Fork Creek Journal

A Sad Year for Hydrangeas

    I have many favorite blooming things, but above all, I love hydrangeas.  I have planted new ones each and every year we have been at Bluehaven.  I enjoy having many different varieties, and I can never resist buying one I don't have yet.   I love having their beautiful blossoms as cut flowers in the house.  And, I usually dry many at the end of each summer season, some to go in vases in the house to have color throughout the winter and the others to share.

    This year almost all of my hydrangeas were killed back to the ground by the late freeze after Easter.  Most of them did eventually recover and put out new growth, but most of them did not recover enough to blossom at all.  I suppose if the record high summer and fall temperatures were to continue, they might bloom eventually this year, but frost will get them before that happens.

    The freeze didn't seem to affect the abundant native lacecaps at all.   And, some of my oak leaf hydrangeas did bloom along with the Annabelles on the side of the house. The Annabelles have never been my favorite because they get too top heavy and look stragly by the end of the summer; but, this year  I praised them almost daily when they not only came back to life, but bloomed profusely in mid-summer.  Fr several years, I had threatened to replace the Annabelles. But, after their performance this year, I have assured them I'm sorry I ever even thought about removing them.

    With company coming last weekend, I went out to gather any last flowers I could to grace the house with their beauty.  I was delighted to find that one of the new hydrangeas I planted this year after the freeze had several new blooms, just perfect to put in Bee Pond cottage for our house guest to enjoy. 

    I'm hoping that next summer, we will again have an abundance of hydrangeas blooming all over our acreage.

Little Squirrel

    Nature is why we love living in the mountains of Western North Carolina.  I've have to look up the actual statistics to be accurate, but I do know that these ancient mountains have the greatest biodiversity on earth, greater even than the rain forests.

    I love that we live among wild things, but I don't love all of God's creatures equally.  On my "Not Much Appreciated" list are raccoons and squirrels. Last year, we got a raccoon baffle that has made it easier to feed all the wild birds that live on our acreage.  We don't mind sharing with the squirrels and raccoons, but left to their own devices, the birds would have nothing.  And, I haven't really ever forgiven the raccoons for the gazebo incident.  That was the year our kitchen was being remodeled and Bob book off honey in the gazebo.  Bee Pond cottage was not built yet and we had a sink up at the gazebo, so Bob did the honey bottling there.  The night after he did the first bottling, the raccoons tore the screening out of the gazebo and then proceeded to open the lids off of 20 pounds of honey, consuming and spilling it everywhere in the process. It was like cleaning up after a sticky frat party.

    But, even though I don't especially like squirrels, one touched my heart recently and I'll probably never yell a squirrel away from the bird feeders again.  My friend, Carolyn, will be happy about that. 

    We had gotten home late one afternoon and Bob called me outside. In the corner of the side door to the garage was a curled up small creature.  Bob thought at first it was a chipmunk and I thought it was a mouse.  I gently prodded it with a stick and out popped
a furry tail and a head with large black eyes . . . a baby squirrel.   

    It was very afraid of us and we both guessed it was sick or wounded since it didn't even try to crawl away.  The big squirrels climb the huge old hemlock and run out on its limbs to jump to the old dogwood to climb down again to the ground to get to the bird feeder at the top of the meadow bank outside our bedroom windows.  Perhaps this was an adventurous young squirrel who tried to follow one of its parents on the journey requiring trapeze artist skill and fell because there is no tree near the door to the garage where we discovered it.

    Not knowing what else to do, I went to the bird feeders and brought it a handful of seed. The next morning Bob found the squirrel dead and buried it under some rhododendrons.  Since, as already confessed, I am not fond of squirrels, I was surprised at how sad the loss of that small life made me. 

Rain, Glorious Rain

    Polk County where we live has been in severe drought status for most of the summer along with the rest of the Western North Carolina mountains.  This summer, rainfall has been little and infrequent.  But, today we had a wonderful soaking rain all throughout the day. 



    It was amazing how alive and vibrant everything looked after one good rain. 

   

    We live on Fork Creek Road and Fork Creek runs boldly through our meadow year round, but you can really hear it sing when it rains.    

   


     I love many types of music, but the sound of my creek is my favorite sound in the entire world.  Before we lived here full-time, I tried once to capture it on tape.  It didn't work.  I suppose you would need very sophisticated equipment.  But, I don't need it on tape.  It is bold enough that we can hear from the house when the windows are open.  It's the first sound that welcomes me every time I return home.

    I went down to visit the creek when the rainfall lightened a bit.  The drought hasn't stopped the weeds from growing, but they'll be easier to pull now that we've had a good rain.



    I'm grateful for today's gentle, steady rain and I'm even more grateful to live on Fork Creek.

Finally A Break in the Weather

    There were weeks recently when the air conditioning was running 24 hours a day.  That is so rare for us here in the Western North Carolina mountains. We are usually able to keep the windows open the majority of the time and almost always at night. 

    We've been able to keep the windows open at night for the past week; but, today, we were able to comfortably keep the windows open all day.  When the windows are open, we can hear our bold creek.  We love the birdsong by day and the chorus of tree frogs, crickets and cicadas at night.

    The late Spring freeze after Easter this year really hurt a lot of blooming things along Fork Creek.  The Summer drought and record heat have taken their toll as well. 

    This time of year, I'm usually gathering and drying hydrangeas from my dozens of varieties.  Not this year.  I'm just glad that the majority of my hydrangeas survived the freeze.  They looked dead for a while, but all but a few came back.  They are looking good, but most are not even budding this year.  The Annabelles along the side of the house along with the native lacecaps were the exception.  A few are beginning to bud, but I do not know if they will blossom before frost arrives.

    Altthough not blooming as profusely as most years, I'm treasuring each and every Moonvine blossom that graces us. Here's a picture of tonight's blooms.    
 

Morning Glory Inspiration

    Computer  problems, travel, company and illness have kept me away from my blogs for the past two months.  I'm grateful to my Blue Heaven Morning Glory vines for inspiring me to get started again today

    I plant Morning Glory vines every year.  My favorite is the large flowering Blue Heaven variety.  This was a glorious year for hydrangeas and almost all blooming things EXCEPT except the morning glory vines. 

    When the several I planted died I had to search really hard to find any seeds, but I finally did.

    In the meantime, a volunteer deep purple morning glory vine came back from one of last year's plants and it has been glorious, providing multiple blooms every day for the past six weeks.  It has thrived so well that it threatens to take over the dead L-shaped dogwood limb that my husband fixed to hold  two of our bird feeders.   

    My husband kept telling me that the Blue Heaven seeds I planted were not likely to bloom this late.  Today proved him wrong.   

    I’ve been sick for almost two weeks with a major upper respiratory infection and bronchitis and it was late afternoon before I was up and  moving today.  But, I could not resist finding the camera and going outside when I saw those beautiful blue blooms.

    My trip outside was also rewarded by the only sighting this year of one of my favorite garden creatures, the strangely beautiful praying mantis.   

    Fall is definitely arriving here in the Western North Carolina mountains, but I’ll have summer heavenly blue  Morning Glory blooms now until the first frost.

Windows Open Again

    The heat affecting much of the country hit the mountains this weekend. 

    With my illness, I do not tolerate heat at all. One of the many reasons we love living on Fork Creek in the Western North Carolina mountains is that we almost NEVER have to run air conditioning. 

    We have central air, but the only time before this week we had used it this year was  when we were away to try to take some of the moisture out of the house during the weeks of heavy rains.

    I can’t remember how long since we actually kept the house closed at night with AC running.  Usually, even during the hottest part of summer, on the rare days when we turn AC on, we open the house up again by night. But, for the past two nights, we actually kept AC on.

    The heat wave was thankfully short-lived and we had a10-15 degree  drop by early evening tonight.

    The first thing we did when we came home was to open us the windows.  I don’t know who was happier, myself or my male cat.  He is an indoor cat, but absolutely loves our front screened porch and asks to  go out every day no matter how cold even in winter. He  could not wait to go through the living room window to his porch.

    I was thrilled to hear to be able to hear the creek and night sounds again inside the house, and to feel the cool breezes coming in through the windows.

    I’m glad we have central air when we absolutely need it, but grateful that we  don’t need to run it often!

Beauty All Around Me

     With my digital camera fixed again, I took advantage of the sunshine between rain showers to try to capture some of the beauty that surrounds us.

    As I've previously mentioned, the cool wet Spring has really seemed to agree with the flora and fauna.

    As I took pictures yesterday, I thought of the Native American chant about beauty . . . beauty before me, beauty behind me, beauty above me, beauty below me . . .  We are surrounded by so much beauty that it makes my heart sing. 

    Our Hydrangeas have honestly never been more beautiful than this year and the Hostas are in full bloom now. I have so many pictures of Hydrangeas and Hostas.  I will post separate entries about both later.

    Below are a few of my favorite pictures from yesterday.

    I was delighted to find one more late Azalea bloom. 

   Not in all the years that we have lived or spent vacation time in Western North Carolina have I ever
seen so many of the native Rhododendrons in bloom at one time.   The one over our pond is so pretty when the sun shines and you can see the blossoms reflected in the pond as well as blooming above.

    The Astilbe are in full bloom.   We have several colors planted, but the light pink are my favorite.

    When we bought this property there were two large very old Rose of Sharon trees.  One died during the first couple of years that we were here.  The one in the front meadow puts on a spectacular show each year.  The recent heavy rainfalls have knocked a lot of blooms off early, but it still has more blooms than I can count.

    A volunteer Rose of Sharon  took root several years ago in a spot I might have chosen for it myself along the edge of the meadow near the mailbox.

    The new variety of yellow Echinacea is my new favorite addition to the front cottage garden.

    I've been working on the small yard area in front of our screened porch to make it into a cottage-type garden.  This is the first year it has begun to take on the look I want.   My husband keeps telling me that there is no room for any more plants, but he told me that dozens of plants ago.

    Yesterday several different varieties of butterflies were flitting around at the same time enjoying the flowers   along with bees from our hives.

    . . .  beauty all around me!

Night Beauty

    The mountain night sounds are a kind of beauty themselves, but our true night beauty this time of year is Moonvine.   Until a few years ago, I had never planted Moonvine. I had read about it and other plants that bloom late afternoon or evening, but never even seen one planted.

    Several years ago I found a bedragled looking Moonvine plant on sale at the hardware store garden shop.  I had recently bought a new garden piece and I thought  it would be pretty growing on it if I could get it to survive. I spent a long time patiently and gently untwisting the vines crowded around each other on the stake in the plant container.  I planted it and rewove the vines around the new garden piece.

    It didn't bloom for a long time. I think it was August that year before it bloomed but when it did, we fell in love with it.

    Now, it is one of my "must-have" annual plants.

    Most everything, wild and cultivated, has thrived with our record rainfall this spring and summer except for the Morning Glories.  Moonvine is kin to Morning Glory, each bloom lasting one evening only.  My foliage of my Moonvine this year also looks a little stressed by the wet, and I have been afraid might it die like my Morning Glories.  But, so far, so good.

    It bloomed earlier than usual and is producing gorgeous scented blooms.  What a joy it is.  I'm talking to it daily and telling it not to let the rainfall do it in.   

    We have it planted by the back windows of our family room where we spend most of our time when home.  We usually park in back so it is a delight when we arrive home late afternoon or evening.  So we can see it and smell it every night.  I rarely miss a day without sticking my nose into one of its large fragrant blossoms. 

    Yesterday, it was generous with four magnificent blooms. You can see me  taking the picture in the corner of the glass reflection. 

Lake Lure Outing

    "Tucked among the Blue Ridge Mountains is a sparkling jewel--Lake Lure, NC."

    We live about 30 minutes from scenic Lake Lure   which is located in Hickory Nut Gorge which also includes the town of Chimney Rock.

    Last weekend my daughter and her husband celebrated their fourth anniversary at a B&B in Lake Lure.    We joined them on Saturday evening and all took the Twilight Tour  of this beautiful lake. 

    Our young tour guide was delightful and entertaining.  He knew some fascinating history of the lake and he had a great sense of humor.

    After our tour, my son-in-law was able to get my digital camera working again.  The pictures in this post were taken on the tour by my daughter.

    To read some about the amazing early history of this manmade lake, see Lake Lure 

Kitchen Herb Bed Completed

   This weekend, my technologically savvy son-in-law got my digital camera working again.   

    So I can now show what the completed kitchen herb bed project looks like.  Actualy, the project is not completed, but the main bed is. 

    I have decided to leave my mints (peppermint, spearmint, chocolate mint, orange mint, pineapple mint, mountain mint, and one unknown mint) in pots. I bought several square-shaped terra cotta pots for the three largest mint plants.  I bought the extra-large size of the same square pot for my large rosemary bush.  We have not had time to replant the other herbs.
   
    To complete the project, I'm looking for a medium-sized antique iron wheel to do a "wheel of thyme."  We own a small one and we've seen some too-expensive large ones. Today I found just the right size, but the spokes were wooden and my husband wanted to look some more to see if we can find one that is all iron.

    My husband did plant some Blue Heaven morning glory seeds in the bed this weekend. He thought  the the newly prepared bed would work great for seed starting.    Blue Heaven morning glory one of my summer favorites.  The one I bought this year got too much rain for its liking and died.  It was gorgeous while it lived.  The only picture I got early in the season does not do it justice.    I know it is really too late to start seeds; but, last year my Blue Heaven morning glory gave me beautiful blooms late into October.

    I went to half dozen places garden places looking for seeds . . . no one had any.  Someone suggested I try a certain local grocery store.  The manager let me go back in the produce prep room and look through the box of seeds they had taken off the rack earlier.  After several minutes of digging through the box, I found some Blue Heaven seeds. 

    So, even though it is late, I think it is  worth a try for $1.35!  Doesn't hurt to hope.