More Spring Blooms and A Surprise

As I continued to walk around the yard, I noticed lots of spring.  The grass is growing and in need of mowing.  But it is the trees that really caught my attention.  At the border of our property right next to a big pile of wood chips that has been composting for two years is a little clump of wild peach trees.  They always put on a ton of blooms before the first leaves appear.  The blooms are strikingly beautiful.

These blooms will develop into peaches this summer.  We normally blanch them and make peach cobblers - my favorite way to enjoy fresh peaches.

As we move from the edible to the inedible, the Bradford Pear tree is in full bloom.  More of a decorative tree, it doesn't produce edible fruit.  I originally got this tree for free from the Arbor Day Foundation, planted it intending to move it and then it grew too big to move!

And finally, the Redbud tree.  It has small blooms all along its branches.  This tree soon grows big, heart-shaped leaves.

Everything is budding out and then I look at our citrus trees - brown, every leaf on them dead and falling off.  The freeze really put a hurting on them.  On the bright side, I scraped a small part of the trunks of each of the trees - I think it is called the cambium layer, and I noticed green.  So the trees are still alive, despite the dead leaves.

And today we got our first indication of new growth.  Here are some green growth on the navel orange:

And these are some shoots on the tangerine...

Finally, on the grapefruit!

So temperatures down to 14 degrees a few weeks ago and it didn't kill the citrus.  That is great news.  Now, what I'm interested to see is if they will put on leaves, bloom and fruit this year or will it skip a year?  We'll have to wait and see.

The Sights of Spring

During this time where lots of activity has just stopped... Spring is still going on - unhindered and unimpeded by the virus.  While many are locked up indoors, there is lots going on outdoors.  It is a good thing, a therapeutic thing to get outside and enjoy God's Creation.  After work and on weekends, I like to do just that.

Tricia has been trying to use up our inventory of frozen blueberries.  That is an enjoyable dilemma.  This week we've consumed blueberry pie, blueberry smoothies, and blueberry ice cream.  We're making room in the freezer because the blueberry bushes have grown and are loading up with berries.

Just to the east of the yard bordering the neighbors is a little grove of "Indian" peaches.  They grow up wild and bear lots of small, tasty, juicy peaches.  The peach trees have no leaves now, but they are loaded up with beautiful, pink blooms.

We take a break from our previously scheduled broadcast of Spring flowers to show a photo of Belle, our 2 1/2 month old Great Pyrenees puppy.  We've currently got her living in the pasture so that she grows up with her charge - the livestock she will be guarding (cows, goats, and chickens).  We like to get her out and into the backyard in the late afternoon so that she can be around us, too.

She has really sharp teeth and we keep having to swat her nose.  She likes to jump up and bite your ankles and your pant legs.  She also likes her ears rubbed and her belly rubbed.  She's got a fat belly.  There are times when she will calmly lay in the clover.

She's developed one bad habit while in the pasture that we'll have to figure a way to break her of.  Hens, from time to time, will lay eggs around the bottom of the round bales of hay that the cows are eating on.  Belle enjoys sniffing around until she finds eggs.  When she does, she'll put them in her mouth and roll around and play with them.  We'll put those eggs aside for us to eat.  So far, she hasn't broken and eaten them, but I'm sure that day is coming.  But tell me, how can you get angry with a face like this?:

Let's get back to spring.  A telltale sign of spring is actually encountered first with the nose.  I'm talking Orange Blossoms!  Walking outdoors smelling orange blossoms is a real treat.  It is one of the best fragrances there is, in my opinion.  I'm not the only one who thinks so.  The honeybees second that motion.

The honeybees work the blossoms hard, flying back and forth gathering nectar to make honey and also gather pollen.  You can see two honeybees in the foreground below along with a very small, green navel orange in the background.

Sunshine, fresh air, along with the sights, sounds, and fragrances of spring are a sure-fire cure to cabin fever.