Where is the Rain?

Apparently Mother Nature has one heck of a sense of humor! She let it rain all over us for the month of May, almost the wettest May on record, and now we have had not a drop of rain since it has been June. I put the sprinkler on the garden last night, something I don't like to do if it can be helped, but the poor little plants looked so weak and sad.  If it can't rain from the sky, it will rain from the hose.  I had grand plans to pull weeds from the garden, but didn't care to sit in the sprinkler to do it, so I opted to dead-head the peonies and iris.

And do you know what those peonies did as thanks?  Developed powdery mildew! So now I am going to try some organic fixes to see if I can fix it, or at least stop it.  It is only the two in the back yard, the peonies along the side of the house and the one in the front are fine.

Tonight when I get home from work, and before we meet some friends for a birthday dinner, I am going to have to water all my poor babies in the front of the house. There are some SERIOUSLY droopy plants in the front of my house.

And they aren't predicting rain in the very near future.  Funny Mother Nature. I just don't get your humor.

The Last of the Peonies

This is the first year that I have put hoops up for the peonies. Of course, this is the first year that they have been this big.  And they would have been more standy-up if it hadn't been for all of the rain we received this May. But they are still lovely.  And they smell good, too.

This is the year of the stunted rhubarb, however.  I normally will get at least two big harvests from it before it gets too warm, but this year I haven't even harvested once. It is very strange. What an odd early summer - Lots of rain, brazen bunnies, ravenous birds and stunted rhubarb. Next I will be told that down is up and up is down, and won't that make planting things hard!

I wonder what will happen this June....

Vegetable Garden - aka Bunny Salad Bar

bunny paradise

This is the first year that I have decided to grow more vegetables in the back garden.  I moved the herbs, except the thyme and chives, to pots to grow so that I would have room for veggies.  I planted more tomatoes (with the hope of canning them or making salsa, or both!) and more peppers, too.  And this year, two of the three lovely trellis will have beans and cucumbers!  The middle one will have the pretty sweet peas that my husband insists upon (nitrogen fixer - yep, I married a biologist!).  Along with those, I have garlic, onions and some little lettuce mixes, and kale!  Yay kale!

It's funny - this seems to be the year of the pots.  In addition to the herbs in pots, I started some strawberries in pots, too.  Those cute little ones with the openings on the side that you can put the stringers into as they grow.  The plants have lots of little green berries ripening.  I hope that I can beat the birds to them!

All of this growing stuff leads to troubles with bunnies. They seem to believe that I planted all of this JUST FOR THEM!  And they graze and nibble with impunity - IN BROAD DAYLIGHT!  Oh, if I could run faster we could have a wonderful herb-y bunny stew.

The trouble is, I am frustrated and angry when they eat my food, but my big, soft heart thinks they are really cute.  I can't win!