One Smart Mama!

  Back behind the house near the canebrake, we have a dozen or so citrus trees.  In this small grove, there are two trees that were (at one time) lime trees.  One winter the icy weather froze the two lime trees and they died back to the ground.  I wanted to remove the dead trees but Son insisted that we "give them time".  The man has the patience of a saint and believes in giving everything time to thrive.  I begrudgingly agreed to leave the trees for three months but then, if they showed no signs of life, they were to be removed.  He was right.  The trees both came out from the roots and flourished but, instead of limes, they produced a weird fruit that seemed to be a cross between a lime and a lemon.  I had no problem with that as I like both.  The trees are now approximately ten feet in height and doing well but....they now have thorns...huge thorns...which brings me to the whole point of this story.

  Last week, while out trimming around the trees, I noticed that a pair of cardinals were busy nest-building in the lemon/lime tree.  The birds did not seem to mind me clearing the area so I continued my work and they snatched bits and pieces of twigs from my trash.   Now, Mama Cardinal is setting on her eggs in the beautifully made nest. Mama Cardinal is smart.  She usually nests in the Boysenberry vines but since they are sparse this year, she chose the thorny branches of this tree.  She is safe from most predators because of her choice of nesting sites.  Not many predatory mammals are going to risk being torn to shreds by the many long thorns.  With the thatching of thorns above her, it would be quite unusual for a hawk or crow to attempt raiding the nest.  The only predator that Mama Cardinal has to fear would be a snake.  Just like Mama, a snake could find its way between the thorns and make a raid on the eggs.  Papa Cardinal stays nearby and is always ready to defend his ladylove so, hopefully, this smart mama will be able to raise her little ones safely. 

 

Sticky business..

Oh, my! I told you that yesterday I tried poking all of the blackberry vines back onto the fence line. That was a very, very scratchy job! But then, today, it did not get much better. The blackberry vines came back into play. Not the ones that I worked with yesterday, but some new "runners" that came up everywhere. They were all over the squash garden and that would just not do. I do not desire to get poked every time that I want to eat squash..squash don't have thorns! These runners are what are planted to start a new patch of blackberries and I hated to waste them. There are already three rows of the plants in the garden so I put out word that if any of my neighbors wanted a few, they were welcome to come get some. Several people responded so I was out early this morning digging the vines. Well, actually, Son was digging..I was pulling. Just from the squash garden, we dug out forty-seven vines! I know that in a few weeks there will be just as many to remove, but it is getting awfully late to move them. After we finished digging, I tied the vines in bundles of ten with jute string and stuck them all in a bucket of water to await their new owners. One came...the others...I have not heard anything from them. Hopefully, they will come tomorrow. (Thank you, Becky, for being prompt!) If the vines are not claimed by this weekend, I suppose there will be four fence lines of blackberries in the garden!

The next job..pick all the remaining grapefruit and kumquats. Yes..there were still some on the trees since I grew tired of picking several months ago. If you recall in earlier posts, I mentioned that both the grapefruit and the kumquat trees have thorns..huge thorns! More scratches! As if this was not enough..I came up with the bright idea that a few of the new growths on the kumquat trees needed to be trimmed. Son grabbed the snips and started cutting. One of the new limbs had started growing at the very bottom of the tree and was sort of woven in between the older limbs. We had no idea just how long this limb was until he pulled it completely from the tree. It was over eight feet long! Eight feet of needle sharp thorns! To give you an idea of the wickedness of these thorns..each was about three inches long! Not something you really want to encounter on any occasion! With the recent armed robberies and home invasions in the area, Son made the comment that it might be prudent to plant kumquat trees around the house! A natural security system! Hmmm...this could work!

Then one last sticky, pokey job was accomplished before quitting time. The climbing cluster rose was retrained onto the arbor. This is the Seven Sisters rose that was planted several years ago and has completely engulfed the rose garden fence. The picture below shows just how full it was last year so you can just imagine what I am fighting this Spring! In a few weeks, though, it will all be worth the effort! Hubby and Son built two arbors over the gateways to the rose garden last summer, so now the rose canes needed to be intertwined to encourage growth in that direction. The only problem I had with this job was that the roses had enmeshed with the Confederate Jasmine making one big tangled mess. To top it all off? A wisteria has joined forces with the other two making it almost impossible tell where one ends and the other begins with the exception of the ...thorns! After all of this..I will probably dream that I am sleeping on a bed of nails like some fakir or something!