our new addition to the landscape and it's first visitor

ever since we moved into our house 6 years ago, i have wanted a patio in the back yard. some place where we could put a table and chairs and have dinner outside or a place where we could sit outside and have our morning coffee and read the paper. the costs of building one can be high, having someone else do it are even higher so we put the idea on the back burner until we could afford it or figure out how to do it ourselves in an affordable manner.

last summer, my friend patti mentioned a place where she was getting stone for free to build a patio and i knew we had found our solution. luckily for us, she was willing to share the source and we made at least half a dozen trips to pick up large slabs of stone to build our patio. we had originally tried to make the stones with a mold and cement but the stones were cracking into pieces because the mold was too shallow. if you ever try to use those molds for stepping stones, be forewarned-they are not meant to be stepped on, just for decorative purposes only. we learned this the hard way since none of the packaging tells you not to actually step on them.

the stones we gathered are actually manufactured from cement by a stone company that then cuts them into various shapes for builders to use in many different applications. they also have broken pieces in addition to the scraps from cutting the stones and all of these are available to the public for free-you just have to haul them off yourself. we selected a large variety of broken and cut pieces to make a mosaic. we also gathered a bunch of cinder blocks that were being removed from a building during a renovation and used these for a sort of retaining wall along the most uphill section of the patio.

a closeup of the stones before we filled in the gaps with dirt

starting along one corner, we filled in the gaps with dirt, packing it in as tightly as we could

another view of our progress

the patio all filled in and awaiting its next layer of "mortar"-moss, our yard has lots of it and we decided to patch it in to the dirt to help hold the stones in place. when we started gathering the stones, we decided to do this as cheaply as possible. since we hadn't paid for any of the stones, except the gas to drive there, i decided to use the moss in the yard rather than paying for it at the garden center. it will take time to fill in but that is okay with me.

while we were working on filling the gaps, i noticed the dog had something. she was circling something on the lawn so i set off to investigate since she will make an effort to kill what ever little critters she can catch.

when i got up close, i was shocked to see a snapping turtle. we don't even have a creek along our property-this fellow had to travel across multiple yards and at least one street to end up in our yard. this was not a small turtle either, it was at least a foot in length and could have easily snapped off a finger tip!

we immediately knew that we had to take the little guy over to the 7 mile creek and let him/her go. when we took him out of the bucket that we carried him in and placed him on the rock by the stream, he made a dash to the water.

immediately, he was in the water and swimming away. there are lots of little fish in that creek so we know he shouldn't have any trouble finding a meal!

a view down stream from where we let the little guy go. it is pretty down there and he should be happy there. let's hope he stays in the water and doesn't go wandering around the neighborhood again!

what a month it's been...

with all of the rainfall and the cooler temperatures during may, our garden is lagging behind a bit.  this week we are finally picking lettuce and peas and our other plants are just beginning to fill out.

we decided to have the house treated for termites-strictly preventative and this forced us to move the herb garden to the other side of the walkway.  darry built a bed quickly using cinder blocks and we filled it using the lasagna method.  now we have all of the herbs we want to cook with in this temporary bed.  it is my goal to fill all of the holes as well.  right now a few of them have thyme, flowers, mint and rosemary in them but i think it would look nicer if enough plants droop over the sides to cover the blocks. 

some of the lettuce plants in the garden

bell peppers and habaneros, the hot ones are the small plants on the right.

this years peaches

hollyhocks

asian lillies

the planter boxes at the end of the driveway are bursting with nasturtiums

coneflowers

the big bed we are creating along the property line.  if the jerk next door isn't going to mow, we will just come up with a combination of plants to hide the ugly mess!!!

it's been a while...

as of today, we have had over 8 inches of rain for the month.  that may not seem like much to some but for us, that is more than triple the monthly average.  if you know anything about gardening then you know that you simply cannot work the soil under such soggy conditions.  you also know that fungus excels in moisture and that plants tend to wither and rot away with the moisture and fungus that it produces.  needless to say, with all of the rainy soggy days and the up down up down of the temperature, our garden is lagging behind!

we have a few different lettuces, some peppers and peas out there as well as a few cucumbers and some artichokes but so far, nothing to brag about or to pick for that matter.

there was evidence of an old (very old, as in previous owners, many years ago) termite infestation in our house so we have decided to have the house treated, after all this is the south and termites are like opinions, everybody has at least one (colony) somewhere!

in the mean time, this lovely new bed will serve as my herb garden since nothing edible can be near the house for at least a year.

this years plants in the lasagna bed at the front walk.  it had to be planted a second time-sometimes, i really don't care for dogs...

we have rather shady conditions along the front of the house and i have decided to make that the theme for these beds.  we added ferns, columbines, huecheras, native phlox, caladium and more.

our sunny bed out front.  linda sent me seeds for california wild flowers and i spread them over the bed.  they are sprouting like wild fire and so are the weeds from all of the rain.  now the dilemma-is it a weed or a wild flower???

do you remember the previous post about shiitake?  here is darry out back checking the logs for moisture=they cannot be allowed to dry out or there will not be any shiitake!

more adventures with bees

since we are new members, we attend the monthly meetings for the nashville area bee keepers as often as possible.  after many of the meetings, there is a field exercise that demonstrates vital procedures and methods of maintaining a hive.  walt is explaining an ongoing experiment he tried to hopefully prevent swarming. the experiment failed but we were able to see the inside of the hive and listen to an experienced bee keeper impart valuable information.

the hive looks healthy but it is obvious to walt that a swarm took place.

a close up of one of the frames.

we also had the chance to listen to jim talk about a top bar hive.  they are common in places like africa and the two main types of top bar hives are the kenyan and the tanzanian.  these are easy to set up but are not very practical for honey production, just for pollination purposes.

the name top bar comes from the fact that the box contains a set of bars that rest on the top of the box-no frames are used.  here jim is holding a bar that the bees have not yet begun to build comb on.

a shot of some of the bees in the hive, hard at work

jim took out a bar to show us the natural comb formations that the bees make.

here is a closeup of the comb.  the yellow lumps-or bullet shaped cells in the middle are actually drone cells (male bees), the darker yellow parts at the top are honey  and at the bottom, they are probably brood cells for workers (female bees)

we were lucky to have three bee keepers speak to us!  here is trevor opening up the new hives-these were set up last month and in my last post about bees, jim was installing the packages of bees to these hives.  trevor was looking to see how the bees are doing.  he was able to find the queen easily and so far, it appears to be going well.

trevor holding up one of the frames to inspect it for varroa mites.  have you noticed that these guys are obviously fearless when handling the bees?  all three of them did so with out protective gear, just a little smoke.

here is a close up of a frame from one of the new hives.  there are drone cells in the center area-they look like yellow bullet shaped mounds.  the darker cells are worker cells and the light ones at the top are capped cells of honey.

bee happy

as new members of the nashville beekeepers association, we are encouraged to attend as many official functions as possible.  last week, we had the opportunity to attend a field exercise and a package installation.

in this photo, member walt is removing frames from his brood box to check for mites and signs of superceding (when the bees replace the queen, can have many reasons for happening)

walt and jim are trying to locate the queen, by the time we were finished, they had not located her but had located several queen cells.  this indicated  the possibility of a swarm or that they were replacing the queen.  this hive is in the ellington apiary and is walt's personal colony.

in this photo, jim has opened up one of naba's two colonies in the ellington apiary.  he is very confidant around the bees and doesn't always wear protective gear.  he went through all of the boxes in the colony in the hope of locating the queen and for general purposes of checking on the hive.  he was able to find a queen but it was not the one from last year, she was marked with a red dot.  this indicates that she was superceded (replaced).  there was some speculation that the hive may have swarmed-the old queen could have left with some of the bees but that was all subject to opinion and when you have two experienced bee keepers give you an opinion, expect at least three!

here jim is preparing to install a package into a new hive.  when you order bees by mail, yes that is a very common practice, they come in a box like this.  you must first pop out the lid on top so the bees will come out.

jim isn't the only one who was without gear, there were several people just as brave-not me or darry!
jim demonstrates the method of dumping them out of the box and into the brood chamber by banging on the bottom of the box.

here he installed a hood small hive beetle trap.  it will catch those pesky small hive beetles and prevent them from making a mess in the hive.

now it is time to add the queen.  first you must remove the cork from the candy end of the little box.

this little box gets placed on top of the frames and by the time the bees eat the candy to release the queen, they will be accustomed to her scent and they will recognize her as their queen.  if we are lucky, that is.  sometimes they don't and they can kill her.

 
next, jim placed an inner cover that has a hole in the center on top of the brood chamber.  this will allow him to feed the bees without bees from other colonies taking advantage of the sugar water-called robbing.

he then placed an empty super over the inner cover.
and then a second empty super so it would be tall enough to house the bottle of syrup-1:1 sugar and water.  the lid has very small holes in it and it will allow the bees to slowly drink it since they do not have any honey stored to feed from.  this was then covered with a lid and a weight.

if all goes well, the girls (as jim likes to call them-the workers are all females!) will begin to build out the comb and the queen (who is already mated) will begin to lay eggs.  before we know it, the hive will be storing nectar and pollen and producing honey.  if all goes well, they will make enough honey to overwinter successfully.  only time will tell!

back in the swing of things

so here it is, a month into spring and i haven't done much to update the garden blog.  please forgive me, it has been a busy month and we have been sorely lagging behind in our gardening duties at home.  the demo garden looks wonderful though.  luckily, for us, the weather has been cooperating.  it hasn't warmed up as quickly as it does some springs and this is working to our favor since we were late in starting seeds.  one thing we have done is start our lasagna beds along the front walkway of the house.  they had completely compacted over the winter and we added new layers and plants.  

the view of the walkway with the lasagna bed at the corner in the foreground and all the way at the end of the walk in the top left corner of the photo.  the spaces inbetween have been filled in with iris, hostas, ajuga, trifolium (fancy clover) and other shade tolerant plants.  the beds along the house on this side of the steps also have seen new additions of hostas, heucheras, convullaria (lily of the valley) and more.  the beds on the other side of the steps, which are not shown in the picture have many new plants including, native phlox, dicentra (bleeding hearts), hostas, heuchera, may apples, convullaria, autumn ferns and more.  the lasagna bed is pictured with it's first new layer-fresh cut grass.

a close-up of the grass layer

the second layer is pine needles.  this is the small bed at the end of the walkway.  it recieves more sun than the large bed so it will feature slightly different plants.

after adding a layer of leaves to both beds, i topped it off with a layer of peat moss.

a variety of shade loving coleus and begonias were planted in the bed and the surface was sprinkled with lime to help lower the acid level in the bed.  

this bed has some verbena along with the begonias and coleus and it also was limed.

out in the front of the yard is a raised bed that forms a circle around our little silver maple tree.  the bed is planted with tulips and daffodils as well as some creeping phlox, hyacinths and a bunch of snapdragons that self sow each year.

the lilac bush was beautiful this year, we had many blooms to cut and enjoy in vases in the house.