It doesn’t take a lot to entertain this backyard gardener. Give me a bowl of crispy leaf lettuce, a big dollop of mayonnaise and a saltshaker, and I’m in high cotton. In fact, one of the great joys in having a backyard garden is to be able to walk among the vegetables on a spring evening– right before dinner – pick a couple handfuls of leaf lettuce or other fresh veggies and … [Read more...]

Most of my backyard birds are year round residents, but a few show up in spring and depart in the fall. Catbirds, like hummingbirds, are among those species. For the past several years, a pair of catbirds has nested in a hedge behind our house. Earlier this week, I saw one of the catbirds return to the yard and feeder. They are really quite interesting. Some confuse catbirds with cowbirds. They … [Read more...]

It looks like my bluebird friends will nest elsewhere this spring, but I was delighted to see that a pair of chickadees has moved into the bluebird house on the fence. I was smoking a cigar and reading my Sports Illustrated out in the back yard yesterday afternoon and caught a glimpse of just the blur of something entering the bluebird house. I watched intently for a full 10 minutes before she … [Read more...]

(Intro: More and more folks, even those in urban areas, are raising chickens. The difference between a fresh and a store bought egg is night and day. Plus, they’re fun to have around. Here are some notes from Sherman Shifflett, a regular CvilleBuzz contributor, about his experiences raising chickens.   By Sherman Shifflett   Except when I was in college and in the Army … [Read more...]

Want to know what love sounds like? Open the windows, close your eyes and listen. Birds. You’ll hear lots of birds calling to one another, seeking a mate. Robins are chattering, doves are cooing, finches are chirping and bluebirds make that chur-lee chur chur-lee call. One bird in our backyard that I wish would sing more is our Red-bellied Woodpecker. Instead of chirping to find his mate, … [Read more...]

I’m an amateur birder, and as such, I suppose I should love all birds. Unfortunately, I don’t. Grackles. I despise them, and right now, my back yard and bird feeders are under attack. Grackles are among the largest of the blackbird family. They are not attractive birds, they have an irritating song (if you’d call it that), they hang in huge flocks and they eat everything in sight. When the … [Read more...]

When my son was a little boy, his name for Woody Woodpecker, the cartoon character, was Woody Pecker. Funny, but when one of our children misnamed something like that, it stuck. Grits, today, are “grips”, a la my youngest, Laura, and biscuits are “bisticks, as my oldest, Angelin, said as a child. So when we see a woodpecker in the backyard or at the feeder, it’s a woody pecker. I believe my … [Read more...]

I’m preparing for the coming garden season. I’m ordering seeds, testing the soil, planning my early and late plantings and mending fences. Mending fences? Yep, that’s the only way I have been able to salvage some of the fruits of my labor. Deer, you know. Back yard gardeners, you see, have a deer problem. More than drought, more than a late cold snap, more than a swarm of locusts, deer … [Read more...]

My fellow backyard gardener, Bill Hitt, orders seeds from multiple catalogues. As a result, he’s on every gardening mailing list in North America. The postman needs a wheelbarrow to get the catalogues up his driveway. I, however, am on just a few lists but already my contacts are sending me seed catalogues. I am beyond ready to get seeds in the ground and to get my garden going. Another fellow … [Read more...]