How's Robb?

... Robb and I have now released twelve butterflies into the world.  We have a tankful of chrysalises, and no more caterpillars.  The fennel crop was a huge success in terms of butterfly-rearing, but a total failure for human consumption.  I don't know what's wrong with my garden. So much of what I try to grow turns out woody and stunted.  I can grow beans and kale and fruit trees with no problems, but I don't have luck with a many, many other plants.  I can't even tell you how many California wildflowers I've killed over the years. Honestly though, if I never ate a single bite of homegrown fennel, that would be just fine with me.  Growing the fennel as a host-plant for butterflies, and having a small part of their growth is a magical experience, one that I wouldn't trade for anything. If you want to read what the genuinely competent gardeners of the blogging world are up to, click here for the Daphne's weekly round-up. For the record, I planted

... Harriet, age ten days Last night, after some rigamarole, I slipped two baby chicks underneath our dozing and broody hen Harriet.  The plan was to bamboozle her into thinking that she was their mother, taking advantage of her broodiness, sleepiness, and general lack of brains.  Harriet didn't fuss as the chickies snuggled underneath her. They all slept peacefully. Then at some point in the morning, one of the babies fell out of the nest.  Robb replaced the chick under Harriet, who promptly and viciously attacked it.  After a few more unsuccessful attempts at re-introducing the chick, we took both babies away from Harriet. Chickens are social creatures, and we couldn't split up the pair of babies. None of this was according to our plan. In our ideal world, we'd stuff the baby chicks under Harriet, and walk away.  She'd raise them as her own, and we'd have a wonderfully integrated flock. Instead, we've got baby chicks in the pantry and have no

... Robb and I bought two baby chicks today in the hopes that our broody hen Harriet could be fooled into thinking that they were her own flesh-and-blood.  (That's what we were doing when we found the sweet ill-fated kitten .) We realize that we're probably adding a whole lot more chaos into our lives by increasing the size of our flock. But we've never shied away from a little chaos, and anyway, it might be the best way to add some younger hens into the mix.  If the babies can be passed off as "family" hopefully there won't be a lot of conflict in the flock. Fingers crossed.  We're hoping for the best, and preparing for bloodshed. We had an elaborate plan about relocating Harriet into a private nestbox while she slept, waiting a while for her to settle down, and then slipping the two babies under her wings.  This is apparently a pretty traditional way of doing things.  Chickens aren't very smart, and have a strong biological drive to raise

... Robb and I were at our favorite urban farm store talking to Birgitt (one of the owners) about what to plant in the late summer garden, when Robb noticed a tiny kitten resting behind a garbage can.  Robb picked it up, and realized what terrible shape it was in.  I've seen a lot of distressing eye problems in cats, but had never seen anything as bad as this.  This poor little fellow was a bag of bones, and Yolanda (the other owner) noticed that there was something amiss with his legs. Robb and I drove over to our veterinarian, to see what could be done for this little dude.  The kitten curled up in Robb's arms and snuggled for all he was worth. And when we got to the vet, the news was bad.  His eyes were the least of his problems.  His legs were so damaged that there was really no hope.  Even if we attempted to save his life, amputations and thousands of dollars of surgeries would be the starting place for his treatment. I have that crazy Must Save All Anima

... Our tiny urban backyard is something of an oasis for butterflies.  And once in a while, we'll see a new kind. I think this is a Common Checked Skipper . It's a small butterfly with a furry blue body.  It was feeding on our asters, which are always buzzing with insect life. How about you? Have you noticed any new creatures around where you live? (For those keeping score, Robb released a fifth Anise Swallowtail butterfly yesterday.) ...

... Our chicken Harriet has gone broody.  She has parked herself in one of the nest boxes in the hen house and is determined to incubate eggs. There are just a few problems with this plan.  Chief among them is the fact that we don't have a rooster.  No rooster means no nookie, which means that our hens lay unfertilized eggs that will never develop into baby chicks.  The second big problem with Harriet's egg-hatching scheme is that neither she nor any of the other chickens have laid any eggs  at all for over a week.  Harriet is dutifully sitting on ... nothing.  And her behavior has apparently thrown all of the rest of the flock into such an uproar that they have all forgotten how to lay eggs at all. There is plenty written about what to do when a hen goes broody. The advice ranges from the bizarre to the downright cruel.  ("Alter your chicken's hormonal urges by dunking her in a barrel of ice water!") Robb and I tend to let animals be animals.  If nobo

... I've been insanely busy at work, trying to keep a particularly lovely project on-schedule.  And during this time, my tank full of caterpillars has mostly all morphed into silent mysterious chrysalises.  I find these fascinatingly enigmatic.  I watch, wait and ... wonder. Watching is one of those quiet activities that I think we could all do a lot more of.  How much do we notice the world as it swirls around us? Only a very keen observer would notice the changes inside of this seemingly lifeless object.   Only a weirdo like me would spend so much time peering at chrysalises, looking for changes. If you compare the two images of the same chrysalis, you'll notice that in the lower photograph the shell seems more translucent.  You can discern patterns of a butterfly's wing through the walls of the chrysalis. Twenty minutes after I took that photograph (and after I gave Robb a particularly boring lecture about how I thought this butterfly was about to

... A quick glimpse at the caterpillars I'm raising in my pantry.  Typing isn't so easy, because I had a mishap with my brand new pruning saw. I gashed my finger impressively, and it needs time to heal. I believe I have twenty-two caterpillars in all.  They are in various stages of development. Six have formed chrysalises, six have attached themselves to various surfaces with silken threads and are preparing to form chrysalises, and ten are still eating everything in sight. We had friends over on the Fourth of July, and I forced everyone to gawk at my tank full of caterpillars. I think they're fascinating, and my friends were all too polite to tell me that I'm crazy for doing this. How about you?  Have you ever raised caterpillars?  How did it go? For more garden fun, check out the weekly garden party at Daphne's excellent blog .