by Angela Hartley | Aug 10, 2021 | Insects in the Gardens, The Gardens
Early this year, I was very lucky to find a group on Facebook called Katie’s Spring Plant Sale at Stoney Creek Valley Farm (I’ve forgotten if someone invited me–if so thank you). Katie Hutchison College has a farm in Dauphin PA, which is just outside of Harrisburg. Once you turn off the highway, the drive up Stoney Creek is beautiful. If you drive out on a Saturday, you’re likely to see lots of people fishing along the side of the road.
I went to Katie’s farm this spring and got a lot of perennials: butterfly weed, delphinium, penstemon, multiple varieties of mint, Culver’s root, Russian sage, cone flower, black snapdragons (gorgeous annual), and foxglove (bi-annual). Everything has done very well, and the bees particularly love the butterfly weed. No monarchs yet, but I keep watching! Katie kindly gave me some annual poppies that were beyond their prime, and I was able to collect seeds from them a few weeks later. Here are some pics of Katie’s flowers in one of my raised beds.
What’s great about Katie is that she makes you feel welcome, and she is always willing to answer questions. As they say in the south, “She’s good people,” and I enjoy everything about the farm, especially the resident greeter/social coordinator, Waldorf. While I was shooting the butterflies on the tithonia, I felt a familiar sensation on the bottoms of my legs. Sure enough, Waldorf was telling me she was glad to see me, so of course I stopped shooting to give her some rubs.
Best greeter in the world!
The farm is beautiful: huge beds of perennials, annuals, and wild flowers everywhere; an awesome greenhouse; chickens and goats; a feeling of home. It reminds me of my Aunt Marge and Uncle Rich’s farm in Bannerville, PA, where I spent a lot of time as a kid. There is an especially stunning flower bed on the way to the greenhouse, covered in pollinators, and a lovely patch of cleome. Having experienced cleome for the first time this year, I’m now convinced that a large patch is the only way to properly grow it.
I visited the farm again last week for Katie’s summer sale. I purchased cone flowers, foxglove, penstemon, and anise hyssop and made a pollinator corner in the kitchen garden where an old nasty patch of ivy used to be. Thank you to Ben for digging it all out for me! I mentioned to Katie that I was an amateur photographer, and she generously offered to let me come back to take pictures of the flowers and butterflies. She showed me a patch of tithonia that was covered in swallowtails and monarchs. Needless to say, I was thrilled and went back the very next day.
This first set of photos includes all bees, mostly bumble bees, on dahlia, tithonia, and basket flower. I was there early in the morning, and I found some bumbles sleeping in flowers. Some of the carpenter bees were huge; they are gentle giants.
The next set of photos includes all monarchs. I was surprised that most of the butterflies I saw had ragged wings–some quite beaten up. I don’t know why, and I haven’t researched it yet. But although they looked a bit worse for the wear, they were still so beautiful.
In this set, the stalwarts: whites, pearl crescentspots, silver-spotted skippers, and a fiery skipper. You see them here on zinnias, blanket flower, and I believe lavender.
And finally, my favorites (I saved the best for last): the swallowtails. Love them! I hope to raise some from caterpillars again next year when I’ve grown enough parsley and fennel. You see these lovelies here on purple coneflower, zinnia, and tithonia. And a note on tithonia: Monty Don raves about tithonia, but I have never understood the fascination. It just looks like an orange zinnia to me. BUT, after seeing the way the butterflies love it, I will definitely plant some in the wildflower beds next year.
Katie, thank you so much for letting me spend time at your farm. I hope I can come back again sometime!
Please leave a comment and tell me which butterfly is your favorite.
by Angela Hartley | Aug 4, 2021 | Insects in the Gardens, Miscellaneous, The Gardens
When I go to visit Mom and Dad, half of my drive is on highways and half is on back country roads. Today I took my camera because I was hoping to get some photos of the sheep that live on a farm I pass on the drive. The back roads border cornfields, and many times there are patches between the two that are full of “weeds”: Queen Anne’s lace, buttercups, clover, chicory, various grasses, fleabane, and others. If you are interested in ditches and meadows in Pennsylvania, a nice short article can be found here.
Today, the sheep were too far away in the pasture, so I decided to stop at a weed patch to see what I could find.
The weather was beautiful: a sunny, clear 80 degrees, a truly welcome break from the blasting heat and humidity of the entire month of July. I stood for a few moments and looked around. There were many plants I didn’t know, but the patch was covered mostly in clover, Queen Anne’s lace, and chicory, and they were covered in bumble bees.
Bumble bee on chicory.
I also saw Swallowtail and Monarch butterflies, but none came close enough to shoot. I was able to get close to an Eastern Tailed Blue (Everes comyntas), a Pearl Crescentspot (Phyciodes tharos), and Skippers (Silver-spotted Skipper–Epargyreus clarus). I had to look up the Eastern Tailed Blue. You can’t see the tail when the butterfly is in flight, but it is obvious in the photos. They can also be identified by the two orange spots on the bottom of the hind wing right above the tail. The Pearl Crescentspot is one of the most common butterflies in North America.
Eastern Tailed Blue.
Eastern Tailed Blue.
Skipper in flight.
After I finished shooting, I stood again and just looked around. Even though I didn’t get shots of anything as dramatic as a Swallowtail or Monarch, I’m happy I took the time to stop. I was reminded to be grateful for the beauty in the everyday:
“There’s a poem in every flower,
a sonnet in every tree,
a tale in every lifetime
it’s just for you to see…”
From “Beauty in Nature” by Arti Chopra
by Angela Hartley | Jul 30, 2021 | Cooking
I love potatoes—mashed, fried, French fried, au gratin, roasted, boiled and topped with parsley and butter. The only potato I ever met that I did not like was scalloped. I think it’s the onion and the fact that as I child, I was forced to sit at the table until I finished a serving. I dislike them to this day.
One of the best potatoes is a roasted one, and I tried for years to get that perfect crisp on the outside and soft goodness on the inside. My efforts were acceptable at best until I chanced upon a game changer in an antique shop in Delaware: a Guardian aluminum cookie/baking sheet (tip #1). I picked it up for about $10 thinking I could use it for something. Well that something turned out to be potatoes. I think it works so well because of the rough texture of the sheet’s surface. I have two of these now.
Once you have a good baking sheet, you need Yukon gold potatoes. I peel, wash, and cube them—small to medium size. You can rinse, drain, and then dry them in a clean dish towel, but this is not necessary the way it is for deep frying French fries. Spray the sheet with Pam and pile the potatoes in the middle of the sheet. Then drizzle with vegetable oil (tip #2) and sprinkle liberally with the seasonings of your choice. Although I generally cook with olive oil, it will not create crispiness the way vegetable oil does. Truly any savory seasonings will do, and I usually use some combination of Penzey’s seasonings, Jane’s Crazy Mixed Up Salt, and others. Stir the potatoes until coated evenly, spread them out on the sheet, and then put them on the top shelf (tip #3) of a 425-435 degree oven. Apparently it gets hotter up there! Keep an eye on them until they start to brown on the top. When they do, pull them out and turn them over. Back in the oven to finish baking until a nice golden brown.
For this meal, I gathered fresh ingredients I had from the garden, i.e., “garden surprise” chicken! Ben suggested simply grilling the chicken, but we have too many good veg now for plain old grilling. So I came up with small yellow and red tomatoes, shallot, basil, and lemon and garlic (not from the garden). You could also use summer squash, zucchini, and/or eggplant. The selection this time of year is great.
Ingredients for chicken.
While the potatoes were baking, I coated 2 pounded chicken breasts in flour and placed them in a small non-stick frying pan with butter. I used salt and pepper on both sides and sauteed until browned. Then I added the juice of half a lemon, some water (maybe half cup just to make some liquid to deglaze the pan), and half of a shallot and a full garlic clove finely chopped. I sauteed a few minutes until the
garlic and shallot were soft and then threw in the yellow and red tomato cubes and basil for the last few minutes. I removed the chicken before the tomatoes had the chance to completely disintegrate in the pan. Chicken and potatoes went on the plates with a small side salad of cucumbers, yellow tomatoes, and fresh mint with a bit of vinegar and sugar dressing.
This dinner turned out to be delicious. Summer dining at its best!
by Angela Hartley | Jul 30, 2021 | The Gardens
I love when the birds share the garden. I talk to them and quite comically try to mimic their calls. I always call the cat birds “Pretty Bird,” and they often respond. I can tell when they are being inquisitive and when they are pissed that I am near their nests. Early this spring, the farm started to feel more like home when the cat birds appeared, and I have many more here than I did in Maryland, although they are much more standoffish. The cardinals are always “Mama” and “Papa,” and the blue jays are “Jay Jay.”
The cardinals are shy, and it’s hard to get good photos. On the other hand, the house finches have raised 3 clutches this year right outside the kitchen (our primary) door. Although I see blue jays occasionally, they rarely visit the yards and gardens here. I miss them swooping in as soon as I fill the feeders and demanding peanuts if none are to be found. The robins are ubiquitous and to me less than inspiring. One hummingbird (perhaps more?) visits the feeder outside of my office window each day as she makes her rounds through the flower beds and yard. I look forward to seeing her. One winter, I had the amazing opportunity to shoot a flock of cedar waxwings from the inside of the house as they visited the frozen bath for water. They are stunningly beautiful. The woodpeckers will have their own post!
Currently in Pennsylvania we are on a sort of lock down with our feeders. Many birds have been found dead or dying with some disease that has yet to be identified. We’ve been asked to take down all feeders and baths. I have not refilled the feeders, but it’s been so hot, I am reluctant to remove water.
Here is a series I call “The Bath.”
by Angela Hartley | Jul 26, 2021 | Bees
One of the reasons we wanted a larger property was so that Ben would have a good home for his bees. In Maryland they were in a small space in the shade, which was not ideal. Here they are spread out in the sunshine and are thriving. We’ve planted wildflowers, bee balm, and borage for them, and they pollinate my perennials and our veg.
Bee keeping is not easy—you certainly don’t set up the hives and forget them. The bees need constant monitoring, maintenance, and care. They get sick, they die, they swarm off. One year we lost nearly all of them because of some fickle weather. It’s not unusual to see ladders propped in various trees on the farm. Ben has collected and returned three swarms of his own this year (the neighbors capture these incidents on video), and he also removes swarms from other people’s properties and brings them home.
The honey bees are generally very gentle and he often works with them without any gear. But one night he got stung on the lip. He looked like one of the Real Housewives, and I couldn’t look at him without laughing! Often, I am a bee widow, but that’s okay. They are lovely, interesting, and beneficial creatures, and I’m happy to share the farm with them.
