A Dismal Summer

August is here. Soon, the robins won't be singing anymore, as the time for courting is over, and the time for getting the last brood ready for flying south is upon them. I saw one picking up a piece of grass today as the final nests are evidently underway.

The grass was really straw. It has been unbelievably dry here. We live, almost surrounded by Lake Superior, the largest freshwater lake in the world, and yet, we've had practically no rain most of the summer. My stored rainwater ran out this morning. I haven't yet built the necessary structures for using our well (which is not our water source; we are on a water line), and there is no rain in prospect until Wednesday evening. The weather today is not as hot as it's been, and the sun is not out all the time today, and there was a heavy dew last night. I watered various plants in the garden, and we've abandoned some others. But, I water plants not the garden. There is a difference. The lack of enough rain this summer and last, and a lighter than usual snowfall last winter have taken a toll on the moisture content. A good indicator of this is our hollyhocks. Last year, they were tall as usual. This year, they are much shorter. Being biennials, they suffered last year and this year.

There is a bright side to the garden this year, though. We seem to have reached a sustainable balance. We are having no problems with pests. This is because we have come to the point where the garden attracts enough predators to control pests. Especially this year, the sparrows of various species have been in the garden a lot. Even though there have been many cabbage butterflies, I have found minimal damage to kale. I haven't even had to go on a cabbage caterpillar round all summer. This, even though the plants are stressed by heat and dryness. Other pests aren't to be seen, either, though I did see a few aphids this morning. As well as all this, the pollinators are also in abundance in the garden.

A well-balanced garden is a musical place. Birds sing, and the drone of insects is quite loud sometimes. There is also the rustle of snakes going along on their rounds (eating undesirable pests as they go). There are these sounds, and with them a quiet.

A garden must be thought of as ongoing. This is not the 2007 garden, but our garden in 2007, on it's way to other seasons, having come from earlier seasons. A garden is a great way to see that the continuum of life is really a circle. I wonder...is that food for compositional thought?