The mosquitoes aren't nearly as bad as they've been so I guess my mosquito suppression tactics coupled with the county spraying a couple of times in the evening have had an effect. Or it could be that it's just because it hasn't rained in a couple of weeks. Whatever the reason, it was mostly cloudy Wednesday morning, humidity at 54%, which may seem high to some of you but is somewhat tolerable down here, until it gets hotter anyway, so I got out the chainsaw to take down those two dead shrubs which I did.
I'm not really sure what this shrub was before it started dying but this is about a third of how big it was before the first arctic blast when it lost a third, and another third after the second arctic blast and now this last third.
The other dead shrub was a very old white with red throat althea that would bloom profusely which I suppose was nearing the end of it's lifetime anyway and the deep freezes killed it all the way off.
Then thought as long as I had the chainsaw out I cut a big limb off one of the yew trees and then turned my attention to the four photinias across the front of the house and cut some branches and limbs off those that had to be ducked under or were crowding other stuff. Ordinarily I would cut it all up into smaller sections and pile them up on the side of the street and then bring the truck around and load it all up but the battery in the truck is currently dead so I had to carry it all to the truck in the driveway. About two hours of activity and sweaty when I came in. Late afternoon it was really hot out there with our summer sky full of puffy clouds.
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We are running low on food at SHARE. The food pantry from which we order once a month in Victoria is having a hard time getting provisions and so it trickles down to us, the HEB and Walmart from which we buy food also hasn't been able to completely fill our orders, and the day old stuff from Walmart has shrunk from about 300 pounds a week to less than 100 the last couple of weeks. I did a complete inventory yesterday of all the food in my section and we are perilously low of some and completely out of other things and running out of meat and other shelf staple items in the other section. If it wasn't for the dollar store donating their 'sell by' milk and lunch meat every week it would be even worse. People are not getting as much as we've been able to give in the past.
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On to happier things. All the pink plumerias are sending up bloom stalks.
The zinnias, black eyed susans, and the double or triple orange daylilies are the stars of the yard these days as it gets hotter and hotter out there.
And my pecan trees have baby pecans! You might recall I haven't gotten any for the last three years, not even baby ones so I hope plenty of them stick.
A few other random pics.
My little Minnie dog cleverly disguised as the evil Emperor Palpatine.
When times get rough, those who already don't have enough suffer the first and most, don't they?
ReplyDeleteYour flowers are so beautiful. I wish I had more but without enough sun, it's just not going to happen. Now maybe if we cut down some of these useless pecan trees...
I really only have two areas in the back that get enough sun and they are at the edges of the property since the 4 pecans, the magnolia, and the maple shade most of it.
DeleteYour glowering season is so far ahead of ours. Months before my black eyed susans bloom. Daylilies haven't budded yet. So I'm enjoying yours first.
ReplyDeleteSad about the food shortages. I wonder if it's weather related or a general slowdown
I imagine your areas will be blooming nicely when the heat of summer puts it all to an end here.
Deletesome of the problem is supply chain problems, some is the expense of food these days. there are things the food bank won't buy if it's too expensive.
Flowering, dangit. I don't know your glowering schedule!
ReplyDeleteHahaha!
DeleteLOL
DeleteI hope you did not climb onto a ladder with that chainsaw... My plumeria are at the same stage, all we need now is decent sunshine and eventually: blossoms!
ReplyDeleteHere, all households have received a flyer about the latest and potentially dangerous insects arriving in our parts of Europe from the global south, incl. previously unknown to us tiger mosquitoes and ticks. Shiver.
No I did not but only because I didn't feel like getting the ladder out as there were only two other branches I would have cut.
Deleteclimate change is causing all kinds of habitat rearranging.
It always makes me sad when a tree dies and I have to get rid of it. Today is hot and sticky and I am thinking a nap is in order!
ReplyDeletegonna be hot and sticky here for the next 4 months at least.
DeleteIt's been so hot here in Illinois and no rain so I have had to water every day at least once a day, sometimes more than once if the pots look droopy. I don't like it!
ReplyDeleteyeah, I've started my watering rounds too. it dries up fast down here in the summer.
DeleteI spent yesterday thinking "I have to tell Ellen about that." Now I have no idea what it was. Maybe it will come back. What I know for sure is that those plumeria are gorgeous, and I have tomato envy. And pecans! I hope your critters leave them alone to ripen so you can get some of them.
ReplyDeleteI just hope they don't all fall off before they get big enough to tempt the squirrels. and my tomatoes...not getting any bigger, not ripening. what the heck?
DeleteYour flower gardens are lovely. I hope you get the full benefit of all those beautiful tomato plants.
ReplyDeleteI would if they would ever ripen.
DeleteI think that food banks and other charitable organizations are all having trouble securing enough food for everyone who needs it, and I can't conceive that it is going to get any better. I read recently that AI has the potential to wipe out most middle class jobs within twenty years, so unless there is serious income distribution a catastrophe, both physical and social, is in the making.
ReplyDeleteI can't believe they were full speed ahead on AI. Have they not seen 2001 A Space Odyssey, Terminator, or I Robot?!
DeleteI think this human culture is destined for collapse sending us that survive back to the starting point. so many ancient ruins point out that human achievement has risen and fallen. Issac Asimov wrote a novelette called Nightfall about a planet that has 3 suns and so never experiences night, never developed artificial lighting, except for one night every 5,000 years when the suns were aligned just right. A civilization that has never seen the dark, never seen the stars with a religion that foretells doom and gloom when the 'stars' come out and destroy everything. The people are so afraid when night falls that they start setting fires for light and madness descends and they burn it all to the ground. every 5,000 years the survivors have to start from square one.
Minnie DOES look like Palpatine! Ha! So sorry about the food shortage. I hope things pick up there.
ReplyDeletewe have funds to buy food but the vendors can't always fill all our orders. the post office did a food drive and donated it to us. I forget how many hundreds of pounds and we gave nearly all of it away in one day.
DeleteI always love seeing what's growing and blooming there. That lizard is very cool, and Minnie is an adorable Emperor.
ReplyDeletehe was giving me the eye trying to decide if I was a threat.
DeleteI love your lizard pic! And it's a good sign that you have baby pecans once again. Funny how the trees took a couple years off. I guess it was those freezes?
ReplyDeletelast year I think it was the drought but yeah, could have been the deep freeze other years if it came at the wrong time.
DeleteMinnie cracked me up! I wish I had a tenth of your energy.
ReplyDeleteXoxo
Barbara
I can manage about two hours at a time. after that I'm useless.
DeleteMuch as I hate all aspects of horticulture or - more particularly - the spirit-grinding toil that goes with it, the front of the house (Brick-laid to replace a scrubby lawn) was beginning to look like the decor at the Bates Motel, the well-chosen location for Hitchcock's "Psycho". Buy the tool that does the job, I always say. And now! But the stainless steel flat hook thing, which cost a bomb, didn't hook out the roots of the weeds poking from the gaps between the bricks. So buy another long-handled steel-wire brush with long virgin bristles. And here's the trick: use it lightly, it excises the weeds so much more effectively that way. This worked a treat but also - unexpectedly - widened my social circle. Elderly ladies, who, seeing my unkempt white hair (uncut for several months) would normally cross over the road when I came towards them en route to the supermarket, could now engage me in conversation, corralled as I was behind my cast-iron fence. Anything to bring blessed surcease to my horrid labours; I talked and - always my aim - made them laugh. And then upstairs to blog. The best blessings are those that come indirectly.
ReplyDelete