Nature & gardening blogs

I've been enjoying reading other people's posts on their nature and gardening blogs. We share a community that wouldn't have been possible in immediate time in a pre-internet age.

I'm mindful, however, of the correspondence that keen naturalists and gardeners had via (very slow) posts that traveled by horseback, carriage, ship, and courier. Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Franklin, William and John Bartram, Asa Gray, Andre Michaux, Mark Catesby, John Jame Audubon, Lewis and Clark, among many others on this continent (North America), corresponded widely with fellow observers throughout the world, not to mention the VERY many others in Europe, Asia, Africa, Australia, and South America. And they all depended on much slower transmission of observations and thoughts.

But I''m grateful for the ability of the internet to connect us (in a much humbler way) in real time, with our observations of nature and experiences in our gardens.

Sassafras fruits

The sassafras trees in our garden are some of my favorites -- my gardening companion planted four of them early on. We've got healthy young trees now, both a male and female in the front and back. We found them at a regional nursery, now gone, that grew a lot of native plants.

Sassafras is a great native (eastern U.S.) tree with wonderful fall color, lovely spring flowers, and interesting leaf shapes. Only the female trees produce fruits, of course, but they're favorites of fruit-eating birds, and usually disappear quite rapidly. The tree near the satellite garden was loaded with dark purple fruit last weekend. Now, there's only one left.

Brown thrashers, robins, and evening

Spring evenings are lovely in the garden -- the songs and calls of birds as they settle in for the night accompany my puttering around checking plants, mulching, pulling the odd weed. It's often a magical time, when suddenly it's almost dark, or it's time to cook dinner. Yesterday, several hours vanished as I planted, dug, and tended.

The brown thrashers were busy protecting their nest; a fledgling, fully feathered, was on the ground, but the parents were protective and attentive. I had seen them yesterday up in the old redbud.

The nest must be in one of the Viburnums or maybe in the butterfly bush. They were watchful again this evening, so hopefully the fledgling on the ground is under cover.

Early this morning, on a rain-drenched (and shortened) birding excursion, we watched a pair of robins doing their courtship ritual, a remarkable display. We also heard song sparrows and saw them foraging for seeds in the lawn.

A nice way to spend the beginning and end of the day.