A Visitor

Thunderstorms today. Love to watch the sheep file into the barn when the rain starts. Who says sheep are dumb?



I'm making "tuna fudge" treats for the dogs today. Odd name, tuna fudge. It's simply a can of salmon (or tuna), ¾ cup flour, one egg, and a ~ quarter cup grated cheese blended to a fine paste and baked in a silicone mat (picture). I flip it over, spread the salmon paste into the tiny hollow cups and bake at 350 for 20 minutes. The pyramid shaped treats pop right out. They're the perfect size for training and the dogs love them.



The Visitor

Tux alerted to a scat in the back yard that looked like coyote. It was definitely not hers or Hattie's, but it was inside the four foot fence near the garden. During the gale force winds last week something caused the lights around the barn to turn on late at night and when Bob checked, found the sheep pretty freaked out. He didn't see anything and thought it might have been the wind blowing things around but now I'm wondering if it was a coyote. The ducks are safe in their house, but a smart coyote might figure out how to get into the sheep pen. I'll have to hope the lights are enough deterrence.

Time for Irises

 A foggy, cool morning for taking pictures of flowers. First three pics show Tag and Hoop's garden.

"Red" irises and a true red peony in the red garden. The dahlias didn't survive the cold, wet winter. I planted three more but they'll be the last. I'm thinking of replacing them with Itoh peonies that should be strong enough to withstand the crazy winds that rip through here.

This yellow rose is pretty but the plant really needs chemical intervention to look it's best. It seems to be susceptible to everything bad for roses. I'm not into spraying and would rather pull the plant if it needs much attention. I noticed stippling on some of the roses this morning and sure enough, there are little white buggies (aphids, maybe?) on the undersides of the leaves. Mildew is showing on others. Sigh. I tried to buy disease resistant varieties and am pretty disappointed with this.

An interesting giant allium the previous owner planted....

The lovely pink Pieris leaves have transitioned to this washed out phase before turning varigated green/white, and once again this tip burning is showing up. The plants only get morning and evening light so I find it hard to believe it's sun scald. The soil is moist but drains well. What else could cause this? Very disappointing.

Good news for Tux! We cut the Valley Fever meds down to once a day and check titer again in three months to see if she's stable. The vet has been worried about liver damage from being on a high dose of Fluconazole for so many years, but so far so good. 

Tux's Cocci

The old girl had her best cocci titer results to date. She's down to 1:8. This is a measure of the antibodies against the Valley Fever fungus. A higher number indicates more severe disease.

The last titer taken in Arizona was unusually high at 1:32. She had been holding steady at 1:16 for a year or more and I thought it would get no lower, so this latest result is a pleasant surprise. She's come a long way from having a titer greater than 1:256 at her diagnosis in 2013 and nearly dying six months later.

What a challenge she's been from the beginning, but we love her all the more for it.

Tux

Growing fast

Sunny days are here again and the plants are digging it. The roses in front of the house are huge. I am always amazed that the spindly little sticks I plant become so big so fast. These are full of buds that will be opening soon.



The Tag and Hoop memorial garden is lush. This rosa rugosa was first to bloom, purple alliums float above it, and blue irises are forming nice buds on tall stems in the background. Hattie is in the shade on the left.



First iris of the season. This is considered red but looks purple with an orange beard to me. Beautiful whatever you want to call it.



The greenhouse below. Bob's hot peppers are in the ground (left front) and tomatoes are flowering already. We ate the first kohlrabi yesterday and have been harvesting salad greens from the outdoor bed for a couple of weeks.



The sheep are lounging in the sun while the ducks are running around under the sprinklers. I have another black eye so I'm keeping a low profile at home. Got hit by a chunk of wood while weed whacking. It flew under my glasses and hit my lower eyelid. I guess it's better to get a black eye than to break expensive prescription glasses, but seems like I've been taking a real beating lately.

Around the yard

Here are a few pictures I was able to take during a break in the clouds. We've had so much rain I'm beginning to wonder what happened to our famous blue hole.

Bees have been scarce this spring. I found this one clinging to a crabapple flower in the wind.



The boys take to their barn when it rains - our fair weather sheep.



Tux is still with us and doing well. She goes to the vet for blood work tomorrow to check on liver function and cocci titer. Poor thing is still taking medication for Valley Fever, hard on the liver. She's a tough old girl.



The tomatoes are growing well so far in their soil bags. I have to be careful not to overwater even with the drain holes poked in the bottom and sides of the bags.



We'll be eating kohlrabi soon.



A mix of things in an outdoor bed, growing much more slowly than the greenhouse veggies.



Cool weather greens doing well in this bed. We put hardware cloth around it to keep out rats. Last summer they destroyed the garden. That chard survived the winter.

 

I think I overdid the garlic this year. Will have to share with the neighbors.



Here are the duck girls loving their little pool. They like this one more than the bigger pool we put out last year so that one went to the dump. This is a safe spot in the raspberries for the ducks to relax.



This is a porcelain canister I've been working on. More interesting are the little sea stars on the window sill behind it. We found them dead on the beach last week.

A New Danger

Cougars! There are eight known to be living in the lowlands between Dungeness Creek in Sequim and Morse Creek in Port Angeles. We are right in the middle. Word is a young cougar attacked a lamb recently so I am concerned about my boys. The lamb survived. I haven't seen news of a cougar being killed, so it must have gotten away. Details about the attack were sketchy. There was a sign about cougar sightings at Robin Hill Park last summer, about a mile south of us.

 In less dire happenings, there were blackbirds walking the sheep's backs today and the herding is going well. While the sheep stomp and move away if Hattie approaches their pen, Tux can get nose to nose with some of them. They are real characters. I had no idea sheep have so much personality. An elderly couple that live nearby were telling us about all the animals they used to have and said sheep were their least favorite because they were so standoffish, but our guys come running for scratches and treats.  

Here are Sapphire and Amber hunting in the flower beds. We have rain again today. Veggies are growing nicely. We're eating lots of salad greens. Too bad they are gone when the tomatoes come in.

Gardening

Our odd winter weather proved too much for the artichokes. None of them have come back so we're going to dig out the old plants and try again. Seems to have happened to quite a few people so I don't feel like I did something stupid to lose them. The asparagus took a bit of a hit as well. We're not going to harvest any and see if they will do better next year. On a positive note, I'm already harvesting greens. 

The Pieris japonica looks much improved. The leaf tips looked scorched last summer and I was thinking about pulling them, but they are covered with new growth this year so I'm hoping they'll survive.

My lone purple trillium is blooming!

The epimedium is doing so well in the shade garden that I added three new plants with purple and orange flowers between four new hellebores. This one has yellow flowers. Love the reddish heart shaped leaves.

Beautiful tulips. I forgot to get a picture of the pink ones that just bloomed. They are my new favorites.

It's a warm and humid 72℉ today and the sheep have settled into the shade of a blue spruce. This is Gimpy, the first to have hoof trouble. He has become a love sponge and can't get enough neck, shoulder and back rubs.

This is Boots on the left, the dark one is Mocha, and I'm not sure who is in front. Either Stomper or 87. I work them with Hattie a few minutes every day and they've settled down a lot. Hoof troubles are over for now. That's it for my update. The days are flying by.