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Monday, June 09, 2008

The best laid mulch

I don't know whether mulch, like plans, can "Gang aft a-gley," but if it can, I have a good idea what it might look like.

Yesterday morning I did some weeding in my little herb bed, then laid down some newspaper and covered it with a nice layer of mulch. Once finished, I admired the results: a pristine, weedless area with clumps of herbs and flowers emerging from a layer of pine straw.

Yesterday evening, I let Sam and Monique out for their evening walk-about. Sam was not in a good mood--he came out of the run full of himself, making menacing noises and strutting about like a rooster, which of course, can only be expected. He began running at me with his wing down, but seeing that I was in control of a broom to swat at him and not to be intimidated by his antics, he soon lost interest and began pecking and kicking furiously at the grass outside the run. Finding that surface hard and unyielding and a little too much work, he then headed straight for my nice little herb patch and began to wreak havoc with the mulch. By the time he had vented whatever anger he felt, my herb patch was a disaster, the tidy mulch replaced by exposed newspaper, bare patches of ground and pine straw scattered to the four winds. It is not, as you can see from this small section, a pretty sight. If that's not bad enough, an entire clump of thyme has gone missing.

Sam also decided that there was absolutely no need for me to know which pepper plants were which, and scratched all the pepper plant markers out of the ground. So aside from torn newpaper and scattered pine straw, the ground is also riddled with popsicle stick plant markers. The last laugh is on him, though, because while they all look pretty similar right now, I'm pretty sure that at some point in the plant cycle, I'll be able to tell a bell pepper from a cayenne pepper from a jalapeno, etc.

I gave some thought to straightening it all up today, but had some errands to run this morning. Now that I'm home, one look at the thermometer on the deck has convinced me that it can wait another day or so:




2 comments:

Rurality said...

But... is it going to change? Will we ever see rain again? Grief and pain!

At least with Sam around, you'll never be bored.

Unknown said...

I think we got spoiled by the spring rains this year. Rain IS in the forecast for later this week, though. Probably just enough to make steam....Seems that Ma Nature has lost all sense of moderation this year, going from one extreme to another.
You know, I wouldn't mind being bored every once in a while....