We live in a magical place where nature delights us on a regular basis. It’s a non-stop show, but from time to time, Mother Nature simply outdoes herself.

Three male deer have deftly meandered into my immediate proximity three times this week. Finally, I was able to quietly get the correct camera lens on and click away without the noise spooking them. Standing at my kitchen sink, I watched as they nibbled on trees, eviscerated the strawberry plants that weren’t moved to the garden and sampled the perennial flowers in the beds. Confirmation endorphins for my silly ten foot posts I insisted on to keep them on the outside of the fortress garden fence. :-)

As I have previously shared, our kiwi failed to bloom this year. I attributed it to a late cold snap. Those thousands of tiny flowers just never opened. Having consoled myself over a week ago, “there’s always next year,” yesterday we made a remarkable discovery. The kiwi are now blooming. They simply had a delayed reaction. Or perhaps in the prior year they blossomed quite early? Whichever the case, we can expect a banner crop in September/October.

It appears we are going to have the best berry year yet. I have done recon and located four decent sized wild blackberry patches, more than enough for the both Teddy (our resident black bear) and us. In addition, the blueberry bushes (trees) are packed with more berries ripening than I knew could be produced from a few plants.

In another wonderful surprise, the irises have again divided and multiplied on their own. It seems the science of natural reproduction is not inhibited by my lack of knowledge or ability to care for certain flowers. And around the iris patch, next month’s day lilies are coming in with full gusto.

The garden is holding up quite well considering the extremely dry Spring we are having. My first ever bug problem in the garden has appeared along with my first ever potato crop. Google tells me they are flea beetles. Small black bugs on the leaves, they seem to only prefer potatoes and eggplants, as all other crops are unaffected. Some organic approved Neem Oil mixed with water seems to do the job. I’ve had to reapply it periodically.

The missing purple asparagus has sent its representative to peek out and get a lay of the land. The first stalk, late but healthy has appeared. Maybe they were talking to the kiwi and decided to rewrite their own timetable. Whatever the case, I am grateful to know they are strong enough to endure despite the directions that came with them. There is a lesson there I think.

To round out last week's excellent Spring program, Mother Nature has sent what I consider perfect temperatures. They are the days when the warm sunshine is drenching me, then a cloud comes by and for five minutes, it almost becomes chilly again with a breeze. Then the cloud passes by and the warm sun breaks out again. With the contrast I can appreciate its warmth all over again, as if it was the first time. Life in the real world… you can’t beat it!

Spring has most definitely sprung, although not quite as expected. As I have discussed with several gardening TIF-ers, the daytime temperatures are already much too hot for early May. The spring rains arrived as expected, but for several weeks now they have barely wet the surface of the ground. What we need is not windy bluster nor liquid sputter, but those early planting season all day soakings to kick off growing season. Sadly we’ve had none to date.

Defying nature’s early season threats, I have already planted many summer crops and resorted to extra mulch to help retain precious moisture. The mulch is organic shredded bark and was delivered by a local contractor via small dump truck for $120. There seems to be more than enough to use in both the garden and the flower beds around the house. With the garden soil principally consisting of dense rocky clay, the addition of the mulch should help to amend the growing environment for future years.

The fruit trees have begun production for later in the summer despite the lack of rain. The apple trees appear to have appreciated the good pruning they received last year and have exploded with what will be an abundance of applesauce, vintage 2015. However, similar to last year, a late frost appears to have stunted the flowering of the ornamental Bradford pear trees and our previously very productive kiwi plants. There is always next year, though that is what we said last year.

The blueberry bushes, which are actually more tree than bush, are now covered top to bottom in berry beginnings, having finished their flowering. When in bloom, the blueberry blossoms attracted every size, shape and color of bee in the neighborhood. Talk about bees in our bonnet. Last fall we cleared out competing brush and plants from around the blueberries and now they are rewarding us for our labor of love.

In between planting, feeding, watering, mulching and talking to the plants, I’ve grabbed Cog from his busy work to evaluate our upcoming projects. That’s code for, “I’m making him a new honey-do list.” Honey, I need you to do this and this and that. Nothing says I love you quite like a renewed wedding vow or a refreshed honey-do list. :-)

At the top of the honey-do list is the installation of the manual well pump. Shown below in the image of the new spider house… er, I mean mailbox which houses my small garden tools, behind it is a concrete cylinder which now encases the top of the well. Currently sitting in our basement and awaiting installation is a Simple Pump brand hand pump.

During an emergency this ultra modern stainless steel deep well mechanical pump will allow us to bypass the non-functioning electric well pump and hand pump water to the surface. Rather than being reduced to filling bucket after bucket with water at the well, the Simple Pump will utilize the existing water pipe heading into the house and fill the indoor pressurized water tank, allowing us to use the shower, flush the toilets and fill every sink in the house. Once the Simple Pump is installed, it will replace the cap on top of the well and the concrete cylinder will not be needed any more.

It is amazing how when the weather begins to turn balmy and beautiful, suddenly there are not enough hours in the day to tackle every chore needed and project planned. Happily this is a good ‘busy’, full of productivity and purpose. Full speed ahead and damn the dry weather, planting season has begun and we are even busier than those bees in our bonnet.

Above: The lilacs are just weeks away from blooming.

With apologies to California, it has been raining here for many days and our mountain has finally turned green. I am chomping at the bit for the ten day weather forecast to reach out as far as May 5, the magic “last day of frost” line in the sand for our unpredictable mountain climate. As soon as I have a handle on that I’ll know when the bulk of the summer garden can be planted.

Last year we had a hard frost in late April. The result was we had NO kiwi fruit as the blossoms did not survive, nor were there any lilacs. So far this spring things are looking up. Even the new lilac bushes that I propagated last year have buds waiting to delight. I’ve given a number of rousing pep talks to the kiwi trees and the team is ready to go for a prolific growing season.

We are busy with various projects now that the weather has warmed a bit. Cog has finished reinforcing the old wind fence that lines the north side of our garden fortress. Up here on the mountain, there is often a steady breeze, delightfully similar to the beach. But we also have 20 to 40mph sustained winds howling with weather fronts and storms that move through. It is a godsend the builder of this home thought to put the fence there to help protect the apple orchard.

Although the wind fence is getting old and leaning quite a bit here and there, we assessed it could last 2-5 more years with a little help. Cog reinforced the posts and added support to each on both sides. We filled in any holes where the bunnies had burrowed, which were our only known security breaches. It seems we are good to grow. :-)

Cog and I have added two new kiwi trees and more blueberries to the orchard inside the garden fence. Unfortunately it appears we have lost one of our veteran apple trees.

It’s turkey season for the hunters in our neck of the woods. I’m beginning to suspect there was a memo that went around alerting all those who communicate by gobbling that there are no hunters on the Cog property. The turkeys show up quite often these days and what a racket they make! I try to get in close with my camera, but usually I am left snapping images of their backsides. They are incredibly fast for two legged birds that don’t fly far.

Since posting the TIF article on Mustard last week  I see mustard everywhere. While spring turned our world green this week, since nothing has yet been mowed or cut, our backyard, as well as the neighboring properties, have turned bright yellow with flowers. Containing four petals with a small florette in the middle that looks like broccoli, it is clearly mustard. Indeed, gazing around at the wild onions, rampant dandelions and prolific mustard, I realized I was walking through a fresh salad. How many times in my life have I done this without ever knowing?

Over the past weeks I have been hard at work building a small rock wall to edge the beds around the house. Our mountain has abundant beautiful white stones so supply was not an issue, only my strength and stacking skills. After weeding and mulching the beds, the landscaping portion needs only flowers added and the majority of efforts can then turn towards the main garden area.

Speaking of the garden, the strawberry patch transplant from the area where they had previously multiplied has been a rousing success. Not a single plant failed to take and I’m getting a very happy vibe from that corner of the garden.

I think there is no better way to escape from both the programming of the mainstream messages and the stream of fear projected in much of the alternative media than to find inner peace and quiet in the garden. In there I can feel the magic I think all humans were meant to tap. Perhaps each of us have a magical muscle of balance and happiness lurking just under the surface, only needing to stretch from its atrophied state to help us be complete. Who would have thought I could find that among the bugs and dirt on a mountain out here in the middle of no where.  :-)