Fresh Veggies, Pickling and Pictures

Chickens, Cucumbers, Flowers, garden, garlic, Hibiscus, Nature, Oregano, Peppers, Pickles, Recipe, Reflections, Roses, Summer, Swiss Chard, Tomatoes, Wild Flowers, , , ,

Summer is in full swing and the gardens are producing. We have been including home grown veggies in our meals nearly daily. So far, we have enjoyed beets, Swiss chard, banana peppers, cucumbers and cherry tomatoes, and of course garlic.

Check out this post for my recipe for banana pepper poppers.

This week I have also started making pickles. I have two quarts of refrigerator dill pickles chillin’ in the fridge and Wednesday I canned 7 pints of pickled beets. I’m excited about having pickled beets because it has been several years since we have grown enough beets for me to pickle them. we usually eat them all fresh.

Guarding the Pond

For a couple of weeks we were having ducks visit our pond and a daily basis. Ruby would chase them off, but they kept returning. We generally embrace nature, but we don’t want ducks or geese in our pond or on our beach as they can introduce bacteria and parasites that could be harmful to those of us enjoy swimming in the pond. After a couple of weeks of this repeat behavior my husband decided Ruby needed some support. He brought out our Guard Owl and stationed it on the beach. We have not seen the ducks since the owl had been in place and as a bonus the chickens stay off the beach as well.

Our green heron has returned. (Can you see it off to the right in the above photo?) It doesn’t seem to be bothered by the owl.

Here is a closer but a bit blurry photo of the green heron.

The chickens still like to forage around the edges of the pond.

What’s Blooming?

Rose of Sharon

Anise Hyssop

Oregano

Hibiscus

Roses

Hostas

In the Garden

Corn and Sunflowers

Beets and Swiss chard with Green beans in the background

Tomatoes

Squash and Pumpkins

A volunteer sunflower popped up in the squash bed.

Wild Flowers

Mountain Mint and Echinacea

Echinacea hiding behind Timothy

Rudbeckia Laciniata (a type of cone flower)

Purple Loosestrife and Mountain Mint

Queen Anne’s Lace

Queen Anne’s Lace and Milk Weed (I’m not sure what variety of milkweed.)

Purple Loosestrife

As I stood by the wildflower patch a noticed two swallowtail butterflies dancing by. They were so beautiful. I pointed my camera in their direction and clicked a few pictures. They are barely visible in the above photo.

The beauty in digital photography is that I was able to crop the photo so we can see both butterflies.

Thanks for visiting.

29 thoughts on “Fresh Veggies, Pickling and Pictures”

  1. Hi Ruth – I will be over to my blog in a minute to thank you for your nice comment, but I wanted to share something here first. I am having a lot of trouble with my internet connection – you’ll see why in a minute and I just got a new modem and all new wiring on September 3rd – the squirrels chewed through the wires and water got in. Although I don’t say in my blog where I live, I live a block away from the tornado that passed through Lincoln Park on September 3rd, two weeks ago today. I felt and still feel blessed that there was no damage to my house.

    Unbelievably though, four days later I went in the backyard with the generator tech for the generator’s yearly tuneup and saw a 10-foot long limb jammed in between my 60-year-old large firebushes. I didn’t see it because I only looked at the house for damage and was relieved, picked up some debris and went into the house.

    I called the guy I use for gutter cleaning and he did a big load of mulch last year and he could not get here right away as he had truck/trailer issues. The top of the branches are stuck in the utility wires (DTE said it was not their issue – I had them come out and check). The homeowners have done nothing to remove them. The limb comes from a very huge dead tree in their yard. I looked carefully at the limb, as there is no bark and there are beetle trails and holes. I’ve never seen, nor spoken to the homeowners. The landscaper has a tree service he works with … he said the tree is $7,000.00 to take down to the ground as its diseased and they need a crane as the tree cutters can’t climb onto it. I thought about $2,000.00. I am scared to death it will fall on my house. I contacted the City and sent them an extensive e-mail and said “the last time a dead tree branch fell on the wire, the power lines fell and we had a huge fire … it burned my two trees, most of my back garden and side garden, the man behind’s garage and stockade fence and that was two doors away at 11:30 p.m. – I was sleeping. I’m afraid the tree will fall over.” I sent six pictures, a long e-mail and left a voicemail. They responded Tuesday and said “we’ll send someone over this week to look at your damage and the dead tree.” I’ve not moved from the kitchen all week – no ordinance officer yet. I hope they didn’t come and not ask to speak to me since I sent the documentation. I hope he/she comes tomorrow. This tree will demolish my small home if it topples over.

    I probably will write about this at year-end, if it is resolved but not give details about exactly where, but I wanted you to know.

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      1. Thank you Ruth – I appreciate your prayers. I’ve been saying more prayers than usual myself especially every time we have severe weather. I hope this can over with very soon. I had already been worrying about it before the limb fell because when the guy cleaned the gutters this last time he said “well there won’t be as many leaves in your back gutters now that the tree is dead, but it’s pretty big and I’d worry about that tree if I were you.” They have two more trees in their yard, but so far they appear to be healthy.

        Go Lions! (It may not happen tonight because of the Bills’ new stadium and them wanting to christen it with a win.)

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      6. Hi Ruth – I wanted to follow up with you and tell you that I heard from the City today … well kind of, I had to contact them. I have sat here in the kitchen, not moving for four days and the electrician from Flame Furnace called as he wanted to come by and measure for the new all-house surge suppressor … my old one is 14 years old. So, I contacted the compliance officer I’ve been dealing with and told her I had been sitting here, listening, I didn’t want to miss the person when they came to the house, but I had to deal with the electrician, so could they call me or knock on the door. I learned they were here Wednesday and this is what she said: “He put the house on notice about the tree and limb and will re-check in November. If they do not comply, we will issue a ticket.” It could take a while then. But at least they see the problem and hopefully I do not have to pay for it. I did not have the gutter guy come for the limb. I hope we don’t have any bad winds or ice until the tree comes down.

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      7. Well at least the city has taken action. I hope that limb doesn’t cause you any problems before they can get it taken care of.
        As for the game, sadly, it really wasn’t worth staying up that late to watch. (I’m usually in bed by 9:00.) Thankfully most of their games are earlier in the day.

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      8. Yes, I am happy the City took action Ruth, but hopefully the homeowners deal with it before much longer, especially before any ice storms. I am worried about too much rain making the ground soggy tomorrow so hopefully strong winds aren’t happening in the near future as well. At least the damaged limb gave us insight into just how bad the tree was.

        I know I always regret when I stay up late and have to get up early … it is just not like it used to be when we were younger and had a lot more energy. 🙂

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  4. Everything is doing so well . The pictures are beautiful. Refrigerator pickles sound good, it has been years since I have made them. Boxes of canning tomatoes are available at the markets right now. Since we didn’t garden this year , I picked up three boxes when we went to town on Wednesday. Guess what I am doing this weekend 🍅

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  7. All that heat is sure benefitting your gardens Ruth, whether it’s produce or flowers. Now you’re going to get some help from Mother Nature with all this rain we’re going to be getting over the next week. I’m glad the fake owl keeps the ducks and chickens away – your chickens will find another place to stroll around. I remember your green heron from last year – he likes your pond! The butterflies are beautiful. I have not seen a lot of butterflies this year, but I saw two species I’ve not seen before last week at Lake Erie Metropark. Did you see the stats here in Michigan on the cyclospora outbreak – over 10,000 as of today … no worries for you by growing your own veggies.

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    1. We sure are hoping for some rain but what they keep changing the forecast. They were calling for an inch tomorrow but now a quarter of an inch.
      The owl is doing a great job. It was a great investment. That heron assuming it’s the same one, has been coming every summer since 2017.
      I think we are seeing fewer butterflies than we usually do but we still have some around. Could you tell what they were in the second (cropped) photo?
      I didn’t realize the numbers were that high. Yikes!

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      1. I read/heard that we might get the worst of it, but we have nothing as of now (5:00 p.m.) I would say those butterflies are Eastern Tiger Swallowtails from their markings. Last week I mentioned I saw two, new-to-me butterflies. One was an Eyed Brown (a bit tattered) and one was a Giant Swallowtail. I thought it was a bird as it was so animated dipping in/out of the trees and bushes at Lake Erie Metropark. When it finally settled down, I got a shot of it and it was huge.

        I listen to WWJ AM Radio 950 and every day they give an update … last I heard was 10,200 … very scary and we remain the worst state with the outbreak.

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      2. Well, we did get rain but no flooding so that is good. Yes, I do think they were swallowtails. I just wasn’t sure how clear they were to people in the picture. I know not everyone sees things the same. I’m glad you could make them out. How exciting to see ones you’ve never seen before!

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      3. That’s good with no flooding – you don’t need to lose any of the garden veggies you have spent so much time planting and nurturing, nor your flower gardens. We did not have torrential rain here as they said we would, just a continuous gentle rain until about 3:00 p.m., but there is more rain from Wednesday on, so that will be beneficial to gardens and grass. Yes, I was sure they were Tiger Swallowtails. I will use the two new butterflies in Wordless Wednesday posts later. I have a Tiger Swallowtail butterfly on a Coneflower for this Wednesday. I am six weeks ahead on my posts … it’s a nice feeling, so hopefully I can get out a lot in August, if Mother Nature cooperates.

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