New Orchid

It's not that I don't have enough orchids, it's just that I can't pass up a sale.

My friend Christine and I traveled all the way to Gorham, Maine last night to the Orchid society meeting, which was a vendor's auction to raise money for the club.

I bid on several, but do have my limits. I finally won the bid on a Epc.Midddleburg MAJ (c. bactiaxEpi phoenicum) which has several buds but none are open yet. It is a small deep red cattelya shaped orchid and I'm looking forward to seeing the buds open. It fits nicely on one of my window shelves. I've actually filled up the window. I can't buy any more.

I'll post the picture when it opens.

Spring has come to Maine

Spring has come to Maine with brillant colors and a few black flies. We have to ignore the flies, because there is so much beauty to look forward to in the yards and in the woods.

One of my favorite colors is yellow and you will see in some of my photos. A second favorite would have to be pink, again you will see.

However, I just love to search the woods for the first show of what has been lying dormant under all the snow. The lady slipper just begining to hood, the Painted Lady trillium and the viburnum also called hobble bush, I have been told.

Spring is the new awakening I look forward to each spring coming after all that cold weather. It is worth the wait.

Golden Angel Trumpets

My golden Angel Trumpet is outdoing itself this year. I have had it for many years and each year it seems to have more and more blooms. I just keep cutting it down to about 2 feet and off it goes again. I counted 14 blooms today. In the evening the fragrance is overwhelming.

I made a picture from inside and outside the sunroom. I had to hurry on the outside shot as it is very cold and windy today. The last time I looked it was 42 degrees, but the wind is steady at 20 mph.

The geraniums get the same haircut as the Trumpet get about twice a year. These were cut back in January and are just getting back their full bloom.

This room is also full of orchids that are in the down time. The blooming ones get to come inside. Most anything grows out there and I have around 70 daylily seedlings getting larger every day enjoying the room. When summer arrives, I'll transplant them all outside in a bed.

A too real nightmare

When I was a child in Mississippi, we lived in a big farmhouse near several small brooks that ran between larger creeks in the area. It was rumored that a black panther had been spotted along the brooks making his way to another larger creek. Of course kids like to tell horrible stories about cat attacks and I was gifted with a vivid imagination.

One night when the air was still, hot and humid, I had my face literally in the window. My bed was pushed up to the window and I was sleeping at the foot so I could get any air that was available. My sleep was shattered by the loudest scream I had ever heard and it sounded like it was right under my window. I was scared so much I couldn't move. My room was apart from my parents bedroom so that I would have to go out onto a screened porch and enter the dining room before I could get to them. Somehow I managed to do it with my hair still standing on end. I was told that it was indeed a panther I had heard, but he couldn't get into the house.

Early this morning, in a deep dreamland, I was again in Mississippi, near the three brooks that crossed the road some quarter mile from the house. I was driving our red buick and suddenly I saw a white puma. I had recently read in the paper about one roaming around somewhere, so I recognize it. Of course that was the Maine paper and I was in Mississipi.

Anyway, I stopped the car and angled a little sideways so I could get a good look at the creature. He came up to the car and started lunging at the window. I didn't know how soon he would be able to break the window, so I grabbed my nikon camera and flashed a quick picture. He stopped lunging and I got the car in gear and drove to the house where Tom and "others" were there. You know how dreams are. You don't always see everything and everyone. Anyway as I was showing everyone the picture I woke up. It was 5:15 a.m. and any thoughts of returning to sleep vanished. We got home around midnight from playing cards, so I didn't get much sleep. I almost felt like looking at my camera to see if a puma picture was hiding inside.

I got dressed, heated up left over coffee and went out to get the paper, looking over my shoulder all the way in case a white puma was lurking in the firs along the driveway.

Well, I didn't see any and came home to watch the sunrise on the deck while I read the paper and finished my coffee. Alas, the sunrise was hidden behind clouds so I was content to read, sip and listen to a forest full of birds flitting from tree to tree. The drama of my nightmare still fresh on my mind.

Warm Easter

I just heard the weather forcast for today and it looks like we may see 80 degrees. It will be perfect for the annual Easter Egg hunt on the grounds of the East Sumner Congregational church. I hope to get some cute photos for the paper.

Good news on the fish survival this winter. I have now counted all five in the bog pond and the two big ones in the deeper pond were swimming around and ready to eat yesterday. We'll have to move some of the ones out of the bog pond into the larger pond because the bog is too small for five nice fat goldfish.

My orchids have survived very well through the winter as well. They certainly brighten up a cold winter day, but now I see life beginning in the garden. My daylily seedlings are coming up nicely in the sunroom, so I hope to have a small bed to transplant later on this spring.

Good news today as well. I just heard that the parks are opening earlier this year. We will be pulling the camper out soon for some fun camping trips.

Fish survived winter, and a baby lamb

Tom and I stopped at the fish pond to see if any fish had survived the winter. The ice had melted from the bog pond. Much to our amazement, there were three fish, three times bigger than last year, swimming around in the water. The larger pond still has a covering of ice, so we don't know the plight of the two fan tails. We knew that they survived in Tennessee under ice, but this was frozen solid, or so we thought. I am delighted.

Tom and I went out to see a new baby finnsheep baby who was born this week at three and a half pounds. I'm doing a story for the paper on the sheep and the farm. The baby's name is Venus.

Daylily seed mystery

It is a big mystery to me how I can spend so much time preparing soil, getting everything just right and then plant my day lily seeds only to find the ones I accidentally dropped in a bowl of rocks sprouting long before the others.

I bought new potting soil and soaked it two days before I planted the seeds carefully in the little sections. I no longer label my seeds because I just don't have the time or energy. I can pretty well spot who the parents are when they bloom and my days of selling are over.

The day I was sorting the seeds to plant, some seeds fell into the rocks. I didn't have the patience to dig them out so I just thought they would be lost, but I had plenty others. You can imagine my amazement when I saw seedlings which were already 6 inches high in the rock pot. The pampered ones have just begun to sprout. This does not exactly go along with the parable of the sower, does it?

Maybe I have discovered something, but the problem may arise when I try to get the seedlings out of the rocks to transplant. I'll let you know.