Life In The Garden

There's been no lack of sunshine this week...a nice counter to the gray weekend. There's no denying the rain has had its impact this year--I've never seen this pink beebalm so tall, or blooming as prolifically as it suddenly is this week.

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Yesterday was a beautiful morning, sunny but not too hot...a perfect time to address some "management issues" in the garden. You know, path mowing, edging, deadheading...(imagining how easy it must be for Superman to prune high tree branches--what I wouldn't give for some heat vision!)...and finally tidying up the very messy garden shed.
Throughout the morning, a pair of Monarch butterflies dashed and darted through the air, looping and swooping through and over the garden beds. What fun they have in the garden!

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This rudbeckia variety has much more compact blossoms than its floppier wild cousins, but it puts more of those blooms out all at once. Who can say which is better?

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Here, the butterfly weed lures in its namesake, as one of the Monarchs lands for a tasty lunch.

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The monarch butterfly is apparently the celebrity of the bug world. Just one glimpse of a camera lens, and off they fly. So this picture seemed a bit of an accomplishment.

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Sunny snapdragons front an ever-increasing assortment of phlox.

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This squirrel was clearly disappointed to arrive on the porch after the tufted titmice had made off with the peanuts I'd set out.

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The season's regular rains have encouraged many dayflower plants, which feature the tiny blue wildflower pictured here snuggling with an orange marigold.

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