Sharing

Aristolochia californica
(California Pipevine)

Close up of the unusual flowers

We hear you, hello-creatures. We know we are wrecking the world and we are afraid. What we have unleashed has such momentum now, we don't know how to turn it around. Don't leave us alone, we need your help. You need us too for your own survival. Are there powers there you can share with us?

     "I,lichen, work slowly, very slowly. Time is my friend. This is what I give you: patience for the long haul and perseverance.”

     "It is a dark time. As deep-diving trout I offer you my fearlessness of the dark." I, lion, give you my roar, the voice to speak out and be heard."

     "It is a dark time. As deep-diving trout I offer you my fearlessness of the dark." I, lion, give you my roar, the voice to speak out and be heard." 

     "I am caterpillar. The leaves I eat taste bitter now. But dimly I sense a great change coming. What I offer you, humans, is my willingness to dissolve and transform. I do that without knowing what the end-result will be; so I share with you my courage too."

                              JOHANNA MACY 

The Pipevine swallowtail caterpillar is beautiful. It has a voracious appetite, consuming an abundance of leaves during it existence. The Pipevine swallowtails have not found the vine flourishing along my West fence. So a friend gave me the tiny caterpillars featured in these two pictures. Alas, only one grew to the size about to form a chrysalis. It was seeking where to do so when during the night some creature consumed it. 

Of course, these picture above is from an earlier April. In February the Pipevine has only flowers sans leaves.

Below the thriving Pipevine some of the stems have fallen in amongst the wood chips with small roots developing seemingly to seeking soil. Last weekend I gently  pulled one up and resettled it into dirt contained in a 4" plastic pot. A friend had reached out to figure out why she had been unable to root a "cutting" so I dropped off the 4" pot.  I suggested leaving the start a month or longer the this container before planting it in the ground where she plans to plant it. 

Recently I have been mulling over digging up one of these rooted stems and transplanting it in front. YES! As I was taking the below picture, I decided to do so Friday or Saturday. These are ideal days for "roots" according to the 2024 Biodynamic Almanac I use as a guide for most of my gardening here at PageRefuge.

This is the trellis where the latest Pipevine will reside. 

Each time I write a post and am about to publish it, I so miss Dwight with his English professor hat reading it. He often had recommendations that I would not think of. So if anyone reading this post finds grammatical blunders, please excuse.

It is cool but a gloriously sunny day. It is winter and more rain is predicted. Hopefully not so much that my electricity is out . . . eek! it got really cold in my house. 

As I bring this post to a close, I