I am such an incredible gardener

[andrew_jorgensen]

I am such an incredible gardener:



Spring is here and the overgrown, mucky sections of the yard are bursting with bluebells. People keep asking me what I do to make them grow, but it's pure benign neglect.



Ok, it is the area into which I toss what dead mice the cats leave on the kitchen floor.

Comments

[scrollgirl.livejournal.com]

Beautiful!

Also: bwahaha! Eww.

[dherblay.livejournal.com]

Thank you!

Also: thank you! Yup.

[ladystarlightsj.livejournal.com]

Holy crap, that's gorgeous!

Maybe instead of going "ick, ick, ick" when my cat drags in dead mice, I should start heaving them into my flower beds!

[dherblay.livejournal.com]

Thank you!

Though to be honest, I dump about a quarter of the dead mice (aggregate; not of each one) into the basement window well instead, and you don't see me posting any pictures of that muck-heap.

Nice photos

[ann1962]

This has reminded me of a family for whom I used to babysit. They had two huskies that would kill assorted animals on their acres of property, and then bring the carcasses back home. When the family would vacation, I would check on the dogs. Regularly I would have to deal with dead groundhogs, raccoons, rabbits and other such creatures. But because the property was wild woodlands, I could just toss the dead animals off the side of the deck into the deep brush. Never a smell either. I never figured out how that worked.

Re: Nice photos

[dherblay.livejournal.com]

I have a theory about that . . .

. . . nothing shocking or earth-shattering or mysterious -- just that things would eat them.

HEY!

[nzraya.livejournal.com]

Those aren't what we call bluebells in my country!

Shit. I wonder what it's actually called, the flower that I've been referring to as "bluebells" this whole time.

Re: HEY!

[dherblay.livejournal.com]

Why trust my botany above yours? That I've been calling them "bluebells" for years doesn't withstand a minute of googling (http://images.google.com/images?sourceid=mozclient&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&q=bluebells).

Re: HEY!

[nzraya.livejournal.com]

Shit^2! Those aren't my bluebells either!

Re: HEY!

[nzraya.livejournal.com]

So I think my "bluebells" are the (sadly, out of focus and blurry as all get-out) blue flowers in the background of this picture. Damned if I know what they are.

Re: HEY!

[dherblay.livejournal.com]

I have (a few) flowers similar to that -- I call them "bluebells" too. Or "blue foxglove-looking thing like what I used to play back in the rhythm-awareness classes they made me take in pre-school."

Re: HEY!

[rebekahroxanna.livejournal.com]

Those are what I call grape hyacinths. I suck at spelling

[midnightsjane.livejournal.com]

This is just gorgeous. You have a green thumb, indeedy.
Every garden needs fertilizer...must look into your brand, 'cause it seems to be working for you!

[dherblay.livejournal.com]

Thank you, though, really, I can't throw that far . . .

[c-mantix.livejournal.com]

Spectacular! Love the field mouse perspective of the second picture.

[dherblay.livejournal.com]

I must zoom. It's a personal ethic.

[c-mantix.livejournal.com]

LOL. This is so not news to me.

[wisewoman.livejournal.com]

Wow. Big yard.

Nice bells, too.

;o)

[dherblay.livejournal.com]

That's just a trick of perspective, really, I say.

[rebekahroxanna.livejournal.com]

What I love about that yard is watching the wild flowers come in in the spring. There are tiny yellow and brown lillies at various places. The trilliums later on in the year are wonderful too. But the bluebells (or whatever) are spectacular.

[anneth.livejournal.com]

Gorgeous! Where I grew up in CA we only really got dusty-colored, prickly little wildflowers, mustard, and lupin in the spring. (Lovely, of course, but less exuberant.) I'm about as in love with midwest (and now, north-east Atlantic coast) spring flowers as I am with snow. So much color! The first time I ever found a lilly-of-the-valley in Chicago I about fell over; my only experience with them was as drawings on boxes of English soap, and for some reason I expected them to be much bigger, like daffodils.

Totally incidentally, you may find this interesting: http://www.guerrillagardening.org/

[anneth.livejournal.com]

Might your bluebells be harebells? They're members of the bluebell family, at any rate.

[dherblay.livejournal.com]

I don't think the pictures quite match up. It looks like I now have a project for today!

[dherblay.livejournal.com]

I have this thesis that you can have seasons, or you can have Alice Waters, but not both.

[anneth.livejournal.com]

Nancy Oakes isn't such a bad trade-off, either...

[angeyja.livejournal.com]

possibly scilla? they will multiply if they like what you have. (I know it is more fun to think it is the mice. I bury mine, poor bugs.) That is a heck of a colony though.

http://www.pbase.com/peterb/image/7882686

[dherblay.livejournal.com]

I think we have a winner! I'm willing to offer a provisional identification of S. sibirica (http://www.hort.wisc.edu/mastergardener/Features/bulbs/scilla%20siberica/scilla%20sibirica.htm).

hee love the icon..

[angeyja.livejournal.com]

I've been off exploring myself.. I just got JL Hudson's rare Seed Supplement 2006-A, and ordered a packet of "English Bluebells" or Endymion non-scripta, and then the name got me curious..

Therefore, ’tis with full happiness that I
Will trace the story of Endymion. 35

The very music of the name has gone
Into my being, and each pleasant scene
Is growing fresh before me as the green
Of our own vallies: so I will begin
Now while I cannot hear the city’s din; 40
Now while the early budders are just new,
And run in mazes of the youngest hue
About old forests...

Keats, Endymion

And visuals o'course:

http://www.imagesofdorset.org.uk/Dorset/004/intro.htm

hiya!

[ramblecrazed.livejournal.com]

*
I just hopped over to check out your bluebells!

BEAUTIFUL FIELD OF BLUE BLUE BLUE!!
I'm very into bulbs, they're easy.
I'm very into easy..
=)
*