Foxgloves are my cue that summer is here. Typically they bloom from mid June until the beginning of August.

They are bright & beautiful.

STEM & LEAVES, & FLOWERS

As a biennial, foxgloves do not produce flowers their first year. Instead, a simple rosette of leaves is formed that first year.

The second year produces a 3 – 5 foot tall stalk with multiple tubular flowers.

2nd year, not yet blooming

Just beginning to bloom

Lovely purple flower

Standing tall

This flower is passed its prime. Eventually, the seeds inside will drop to reseed the area.

The majority of the foxgloves around here are purple, but there are a few white ones scattered about.

POLLINATION

I have spotted moths, butterflies, bumblebees, and hummingbirds crawl in a flower tube to collect what I assume to be delicious nectar.

Peeking inside the freckled flower to spot the stigma.

WHERE IT GROWS

Often foxgloves are grown for vertical interest in home gardens.

Around my house, though, they grow naturally in the sunny areas among the trees.

They look beautiful among the native grasses, daisies and Columbia Lilies.

TOXICITY

All parts of the foxglove plant are poisonous. Ironically, for the same reason they are poisonous, is the reason the plant is used medicinally. Ingesting any portion of a foxglove can cause diarrhea, vomiting, and irregular heartbeat. The leaves can also irritate sensitive skin. The deer around here don’t even eat them.

Take a moment to enjoy the Wonderful World of Plants!

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Finally we’re getting some good color. The flowers seem about a month behind compared to last year. That’s ok, I’ll take the color now.

LEOPARD’S BANE
I love the sunny yellow of this flower. It’s always such a treat seeing this summer-feeling flower in spring.

ENGLISH DAISIES

UNKNOWN

CAMELLIA & BLEEDING HEART

LEFT: VARIEGATED VINCA MAJOR
RIGHT: HEATHER

VINCA MINOR

‘HEAVENLY BLUE’ LITHODORA

BLACK LACE ELDERBERRY, FLAMING SILVER PIERIS, & MEDITERRANEAN PINK HEATH
The Elderberry & Pieris aren’t blooming, but I love their color.

BARBERRY

LEFT: JAPANESE ROSE
RIGHT: ELDERBERRY

LILAC

AJUGA

FLOWERING CHERRY TREE

CREEPING PHLOX and chicks we recently hatched.
The creeping phlox in spring along this rock wall is one of my all time favorite blooms at our house.

To enjoy more Bloom Day posts check out May Dreams Garden

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One of my favorite spring plants is the Western Trillium, or Trillium ovatum. It is lovely with its showy white flower against the greens and browns of the forest floor.

Where & When Trilliums Grows

I adore trilliums. They are one of the first plants to flower near our house. It’s a sign that spring is here. I usually spot them near the end of March, into April.

I find trilliums tucked in among other low lying greenery in the coniferous forest surrounding our home.

The Stem & Leaves?

Trilliums grow to about a foot high on what is stem-like, but not scientifically a real stem. The “stem” is actually part of the rhizome.

Similarly, the plant does not have real leaves. Instead, the 3 green sections are bracts with the flower extending from it. They do function like leaves in that they aid in photosynthesis.

Color Changes

Western White Trillium with pink markings

As the flower ages it turns a dark magenta color.

Trilliums are Fragile

Trilliums are fragile. If the flower is picked, the rhizome does not get the nutrients that is needed for next year’s plant. The advice is don’t ever pick a trillium.

They also don’t propagate easily. They don’t transfer well and it can take as long as 5 – 7 years to get a plant grown from seed.

With the help of ants, though, trilliums are able to reproduce. Similar to the Western Bleeding Heart, ants aid in spreading the seed.

Beauty of the Forest

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• We’ve had a crazy busy schedule the last couple weeks. Part of it is getting adjusted to school days, on top of activities for the kids. But also, Farm Kid1 had pneumonia. Then right as he was recovering from that, he dislocated his knee. Now he hobbles around and has 6ish weeks of physical therapy. Farm Girl got sick right around this same time. She had a high fever off and on for a week. She spent a lot of time cuddling with our dog.

In other news:
• Farmer John is working on phase one of a lean-to against the shop. He flattened the area and had a load of gravel poured.
• I’ve been waiting all summer for the morning glories to bloom in one of the herb barrels. Finally, they are making an appearance.
• In the taco garden, a couple cayenne peppers are ready to pick.
• It’s difficult to see, but there is a bird on the Roots & Shoots sign. The Golden-crowned Sparrows have returned.
• Early in the summer, Farm Kid2 & I planted wildflower seed in his garden. Finally they are blooming.

The post 2016 Update – Week 38 appeared first on .

Every year at this time I have mixed thoughts about our flowerbeds. I love all the blooms. The flowers are beautiful. But, as a whole, the beds are very unkept and overgrown. It is impossible for me to keep up with the weeds and deadheading. Too many flowerbeds, too little time. I’m working on coming up with a solution to this dilemma. Unfortunately, the solution will take a lot of time and a complete overhaul of at least one flowerbed.

Here are the majority of plants blooming now, amongst all the crazy.

This is the time of year when the shasta daisies really show off – and we have a ton of them.

The lilies/day lilies are also taking over the flowerbeds.

Every year I throw new wild flower seed in the meadow hoping for a little variety. And, every year the same ol’ daisies and blanket flowers take over.

The weeds are in full swing right now.

Stinking Chamomile, or Anthemis cotula. I acutally don’t mind this weed, but it does stink.

Top left: White Clover
Bottom left: Canadian Thistle
Right: Lady’s Thumb, sometimes referred to as smartweed

Queen Anne’s Lace

The butterfly bushes just started blooming, but they seem to be fading quicker than I remember in the past.

Potentilla ‘Goldfinger’
I don’t love this plant. But, it’s hardy and is a reliable bloomer each summer.

The lavender in the Bird Village, Lavandula ‘Jennifer’,  is looking lovely.

There is a little section near the pond in the front yard that I enjoy. Purple lavender growing next to the pink flowers of what I believe is a Potenilla plant. Nearby is also yarrow in a darker shade of pink.

A few other random items in bloom. This year the nasturtiums are putting on a poor showing, which is a bummer. I love nasturtiums in my summer gardens.

Left: Mallow. It’s pretty. But, I don’t recommend it. It grows like crazy… in all the places you don’t want it.
Right: Hardy gladiola. I adore the chartreuse color.

Calendula

We struggle getting plants to bloom in Farm Kid 2’s flowerbed. It is a favorite place for our chickens to take dust baths. This year, though, we don’t have many free ranging chickens, so the wildflowers actually have a chance to show off. I love it.

Pansy’s and viola’s are looking great in the shade garden. This is another place we struggle keeping flowers alive due to the chickens, but not this year.

We also have flowering going on in our food garden – like this tomato.

Flowering in herb pots. This is the first time I have grown tarragon and I’m loving the golden flowers.

I have to make our flowerbeds a priority. In the winter, there isn’t a lot of interest, but in general they look ok. Everything is green and vibrant in the spring, which is my favorite. By mid summer, though, there is just too much going on for the flowerbeds to look nice. I like a cottage, informal look. But, I’ve been struggling with making it informal, without looking unkept.

With a lot of work, maybe next July’s bloom day will have the whole effect I’m going for, not just pretty flowers.

To enjoy more Bloom Day posts check out May Dreams Garden

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There is a lack of blooms around here during the winter. However, spring is nearly here and we have a few flowers showing off. Not many. But, a few.

FRONT YARD

The daffodils and heather are putting on a nice show in the front yard.

BACK YARD

The back yard is in pretty poor shape. I cringe every time I look out there. But, the weather has been so crummy I just don’t feel like bothering to clean it up. Among the weeds and stems from last years perennials are a couple flowering plants.

Vinca minor

Pink Dawn Viburnum

SHADE GARDEN

I really enjoy our shade garden. Unfortunately, every year the spring flowers look horrible. They bloom, but they sure don’t look great.

Camellia

Hellebore

BIRD VILLAGE

Daffodils and crocus have been blooming in the bird village, as well as one of my favorite native plants.

Red Flowering Currant

And that concludes our first Bloom Day post of 2016. It’s not wowing, but it’s pretty typical of our mid March blooms.

I’m sharing this post at May Dreams Gardens Bloom Day.

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We’ve had a number of spring like days this week. Brisk in the morning and slightly warm in the afternoon. Woo hoo! I’ve been loving it. Thanks to this glorious weather I went outside and tended to the flowerbeds this week.

• I even put Farm Kid2 to work trimming last year’s flower stems.

• While he did that, I cleaned duck poop off the creeping phlox. I would have rather have been the one cutting the stems.

• Kale is growing in the greenhouse.

• A few of the herbs I planted last week have germinated! I’m waiting impatiently for the others.

• Awhile ago Oliver, the pot bellied pig, busted through the door of his home… twice. Since then there has been a trough full of water keeping the door shut. This weekend Farmer John fixed the door.

• Heather, hellebore and crocus are blooming. I was shocked to see the crocus. It seems a tad early. But, it was a welcome surprise.

• I haven’t been doing much bird watching these days, but I did spot a Northern Flicker in a tree.

• When I make pizza dough, I make a double or triple batch. I put the extra’s in the freezer. This weekend I pulled one out for dinner. As it turned out our friends brought over pizza that night, so I turned my dough into cheesy bread.

I’m sure this is just a tease. But, this spring weather sure has been nice.

The post 2016 Update – Week 6 appeared first on .

2015 has officially ended. Let’s look back at how our farm and gardening endeavors played out this past year. We had a fairly steady year with good food being grown and plenty of animals to keep us busy.

CHICKENS

We dabble in a variety of things related to farming and gardening, but chickens will always be a main stay for us. That being said, this year we did take a slight step back. We didn’t incubate eggs, we didn’t attend any shows or swaps, and Farm Kid2 decided not to continue with poultry in 4H. But, that doesn’t mean we’re short on chickens.

We chose not to incubate eggs this year. We did, though, have 3 broody hens hatch small clutches. Click here to read about the first hatch and click here to read about the second.

The majority of our birds are Rhode Island Reds and Easter Eggers. But, we still have two golden polish hens that are nearly 4 years old. They lay a fairly small egg and are such a great looking bird.

Mo, our Easter Egger rooster, has been demoted. For a number of years he was our top rooster. However, some young, cocky boys have moved up and taken his spot in the pecking order.

Three of our handsome fellas.

We were given this Old English Game bantam. I think he’s beautiful. He’s meant to be a show bird, but at the moment nobody in our family is showing poultry.

This wasn’t an outstanding egg year. One day, though, Farm Girl decided to count how many eggs we had.

We raised 10 birds for meat. Usually we roast the whole chicken, but one night Farmer John made chicken strips. They were delicious!

Four white leghorns, one buff orpington, one barred rock and one black australorp were added to our laying flock this year.

DUCKS

The ducks have given us a bit of excitement by each hen hatching eggs this year. That’s a first for us.

Our two Welsh Harlequin ducks.

Sally, our male Muscovy. The left photos are from January and February of this year. The right was taken in September. His looks changed significantly.

Both ladies sat on eggs this year, which was a fun experience for us. To read about the first hatch click here. And click here to read about the second hatch.

I’ve enjoyed watching how the Welsh Harlequin/Muscovy cross ducklings change as they mature.

Unfortunately, we lost Sally and one of the Welsh Harlequins to predators in the fall.

GOATS

The goats are cute as can be doing goat type things. You can read more about them here.

PIGS

We’ve had two sets of hogs this year. The first round Farm Kid1 raised 2 and sold them to earn money for a computer.

The second round was to fill our freezer, as well as to sell. The pigs were a Hampshire/Berkshire cross.

OLIVER & LOIS

A couple weeks ago we acquired a pot bellied pig named Oliver, and his friend Lois, a pygmy goat. My hope was we could be their forever home and they would live happily ever after with Sven and Olaf. Unfortunately, things aren’t working out as well as I had hoped. So, we are in the process of finding them a new home.

FLOWER BEDS

There wasn’t a lot of action this year in our flower beds. But, the same ol’ trusty trees, shrubs and perennials put on a pretty show mainly in the spring and summer months.

The ducks, unfortunately, are not great for the plants. They step on them. They sleep on them. They poop on them.

The deer also make flower gardening a challenge. Apparently some of our plants are quite tasty.

The only new additions to our flower beds were 10 lavender ‘grosso’ plants. They’re in an area that I’ve struggled with for years. I finally decided lavender was the thing to spruce it up.

PONDS

We have two small ponds that I love. Our farm critters as well as wild critters love them, too.

GARDENING FOR FOOD

Another thing we didn’t spend as much time on as in years past, was the garden. It is incredibly time consuming keeping up with the weeds and by the end of summer it had gotten a bit out of hand. We did harvest some produce, though. We got onions, potatoes, a few eggplant and squash, cherry tomatoes & herbs.

We tried the three sisters method in one area of the garden. Corn, beans and squash all growing together. It worked kind of . Everything grew. But, we tend to have trouble with corn and it didn’t grow fast enough before the beans grew tall. The squash (pumpkins & gourds) grew well, though.

Many of our seeds didn’t germinate this year. I think the birds got to them. Darn it. I should have had a fabulous showing of tall sunflowers mixed with viney cucumbers growing underneath. What I got was one sunflower. One.

This was not a great year for tomatoes. We only picked a handful of big, juicy red ones. It was so hot this summer, I actually think we didn’t water them enough. We did, however, get renegade yellow cherry tomatoes. They reseeded from last year and were a pleasant surprise.

Fruit. My favorite items to pick from the garden is the fruit. Our grape vines are finally producing well, we got a couple apples, lots of plums and lots of raspberries.

NEW PATIO

Our only big project of the year was pouring a much needed back patio. We decided to do stamped concrete, which was a lot of work. But, I’m so happy to finally have a patio. The ducks, too, are quite happy with the patio. It is one of their favorite places to hang out and poop.

AQUAPONICS

This was our first full year experimenting with aquaponics. We have three grow beds, one fish tank and a sump tank.

A good sized pump cycles the water and aquarium heaters keep it warm. Depending on the time of year we keep the water between 70 and 80 degrees.

We have a fan for circulation in the greenhouse.

Grown in the garden beds were/are peppers, Mexican sour gherkins, tomatoes, eggplant, mixed greens and okra. This growing method works very well.

I also started nasturtiums right in the garden bed and overwintered geraniums that loved the greenhouse.

We grow tilapia in the fish tank part of the aquaponics system. The fish aren’t growing as quickly as we thought they would. But, at the beginning of December we did finally catch a couple fish and have them for dinner. I was hoping they’d be good, and they were.

Whew! There were no major plant or animal changes this year. But, just keeping up kept us plenty busy. It’s so much work living this way, but so rewarding. I can’t wait to see what 2016 will bring.

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The Rose Parade, or more formally known as the Grand Floral Parade, is Portland’s largest Parade. It is held during the first part of June during Portland’s Rose Festival.

The Rose Festival has been a tradition for over 100 years & is still going strong. There are many activities taking place during the Festival, but the most popular is the Rose Parade.

WAITING FOR THE PARADE TO START

The parade is such a big event that we arrive a few hours early to get a decent spot. We get up early, hurry to get downtown, then wait. And wait some more. Luckily, there is enough entertainment around that we don’t get too bored.

If you go to the parade with friends or family, you can trade off saving your spot and walking around. One year we walked to Pioneer Square to see the tattoo created from flowers for Festival of Flowers. It was amazing.

Top: Lots of vendors walk by before the parade. I don’t ever buy anything, but it’s fun to see what they’re selling.
Bottom Left: The Grand Floral Walk follows the parade route.
Bottom Right: Police make their rounds & hand out stickers.

THE PARADE

Floats
made from thousands of flowers and other natural materials. They are fantastic!

Rose Festival Court
Girls from Portland area high schools

The Royal Rosarians
Portland’s Official Greeters & Ambassadors of Goodwill

Horses with Pretty Girls

After the horses, come the Pooper Scoopers
It’s always amusing to see the names they come up with. This one is Pooplandia, a spoof on Portlandia.

Clowns

College Spirit

Military

Celebrating Cultures
These groups of people always look and entertain fabulously.

And More

Clean Up
Right after the parade ends, and I mean right after, the street sweepers come through. You have about 30 seconds to get out of their way.

AFTER THE PARADE

Downtown Portland is a busy place with a lot going on the day of the parade. Sometimes we go home right after the parade. Sometimes we take advantage of being in the city and explore.

Top: City Fair is a carnival at the waterfront.
Middle Left: Playing in the Salmon Street Springs fountain at Waterfront Park is fun.

Middle Right: Watch the Dragon Boat Races.
Bottom Left: See the parade floats up close.
Bottom Right: Enjoy the views from the Willamette River.

If you’re in the Portland area in June, this parade is a must see.

The post 31 Days in Oregon: Rose Parade appeared first on .

Weather

Most of August was warm, dry & uneventful. However, one night there was a fantastic lightning show that I really could have enjoyed had I not been so nervous about the trees around our house catching on fire. Here in the PNW we get thunder & lightning. But no real great show. It lasts a few minutes and moves on. This time it went on strike after strike for a couple hours straight. I spent those couple hours in awe of nature’s wonders, but also running through my mind the course of events that needed to happen when/if I notice something catch fire. Thankfully, there wasn’t a fire.

Flower Beds

My two favorite plants throughout August had to be lavender & zinnia. To see what else we have blooming check out August’s Bloom Day post.

Goats

Between a garden bed & one side of the goat fence I planted sunflowers & zinnias. They don’t have near the wowing effect I was going for. But, those plants that did grow are pretty – although, kinda on the short side. Truthfully, though, even the weeds don’t grow great in this spot.

The goats favorite item to munch on throughout the day is anything outside their fence. They squeeze their heads through the fence and gobble away. Knowing this, I planted the sunflowers & zinnias just out of their reach. Bahaha! I also purposely left weeds growing between the seeds I planted & the fence. I was hoping they would eat the weeds as opposed to my flowers. I do believe these tactics worked. Yes!

Chicken Keeping

All those chicks we hatched earlier this year are keeping us mighty busy. 70ish growing chickens eat, drink & poop… a lot. I plan to bring the majority of them to the Oregon Poultry Swap in October.

Such a handsome fella.

I bred Easter Eggers with our Splash Marans hoping to get some lighter feathered Olive Eggers.

Black Copper Marans chick

BCM trying to get a nibble of watermelon.

Apparently it wasn’t the goats I had to worry about eating my zinnias.

The chickens also enjoy picking their own tomatoes.

Our middle kid, Farm Kid2 & our daughter, Farm Girl, entered eggs in the county fair. Both won a blue ribbon. Way to go kids!

Wildlife

Lots of stinging type flying critters around these days.

Northern Alligator Lizard

Rufous Hummingbird
Unfortunately, Farmer John found this one dead with its wings & tail feathers spread out. I took the opportunity to examine just how pretty its feathers really are.

Pond

Except for a few decorative aspects and a bridge connecting the pathway the pond is complete.

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