reading that strongly aromatic plants may be an effective deer deterrence strategy. I thought I had come up with this idea on my own, but now I've read it in at least two different places (1,2). This is good news, because I happen to admire most herbs anyway and would be very happy to have an excuse to plant more.

Cruising the Internet for new ideas, I found a page on the Brooklyn Botanic Garden's web site about fragrant plants - it mentions one of my favorites (Corsican Mint), and gave me some ideas for new things to try (Costmary, Patchouli). I didn't know Patchouli could be grown as an annual. Reminds me of 1970s incense (there's the 70s again).

Anne Raver visited the New York Botanical Garden last fall and her article about it described an Agastache (Black Adder) with a very minty fragrance:

The blossoms were pleasant enough, but the crystal-clear menthol that filled my nose and throat was astounding.

I was suddenly wide awake. I noticed the shape of clouds, the fuzziness of my sweater. I made a note: must have this plant.

It�s legal. It�s also drought-tolerant and deer-resistant.

Now, if only I could find a recipe for that Clairol Herbal Essence fragrance. I seem to remember the commercials saying something about balsam and melissa?

P.S. You'd be surprised at how many people recall the scents of the 70s. I hadn't thought about some of these in a long time.

Labels: critters, fragrant plants, seasons

Monday, January 08, 2007

Meeting the Neighbors

Four of our new neighbors stopped by for breakfast yesterday. I took a couple of pictures (1, 2) to share with everybody.

Have I mentioned that they're vegetarians? So hard to think of a menu that will please everybody...

Labels: critters

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