It's a rainy but warm day at the farmette. The huge storm that blew through southern Ontario missed us yesterday.
The destruction down there was pretty daunting - four people were killed. Lots of downed trees and power lines, and the Hydro spokesperson said it could be days before electricity is restored in some areas. Yikes. Hoping all the friends and family stayed safe through it all.
Here, we just got enough rain to nourish the newly planted beds and gardens. Our trees are pretty spectacular just now, so I thought I'd trot them out.
This is our red bud. It was a single stick when I transplanted it ten years ago from our house in Guelph where our red bud was the centre piece of our extra outdoor room. With its massive leaves, it gave shade to the whole yard during hot summer days. I put it in pride of place - right in the middle of our sight line from the sun room. This is the first year it has really put on a full display of blooms. Nice, eh?
About six or seven years ago, I decided to fill the west yard in with a grove of poplars. Again, I started with 10 rooted sticks we picked up from the local conservation authority sale. Now, look at the tallest one! It's about 25 feet tall and still growing. Further south is the veggie garden, then a line of older spruce trees that look like a rearguard of sentinels keeping watch over the farmette.
I can't remember if it was the same year, or maybe the next one, but we bought this paper birch around the same time as the poplars. Talk about slow growing! Barely two feet tall.
To be fair, this one has been munched on a few times by the damn rabbits, so it's actually a bit of a miracle that it survived.
Our three crabapple trees are around three or four years old. Got them from the Co-op in town.
They, like the red bud, are finally coming into their own with a gorgeous display of rich colour.
Originally from Kazakhstan, the crabapple is associated with love and marriage in Celtic mythology and even symbolizes youth, joy and surprise.
Well, I'm glad we have some in our front yard to brighten up the farmette and the neighbourhood.
Finally, the tulip tree survived another winter. I'm always a bit anxious for this guy, whose natural habitat is the Carolinian forest - way further south than the wilds of Grey County.
In the early days, I used to bundle him up with burlap, but he's over ten feet tall now, so can't really do that any more. He's in a fairly sheltered spot on the west side of the house, surrounded by maples and the big Group of Seven white pine tree.
Anyway, I love the strangely shaped leaves of this guy and hope he sticks around for a while.
So that's the tour for this week. The rain is supposed to be letting up around noon, and I can't wait to get back outside. Until next week.
Gratuitous photo of a cat courtesy of Fred...who was carefully watching me out the west window a couple of weeks ago.
