Last year, the high temperature was 27°F, and the low was 14°F. Today, those temperatures were 70°F and 65°F, respectively. Tree frogs are chirping, wasps and flies are in the air, and my native azaleas have bulging, green buds showing. I saw a bat last night, flitting about for some food.
Neither day is ideal.
Gardening for me is like searching the internet—I get distracted easily and next thing I know, I’m down the rabbit hole. Take today, for example. Got out about 1:00 to enjoy the 60°F weather, with plans to plant some more trees and shrubs. I took the tiny sourwood to the woods along the driveway to find a spot. I saw an evergreen shrub with dark berries, and the Plant Identification group on Facebook confirmed my suspicions: Ligustrum, or privet. I had a couple of these from previous owners and they had spread. The originals were cut down last year. So of course, I had to cut this down first. Continue reading “Gardening log for 29-30 December”
We have officially had the most rain in a year on record (since 1944): 59.2 inches as of 28-Dec. Average is 41 inches. 34 of 52 weekends, we have had rain. We are within 0.6 inches of our wettest winter ever–57.10″ so far. So when I get both several days without rain AND holidays, I get to work!
Wood Thrush offered some seeds this year, so I consulted my new list of compatible plants and bought a few (lol).
In the interests of planting more compatible wildflowers, I bought some seed from Nancy Ondra, who has the Etsy shop Hayefield. Details of the seeds and how to plant them are below.
I haven’t posted in a while; more on that at the bottom of this post.
After observing my small prairie garden and the rest of my yard during this wet summer, I noticed the tall grass and goldenrods were falling over. More of this weird grass had sprouted up as well. I showed this picture to the person at NCBG’s grass area during their fall sale, and with his ID, suddenly it all clicked.
Another week of putting things in the ground before all the rain that’s coming our way.
After several false starts following freezes, we are finally in the spring-time weather, although the last two days had lows in the low 40s. I’ve been busy planting!
We’ve had a fairly normal winter until the end of December, then WHAM!! Early in the morning on December 31, we dipped below freezing and stayed there for over a week—200 hours—breaking a record from 1979, and the first week of January was the coldest ever on record.
There was snow on Wednesday, about an scant inch here and more west and south; the lowest it got here in Durham was 3°F, and in Pittsboro with more snow, it got down to 0°F! We finally rose above freezing Monday morning. Tuesday we reached 63°F, and by Friday we hit 73°F—100° above the low just five days prior.
Do you know where that blue can of mixed recyclables goes every two weeks?
Much of it goes to China, but that may end in January. In July, China informed the World Trade Organization that it would ban “imports of 24 types of recycled materials including various plastics (PET, PE, PVC and PS), as well as unsorted mixed paper, textiles, and some trace metals. And according to Beijing, starting in January every waste container entering China is to be inspected for contaminated materials”, according to Bloomberg BNA. Much of the recycling we send is contaminated, meaning that it’s mixed with other recyclables or garbage. When it get to the Chinese processing plants, it requires people to pick through it, and the garbage has to be disposed of in China—after being trucked and shipped all the way from the U.S.
