Monday Monday

A cloudy morning started us off today and it sort of matched the mood of my heart. It's funny how it changes a little like the tide lately.

I have chosen with no regret, and seem to be finding happiness wherever I look. And yet still there are things I wish had been different, that sometimes make me a little sad.

I miss the Garden, wonder what is happening along the fence, if the rest of the mums have begun to bloom yet, and if the cosmos ever really started blooming, and if any of them turned out to be seashell shaped.

I have a few roots I would like to extract still, particularly some irises only recently planted there. One or two of them promising to be purple. And maybe a little red dianthus. So I will be heading to Harwich one carefully chosen day soon and I'll be sure to bring the camera along, to show you what I find.


I had to pull over at Rock Harbor when I got a look at the sky over the bay as I headed for work this morning. I'm sorry I didn't notice until I was back behind the wheel and driving what the sky behind me looked like...it was pretty amazing looking. Sorry to tease with just the mention.

Hey, this really bugs me. The property you see here used to be a nice wild patch of woods, all trees and wildflowers. And then last year they cleared most of the lot and built this McMansion. It happens WAY too often on Cape Cod lately.

That was enough of an abomination, a crime against nature, to me...and then this week, they took down another tree or two and hoisted this great banner, which is spotlight-illuminated by night and day. It's a pretty residential area and anyway, I bet its not zoned for nightlit billboards...so add disregard for the law to raping the land, needless power consumption and reshaping the world in one's self-important image. Yep, sounds like an apt advertisement for the candidates.

Oh, I'm getting all itchy thinking about it. Here, let's chill with a bachelor button instead.


As you can see, I got more painting done in the living room this evening. It took a little while to sketch in the crow. I wanted to make sure it looked just right before doing anything with the permanance of black paint.

I'm pretty happy with how its looking right now.

Remember way back on September 13th, when I was painting the bedroom with Cape Cod Gray and tapped the end of the roller on my palm?

I did sort of like the pattern that made...especially as my mind began to transform it into some kind of stylized cave painting version of the sun. And when Patrick suggested in comment that it represented a Brand New Day, I knew it had to be front and center in my plans for the living room.

In fact, it kind of brought together the idea of the garden as cave painting.


It was very important, though, to make the sun a big icon in the scheme of things, and it had to be perfectly round...so I needed something big and round to trace.

In a stroke of luck, I found this pristine metal garbage can lid in the barn outside. What a find! Not only is it perfectly round and just as big as I'd hoped...but also one of those lids that feels fun in your hand, you know, like you've just picked up a great shield and are ready for battle...well, would be, if you also had a sword, and even the slightest clue what to do with it.

I lit my butterfly candle this evening with thoughts toward an orange tiger-striped buddy of mine - Mom and Dad's Dewey cat - who seems to have wandered away from the house in Connecticut they've all just moved into this past week.

I wish him courage and bravery and resourcefulness, and whatever else he needs to make a safe return happen. And meantime, hugs and the power of positive thinking are sent to Mom and Dad.

It's like a mania: tonight I stenciled some more leaves on this particular tree part of the living room wall. I almost think there are enough now...but we'll see what tomorrow brings.

"Everyone must leave something behind when he dies, my grandfather said. A child or a book or a painting or a house or a wall built or a pair of shoes made. Or a garden planted. Something your hand touched some way so your soul has somewhere to go when you die, and when people look at that tree or that flower you planted, you're there."

"It doesn't matter what you do, he said, so long as you change something from the way it was before you touched it into something that's like you after you take your hands away. The difference between a man who cuts lawns and a real gardener is in the touching, he said."

Ray Bradbury, Fahrenheit 451, 1950.

Kitchen Paint and Flowers

The on-going painting campaign at the Nest resumed shortly after the sun had set on Sunday evening, as I turned my attention to the terribly-pink kitchen walls, which are being covered with a brick red called Mexicana.

I'll admit I was a shade non-plussed to open it in the artificial light of evening, where it seemed a little browner than I thought I liked. And I still see a little of that in proper daylight, but it's a sort of terra cotta note, which I quite like.

And I'm very fond of the way the peachy-orange dining room walls are playing with the red of the kitchen.

I'm not brushing/rolling the Mexicana, though. I'm applying with a sea sponge, which is creating a sort of mottled texture to the painting. Plus, the more you work the paint with the sponge, the more you can get the over and under tones of the color to come out a little to build on that texture.

The cutting in's actually the worst with this treatment, since you need a wee bit of sponge to get into the cracks and corners...and I've had some bad luck with masking tape adhesives failing just as I start laying paint along the edge.

Ah, well...all the trim in the place will get a nice fresh coat of white once all else is finished, so no real worries there.


There's just the west wall of the kitchen left to get the Mexicana, though that will be a project for tomorrow night after work.

The bricky-red should butch up the pink walls that will remain in the pantry.

Meanwhile, I thought I'd share with you a few snapshots from the garden at work.

I just love these yellow David Austin roses. I can't recall the name of this variety, but the scent is just lovely, even muted a little by the recent cool temperatures.

These single pink roses are also nicely scented. You can see that the rose plants are looking a little scraggly at this end of the season, even though they are continuing to bloom. They'll do so on and off til around November, weather allowing, which it often does. That's always nice.

Just a bit of blush from cool evenings on the flowers of this PeeGee hydrangea. You can also see the wear of this part of the season here, as well.

This first evening of autumn (sob...) brings us temperatures teetering between 58 and 59 the last couple of hours. It's mostly comfortable, but every once in a while there seems a bit of chilled air current (not really a breeze, per se...) that suggests I ought to have all the windows closed. I've shut a few, but not all of them.

I like the fresh air as much as I enjoy a comfy flannel shirt.

Gold Medal Monday

I'm playing catch-up a little this evening, as these are all Sunday images, starting with these noon-time portulacas. I hadn't share any in a while, and this was a nice trio.

I'm glad I held on to a few pictures from Sunday, too, since today was a pretty rainy and gray day and I didn't actually take any. Rain was really heavy as it moved through in waves this afternoon, and we saw a kicking thunderstorm roll through earlier this evening. I did let the camera roll there, but haven't yet checked to see if I got anything worthwhile.

With all the events at work this weekend, I missed the start of the Olympics and hadn't really gotten into the routine of enjoying the coverage until this evening. I still haven't had a chance to track down the video of the opening ceremonies, which I've been hearing were quite impressive. Tonight I have been watching, so I was able to watch Michael Phelps get his ninth gold medal this evening, and I'm enjoying the men's gymnastic coverage as I write. Woo hoo!! Go USA!! I'm by no means an athlete, but every time the Olympics roll around, I can't help but be inspired and thrilled by these kids and their ability.

Last night, however, I was watching Moby Dick on PBS, with Gregory Peck as Ahab. I was watching the scene where the whalers harpoon the great white whale and then get taken for a wild ride...and it occurred to me that sometimes walking Emily is a bit like a Nantucket Sleighride.

Both of these hydrangea pictures were taken on one of those walks, so that they are in focus at all is a testament to her patience with me.

First up are these pristine white blossoms of Peegee hydrangea. There's a whole hedge of this stuff down the street, probably about eight to ten feet high. It's interesting to note that these plants, in a semi-shaded location, are so much further ahead of the same plant in full sun outside the restaurant. That one's flowers actually turn pale shades of green and red come September.

Across the street from those peegees, are a few absolutely beautiful purple and blue flowered hydrangeas. How could I resist sharing one of those with all you purple-lovers?!

Knowing that there was so much rain in the forecast for this week, I had been thinking that last night might be my best chance for a look at the Perseid Meteor showers...but sadly, the clouds moved in across the sky even before it was fully dark, obscuring the half-moon and the rest of the sky.

This evening, in the cool night (current temperature of 63F) following the earlier rain, the crickets are singing all up and down the street.

Skies remain dark and cloudy and our forecast advises us that thunderstorms remain possible well into morning. I might even be hearing just a little distant thunder now. Actually, the Olympics have just been interrupted for an EAS warning about a Severe Thunderstorm Warning. So, I think I'll be posting this and shutting down the computer.

However, there's some sunshine in the forecast for mid-week, so I'm hoping I'll get to see a few meteors then. Have a good night everyone.

The Bachelor's Buttons

The morning sunshine was more a theory this morning than actual blazing rays of orange and gold. A quick check of the forecast (where every day in the coming week had been wet with rain a day ago) revealed now only a "chance of a shower" today, and as there'd been no rain in the night, or at least very little, I went about the usual routine.

Unexpectedly, the overcast mornings are often when you get the best garden photographs. After all, you don't have that brilliant light directly on your subject, but a nice strong bright light, naturally diffused by the clouds. Of course, there was a strong breeze continuing. This is comforting, in light of the recent humidity, but it does make it more difficult for the subjects of the photo to sit still, especially if they are thin stemmed, as the bachelor's buttons are. I imagine it's a lot like trying to take class photos of kindergarteners.

Still, I managed some nice shots in between gusts...tho I can assure you there were plenty of misfires deleted from my memory card in addition to these three sweet shots.


I just love how easy it is to grow these little guys. Because they are lovers of full sun, I haven't had the pleasure nearly often enough. But whenever I have, I've had nothing but praise for the show they put on, in exchange for some commitment to deadheading.

Curt asked about the story behind the name, bachelor's buttons (Centaurea cyanus) and so I did a bit of checking around. They are so named because, as they are small (an inch and a half across at their fullest), and hold their shape well out of water, they became a popular choice as a bouttonniere. According to the Victorians' Flower Code, bachelor's buttons symbolized solitude. (So if Superman had landed back then, he might've had a Fortress of Bachelor's Buttons instead, which might've looked pretty cool! Hmmm...)

Since the blue ones (originally the only color) grow wild in the fields of England, they are also known as cornflower, for their appearances amongst the corn stalks there.

I'm sure the way they bend and bounce on the breeze works to their advantage as far as getting their seed flung as far as possible. I'm always fascinated with the devious and delightful ways plants have for reproducing, on the pollination end and the distribution of the resulting seeds.

This is my sixth gardening location on Cape Cod--nine if you count workplace gardens--and I imagine it won't be the last, either. It makes me happy to work with plants who I suspect may carry on after I've moved on to my next bit of earth.

The flowers only last a couple of days at best, but each plant will flower all summer as long as you continue to snip off the fading flowers. I don't have any problem letting them drop down into the bed of the garden as I do snip them, since they will re-seed nicely.

If you have a small patch of bare earth that you want to dress up real simply, I think you couldn't pick an easier (and relatively quick growing) combination of seeds than bachelor's buttons, cosmos (they'll be blooming shortly, I think...) and allyssum.

As an added bonus, at the end of the season when I do let them go to seed, they will be popular with the local finch populations. I remember the first time I saw a tiny goldfinch perch on the flimsy stem of a bachelor button plant...and it was a great insight for me into the tiny bird's weight that the plant didn't drop to the ground like Charlie Brown's Christmas tree.

Not that I'd thought birds were heavy exactly, that would make no sense as far as the Flying thing goes...but it just wasn't something I'd really given any thought to before, and really, it was just idle musing as I watched the miniature acrobatic show as the finch feasted on all the seedy past flowerheads. I know there are goldfinches hereabouts on Not Wisteria Lane, so hopefully we'll see that show again here, too.

While I love the true blue of the originals for their cooling of the oranges and yellows I enjoy so much, I've quickly become a big, big fan of the different colored hybrids...particularly this purple one. I wonder if they will come true from seed or revert back to the original blue? Either way, I think I win.


One more thing I almost forgot to tell you about bachelor's buttons: they are an edible flower! I've not tried them yet, but I've read that they bring a nice spicey note to a salad. Can't think of a more fantastic garnish for anything, though!

These smaller variety sunflowers are certainly doing their thing in a strong way. This is the first plant to bloom and the new flowers just keep on coming. The best part is that, while the current crop is distracting me with their commanding floral presence, I can see the later successions growing taller and fuller in my peripheral vision.

I still have sky-scraping high hopes for some of those Russian Gray Mammoths. Who knows what August may bring?

Here's a great shot of the marine heliotrope. Two of the plants have been cut back after their blooms faded, as they were a little leggy when they came home from the nursery. I see all kinds of side shoots forming on them now, so the Cropping was a wise choice.

Meanwhile, this one, which hadn't been blooming when it came home has now begun scenting that corner of the lamp post bed with its distinctive, but hard-to-describe scent of intoxication.

As you can see, the latest seeding of allyssum has come in nicely in the background there. This morning, I got out the edging shears and tidied up the outside of the beds, and was somewhat stern with the earliest allyssum plants, as well. While they were still flowering, they were doing so on stalks that were now going on four or five inches long.

I cut them back in patches, so that some remain, which I'll deadhead a little later on. That way I should have a nice staggered cycle of blooming from them for the rest of the season. The dianthus are picking up a little slack along the lowest edges of the garden and the pansies are still blooming their happy little heads off.

As Jenn pointed out the other day, the Midnight Garden is also a Learning Place, and so, while we continue to learn about the blooming habits of the hens and chicks, I present to you the first flower on that stalk I've shown you in previous posts. As you can see, it looks to be one of many and I'll do my best to show you the full glory of it all.

As I mentioned before, the sunflowers really have been going to town and are forming the framework of the garden "wall" which is slowly rising all along the fence.

The daisies, I'm sad to say, are requiring deadheading at a faster pace, and for them, this doesn't always bring reblooming. Perhaps we love their joyfulness all the more for it's brief stay.

But the cosmos will be coming into their own shortly and the Queen Annes lace (there are more than I remember transplanting, which is by no means a complaint) have just exploded into clouds of those distinctive and detailed flowerheads, each one like a giant snowflake floating at the top of a stem.

While there's obviously no lack of flowering to hold my interest in our front yard, I'm also happily drawn around the block to all of the beautiful things happening in everyone else's yards.

There was a stand of deep purple astilbes blooming around the corner last week, but they didn't last particularly long...at least not long enough for me to remember to bring my camera along on our nightly walks.

This blue hydrangea across the street caught my eye this morning and drew me over for a closer look. I do miss the hydrangeas we had at the old place, but they were too large to move and really at home where they are. But I don't mind not having too many of them here, as the mid-cape area has been known for hydrangea-nappers.

I know, it sounds ridiculous, but almost every August since I've lived here, there's been a news story about police arresting someone with their cars loaded with trashbags full of cut hydrangea stems harvested from people's homes, businesses and condos. Apparently, a single stem can be sold for $4 or more each, because of their popularity in flower arrangements for weddings. Crazy world, isn't it?

Not that I'm in any way trying to devalue the flower's beauty. Sigh. It just feels wrong to put a price on it.

Tomorrow, I will have to pay some attention to the cleome flowers, as they continue to bloom as their stalks climb, but they leave long seedpods hanging out from the stalks where the previous flowers were. You can see one of them here, in the lower right.
I haven't grown these in a while, so I'm putting out the call for advice here. (Lost, you know these guys, right?) The seedpods are a pretty distinctive look as the cleome gets taller, but should I remove them in order to keep the flowering going?


A few new evening primrose flowers had opened this evening, as I went about lighting the candles along the fence at dusk.

I would've taken the time to sniff for their scent, since that is surely how they attract the night-time pollinators, but I'd forgotten to douse myself in OFF and as the breeze had become more occasional, I was swarmed with mosquitos and so kept my time out there somewhat brief.



But I did notice that, in the section of garden underneath this particular coreopsis plant, there was an unseen cricket tuning up for an evening's outdoor concert in the park.

Our temperature at 10:15 is 74 degrees and I'm enjoying the cricket's debut summer concert through the window as I write this.

Anyone else a fan of this book?

Sunday Garden Report

Through some unfortunate set of circumstances I've yet to completely comprehend, I found myself awake at 6:30 this morning. Not a bad thing, per se, unless you've stayed up until 2:00 a.m. watching the first Michael Keaton Batman movie on television.

But that's okay, there was coffee, and I had a project I wanted to tend to before heading off to a day of fun in Happy Function Land. You see, the mails brought a treat this week, from my friend The Rhet. She'd been to an iris swap recently and, aware of the minimal show of irises currently available at the Midnight Garden, put together a small sampler box of roots from her Baltimore garden and sent them winging in my direction.

They'd arrived in fine shape, if a little parched (it was a hot week to travel in a box, after all). To prevent any nasty Maryland buggies from gaining a beachhead here in Massachusetts, I set them up for an overnight soak in water, with just a capful of bleach.

This morning, they were ready to be planted and so after that all-important first cup of coffee, out we went to the border to find suitable homes for each of the new additions.

Who knows? Perhaps numbered in this bunch will be my first scented iris, or maybe one of those new-fangled re-bloomers for the 2009 season! Already I'm giddy with anticipation...

I'm especially fond of the Rhet's unconventional plant tags. I'm also quite fond of her unique handwriting, which I've known for more of my life than not at this point...but I also simply enjoy the economy of it all.

After all, once the roots are planted, the leaves should be cut right down (and were...by the way, if you've not already done so with your irises, now's a fine time of year for that...it'll tidy them up and you'll have new green leaves by August...) to push that energy down into the roots. No doubt in a week or two, new leaves will form to gather solar energy for next spring's show.

In the meantime, I have some possibilities to drool over. I love the one that says "Probably Purple", but the Polish Princess with gold, yellow and lavendar sounds pretty delightful, too! Thank you, my dear!!


These happy golden marigolds echoed the color of the cloud-obscured sun this morning, as the temperature was already climbing toward the 80s in the early hours. Humidity never really abated in the night, as our tropical wave continues.





This purple hydrangea is still a bit overgrown, but certainly flowering nicely now that I've freed it from the bonds of the rampaging bindweed.





I know I've shown off these pretty portulaca before, but just look at it. What a spectacularly perfect little flower, how could you not love it?


Of course, if I get enough protests from you who are sick to death of them (yah, it's a challenge...you wanna take me and the Nicodemon on, do you? Heh heh...), I'll stop showing them off. Maybe.



More of the bachelor's buttons continue to reveal themselves each morning. What's better than a flower you grew from seed?

There are more than a few of these delicious blue guys, but some of the other colors continue to reveal themselves, like this bright rosy pink version.

Sorry the pic is a little on the crappy side, but with the tropical humidity we are also seeing a lot of gusty winds (filed under Y for "yay, a breeze!"), which make flower photography a special challenge.

Meanwhile, in another part of the garden, another variety of sunflower has joined in the great chorus of July. Purty, ain't it?
Last evening, it was the Turkeys. Tonight, while Emily and I were on our walk around the block, we crossed paths with a family of gray ducks. Again, a momma with six young ones, no longer babies, but still not quite the size of their parent. They herded together at the sight of us and waddled off through the hedge of someone's yard.

I didn't have my camera with me. I think you'll understand that wrangling eighty pounds of Herself as well as managing bags of poo is really quite enough, without having to juggle pricey electronic equipment, too. I went back with the camera when our walk was through, but they were gone.

On an unrelated note, a few of you have encouraged me to be kind and treat myself as I travel this path away from the Cigarettes (day three went well, thanks!) and I wanted to let you know about one of those treats. I've recently discovered the Green Machine, one of the juice smoothies from the folks at www.nakedjuice.com at one of our local convenience stores.

At $2.99 a bottle, it's not cheap, but it's still half what I was spending on a pack of cigarettes and so much tastier. As an added bonus, it's got spirulina, which for some reason I just love. It makes me feel all good inside. Plus, it's green!

Here's the windblown garden as I returned from my half-hearted search for the ducks. It's looking a bit overgrown just now, since the edging needs to be done, the grass is ready for mowing and plenty of the allyssum are ready for deadheading. But the dianthus are beginning a second flush of blooming and with the bachelor buttons coming on strong and the cleome taking center stage, it's still quite a lot of fun.
In the foreground (at the base of the closest sunflower stalk) is a nearly invisible blue-green cloud of thistle foliage, which is simply covered with flower buds that'll be opening into little purply-pink blossoms sometime this week, too.

Summer Days

Well, the days certainly slip by quickly here in July. I never got around to posting yesterday. My computer sort of reminded me recently that there are other things to summertime life besides blogging. You see, I have this CD burner that is usually pretty reasonable, but every now and then, the software that came with it doesn't recognize the burner...and the best bit is that it usually decides not to see the hardware exactly the week that my photo files start to clog things up and need to be burned to disc. The Laws of Murphy are strong in this one.

Finally, after much futzing, I got the burner working and spent some time burning discs--two of them for the first three quarters of June!!! Anyway, now my hard drive's all freed up and running a little more smoothly...but between this issue and the connectivity thing, I found myself with that time I was looking for to dive head-first into the Wind in the Willows, as inspired by both Cooper and Patrick...and I just never want to stop reading it now!! Blogging, what's that?

I can't remember when I read this book, but it was a terribly long time ago, and so this feels like a brand new thing for me, while also an old friend. You know, you read a book as a child and you take it in on a much simpler level...and then you come back to it later, and you see a completely new pleasure, informed by the years you've lived, experiences you've had, knowledge gained and people you've known. I don't think my pal Bob would mind or disagree with the assessment that he is not unlike Toad in many ways, for example.

I find it's a difficult book to read late at night, not only because it keeps hitting me in the face when I fall asleep, but also because, when I'm not tired from a long day, I'm laughing right out loud almost constantly and I'm a little concerned I'll wake everyone up laughing so heartily. Anyway, if you haven't read this book recently, get a copy, read it for yourself. Read it to your kids. You won't be sorry.

Ahem. Okay, hopping down from my Read a Book soapbox, let me show you this beautiful evening primrose that's starting to strut this week. I didn't plant these guys, though I may have transported the seed in soil from the old garden.

They are sort of wild and weedy in these parts, but I find them pretty well behaved (and easy enough to yank up if you don't like the spot they've chosen) a wonderful bit of height and color in the summer garden, so I'm happy when they show up here and there.

As the name suggests, the new flowers open up as the sun is setting. Yesterday morning there was one, but I noticed around 10 or so last night (by flashlight beam) that these four had opened, sending their scent out across the night air, teasing night time bugs and moths to come taste...which in turn brings the bats out to swoop around.

Ah, nature.

In the interests of full disclosure, not all of the photos to follow were taken today, but rather, they represent a melange of garden activity during the last thirty-six hours. Like you care.

I don't know about you, but I can't look at these portulaca flowers enough. Each day there's a new array of assorted colors. I'm so glad I didn't end up with the pack of all one kind of flower that was originally in my hand at the nursery. I'd much rather have all these colors in a random collection.

I'm also sort of tickled to point out a small hedge of about four cleome seedlings in the background, still fairly small, which were born of a second seeding with the remainder of the packet somewhere around mid-June.

While the first flush have yet to actually bloom yet, it's nice to know this second wave will be coming along to bloom much later in the season, possibly as the early guys begin to fade. I've always enjoyed this plant, but haven't had the conditions to grow it well for a few years. It's nice to have it around again.

On the Produce of the Future scene, the Three Sisters experiment is going quite nicely. Here's one of the best hills, featuring a good balance of corn, beans and squash all growing together. You may also note that I should spend some time this weekend doing some weeding around these guys.

You may recall I was eight days late after the Full Corn Moon planting my corn seeds this spring...so it shouldn't be any surprise that it was five or six days after the Fourth when my corn plants began to reach that knee-high benchmark you're supposed to have hit according to the old saw about corn growth, Knee-High by the Fourth of July.

Also, while the title seems a shade dubious, the "Early Girl" tomato is making some promises for a first harvest of fruit sometime fairly soon...but not really early by most measurements.

Now, I try to be good about admitting mistakes, and I am reasonably assured that this lovely red rose which I've been touting as the return of the often-dead Mister Lincoln tea rose, is not at all that plant.

You see, in Spring of 2007, I bought two rose bushes rather inexpensively at the Ocean State Job Lot. One of them died over the summer, but the other did pretty well, though never bloomed to cement it in memory.

This is that second plant, which I think may have been called Proud Nation, or Proud Land, or something like that, and if I recall(or stumble across the label, which I did tuck into some book or other for safe-keeping. Hopefully it was actually a garden related book.), it's actually supposed to grow into a serious bush of such blooms. This would be wonderful, as right now it is rather small.

Now, not only did I recently recall that purchase and the survival of the rose, but also Wednesday, this other, smaller red tea rose began to bloom down at the other end of the fence garden, and I realized that this, indeed, was the real Mister Lincoln standing up.

But sadly, Generalissimo Francisco Franco is still dead.

I found this lovely purple hydrangea blooming under a tangled clutch of bindweed this evening, which I tore out by the handfuls to reveal this lovely flowerhead. This plant is badly crowded by an azalea and a juniper bush and needs to be transplanted to a location where it can thrive a little better.

Also, it's past time to address the bindweed, which is a little seductive with its pink flowers, but will wrap itself around me and my coffee cup, if I sit for too long in one place. It weaves through all the foundation plantings around the house and will probably completely cover the house one day if left unchecked.

Check out this massive spidery-looking sunflower head. This plant is now just a little taller than my five foot and eleven inch height. I just love the crazy way it looks. This is definitely one of the Russian Gray "giants" who love to get so very tall. Can't wait to see how high we can go with these!

Along the inside of the fence, another shade of African marigold has begun to bloom. These guys (there are also some in a canary yellow color in the cleome bud photo earlier this week) will eventually get to be about three feet tall themselves.

I like this color. It's not that pale bright yellow, but it's not the neon orange. It's a nice golden cross between the two...and a real bridge between all the other shades of marigolds in the garden.

Here's one of the gardens down around the bend here on Wisteria Lane. It sort of amuses me, as I think from a distance that this is a statue of Saint Francis, who welcomed all the animals of the world to him. And the garden in his honor, properly fenced to keep the animals out.

I wonder if this bunny was thinking something similar.

I think I'll post this picture over at BugGuide.net, to see if it's clear enough for anyone to identify the species of pollinator seen here. I don't think there are bees with green heads. It would be a real lesson for me to accept the evil Greenhead Flies (of the painful bite) as beneficial to the garden in the absence of more bees.

[EDIT, 7/12/08: First response to my posting at BugGuide suggests this is a halictid bee...which I'd never heard of before. They are also called sweat bees, which I have heard of previously. Other photos I've now seen indicate their entire bodies are green, sometimes. Join me, won't you, in a brief education on the subject (and some much better photos) here.]

I did see a nice group of honeybees flitting about the roses outside the bank in Eastham the other day and that was a bit of a relief for me. I've still not seen a single honeybee in Harwich. Have you seen this? (Thanks, Curt!)