When I work in the garden I volunteer in, I can hear a Wood Thrush up in the trees, Canada Geese honking on their way to the river, the argumentative back and forth of the House Sparrows.
But nearest and loudest of all is the bubbling song of the House Wren, familiar to people everywhere.
Leave your watering can untouched for two weeks and these tiny squatters move in. Go to water your hanging fern and find wren babies inside.
The pair I see at the garden have a nest in the chimney pipe of the preserved old schoolhouse. I do not know if they are building a new nest or renovating an old one, or if there are already chicks in the nest of small twigs. Whatever they are doing, they do cheerfully, though there was an incident of sharp calls and alarm the other day as a foot long garter snake below rested on the gravel. I do not know if garter snakes can climb, but the wrens thought it a possibility
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The compact Weigela “My Monet” is blooming now. It is a handsome shrub for small spaces.
I chose this bun like dianthus for it spiky blue foliage, and not for its blooms. The color is a bit garish, but after the churlish, shivering New Hampshire spring all colors are welcome. It has joined purple toadflax, festuca, catnip ,lamb’s ears and santolina in the front of small rose bed. The center of the bed is a meagre headstone of the late “Mary” , who has no last name and is identified only as wife. How Mary and her headstone parted ways is a mystery.
Gardening On Granite 