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| Self-seeding cosmos |
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| Common teasel relics |
This has been a beautiful summer at Bean Hill. Plentiful rains made everything green and made it stay that way. Perennials bloomed in abundance. Because of an early start to their breeding season, the birds have also been in abundance. It's been a joy to see hummingbirds, honey bees, and butterflies every day--very different from last year when these were hardly ever spotted.
August's average high and low temperatures, like July's, were slightly below the historic averages. The seven very warm days, when daytime temperatures ran 5-12 degrees above average, were balanced out by the seven nights when temperatures were 5-12 degrees below average. Although the dog days never really materialized this month, we were 2.3" below in expected precipitation, but since all but two of the previous seven months have seen above average rainfall, I'm not too fussed.
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| Cosmos and clematis make a "creamsicle" |
Typically in August, the gardens take on a different look. Most showy perennials have stopped blooming, and have been cut back. The echinacea and daisies have nearly finished their second bloom. The meadows are turning to browns and olive drabs. There are fewer bird sounds, but lots of noise from the cicadas. Late summer plants like mums, cosmos, and autumn-blooming clematis have emerged--as has the golden-rod in the meadows! The vegetable garden's plants look spent after all their high-yields. The summer crop was so successful that this August, for the first time, we planted lettuce, carrot, beet, and radish seeds to try for a late fall harvest.
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| Chrysanthemums |
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| Milkweed pods and meadow |
The near-perfection of this summer at Bean Hill could make me forget that beyond our little sanctuary there are extreme weather events spawned by a warming Earth. Words like "historic" and "record-breaking" are heard all too frequently for comfort. In the U. S., the summer began with days of such extreme heat in Arizona that commercial jets couldn't fly, and businesses covered their door handles with cloth to keep customers from getting burned. As the summer winds down, extreme heat in the Pacific Northwest has not only shattered records but fed dozens and dozens of wildfires. And then there was Hurricane Harvey that dumped 27 trillion gallons of water on Texas and Louisiana in six days, and set a new record for rainfall--51"--in the continental United States. As I write, Hurricane Irma, one of the biggest Atlantic hurricanes ever recorded is churning toward Florida after destroying a couple of small islands. I think about the weather disasters that occurred and are occurring as I sit in our beautiful sanctuary, and wonder how those in the highest level of our government continue to deny that climate-change is real. Their refusal to believe the science showing that much the Earth's warming is literally fueled by human action is not just ignorant and irresponsible, it is immoral.
