Anyone who has seen a rose bush captured by grassy weeds will consider all weeds evil, destructive, and worthy of RoundUp.
Weeds are God's cover crop, and they fill in according to the need of the soil left bare, the engineering of the hardy plant geminating there. For instance, one is called poverty grass because it inhabits poor soil. In fact, some medicinal herbs grow much better in poor soil than they do in rich soil. Was that planned? The Creation Gardener does not pause to doubt.
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| I always wanted a Europeana Rose, and got one in a bargain buy, $5. |
Some people struggle to prove Creation through science, which is like proving artistic merit through science, a mismatch - using a good tool for the wrong purpose. The same people would laugh at someone pounding a screw into a wood beam.
But I wandered to make a point. The defeat of evolution can be found in the Scriptures, observation, and purpose. If every living thing has a purpose, often a good one, then an infinity of purpose and dependency only allows for Creation, divine engineering, and the continuing management of God.
Creation is revealed not proven: John 1 reveals the reality of Genesis 1. All things were created throgh the Logos, and nothing was created apart from the Logos - Jesus, the Son of God. So we can see in Genesis 1 - God creating is the Father commanding and the Son serving as the Creating Word. The Holy Spirit hovered over Creation as our Witness. Through John 1 we can see the Holy Trinity in Creation, in Genesis 1.
Observation without the Word of God is likely to be swayed by various emotions and societal trends. Nevertheless, observation helps city folk understand the Creation message of the Scriptures, which are in reality a very long sermon about Jesus.
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| Everyone took Monarch butterflies for granted, but now people are growing milkweed and its cousins to support them. |
Observation
Creation is the revelation of the Holy Spirit, the foundation of all wisdom. Secondarily, we can observe how true this revelation is. Almost all our human reactions to Creation - in this great age of technolgy - are wrong. We see a weed and want to soak it with herbicides, hack it down with tools, or pull it out after a long rain. How satisfying - to grab an entire dandelion plant in rain-softened ground, to pull it out and admire its evil, grasping roots. Bad idea!
Dandelions came to America as herbs, because their roots can make a beverage like coffee, their flowers are sweet enough to make wine, and the leaves are packed with vitamins and calcium. Dandelion salad is especially good in the early spring.
Dandelions and lawns go well together. Dandelions invade lawns and grass invades commercial dandelion plots. But Scott Lawn and Garden has trained us to hate those golden flowers and their sinister stalks of air-borne seeds. Scotts will sell us a special mix that chemically thrwarts the soil, making it thirsty for even more water, and kills the dandelions at the same time.
Dandelions improve the soil by opening up the soil, mine minerals from the sub-soil, provide food for insects, nest-liner for birds, and nutritious flowers for rabbits. The dandelion-fed rabbits feed hawks, and so forth. Wherever we start, the purpose of each form of life expands outward in many directions.
The rabbit does not rob the plant life with all his eating. He returns his high nitrogen food to the soil in pellets and rabbit-gro, which encourage the equally muscular (high nitrogen) earthworms. The red wigglers mix their organic food and leave it on or in the soil to fertilize the plants rabbits love. We put kiddie pools under our rabbit cages, filled them with soil, and added earthworms. The earthworms sanitized the mix while breeding, turning the original soil into a solid mass of wiggling worms. Fresh soil underneath meant the bundles of earthworms got a new place to live, and the left-behind worms soon filled the new soil with offspring.
But all this is very high level, since the most basic foundation is comprised of fungus, bacteria, protozoa, and other microbes - the very bread of life for one another (in some cases) and for higher level creatures.
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| Hog Peanuts add nitrogen to the soil. |
We have some large patches of grassy weeds, waiting to be tamped down under newspapers, cardboard, and wood mulch. In the meantime, I am growing and dividing:
- Hostas
- Mints
- Daisies
- Joe Pye Weeds
- Butterfly Weeds
- Comfrey
- Hostas
- Garlic
to serve as cover crops between the roses. Birds plant wild strawberries for me, an attractive and low-growing mat of green with brilliant red berries. They also plant lots of Pokeweed, which I let grow for a time and cut at the ground level. Poke grows tall in the backyard, prompting Little Ichabod to ask, "Pokeweed? Are you kidding me? That is the name?" I said, "Yes, yielding Poke berries and salad, berries for 60 kinds of birds, salad for the brave." Poke leaves have to be boiled twice to remove toxins.
I am planning on tall and wide plants in the rose garden, to separate the roses and support beneficial insect life. Hog Peanuts are tall and impossible to pull out, so I cut them at their base until they get to tall again.
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| The Crepe Myrtle was soggy with rain last summer, and the Buckwheat grew jungle-thick, re-seeded, and grew again. I have a third crop seeded from last year, in spite of the winter. |
The Delights of Creation
When I go to the mailbox, baby robbins are chirping a foot away, in the Crepe Myrtle bush. Mr. and Mrs. Robin are always alarmed and anxious to draw me away.
One member introduced me to serving thistle seed, which is a good deterrent for squirrels. When we are at the kitchen sink, Goldfinches feed on thistle a foot or two away.
I clean and fill several birdbaths each day, so I often see them splashing around in the sunlight. They leave behind plenty of additional food for the plants.
Roses delight our neighbors and friends, since cutting them is good for all involved.
