“I eat like a vulture. Unfortunately the resemblance doesn't end there.” ~ Groucho Marx

I spent a rather Edgar Allan Poe-esque Saturday gardening with a vulture. Even for a lover of birds, gardening while a turkey vulture sits above and watches you is a little creepy. As he sat on my barn roof looking at me, lines from Poe's poem 'The Raven' kept running thru my head.

`Prophet!' said I, `thing of evil! - prophet still, if bird or devil! - Whether tempter sent, or whether tempest tossed thee here ashore...

Apart from the ugly head--which does look like a turkey's, I think they're very handsome birds. Their wingspan is six feet or more. I often see them gliding over the house and fields and they look magnificent. I believe they nest nearby, probably in an outbuilding or barn loft.

(Apologies for the extremely poor photo quality.)

After eating, vultures rest in the sun. My new friend must have just dined because he sat there on the barn roof, shaking his head. This is to rid his face of pieces of his lunch which contain bacteria. The sun's heat helps kill the bacteria. I could hear a large flock (or do they call it a murder?) of crows in the field so there must have been a dead animal there and the smaller crows were finishing what the vultures had left.

Things I learned about vultures: Vultures are not buzzards. Buzzards are European birds related to the hawk family. Vultures are new world birds related to storks and ibises. They don't kill their food, they eat only dead things they find with their excellent sense of smell. They cannot carry their food away and must eat it where ever it was found. In addition to meat, they will eat pumpkins and other vegetables.

Turkey vultures are masters of the air. They can glide for six hours without ever flapping their wings. They venture out as the day warms, quickly finding pockets of rising warm air, or thermals. Once they find a thermal they are uplifted and circle finding other rising warm air currents to sweep them across the skies at speeds of up to 60 mph. What a truly great engineering accomplishment this bird is. Nature never makes mistakes.

Later in the day a small blackbird, probably a redwing came and attempted to drive the vulture off. I think the vulture was willing to make an exception and eat this live pest but the blackbird was too quick. When the vulture finally flew away, I could see the blackbird pecking at his back and head.




From vultures to roses. Bloggers don't have to follow the 'rules' other writers are bound by. We can veer off course and combine any number of odd things in one post.

My English roses are blooming now. These are elegant roses having the look and often the scent of the old heirloom roses. The advantage of these modern Austin English varieties is that they bloom all season and not just once in the spring.

Abraham Darby

Charles Austin

Pat Austin always looking downward.

Gardeners are - let's face it - control freaks. Who else would
willingly spend his leisure hours wresting weeds out of the ground,
blithely making life or death decisions about living beings, moving
earth from here to there, changing the course of waterways? The
more one thinks about it, the odder it seems; this compulsion to
remake a little corner of the planet according to some plan or vision.
~ Abby Adams

There is so much to be done in the garden and never enough time. Oriental lilies need staking , sedum must be cut back, more mulch needs to be spread after I top dress with alfalfa. The edging is looking ragged, bearded iris need to be dug and thinned, the trees all need cutting back, and on and on. I doubt I’ll ever get to it all.

Sunday afternoon I stopped worrying about chores and just enjoyed the garden. The roses are blooming. I overlooked the chewed leaves. My roses are never sprayed and they do surprisingly well. They may get some holes in their leaves and a little blackspot, still it seems better than a residue of poison left from spraying for inperfections. The poor gallicas got moved every year for four years and always had mildew. The unsightly white powder bothered me more than it effected the roses. This spring the gallicas did not get dug up and transplanted and they have no mildew.

(Gallica rose Surpasse Tout)

The annuals got planted late this spring and haven’t filled out much--disappointing. On the other hand some plants are performing much better than hoped for. The Jupiter’s beard has been blooming for two months, what a great little plant. The dicentra still have pretty hearts dangling from their stems and phlox pilosa is still covered in pink blooms. Geranium Rozanne is decked in pretty blue flowers. If she does as well as she did last year, she will bloom non stop through September.

I think my Griffith Buck roses deserve a tribute. These are some of my favorites and almost as easy and carefree as Knockout roses. Dr. Buck devoted his life to breeding beautiful roses that were both hardy and healthy.

The pale apricot Golden Unicorn.

Country Dancer with big bunches of blowsy pink blooms.

Different Drummer, the prima donna of the group but with lovely blooms.

One more photo. Sweet William--loved by butterflies. I enjoy the spicy, clove like fragrance. Sweet William seems to bloom for quite a long period and is never bothered by pests or disease.

The telephone rings, It's the call of the wild

A brief departure from the usual topics of gardening and wildlife. Went to a concert the other night-- my all time favorite band, Mark Miller with the group Sawyer Brown. I've seen them perform dozens of time over the last 20-something years and always had a fantastic time. This was an outdoor concert and the lightening was difficult so regretfully, I didn't get any really good photos.

Betty’s out being bad tonight

Betty and her boyfriend had a big fight

Well I ain't first class
But I ain't white trash.
I'm wild and a little crazy too.
Some Girls don't like boys like me
Aww, but some girls do.

~~~~~~~~

Monica, at Garden Faerie's Musings, had a good idea when she originated her Mish-Mash Monday posts. That's what I have today, a collection of unrelated thoughts and photos.

First of all a view from my back yard. Everything is lush and vivid green. The rain and record breaking cool temperatures have affected our corn crops. Many farmers were a month late getting their corn planted. Driving to Monroe Center last week I noticed several large fields that never did get planted, some still have standing water. On the other hand, we are growing a world class crop of mosquitoes. I'm buying enough Off spray to keep our economy healthy;)


Erigeron or Fleabane hitchhiked in on a plant purchased at a plant sale. I know nothing about these--have never grown them, but there are some species plants in the fields around the farm. It seems like it would be a nice little filler plant if it doesn't surprise me by doing something completely obnoxious;) Anybody who has grown it, please let me know if I should leave it in the garden or rip it out. The airy little white blooms are kind of pretty, like a early blooming aster.



One of my hybrid tea roses, Heirloom. This rose is the prettiest lavender color and smells nice too. Like the corn, my roses got off to a late start this spring so their season was very sort. Thursday I'll post an explanation of why everblooming roses have a 'short season' here.




Along the drive this bed is seriously neglected. The Tall Bearded Iris, purple coneflower and Siberian Iris are overrunning it and needed to be divided and moved last spring. My number one priority this fall or next spring is to thin these beds and introduce a little more variety.



The lovely Tiffany, many people will tell you this is one of the very best roses for fragrance. It's an older hybrid tea like Heirloom. For me scent is important. Isn't it just natural to see a lovely bloom and bury your face, feeling the silken texture and inhaling that warm, sweet smell? By the way, all the rose photos you see on my blog were taken prior to July 1.



Exquisite Peace with it's wonderful story of war and peace. This rose is loved by most everyone, including me. The blending of pastel colors and the sweet fragrance make it a must have for rose lovers.



Will be back Thursday with another post. Meanwhile, I'll be visiting my blogging friends for updates on what's going on in your gardens;)

The Parade of Roses

Leading the parade we have the antique Rose de Rescht

Next the lovely French rose Peace with it's message of world peace and hope.

Double Delight very nearly perect.

A beautiful Buck rose Honeysweet.

Saving the best for last, my favorite Buck rose Golden Unicorn.

More rose parade coming soon.

Advise from Julie Andrews

Remember in Sound of Music when the thunderstorm was crashing around the castle and everyone was singing My Favorite Things? I love that movie. Anyway, last night as the thunderstorms crashed around my not-a-castle, I was processing photos (I know, dumb to be using the computer in a storm). I had taken several photos of roses covered in rain from an earlier storm so that song just popped into my head and would not stop.


Photos of Distant Drums (my second favorite Dr. Griffith Buck rose) and Toby.

Raindrops on roses...



















...and whiskers on kittens.
















These are a few of my favorite things.

Ah, May

May. All the trials of winter are behind me now. Forgotten the painful cold, the pounds of outdoor clothing, the itchy, dry winter skin. Treacherous icy roadways are of the past. Numb fingers scraping frost from car windows are no more. Moving tons of heavy white snow from place to place is but a dim memory. The life of a gardener begins anew every May.

Winter evenings I sat by the fire with glossy gardening catalogs propped in my lap (or rather propped on the cat that was sleeping on my lap). I dreamed of variegated miscanthus gently swaying in a summer breeze. I imagined tall phlox and tiny hummingbirds sipping their sweet nectar. Spectral roses shimmered behind closed eyelids. Those dreams are finally real. It’s May.

Surely heaven must look and sound and smell like May. This is the very best time of year. Hard work, digging, pruning, even cutting down tree limbs is a pleasure when the temperatures are in the 60’s and the sun is shining. I am filled with energy and optimism. This is the time of year when you don’t look ahead. Don’t think about what’s coming in July. Late summer is a gardener’s nightmare in Illinois, but today is a Friday in May, the weekend begins.