witt's Blog

After I finished working on the lawn in the back, I came around to the front to rest my back the other day. I saw some activity on the "new" bluebird box. We've had it up there for two years, but they always preferred the old one. I thought it was the chickadees again, or either it was the woodpecker that had been pecking at it, but lo and behold, it was a pair of bluebirds. No more work for me for a while! I got my binocs and watched as she worked on building her nest, and he would catch a bug and feed it to her.

I ran inside and got some dryer lint, but so far I haven't seen any birds working on it. I believe that this pair is here to stay.

Why I decided that I didn't like the first natural area that I created a few years ago, I don't know, but I did. I wanted to clear out the rest of the area and straw it all the way to the sidewalk. I started pulling the junk. There was every kind of weed imaginable in there with every kind of crap grass there is. After I had pulled a bucket load, I turned around and saw just how large of an area it was. Oh, my. This will be impossible. I was ready to give up on this foolish idea. Yesterday morning I set my jaw and wrapped my pulling finger with a bandaid, got two big buckets and went at it again. It was cool, and I was covered with OFF!. I started seeing some progress, so I really started pulling. We got a little shower, so I did get to take a break. All I had left to do was one three-foot section of nothing but crabgrass. Yikes. I was persistent, and after using about five bandaids, I got it done and totally strawed! The only thing left in that area are volunteer perennial petunias. I left them, but I think that I'm going to get them out of there, too. I gave the neighbors little girl a handful to plant. She was thrilled with that. I think today will be a day of rest. I'm so sore, I probably couldn't pull up a single blade of grass.