After more rain, it feels like a sweat lodge out, but we took advantage of the precip break to mow.  As usual, it takes E hours on the rider mower and me on the cordless electric mower and weed wacker to get the job done.  We’re fortunate to have such a problem, I suppose, and the strength to keep up with it for now.  But the sooner we can replace lawn with trees and native plantings, the more sustainable and beneficial this land will be.

I’m still getting piles of green and purple pole beans each day, and there are signs the squashes and tomatoes may eventually get their act together.  Mostly it’s the flowers that are proliferating so far this year.  It’s become apparent that this poor toxic soil needs several years’ worth of intensive improvement to yield anything successfully.  But I’ll keep working at it as long as I’m able.

One thing I’ve learned about gardening–after years of trials and errors, I’m still a novice learning new tricks all the time.  But the patience pays off in results.  For example, I’m constantly amazed and pleased by the increasing diversity and numbers of birds that are finding this place more and more inviting and sheltering.  As I wrote this, possibly a dozen different species, many in pairs, were lined up perched on the fence or foraging in the garden outside my window.  I must be doing something right!