Wednesday 18 April 2007



These are my roses. These pictures are from last summer. The image in the post above is the corner where the Westerland ( tall tree), the Fiona ( the bright red), the Cherry brandy (the low peachy coloured ones)and the English tea roses (the yellow ones) are. The Westerland has doubled in height since this picture was taken and the rest are all at least two feet taller and bushier as well with the exception of the Cherry Brandy, which is struggling. They are being munched on by something which really likes their leaves I can't figure out what it is yet and pesticides are not an option. Still the roses are budding and it is only Mid April.

The image directly inc with this post is of the evil sleeping beauty roses, I actually can't remember their real name but they are spawn of satan. They have throwns that will tear through gardener's gloves, they grow like weeds and are just as pernicious, like wild roses or briar roses they have single layer petals and but unlike wild roses they have sadly no scent. This past weekend we removed 90% of the plants you see in the image and replanetd them in other spots in the garden where we had edel roses planted. The edel roses ( long stemmed) didn't like the places they were given last year so I decided to put them all in the sunny spot that the mad roses from hell loved. I figure the sensitive edel roses will do well with more sun and more space and the mad roses would survive a nuclear war...

In the same image you can also see my poppies. I love poppies though this year I also thinned out the batch that is growning mainly because they also have a must take over the world mentality and on top of that they are aphid hotel of choice. Now I don't mind aphids or ants to a certain degree but when you see more aphid than flower there is a problem..especially when they decide to wander over to my roses. We also planted a lot of lavender as well because neither aphids nor ants like lavender very much but the roses don't seem to mind sharing space with them. Other than that we have the usual suspects of pink things, white things and some forget me nots. There are also some giant black eye'd susan type flowers as well. There is an azalia (sp) that's slow growing and a delphinium which is growing nicely.

And the usual assortment of wild things that wander their way down from the fields above us to make home in my garden.

Should also mention the lizards, there are lots. I like lizards and snakes, although here some of the snakes are poisonous and could be bitey if threatened. So I don't wander around the actual garden barefoot any more.I tell the little lizards who get a scare when I appear on the terrace that this is a lizard safe garden, I won't harm them, give them a month and they tend to take this message to heart and not skitter away when I come out unles I make lots of noise.

We also get a decent assortment of insects, lots of bees, but I have yet to see any honey bees...worrisome given that mass populations of honey bees are dying and vanishing. We get huge black field bees and soft fuzzy bumble bees of several types. Last year whenthe weather was still cool in the mornings and evenings I found myself rescuing tired bees with a drop of honey so that they had enough energy to get them home. I'll post some pictures if I can find them.

We get all kinds of wasps, mostly the fliege wespe ( flies that look like wasps) and smoe non evil wasp types. It is worrisome that I have seen a fair amount of yellow jackets...early for them and many queens have been looking for a good nest place. Me and yellow jackets DO NOT GET ALONG. In the darkening of the evening we also get bat you can see them flitting about in the dusk, their wings making wuff wuff sounds as they zip about. Lots of birds too, for the first time since I have been here there are Amsels ( black birds) and a ton of piebald crows. There are also stein adler ( golden eagles ) here too, but I have not seen them yet. They ride the thermals that rise up from the valley in the summer, pretty damned impressive. See a lot of crazy humans doing that as well as they paraglide or what ever it is called...

I love my garden and my roses. I always wanted a rose garden and they seem to like me so it is a good thing, now if only I could get the mint to calm down a bit.

anyway, I thought I would share.

Until then be excellent to each other.
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tales from the dark side...