Thursday in the Garden

Today's Thursday in the Garden is brought to you by the color PINK!

::meowww:: 

 The azaleas in the back yard...

 The Peony in the front yard.  On this day, it had taken quite a beating from the heavy rains we were having. 

 Closeup of an almost open bloom...

 The knock-out rose bush by the front porch.  This is not the one with the baby bird in it...

Finally, one of the Gerbera Daisy's that have made an appearance.

To see more lovely gardens head over to Master Gardener Jonesie's site...

Visitor in the Garden

It's been a while since we've done a garden post, but things have been happening!  One day, we'll have mom get out there with the flashy box and show you.  Today though, we'll settle for a shot from inside at our visitor.  This is Buddy the squirrel.  He comes most everyday and enjoys eating from our bird feeders.  For some reason, eating upside down is preferred...maybe this helps him stay trim.  We should have Tanner try that out!

We hope you've enjoyed our visitor...

Thursday in the Garden

Today, Tanner will show us around the garden...we have had a few nice days and the boys have been able to get outside for short bits...highly supervised of course.

 Tanner beside the pole for some of the bird feeders...poor sad hydrangea is looking rough this winter...it will perk up when then weather turns warm.  Even the grass has turned brown...

Tanner beside another bird feeder pole, and another dried up, dead looking plant...hoping this one will come back in the spring too.

At least one plant is still living...Tanner was very excited about this...fresh Nip! It is important to keep it well pruned...Tanner demonstrates his technique for you all...Watch and learn!

Christmas Garden

 This is the tree in the living room...where we all spend most of our time.  Our Chalet is tucked next to it, and we love to lay on the presents underneath the tree.  Some of the packages are quite squishy, like a blanket or something...

 This is the tree in the study...Smokey's tent is behind here...he enjoys laying  in the forest. 

 In the Christmas Garden, you'll find many animals...like this orange cat...looks a bit like Tanner!

 Black cats...this one is round on the bottom, sort of like Devon.

 Crabs...our mom loves blue crabs and can't get enough of them when she's at the coast!

 Pretty red birds...

 Even some birds wearing sweaters!

 A long skinny black cat...this could be Smokey

 Tanner's weight loss inspiration...a skinny orange cat :)  Maybe we'll attach him to the cabinet in front of his food bowls for the new year!

And finally a peacock showing off her feathers in green, blue and purple...

We hope you enjoyed a look at the Christmas Garden this year...

Thursday in the Garden

Today we are back in the garden...this time at mom and Auntie's family home...enjoy!

 ::Meowwww::

 

 Thanksgiving day was beautiful in the foothills of North Carolina.  The ground was covered in leaves and pecans!  Auntie is driving the tractor over to one of the trees to give it a good shake.

 Before the shaking begins though, the leaves need to be raked and the pecans on the ground already picked up.  Mom and Aunties parents, L and M, are working hard...

 This is one of their dogs...Samson. He is a treeing feist.

 L is shaking the tree now...you would not believe how many pecans fell off!  They were everywhere!

 In the end, we had 5, 5 gallon buckets full of pecans....and more trees to collect from.  Thankfully the sun was going down, so we didn't have to pick up any more :)

 Here's Auntie raking more leaves...

 L is picking them up to put on the truck...he's going to take them to the blueberry bushes as compost.

Just a cute shot of a calf with it's mom...aaaawwwww.

Check out more fantastic gardens over at Jonsie's place.

Visitor in the Garden

We interupt our regularly scheduled gardening blog to ask you all to send purrs to our friend Derry at Fuzzy Tails.  He is spending the day at the vet and would appreciate calming and healing purrs sent his way.

Now back to the regular program...

::meowwww::

Today we bring you a visitor in the garden.

This little fella has been visiting our yard all summer.  He loves the sunflower seeds we have out for the birds, and can just about clean out the feeders each night.  Auntie is calling him a pig, but we believe he is a raccoon!

Have you had any special visitors to your garden this year?

For more fabulous gardens check out the Society of Feline Gardeners at Master Jonesie's place.

Thursday in the Garden

Today, we are back at the farm stand we found in Minnesota.  Donna had many chickens roaming around and we wanted to share them with you all...

 This is Big Red.  He is a beautiful rooster and he knows it.  He strutted around for us and wanted his picture taken.  The ladies that worked at the farm stand, said the girl chickens didn't much care for him, or his attitude.

 This rooster is the favorite.  He isn't very attractive, but he has a good personality.  The girls have plucked him, but he didn't seem to mind.

 Here is a mom with her babies...the ladies that worked there brought out some fresh corn so we could watch the chickens eat, and so the babies would come out.

This chicken was a bit crazy sitting on this chair!

We can read more about Donna and her farm here.

You can also visit more wonderful cat gardeners at Jonesie's place.

Thursday in a Garden

This week, we are letting mom show you some pictures from her recent trip to Minnesota. She, Auntie and a friend spent a week just driving around and seeing what they could find. This was a fun place for them, and we'll let mom tell you about it now...
Thank you boys for letting me take over today, and again I'm really sorry for not even getting the 'flats' out of the bag while on vacation! This roadside farm stand and homestead were a wonderful find for us. We passed by and turned around to go back...we are so glad we did!

The owner of this place is a lady named Donna. She is in her seventys and is a spry and spunky lady! Owning a farm had always been a dream of hers, and she is making is happen!

We walked around the yard and loved all the bright flowers we found...these purple ones are just gorgeous!

I don't know what these are called, but they are unique with a lovely color...

This is the house Donna lives in...There are fields with soy beans planted this year, next year they will be corn. There are chickens and a large vegetable garden too...I'll post more about this lovely place next week! Stay tuned...

To see more gardens, check out the Society of Feline Gardeners.

Thursday in the Garden

:: 3 paw taps ::

Today in the garden we will be looking at my favorite flowers the gerbera daisy.
We have several in our garden out front...Aunties favorite color is the pink...they are very vibrant and add a nice pop of color in the flower bed.
We both like the yellow ones too...we have a lot of purple and yellow flowers in our garden...

This year, our neighbor gave us one of my favorite colors...an orange one! I love the brightness and the earthiness of this color.

Well, that's our garden...please check out more fabulous flowers at the Society of Feline Gardeners.

PS - We spotted our bird visitor from last week again this morning. We will be on the lookout and hunt once again to try and catch him.

A Visitor in the Garden

::3 paw taps::

Today in our garden post, we wanted to show you the visitor we had last Sunday. Mom and Auntie were eating lunch, of course we were helping, and they noticed this on the bird feeders outside...
He is a Quaker Parrot. (They learned this later on) We knew immediately what type of fevver it was, but enjoyed watching them try to figure it out.
He sat and ate for a long time. Mom and Auntie decided they should try and catch him, because he is not native, and someone may have lost him. A trip to the Lowes and a phone call to Petsmart later and they were ready to try...
They sat outside and waited...he came back time and time again, but they were too slow. Beans are not as well equipped for catching fevvers are us cats...they would not let us out though!
They tried for about three hours, with no luck. He finally stopped coming by the feeders...
They are still on the lookout for the magnificant creature...and hope to get him one day soon. What sort of interesting visitors have you had lately?

For more great garden posts, visit Jonesie and the Society of Feline Gardeners.

Mom here: We called the vets in the area, checked craigslist, called the wildlife rescue, shelter, etc...to see if anyone had reported a lost bird. No one had. There's no telling how long he has been out, or where he could have come from. I still hope we can snag him...and then find him a nice home.