I did everything short of waxing the car and watering the roses to bring on the rain yesterday. The jeremiad posted about the drought helped, even if I had to eat crow in the postscript.
We are on the second day of a three day rainstorm, ideal for the roses and the new crop of Borage, the little herb flower for courage. I was not looking for a new crop, but I found a large, half-empty bag. I put all the cute Joe Pye behind the maple. I played sower and the seed and scattered Borage across the pile. They were watered first to germinate them. Now the rain is soaking them with usable nitrogen and moisture. At the bottom of the pile will be soil creatures basking in the shade, since they hate the sun.
Mold will form in the pile and provide food for sum. Tragically, the most active feeders become the most desired food. The food chain works its way up until the birds are perching on the pile to enjoy big fat bugs and high-protein earthworms. The earthworm is all muscle, so he provides in several ways. He is tiger-meat for newborn birds and their parents. When he dies, he leaves a deposit of usable nitrogen compounds. During his life he aerates the soil, allows rain to penetrate more deeply, and uses his calcium glands to sweeten the soil. That makes the soil better for most plants and for all earthworms.
A Mormon engineer marveled at the design of the earthworm and wondered how that happened. I said. "God created them that way." He was startled and not apparently in a good way. For many today, the intricacies of a single creature is quite a marvel, but they do not consider that the design suggests a Designer. Even more so, the way everything works together is miraculously effective.
One thing I learned from Jessica Walliser was the way in which flowers attract insects and how beneficial insects are called to the scene when pests threaten. One call to arms is the sound of munching. Another is a set of chemical signals the flowers set off. Leaving this all alone, forgetting the pesticides, means the parents will make a home near the place where their children can grow up and be healthy. So the mother lays her eggs near, on, or - shudder - inside the pest. The babies hatch and eat their way to adulthood. Most adults enjoy adult food, so various plants encourage their mature needs.
This bounty of insects prospers with rain and sun, so we are having a great time.
When the Military Gardening Group met last, Ranger Bob said, "Most people like to visit nature centers. You built one."
We were watching the Hummingbirds and bees.
