Springtime in the Mountains

Tried the other day to post to this blog, and the power went off in the middle of it. Nothing was saved. We were having a big snow storm, on April 2 no less. It snowed for about 36 hours, accumulating 18 inches before it was over. Our satellite dish filled up and we lost internet and television for a while. But today, well, today is simply gorgeous. The snow is almost completely gone. We have been up in the high 60s for two days.

This thin air is hard to work in, though. We spent all morning raking pine needles and the pile we have is about 4 feet high and 10 feet across. A neighbor with a trailer is coming tomorrow to haul the pile off somewhere. He has land down in the valley and uses pine needles to fill in holes. Anyway, we wore out really fast, much faster than we do when we're working down closer to sea level.

We broadcast grass seed last year and the seedlings that are coming up now were growing too spindly trying to push up through all those needles. And they tell us it's good fire prevention to get rid of the needles. These pine trees are as much trouble as the oaks were back in Texas. They house cute birds and squirrels though, and I love to sit outside and watch them.

A mountain bluebird has taken up residence in the new bluebird house I bought last year. My SO hung it up in the Fall and sure enough, we saw a bluebird flying in and out of it just before the snowstorm. I hope it's still there but I haven't seen it in the last couple of days. They're mountain bluebirds, after all, they must be used to cold weather.

There are several species that stick year-round. The white-breasted nuthatch, for one, and pygmy nuthatch. We have chickadees year-round, ravens, and Stellar's jays. Red-wing blackbirds don't leave for long, but when they do, they come back in flocks. Sometimes, when we sit on the deck, things get hectic with the birds chirping and flying by overhead. We've had several near-misses when we were sitting too close to the feeders. These mountain birds are hearty and pretty fearless. I had one land on my palm last year and take a black-oil sunflower seed right out of my hand.

I've got baby plants growing in my office inside those Jiffy greenhouse trays. The success rate so far has been really high. I have found from experience that good viable seeds are the real key. The packets you buy at WalMart or the hardware store just don't have the germination rate as the ones from the seed companies. This year I went with Johnny's Seeds. I like veggies from Burpee, but I haven't given vegetables much thought just yet. The last frost date here is May 20th so I've got a while to wait before I try planting any tomatoes.

Still learning about this mountain gardening. It's trial and error, but I'm trying.

Onward ....