Adventures

How An Abysmal Garden Bed Leads Me to Photograph Bugs Instead of Flowers Summer 2023

Shelley

The abysmal attempt at growing this year’s flower garden isn’t all my fault. Nope, I blame it on the drought and the scoundrels (rabbits). I’ve done my part to abolish the weeds in the dust and to water the dust. Every bug-stinking day!

I absolutely cringe when I see morning glories and zinnias abscond overnight. The weeds, though, never touched and continue growing!

It’s a garden bed battle between the yuckiest-tasting morsels versus the scrumptious-tasting morsels.

I’ll be tickled pink if the Cosmos Pinkie plants win.

When my doubts settle in about will this garden survive, I scurry like a rabbit down low near the ground to document abstract views and enjoy the precious plants while they last.

Meanwhile, when I glanced through the lattice across the yard, I saw that the wild milkweed plants are abnormally growing well this year. I’ve yet to see them attract monarchs instead of red bugs. 🤷🏻‍♀️

Hmm…Maybe I’ll have to abort the idea of photographing flowers this year and go for abstract bugs and butterflies instead.

Post Inspiration – Linda G. Hill’s Stream of Consciousness Saturday – Your Friday prompt for Stream of Consciousness Saturday is “starts with ‘ab’.” Find a word that starts with “ab” and use it in your post. Enjoy! Terri Webster Schrandt’s Sunday Stills – June 25 Plant Life and a challenge for me for sure by limiting my photos in a post is thanks to Patti Moed at Pilotfishblog.com (link to her challenge here) – “This week, we’re focusing on telling a story with our photos. Sometimes, if we’re lucky, we can convey a story in one image; other times we need several. For this challenge, we’ll set a limit of 5 photos per story.” 

PS – When in doubt what do you do to pivot and make do with what is in front of you? Do you know if rabbits like Cosmos Pinkies? What is your favorite summer flower and is it growing well for you? Did you miss seeing a photo of how the wall is coming along? How many pounds do you think Mr. lifted this week?

Published by Shelley

Letting my quirk out one post at a time.

50 thoughts on “How An Abysmal Garden Bed Leads Me to Photograph Bugs Instead of Flowers Summer 2023”

  1. What beautiful shots of your garden–especially the close-up of the bugs, Shelley! Sorry to read the rabbits and pests are making it difficult to maintain the flowers. We put chicken wire around our beds and real fences around the tomatoes or the deer will feast. Happy Sunday and have a great week!

    1. Thank you, Terri! I so enjoyed your post seeing all the beautiful flowers and reading the lessons on why it’s important to talk to and touch our plants.
      Yes, next year is going to be the year of fencing and raised garden beds. The little pots haven’t kept the scoundrels out of them, they jump right up in them.
      Happy Sunday to you too – enjoy your last week of June!! 🥰😉😊

    1. 🤣 Thanks, Tina! I’m seriously considering the raised flower bed idea and fences and borrowing the neighbor’s dog to sprinkle tinkle in the yard.
      I so enjoyed your post this week – I’m glad you didn’t lose your whole house and that you were able to find the good in a very challenging fire situation. 🤗

  3. These are beautiful photos, Shelley. I get the sense of sorrow around the battle with the critters. We have lost cucumbers multiple times so far. As soon as they sprout, somebody or somebunny eats them. I wish we could speak bunny so I could tell them that, if they let them grow, there will be enough for everyone. We are getting oodles of rain this week. I hope you get some relieve soon.

    1. Thank you, Dan. Yes, you have lots of critters in your yard this year too. If only they could see into the future and wait for the cucumbers! Are you thinking next year you’ll have raised garden beds too? 😉
      Your wish for rain for us came true. It rained a few hours last night, more this morning, and I think we’ll get some before the day is over. I haven’t checked to see how far the rain soaked into the garden beds, I’m going with the faith that it was a good soaking for a change!
      I so enjoyed your interview with Carol! Great questions and intriguing answers. I need to add her books to my TBR list!! 🥰

      1. We’ve toyed with the idea of raised beds. My wife handles the garden, and she moved it into buckets when the weeds invaded and never gave up. Somebody can reach into the buckets. Watch for my post on Wednesday to see the likely culprit.

        I’m so glad you liked Carol’s visit. I think she’s going to have a big place on my shelf/kindle.

        1. I might’ve asked for raised beds this year if we hadn’t decided the wall was priority. Hopefully over the winter Mr. will recover and be ready for another big project like that 🤣
          I’ll watch for Wednesday’s post! I bet I’ll recognize the scoundrel.

          Yes, indeed, and rightfully so!

  4. I have an abysmal garden too. I’ve weeded it and weeded it and you still can’t tell the perennials from the weeds. Supposedly we hired help with the weeding but so far they have avoided this garden. I wonder why.

    1. It’s a challenging year for gardens. I planted some Catchfly in the garden in the post and then when I thought the weeds were taking over I accidentally weeded out all the sprouts of the Catchfly. I’ll have to be more strategic next year. 🤣
      I prefer to be able to weed after a rain – the ground is softer and easier pulling. This year, the weeds are getting to stay growing much longer than they should. Hopefully you’re getting a deal with the hired help not doing all the work! 🤔😉

    1. Thank you for the well wishes – I’d love to have my garden survive like yours is doing! I hope the Cosmos survives too. 🤞🏻🤞🏻🤞🏻🤞🏻🤞🏻🤞🏻🤞🏻

  6. I agree with Dan, your photos are very beautiful, Shelley! The grass looks so sad,the rains just won’t come. Welcome to the desert. I hope you guys get a serious rain this coming week. 🙏🏻❤️

    1. Thanks, John! Your wishes for rain helped! We got rain starting at 9 pm and it’s been raining off and on since. Hopefully we’ll get a few more showers this week. It has felt like the desert and the grass is VERY sad indeed.

      I love seeing your bird bath and hummingbird feeder. We took ours down this year because we couldn’t find one that didn’t leak.

      We hope you have a great week too! Stay cool!

        1. We tried, it didn’t work. It seems like the wind has something to do with it. And we bought a brand new one and it did the same thing. I was hoping my flowers would attract the hummingbirds, but they haven’t blossomed yet. They did enjoy the bleeding hearts when that plant was in bloom.

  7. hahaha this was cute Shelley. And great photos. Fingers crossed the rains will come. In the meantime I will picture down on your knees visiting bugs and butterflies. I happily discovered some baby preying mantis in my garden this week. And they love munching on the bugs I don’t like. So I will leave it alone for now.

    1. Thanks, Donna! We have had some rain on and off for about 24 hours. YIPPEE. I haven’t gone out to measure the sprouts that might not survive, but I did see the scoundrel trying to jump into one of the flower pots. Banging on the window didn’t scare it so I chased it. At least I’m getting a little bit of exercise as I try to save the flowers! 🤣🤣
      That’s fun – I hope we see the praying mantis in a cameo appearance in your photos in July!

  8. I hope you are getting rain today, Shelley. It’s been raining on and off all day and I am so happy, although we could use a full two-day soaking rain.
    My neighbor and I started a little garden across our parking lot, at the edge of a woods. There is some color, but we hope the perennials we planted survive the coming winter and eventually fill in. We want to attract the butterflies too, but at the moment, Mr. Bunny is treating our coneflowers like his own personal salad. If deer/bunny spray doesn’t work, we’ll have to consider a chicken wire fence. I hope your garden grows…maybe we won’t have to wait “weeks” between raindrops.

    1. Hi Mary! Yes, we did get some rain. We could’ve used more, but we’ll take what we get. The little scoundrel was out eating the long blades of grass so I hope it filled up and left my flowers alone. I’m afraid to look at the garden this morning to see what they ate overnight.
      I hope your flowers grow too! I tried coneflowers years ago and the rabbits and deer loved to eat them.
      Next year, it’ll be fencing and raised flower beds for us (shh…don’t tell Mr. until he gets done building the retaining wall 😉). I kind of chuckled thinking about raised beds as the deer are tall and it would make for a nice salad bar for them to graze upon. 🤔😏😆
      I hope the rest of the summer is kind to you and you get to hit the bike trails some more!

    1. Thanks for the encouragement, Brian! I’m going to start researching raised garden beds.
      I LOVE that video and I remember watching it when I was young too!!

    1. Thank you, I’ll take all the good luck wishes I can get!
      I enjoyed seeing your photos of your birthday trip – stunning! And you’re so brave to travel alone! Bummer about the 3 kids at the end of the trip. Been there, done that! 😆

  11. Shame on those scoundrels Shelley – the nerve and even more so because they are picky and don’t like the weeds. Scoundrels born with a silver spoon in their mouths. Do you have clover growing there? Usually bunnies like clover. Our clover is out now so bunnies galore in the neighborhood. Maybe it is too early for the Milkweed so the bugs like just the buds? As to the Cosmos, well they are pretty tall flowers – so the bunnies won’t be able to reach them once they grow tall – help them with lots of Miracle-Gro Bloom Booster. When I planted the Sunflowers in the ground one year, I had to put glass jars over them to get the greenhouse effect and keep bunnies from chomping on them until they were bigger. I know your frustration … today I said “no more” to the shelled peanuts for the birds, a hobby I was trying to cultivate again, as you know, but the squirrels embedding themselves in the bushes to get first dibs turned me off.

    1. Yes, they sure are picky eaters. LOL – we have one small patch of clover where we spray water to clean out the bird bath in our front yard. Oddly the rabbits never go there to eat. They go in the flower bed right next to the patch!
      That could be about the Milkweed. Yesterday and today it is very windy, I’m not sure if the plants will survive the wind.
      I should get some Bloom Booster. The little plants likely need some kind of boost. I know you know the frustration level – I’m thankful for your sympathy!
      Dang squirrels…they’re cute at the parks but they can stay there and not invade your yard!!

      1. When I had my garden and all the annuals in pots years ago, the squirrels dug up the pots to hide the peanuts I gave them. I stopped giving them peanuts in the Summer, when other food is plentiful for them – especially pine cones. Then they dug into the pots trying to remember where they hid their peanuts!

          1. Ya, I would hate to see the bunnies get blamed for tricks by your little red squirrel. I should have remembered the squirrels’ antics from the olden days. When we had the Oak trees, the squirrels dropped all the acorns on top of the shed to retrieve them easier. You’d hear them falling down onto the shed. I’ve had phone wires replaced 2X from squirrels chewing them – likely this stopping the food will cause the yard squirrels to chew on the wires and cause static, then the phone will die.

          2. Our neighbors have been pestered by the squirrel. He likes to sit under their bird feeders and enjoy the tossed out seeds. We haven’t been feeding the birds as much here since there seems to be plenty of bugs for them to eat.
            We’ve seen an increase in the little oak trees that have sprouted along the side of the road. Some animal was busy throughout the winter! Hopefully your squirrels will just move on over to the noisy neighbors yard.

          3. I felt badly this morning as I was out there about two hours while the handyman was there for the gutters … I had to be home anyway (and missed a walk – grrrr), so I just did some yard work. The poor female Cardinal was tweeting at me like crazy. Broke my heart to disappoint her.

          5. I think they tweet all the time … I was hearing them before they even built the nest. I figure they were giving the grubs and bugs to the kids and eating the peanuts themselves.

          6. You might be right about tweeting all the time. When we see them in trees in the neighborhood where we walk, they’re always tweeting! Twitter should’ve used a cardinal instead of a bluebird for their logo 🤣

    1. Thank you, Rebecca, I appreciate your words of encouragement!! I hope your summer is off to a great start. The boys are growing so fast and getting so TALL!! 🥰😍😊

  14. Hi Shelley. Your story changed from a story of disappointment to a triumph in the end. I love that final shot of the insect. I enjoyed your post very much!

    1. Hi Patti! Thank you for your encouraging words and for hosting the challenge. I enjoyed how the challenge made me think harder about what photos to use. That was good for me to do – now if I could just delete some of the rejects to make room on my SD card! 🤣🤣🤣

  15. I’m not at all bugged by your bugs. As for pivoting… my saying is: when in doubt, don’t. Or don’t until you know why you’re doing the pivot. And where it’ll take you. 🤔

    1. Hi Ally, I’m glad you’re not bugged by the bugs. We have plenty of them around, I just need to figure out how to sneak up on them and get better photos!
      Thank you for sharing your thoughts on pivoting – great words of wisdom! 😊

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