Ginormous Dragonfly

During the summer we have some very large dragonflies that fly over our yard at rooftop level.  We've never gotten a good look at one. 

Until this week.

I found this handsome devil perched near the ground.  He's about 4 inches long.  [That's ginormous for modern dragonflies, there is a size limit based at least in part on the oxygen concentration of the air - modern air has less oxygen than prehistoric monsters with wingspans over 2 feet].

I'm not sure of the ID on this guy.  I'm still looking.  Any ideas?

Foundation Plantings Problems... or WWTT?

I've found choosing foundation plantings to be a bit... problematic.  When I look around I see several common themes.  One of which is plants that are too big for the spot.

Think these foundation plants got a bit out of control?

Um... No

Found at an LGC a few weeks back.  The container says "Nature's Classics"

The plant? 

Not exactly something nature designed...

Any advice for Smuggling?

Last year in Panama I saw a purple blooming Anthurium.  I wanted it.  I thought about plucking off a leaf and smuggling it back into the US.  

Then I thought - don't be silly.  This is the age of the internet.  You can find anything.

Wrong.

Well, partly.

I can find purple Anthuriums for sale.  From Hawaii.  Including shipping that costs, like, triple digits.  More than I usually spend on a single plant.

So I kept looking.  And looking.  And looking.

Finally found one -see?!

Unfortunately this one was for sale (for a reasonable price) at KEW GARDENS IN ENGLAND. 

Thought about buying it (couldn't steal a leaf to root, too many witnesses) and trying to smuggle it back to the US.  The Husband thought that was a bad idea.

Spoilsport.

He also said he wouldn't bail me out if I got caught.

So I continue to live without a purple Anthurium.

I has a sad.

[Did I hear a someone say there's an Orange one?]

When the LGC lets you down

My new-last-fall dwarf Pieris (Pieris japonica 'Cavatine') are looking like, well, frankly, like crap.  Their leaves have all turned brown and speckled.  It's only the dwarf Pieris that are affected, so I took a leaf to the Local Garden Center for interpretation.

"Oh, that's lacebug (Tingidae sp.).  They're a common problem on Cavatine Pieris around here.  Here's a poison you can use to kill them, your local bee population, butterflies attracted to your flowers and potentially cause long term health problems for you and your pets."

OK, so I paraphrased that a bit.  [I'm not a fan of pesticides.]

This is NOT a pesticide rant [been there, done that, will probably do it again] but a rant because the LGC that I went to for advice is the same place that sold me the plants to begin with.  If they know that this particular strain of Pieris is frequently heavily infected by a locally abundant pest species then WHY ARE THEY SELLING IT?

They're also selling Lilies.  In our area Lilies are decimated by the Red Lily Beetle (also know as the Asian Lily Beetle).  So if you buy Lilies you need to buy pesticides.  

[They should sell them in a combo pack]

And don't let me get on about Weeping Cherries and Winter Moths.  They always look bad after a year in the ground around here.

Clearly the LGC is not organically minded. But couldn't they at least let people know when they buy a plant that it is potentially a big honking waste of money?

Oh, wait.  That's one strategy to make money.  By selling pesticides and replacement plants.

But that does not make me want to go back.

Sad Plants.  Sad Gardener.

[but now I have some new spaces!  What can I use to replace these...  I'll just have to go someplace different this time!]

Feeling Blue

When I pulled the garden bench out of the basement I decided it needed to be spruced up a bit.   It's a cheap, wooden bench that was originally stained.  So I could sand and stain it or I could spray paint it.  

I'm lazy.  Spray Painting is quicker and easier.  Guess what I did?

That's right.  The Husband and I walked up to the local hardware store and picked out some spray paint.  

Guess what color we went with?

Hey, how'd you know?  Did you read the title of this post?  Cheater!

Bright, bright blue.

Now I didn't have anything else in the garden that was blue - my pots were all green.  So what to do to make this bench look like it belonged? 

Spray paint some cheap plastic pots from [CENSORED].

So now I have the color on both sides of my property.

The pots became my herb garden for the summer.  I dug up some tarragon and sage and oregano from the garden and bought some lemon balm and basil and dill and...  Make my mouth water just typing this.

Not pictured are the matching tomato cages - also found at [CENSORED - it's a Big Box Store.  The local garden center doesn't carry anything quite so tacky unusual.

Garden decorations are definitely beautiful in the eye of the beholder.  Some of my neighbors cringe at my bright colors and other neighbors...  well, let's just say I might have started a trend with the spray painted pots.  

Maybe I should patent the idea....

People who should know better

This past week someone in Manchester, NH spotted and took a video of a bobcat in their back yard.

I looked at the video and it actually IS a bobcat [these sitings often turn out to be house cats with bobtails].

So what did officials do?  

Totally freak out and over-react!  An animal control office [target of this rant] said it's hard to tell from the video but it might be a mountain lion.

[hysterical laughter]

um, no.  The video may be out of focus but it is very, very clearly a bobcat.

Why, oh, why, does an animal control officer know NOTHING about local wild animals?  You'd think that would be an important component of the job. 

But this is a common problem. Animal control knows how to deal with dogs and cats (hopefully) but wildlife is usually a complete mystery to them.

I don't get it.


 
 photo from USDA [why does the department of agriculture take photos of mountain lions?]

The mountain lion has been extirpated from the East Coat [extirpated means the local population has been hunted to extinction but there are still mountain lions in the mid-west, the west and Florida].  There are often reports of mountain lions but they are almost always not supported by evidence or additional sighting and the ones with pictures or other evidence usually turn out to be housecats.  Yes.  Really.

[There was even an instance in California (where mountain lions DO occur regularly) where a police officer shot and killed a "mountain lion" and then got sued by the housecats owner.  Yes, it was a domestic cat.]

A mountain lion (or cougar) is about the size of a grown human.  If the first words out of your mouth are not something like "I can't believe how freaking BIG that was" then it wasn't a mountain lion.

The rare occurrence of real, honest to goodness mountain lions are often escaped or released captive animals.  On very rare occasions they find evidence of a cat moving from the West or mid-west hundreds or thousands of miles to the East (one case in Connecticut was of a cat that genetics showed had been born in South Dakota and had migrated 2000 miles!).

The best website for more information?  The Cougar Network.

And now for a gratuitous photo of my (adopted) bobcat - Reno.  She lives at Conservators' Center, a carnivore sanctuary in NC for former "pet" and "show" exotic carnivores.