I "Heart" Chives, True Confessions, Spring!

Notice vole holes top left and bottom right.

The first things to turn green that I can actually eat are my chive plants.  They are also, it appears, not on the vole menu.  I am always so excited to see the first little green shoots poking out of the brown clumps!

Since my explanation post, I've been rather inundated with all kinds of comments and emails.  I can imagine friends and family spending anxious hours Googling "Interventions".  Well, don't get your tighty-whiteys in a knot.  I may be a wing nut, but there you have it.  I am too old to change - and I wouldn't anyway. 

I have always been a, "If I talk the talk, I should walk the walk" kind of person.  That, and I am a learning addict.  There, I've said it.  I will try almost anything (except elephants....)  If I was a cat, I would have been long dead.  I am as curious as they get - in every aspect of that word - and I am a hands-on learner.  That being said, this latest addition to Sweezie's Living Library (aka Dexter) is another example of taking what is offered and seeing how I do.  I eat beef.  Ergo, it would make sense that I would raise beef.  If I can.  I am fully aware of most of my limitations.  I will not risk injury or make my life a living hell just to see if I can do something.  I firmly reserve the right to change my mind.  I also eat pork, but would not raise a pig.  Because you really have to raise two and I don't have the room or the fencing for pigs.  Dexter was given to me and I will do my best to raise him well.  If I can't, well then, I will make sure he goes to someone who will do as good a job as I would.

I hope that makes everyone feel better...

This plant made me feel better
all winter.

I've been doing a little Kamikaze clean-up - a fast rake here, a fast rake there.  I went out and raked up the chicken yard and, by the time I got back with the giant trug, the little buggers had completely undone my neat pile.  Lesson learned - have trug at the ready.

This year I have to completely redo my herb garden.  The edging boards are rotting, the fencing has been compromised by rabbits, and the voles have found it.  I am going to take the whole thing apart, temporarily move my perennials, replace or replenish the soil and enlarge it.  I am going to put up a sturdier fence this go-around, so that I can enjoy my parsley before the rabbits chew it to the ground.  I am also thinking of adding onto it and making a medicinal herb garden as well.  I might just get to sketching it out this year, but I like the idea of having useful herbs at hand.

Our forecast still calls for very chilly nights (drat), so there will be no planting yet.  I just received my fingerling seed potatoes (from California - what do they know of our non-spring??), so I need to get the potato bags out and set up.  Given the restraints of my garden and the fact that I can get 50# of very serviceable potatoes from a local farm for $9, I am only planting specialty types.  I left my cold frame open for the rain (free water) and will plant lettuce in it this weekend.  I need something green!