Hummingbird garden

I have already written about the bare root stock of native plants that I put back by the creek. At the same time I ordered those, months ago, I also ordered a butterfly/hummingbird garden. And then I forgot all about that until I got an email that it was shipped on May 22. Terry provided a sod shovel, which I didn’t even know existed and was a great help. Even so, it was hard work. I remembered my plan for where I was putting the garden, which was on the south side of the garden shed where I couldn’t get the mower. It was not a large area, but it took a couple of hours to cut the sod off anyway. Terry brought the Gator by several times to move the sod to other places on the property where it was needed.

The plants arrived Wednesday when I was in Glendale Heights getting the one-year, 15,000 mile check up on my car. (I have been to a gas station 8 times in the last year, by the way. I used to fill up once a week!) Thirty-eight plants, fourteen species. I was impressed with their size.

Ready made butterfly/hummingbird garden: 38 plants, 14 species for wet soils

When I read the directions and did some measurements, I realized my cleared area was half the recommended size. Oh well. Being a plant ecologist, I regard plants as being pretty smart. They are perfectly capable of deciding whether or not a site is good for them. I’ll just see what grows and separate them later if I have to. When I got home from a meeting at work on Thursday, I put them in the ground more or less following the suggested layout that came in the box.

Plants in the ground in the corner behind the garden shed where I can't get the mower

Friday morning, again following recommended procedure, I laid down newspapers and put mulch on top. And then it rained, which was perfect. We may never get the rest of the garden in, and the potatoes may be rotting in the ground, but it has been a great year for planting natives. I have virtually never had to water.

Mulched and done for now

That brings up a related question. How did the toads know? In the 5 years I’ve lived here, we have never had such a massive toad breeding event. I remarked at the time that there was no way the puddle would stay long enough for the tadpoles to reach maturity. Last year the chorus frog tadpoles all ended up being hors d’oeuvres for raccoons. But here we are at the end of May, and that puddle is still has 8” of water at its deepest place. We have rain several times a week. By Terry’s measurement, we had 6.6” of rain last month and 5.8” for May so far. Another 0.7” yesterday morning. Many of the tadpoles have leg nubbies now, and odds are good that a fair number will, in fact, become adults.

My three tadpoles are finally showing signs of growing up. The fact that they had leg nubbies when I brought them in made me think that they would be done growing in a few days. Not so! As of Wednesday, they looked about the same.

Tadpole on Wednesday with no visible changes

Yesterday, their legs were bulking up and bending at the knees. One of them is showing angles on its body where the front legs are developing.

Back legs looking more toad-like yesterday, bumps on the front of the body

It was Bird Party Central at the feeder Friday morning. Two male and one female rose-breasted grosbeaks, a male gold finch, and a male oriole were all vying for position.The female grosbeak went down to the jelly feeder while the goldfinch flew away.

Female grosbeak jumps to the jelly while a goldfinch flies away. Two male grosbeaks watch the action

The goldfinch came back, though, and the grosbeak was joined by an oriole. 

There are five birds in this picture...

The orioles don’t usually share the jelly, but this one didn’t seem to know what to make of this other species. Really, the jelly is not for her, but she has not read the book, apparently. I have since seen a male grosbeak eating jelly as well.

Male oriole and female grosbeak sharing the jelly, even though it isn't for the grosbeaks

Close up of the male grosbeak and goldfinch on the sunflower seed feeder where they belong

Saturday morning, this handsome fellow showed up. Terry spotted it first. “There’s a yellow-headed blackbird out there! He’s a long way from home.”

Yellow-headed blackbird

He stayed long enough for me to get several pictures. I had never seen one outside of North Dakota, but Pat and Nancy tell me that they have seen them in Illinois and Wisconsin. We haven’t seen it again, so it may have been just passing through.