UBER Dropplets!

Greetings Wild Indigo readers! The Celtic Gardens are greener than ever with the whopping 2"+ rainfall we've had this weekend so once again many thanks to mother Nature for her showers of blessings! Seriously, the rain barrels are once again full and the bird bath graciously held out its Celtic arms and is at maximum capacity. The bird bath is at the center piece of the Celtic Garden for a reason: its kinda like having a pool in one's back yard - all the neighbors want to come swim! Its an eye catching garden feature but also serves as a major water and bathing source for our feathery friends. Plus it provides beaucoup tweety bird entertainment! Speaking of tweety birds, a pair of yellow finches were recently sighted accompanied oddly enough by a female hummingbird. They enjoy grazing in the zinnia, drinking from the bouquets and feasting on seeds.  These beautiful yellow and black birds are familiar Celtic Garden friends and their return is an auspicious homecoming!  Hopefully I'll get a picture of them since they are so captivating.
  
While planning our gardens sometimes we achieve undesirable results. Recently the Celtic Gardens received a much needed mulching. As all gardeners know, mulching provides as both a weed barrier as well as moisture retention which in addition to its clean look is a win-win all around.  Research and choose wisely for the kind most suited for your Xeriscaping needs. As for me, I choose a compost mulch that biodegrades well for soil amendment. However prior proper planning should be utilized, specifically in regard to drainage. Mulch was applied to the new serpentine shade bed and wild indigo crescent bed. During the mulching madness application, drainage troubleshooting was discussed. But we went ahead with the plan.  Friday evening's thunder storms were a sure test. After scouting this area from the deck during the storm, flooding indeed ensued to include the entire area beyond the wild indigo bed, surrounding the Japanese Persimmon tree and flooding clean down to the garden gate. The torrent of rain streaming off the roof line took the usual run off path along the foundation under the deck into the garden and/or driveway but was greatly impeded - by a bunch of horse poop! So this week's task will be to install the suggested pea gravel along the roof line and spread the excess mulch to other areas after flooding necessitated the immediate manual removal during the storms. Yea we're still drying out!

Despite the live and learn mulching event a personal gardening victory has been achieved!  Up until this point the elusive lupine has escaped the Celtic Garden.  Many plants have been tried and much investment has been made into plants that failed to thrive. Various locals were tried throughout the garden but to no avail. Until this little number came into the picture.  May we present: Wild Lupine! Many thanks to LITFM for sharing seeds and as you can see successful germination has taken place! YIPEEEE!!

While not yet rated by the motion picture association upon review it may prove risque for I'm sure you'll agree the carpenter bee is having a field day to say the least getting his buzz on in the bee balm crack!

Now these Rudbeckia Hirta Green Eyes were featured in the last post but I simply couldn't help but include their happy shiny faces in this one either. 

  

Obviously this is a soap making photo bomb! Patchouli you are a free spirit, indeed!

Capping off this weeks blog is a series of sunset photos taken Sunday evening. I'll let Mother Nature speak for herself ~ no words necessary.  : )

 

 

And as always may happiness be a ray of sunshine in your mind, body and soul!


UPDATE: Project completed! With a quick jaunt over to the local Lowes pea gravel was procured. The unruly mulch was raked into other garden spots freeing up the run off path. Now that the gravel is down hopefully this will solve the issue.