Daffodils out front

Daffodils

Our 120 foot long, 5-6 feet wide daffodil beds in front of the house on the other side of the driveway are about 8-9 years old and they had gotten pretty overgrown with weeds lately, so over the summer I ordered 260 new bulbs from Breck's (120 Daffodils for Naturalizing, 70 Giant Daffodils for Naturalizing, and 70 Spectrum Sweet Aroma Daffodil mix).  When we first planted the beds we thought we were planting a multicolored mix of daffodils for naturalizing, but the resulting blossoms were almost uniformly large yellow trumpet daffodils with yellow petals--like King Albert Daffodils.  Hope the new mixes will add some additional color to the trumpets and petals.  I dug up and planted the first 25 feet myself about a week ago.
On Saturday morning Leslie suggested we get going on planting the bulbs while the weather is still nice.  So, on both Saturday and Sunday, Leslie planted all the bulbs, while I dug up the rest of the beds and pulled out all the weeds.  The old daffodils that were in the bed had multiplied in clusters, but those bulbs were about half the size of the new bulbs from Breck's, probably because of overcrowding.  After I dug up those clusters, Leslie separated the bulb and planted them along with the newer bulbs.  We still have a bucket full of the old bulb clusters, so we will try to get them planted along the paths in the forest.  I put down lime and fertilizer and added about 4 tractor bucket loads of compost to the beds to give all the bulbs a good start.  We expect rain here tomorrow (Tuesday) and again on Thursday, so that will help settle the bulbs in for the winter.  It was 27 degrees here this morning.  Winter.  Is.  Coming.

Kitty Lapp daffodils

We've been husbanding them since 2007 when Jennifer moved them from Arlington to our care.  We started with 12 or so and now have about 100. They are always the latest to bloom and wither and fade quickly in hot weather.

 Pedigree Chart of Kitty Lapp, 9 W-YYR, Dr. William (Bill) Bender, Pennsylvania, United States, 1996 
http://daffseek.com/query/Pedigree.php?name=Kitty+Lapp&lastpage=1&which=hist3&generations=5&fontsize=8

			Milan
		Kitty Lapp
						Glory of Lisse
					Seedling
						unknown
				Dactyl
			Cantabile
				Raeburn

Stories about Mom Kitty and her daffodils that inspire us:

The Ways To Ensure A Daffodil Display - Philly.com

articles.philly.com/1990-05-27/.../25885215_1_bulbs-daffodils-herbs‎

May 27, 1990 – There were no daffodils at the site when Kitty Lapp and her husband, Vernon, purchased their Montgomery County home in the mid-1960s.

Daffodil (Narcissus 'Kitty Lapp') - All Things Plants

allthingsplants.com/plants/view/524240/Daffodil-Narcissus-Kitty-Lapp/‎

Plant database entry for Daffodil (Narcissus 'Kitty Lapp'), with 26 data details.

Squirrel

Gambol brought me a dead but warm squirrel on Saturday early morning, a very nice present because I know how much they mean to him.  Then Sunday night he caught fur and has a bite on his mouth to prove it.  I watched this tussle;  Gambol was within 3 feet of the dang-blasted mammal 3 times but just couldn't quite do the deed.
Asparagus and ham fritatta planned for dinner but just as I opened the egg carton the electricity went out (and the generator went on but the stove isn't on that line) so we had the fritatta minus the egg.
Chicks are outside permanently now.  They are snuggled in the chicken tractor with a nice load of shavings. It was 65 last night and even though it rained a bit, they seemed happy with their space.
Easter flowers are blooming at the Barony.

 May apples (Podophyllum peltatum), neither in May nor apples but a sure sign of spring.

 Grape hyacinth (Muscari)

 Virginia Blue Bells (Mertensia)

 Daffodils (Narcissus)

Bloodroot (Sanguinaria canadensis)

First color

The daffodil bed uphill from the Carriage House was showing some bits of yellow color, so on our noontime walk, the dog and I documented the first blooms of spring. These were the first bulbs we planted. There are 2 naturalized beds alongside each other that have a couple blooms coming on, but none of the other beds have any color, including the new ones in front of the house.  Rain and temps in the upper 30s right now--it sure doesn't feel much like spring.

Tressler and Fedor flattened Jonathan's fossil mountains in the meadow so he'll have to be happy with a fossil plateau.  We still have plenty of rocks, fossil and not, to collect but the view from the house to the meadow has changed dramatically.  We still have the slash piles and about 1/3 of the topsoil pile that block a bit.  The dogs were a bit disoriented on their first walk since the tall grasses at the base of each hill where they liked to snort for voles is gone too.  Gambol quickly recovered and brought me his first (visible) catch of the season.

 Paul planted another bushel (~300) daffodils and muscari to complete his garden under the mountain ashes.  His prepped raised beds certainly made the bulbs easier to plant.  We'll spend the winter visualizing the golden spring view from the living room.
Kohlhepp's and Tim Mauer delivered the final rock for the back entry step. We need some grading and, of course, planting back there.

 Dodderer's took the RTV for winterizing.  It was 20 degrees on Monday morning with a ice skin on the outside chicken water.  One of the barred rocks has a very scruffy molt going on, but the rest have picked up their egg laying for us.

The weekend was beautifully cool but sunny so we moved the boxes that Paul built for the lavender garden and the bluestone slabs for the front and rear entry by the asparagus plot to function as raised beds.  Of course we had to pick rocks so we have 6 more feet of rock wall base on the property line.

First order of business is to plant some garlic and onions to winter over.  Then in the spring we'll try out growing potatoes. We have 3 beds and we can rotate our crops. Luckily we had 3 boxes to play with.  There is still room for one or two more boxes, perhaps for peppers and tomatoes and things.

The other big job was to plant 1.5 bushels (300 bulbs) of mixed daffodils and some muscari in the rock-free beds Paul prepared. They are from VanBourgondien, and come in real bushel baskets.  We need another bushel to finish off the beds.
Sir Rooster led his girls to help; Paul laid fencing on top to discourage them. He's a beautiful bird, except for his feet, but he's getting a bit too territorial and protective.  I watched him and a barred rock fight for over a minute.  Both had their capes raised and claws looking for blood.  She had him on his back for a second; he tore a beakfull of feathers.  They called it a draw until next time, I guess. He's beginning to put up his dukes at me, daring me to fight.  That isn't acceptable, Bird.  you may be seeing the inside of a crock pot before the winter is over.

Reading: The Perfect Crime **** by Peter Abraham from Stephen King's list of well written books he's enjoyed. (library book!!!!)

Daffodils

Some of the Kitty Lapps are still red rimmed, but many have reverted to a washed-out version.

We have several thousand dotting the woods now but have a long way to go to reach Tupenny Meadows' standard.

First turkeys of the year

Buddy started barking aggressively while looking out the window over the deck. He was barking at 3 turkeys who were walking calmly down the path toward the sand mound. They didn’t seem to be scared off by the noise.
Yellow is the color of the season; coltsfoot and forsythia have joined the daffodils and crocuses, goldfinches are turning, too.

Saturday work

Paul spent several hours cleaning the garage and moving stuff from the wall so the crew has room to do their magic. We took some garden tools and equipment to the shed, but that's pretty full too.
We planted the bulk of our bushel (about 300) of mixed daffodils for the year.  These are from VanBourgondien in New York. It was a beautiful day for digging.  These are in the aspen grove outside our (new) bedroom window. The chickens helped de-bug the compost.  Gambol kept all the chipmunks away but he did a good job of staying close today.
The big girls look almost like turkens with bare necks now as they molt. They are very ratty and prickly with new feathers coming in, We are getting 4-6 eggs even though we have extra light for them.
We moved some big rocks from the very big piles to make a wall around the well.  Jerry has a tall stick with a red flag in from of the well, but rocks might protect it too.  While they didn't run into any "rock refusal" we have lots of chunks to build with.

Kitty Lapps revisited

It looks like Lady Terra's Arlington Kitty Lapps more than doubled in number; we might have 70-80 bulbs now in 2 beds, bookended by mertensia. Today's 92 degrees didn't do them any good; the orange kiss on the trumpet has faded since Saturday.

Kitty Lapps

Another birthday event for Shannon: the Kitty Lapps that we rescued from Arlington, Va before Lady Terra moved north, and that the Baron lovingly composted and coddled, have bloomed at The Barony.
Although today was very windy (gusts to 35 mph) and 85 degrees, we planted and composted 10 Arbor Day spruce near the Toy Shed to soften that forest edge, and a few DCNR apples. Prince Smiley-face's spruce is at home in the upper meadow line. The middle tree line in the meadow doesn't have as many holes as we thought. We did have to trim some of last year's cicada damage off, but most of the trees (apple, hawthorn, walnut, dogwood) made it through last year's winter.
We gave Gambol his Saturday morning rawhide to keep him busy until 0800. This one is the size Chicago Baron likes. Gambol hardly knows what to do with it; he can hardly get his mouth around it. Success!

Hard to be a bird in our forest recently.

1) Gambol brought us 2 wings on Sunday. They look suspiciously like Freddy's. We don't believe he did the deed. He was very proud to give us the presents. But, we haven't seen the grouse for a while.
2) I found a fluff ball of owl feathers. No owl attached.
3) Gambol wretched up a small bird carcass. I thought it was a hairball but upon closer inspection we saw a toe nail and string of crop, gizzard, stomach, etc. He and the Baron found a dead Cedar Waxwing along the fence and were practicing retrieves with the carcass. We retrieved it all right but not the preferred way.
4) And today only 4 chickens came home to roost. They've been wandering far from the coop down to the septic mound; 1 has always lagged behind or gone off solo. This time she made it the ultimate solo. They'll probably spend some time confined to give the predator time to move on. Besides we are looking for 1-3" snow overnight, and the girls really don't like snow at all. It figures that we'll have a storm: the Baron took the snowplow off last weekend.

His timing was great on fertilizing and seeding the meadows. He spent most of Saturday walking behind a small subdivision-house sized fertilizer in 40 mph gusts but somewhat less time on Sunday with a hand held rotary (clover) seed flinger. On Sunday his face was red from sunburn not windburn. The freeze/thaw cycle we will have for then next several days will lay the seed firmly into the soil.

Found!

One golden goldfinch. This one is almost all yellow while the rest of the flock have only a yellow feather or two. The pine siskins are still here.
Daffs are poking through also, even the Kitty Lapps, which are late bloomers.

Dear Aunt Pricilla,

From the Baron (just slightly modified):

Dear Aunt Pricilla

We continue to have a roller coaster ride as far as the weather out here in Pennsylvania goes. A week ago we had two days in a row with lows in the single digits. This morning the low was 54 degrees. We missed the recent East Coast snowstorm last weekend and only got a couple of flakes in the air--no accumulation. With this weekend's heat wave our snow has completely melted. Some of our daffodils are starting to poke up through the mulch and I have been trying to cover them up with more mulch to delay their efforts to break out and grow. If I can delay them another week, or so, that should be enough to protect them from any cold outbreaks that sneak up on us.

The warmer weather has brought a rather unpleasant aftereffect--ticks. After going without any ticks since we started visiting Pennsylvania, I have been plagued by 4 in the past 2 weeks. Poor Gambol has accumulated his share of them too, which is not a surprise with him going through the forest and meadow with his nose on the ground. For Gambol we got a standard flea and tick collar and just got a prescription filled for the anti-tick medicine you apply direction to the skin of a dog. This is a 30 day treatment, so we'll be giving this medication to him once a month until winter returns and the cold kills off the ticks. I guess I will have to start applying insecticide whenever I go out, especially on my jeans, shoes, and hat.

We had a bit of excitement at the Barony last week. On Wednesday morning The Baroness was just starting to take a shower when the power in the house dipped (like a brownout) and the shower head produced a burst of gray-black water. The shower water turned cold, so I went downstairs to check on our tankless electric water heater. The electric circuits were fine, no circuit breakers had tripped, but the water heater was leaking slightly and the leak apparently had just started when The Baroness experienced the brownout. My first assumption was that the well had run dry and the pump had surged when it sucked in some mud at the bottom of the well. That, of course, is a nightmare scenario for a home owner: clogged faucets and equipment, like the water heater and even the washing machine, and having the well drilled deeper or treated to increase the water flow--all of which can be quite expensive. We called out the well people and they drained our water pressure tank in the house and it ran as clear as could be. They suggested that the electric water heater had some built up calcium in the lines and a small part of that calcification had broken off, causing the buildup of pressure in the water lines and the water heater (and causing the temporary power surge and the resultant leak). So as a last resort, The Baroness called our builder and asked him for help as she was not enjoying taking cold showers. He responded that day and came out to check the system. He fixed the small leak in the system but couldn't really do much for the heater itself, so he called in his brother, a plumber. The plumber came out and did a quick check, confirming that the systems was not working. He asked his brother where he got the heater (a local plumbing supply store in State College), so they went off to see what the manufacturer (Bosch) would do for the 10 year warranty on the heater. After a couple of days of calls back and forth Bosch agreed the system needed replacement and shipped a new unit by Fed Ex. The new heater arrived on Friday morning and the plumber came out that afternoon and hooked it up and everything worked again. So we were without hot water for 9 days. The Baroness appealed to a hotel in the industrial park where she works to let her use their fitness center for a morning shower. Otherwise the Demmert family was taking wash cloth baths with water heated on the stove. I should add that we will be getting a water softener system installed shortly to take care of that calcium problem. Interestingly enough, our well water is incredibly soft--only 4 grains of hardness. The problem is that the massive amount of heat the water heater applies causes any minerals in solution to precipitate out and that results in the scale buildup in the pipes.

Gambol is maturing every day and although he does not come immediately when called, we have been experimenting in letting him off leash at the end of our walks. For 3 out of 4 times he came running when called for his hot dog treat. On the 4th day he decided he didn't need a treat and took off for 30 minutes on his own. We will graduate from beginner puppy class tonight, but have already enrolled him in a follow-on training class starting next Thursday evening. One trick we have been working on is hiding a treat in another room and telling Gambol to find it. We started out with that trick by just throwing a treat on the floor and saying, "find it." Of course he saw it fall and went right for it. Now, because he didn't see it fall, he has to air scent to find it. He sounds like a pulsing vacuum cleaner as he goes about tracking the treat's scent. It is amazing to watch and he really seems to have fun locating the treat with his nose.

So with the start of Daylight Savings Time and a hot shower to boot, we hope that Aunt Priscilla is on the mend from her recent surgery. Get well soon, St Patrick's Day is just around the corner!

Today is not a day for planting daffodils!

We are glad to have gotten all the bulbs we had ordered in the ground because today is cold, windy and snowy. I don't think we are expecting much accumulation. With these winds, Maplewood could accumulate our snow before we will. Down 4 degrees since wake up.
Turkeys appeared early this morning. I had just put out their breakfast and let the chickens out, about 7:30, when The Magnificent Eight came strutting to their table. We might rename our endeavor the Bed and Breakfast at the Barony. The chickens had a light breakfast of warm homemade yogurt (for protein and calcium) and oatmeal. They made their normal bee-line to the turkey table, when The Eight pushed the ladies and their roo off to Cardinal Run to join the chickadee, nuthatch, junco, titmouse and goldfinch flocks that enjoy the BOSS (black-oil sunflower seeds). Soon after retreating to Cardinal Run a snow squall came up and the chickens pushed further into the woods by the pine trees. I could only see them when they moved against the brown leaves and gray bark of the winter forest. Snow didn't bother the turkeys at all. They stayed around for a hour or so. The girls came back up the hill when The Eight had had their fill and moved off to their next course.
Freddy was missing for 2 days but the Baron took some grapes on his normal walk-about, just in case. He is back but didn't offer any explanation for his absence. They shared a few minutes at the log as the Baron offered green and red grapes. Since he's familiar with green grapes, (perhaps they look like aspen buds), he selected them first. Only when they were all gone did he try a red piece. Those were gone in seconds, too. The Baron tried to leave the bird to find some nails in the Toy Shed. No sooner had he turned his back than the grouse followed him through the door of the shed and wandered around inside checking it out. He must not have found anything worth eating because when the Baron walked out of the shed, shutting off the light, Freddy was at his heels--we have to walk away in a fake-out motion and then turn around quickly to shut the door before he decides to go back in on his own. The grouse still thinks he's a dog.

The new winter chicken coop is almost ready for residents. Walls (light purple like my room upstairs on Spring Ave), floor, nest box and roost stand (all deck gray), are painted with several coats, raccoon-proof clasp installed on door, hooks to hang feeder and toys have been installed. We have several bags of sawdust/wood chips and are just waiting for the water box and nest box ladder to dry. I'll get a couple of bales of hay to stack between the door and the roost for draft protection. Then they make the big move.
I advertised on Craigslist for a Whizbang Chicken Plucker to rent and got a call from a man 2 hollows away. This could be wonderful: convenient and fast. I called him tonight; he offered to help me do the deed at his place. Wahooo!
Afternoon Update
Snow burst--mountains disappearing out to west; chickens, AKA Fluffy Butts, are all out; bear under feeder; both cameras temporarily non-functional; we watched for a minute or so until he/she took off in an easterly gallop, shiny coat waving like a Herbal Essence (shampoo) commercial.

Critters of all sizes

Happy 5th anniversary to Lady Terra and her consort. You have made lots of wonderful things happen in the last 5 years and we are very proud of you. (Always have been; always will be.)
We woke to the loud crash of the feeder falling 30 feet. Little birds were in a frenzy and the squirrels were vacuuming up spilled seed. The cord frayed inside the PVC pipes that we'd used to deter squirrels; we don't think the fraying was caused by squirrel teeth. So the Baron hauled up the extension ladder and rehung the feeder, this time without the pipes. At least this way we should be able to see any fraying. The cord is a cotton wrapped nylon; I wonder if it will stretch. It has a new larger pulley which makes raising 5 lbs of feeder and seed much nicer. We looped hand holds and wrapped it around the same tree. The feeder had only a slightly bent tray which I was able to step on and flatten.
Then we noticed the daffodils; they are out in color now, even the Conshohocken 'dills that were so tightly packed down south have drawn juice from the excellent composted planting. Crocuses have been in color of a week. Muscari are just budding. It's 60 degrees and sunny today on its way to 30s and snow tomorrow.
And, as I was burning trash and last week's gypsy moth eggs I noticed a palm sized bear print. I guess that's who demolished the 2 thistle seed bags and the bottle of goose-greased sunflower seeds.
We also poured insecticide around 2 hemlocks. It's a $40 treatment for the large tree east of the house. We only have a small infestations, but would hate to lose any of the 7 hemlocks that we have.
We overturned a log to look for amphibians and found one: a 3" dark brown salamander. He's not moving very fast in the cool weather so I picked him up and let hime slither around my hand.
Even though snow is predicted for tomorrow we decided it won't be plowable,(and even if it is, we won't plow) so we prepared the RTV for summer work. One of the rear hydrolic cable nipples is stuck and won't plug in. Isn't there always something?!?!
And for the final trick of the day we weeded and tubed with small tubes the locusts planted last summer. Most are still there and none are leafing out yet.