Crossed Fingers

We planted at least 100 loblolly pine seedlings this weekend in an attempt to replace the young pines we lost this past summer during a fairly wicked drought.  While the folks that predict the weather are calling for yet another La Nina year and another drought, we are hoping, crossing fingers and toes, that they are wrong and that these little guys make it.  

We live out in the country on 10 acres, about 8 of which are fully wooded.  Our little house is tucked right in the middle of these woods. Our hope is to re-tree an area of our property along our driveway that the previous owners of our house decided to clear so they could see the road. 

The pines we lost were planted as seedling almost three years ago, and a few of them had managed to shoot up to a little over 5 feet tall! Here is what they looked like when we planted them in April 2009.

They are so tiny when they are first planted!  It is hard to believe how fast these grow!

 

This whole area of pine seedlings was completely wiped out by the drought.  The planted crape myrtles made it, and sweet gum trees have moved in to this area as well.   

Let's hope that these new seedlings can take advantage of an earlier planting, some fertilizer tablets, and much moister soil!  

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As we were working on getting the new seedlings planted, we (and I mean my husband Jeff) cleaned out our bluebird houses and found this long-abandoned bluebird nest.  While it is sad that these little birds did not make it, isn't a bird's nest just a beautiful work of art?

Our own Charlotte

Yesterday, my husband and I took advantage of a lovely Spring day, getting the front garden in order (no small task), getting the automatic sprinklers in tip-top shape, and basically sweating our tails off (it was in the upper 80s).  As I brought up in an earlier post, my husband comes across skulls from time to time as he roams the woods throughout the area.  He currently has a wild dog skull sitting outside on the porch letting the sun bleach it a little more before it is added to his curio cabinet.  While I was working in the garden, I caught a little jumping spider meandering throughout the skull, and it was calm enough to stop and pose for some pictures.

I was not brave (crazy) enough to take a picture of the red wasp investigating the skull.

We are mostly finished with the front garden - hopefully all of the new plants grow.  I planted a peony, two camellias, petunias,  Mexican heather, lavender, basil, oregano, and snapdragons.