Garden Wildlife

I wrote a while back that I would take a photo of the very neat interior lining of the cardinal's nest in the rose arbor.  Well, by the time I took the camera outside, she'd already added another layer inside!

What was the interior (the lighter-colored material) was now covered up by a finer weaving of what looks like pine straw.

A day or two later, I heard a bird startle away from the arbor when I (apparently) got too close for comfort.  I took a look to see if she'd made any further remodeling efforts-- and there was a little speckled egg!

Another couple of days, and there were two of them!
It's been a few days more, with no more eggs.  Donald read that cardinals typically have a clutch of 2 to 5 eggs, so this may be all she'll lay.

There are not a ton of bees, lately, but I have seen a variety of them.  Bumblebees seem to be the most common type in our garden.  Butterflies, moths, and ladybugs are reappearing, too-- and I saw a hummingbird a couple of times this week.  Time to refill the feeder!

We've been enjoying the fireflies, lately.  There were so many of them, the other evening!  Lightning bugs are just as mesmerizing and magical as they were when I was a kid; some things never lose their ability to amaze.

Less amazing are the young grasshoppers.  (That's what that is in the next photo, right?)  I don't mind them as long as they don't eat too much of my plants, though.  At least they don't (usually) fly right at you, like leaf-footed bugs, or threaten to sting, like wasps.

There's no photo of it, but we've been seeing the same black snake in the garden, several times this spring.  I'm not sure if it's a black rat snake or a black racer.  It's about three feet long and very quick to move along, when we see it.  As long as it stays safely away from us and the dogs, I'm not that worried about it.  I've always heard that a few "good" snakes in the yard can deter the venomous ones by cutting down the prey population.

Speaking of snake prey, we're enjoying the antics of the Carolina anoles and skinks (both the pretty ones with blue tails-- I think they're called "Southeastern five-lined skinks"-- and the less attractive broad-headed skinks).

There's also the occasional toad and frog...

He spent hours hanging out on this new, dark-leaved canna.  I think he's on 'Wyoming', but I'm not positive which is which, yet.  (It'll be easier to tell when they get a little bigger.)  One is 'Wyoming' and one is 'Russian Red'.

Then we have rabbits slipping through the fence for free salad fixin's-- and of course the occasional garden fairy...

...or tiny garden cherub.  ;o)

White Blooms

There aren't that many white flowers in my garden.  It's not that I don't like white flowers-- I think they can be beautiful by day or night, and they offer a refreshing visual "cool spot" that can only be a good thing during our hot summers.  However, I tend not to plan my planting color schemes very carefully, paying much more attention to a plant's likelihood of survival than to its flower color, and I just happen not to grow many plants with white flowers (compared to pinks, reds, yellows, and so on).

However, there are a few white blooms in the garden at the moment, and the repetition of the theme caught my attention.

One of the first flowers to bloom in our garden is the spring snowflake (not pictured here).  This unknown white clematis starts flowering fairly early, too, but it's still blooming sporadically:

Already done for the year are two types of "bridal wreath" (spirea) that bloom in white.  The viburnum comes later, but as you can see, it's started:

I value the blooms of gardenias more for their scent than for their form or color, but they too are a dazzlingly bright white:

Another crisp, clean white adorns 'Little Gem' magnolia:

The blooms seem to glow against the glossy dark leaves...

The petals (and sepals) have a sculptural quality, catching fallen stamens and holding them like shallow bowls of the finest porcelain...

Other white (or cream) flowers that come and go through the year include wild violet, cemetery iris, peacock orchid (Gladiolus callianthus), common yarrow, 'White Star' spring starflower, 'White City' Spanish bluebell, moonflower (an annual), white cleome (another annual), purple oxalis, 'Little Lime' hydrangea, night-blooming jasmine, strawberry begonia, tea olive, crepe myrtles, rose of Sharon, confederate jasmine, angelwing jasmine, butterfly ginger, English dogwood, white loropetalum, and an unregistered white daylily-- to name the ones that come to mind.  (Spider lilies are white, too, but I'm not sure any of mine still live.)

One (or both?) of Granny L.'s roses that I planted this spring also have white flowers, and I hope that this year white tuberose will bloom for the first time in our garden!  It may take another year or two before they start to flower, but eventually, three new white crinums will add more spots of white to the garden palette.

...Once I got started on that list, I realized that we do actually have a lot of white flowers-- but many of them are small, and of course they don't all bloom at the same time.

They're not flowers, but my favorite (and the most continuous!) "touches of white" around our garden are the Eskies.  ;o)  Here are the latest photos of Luna:

Daylilies

Here are the daylily photos from the past few days!

I can't keep track of which are new this year (the first time a given seedling has bloomed, which is usually in the third year after starting from seed-- sometimes in the second year), but I'm pretty sure some of these are new.

That's it until next time!

More April Photos

{'Blue Bedder' salvia with 'Sunshine' ligustrum in background}

{Salvia farinacea 'Blue Bedder'}

{Salvia 'Pizzazz Purple'}

{unknown pink shrub rose}

{blanket flower, tropical milkweed, salvia, w/ 'Sunshine' ligustrum in background}

{from front: 'Nearly Wild' rose, Mexican bush sage, 'Sunny' KO rose and crinum, dbl pink KO rose}

{looking down the gravel path}

{layers of roses, w/ butterfly ginger, sage, etc.}

{another view along the gravel path}

{'Happy returns' daylily}

{daylily}

{daylily}

{daylily}

{'Joseph's Coat' rose and unknown clematis}

- - - - - - -

We had rain overnight, and now we're enjoying what may be the last real "cool front" of the spring.  The windows are open, birdsong is drifting in on the breeze, and it's the perfect time for lazing on the couch with a good book and a sleepy dog.

{Luna the American Eskimo Dog}