a man and his hoe

every day is a good day

Author: theMan

  • Summer Cool

    fresh eggs

    We are back to summer cool, chilly, refreshing mornings and sunny, warm afternoons. What we are powerless to stop are the forest fires raging on the other side of the mountains. Each day the ocean breezes keep the smoke on the other side of the Cascades is a blessing.

    Into this soft, cool summer, two ducklings appeared in the garden. I’m still not sure which of the two garden ducks hatched them. Without a drake in the garden, I placed, what I thought were three fertile eggs underneath the gray hen, and just one underneath the black one. But the two ducklings which popped out, are sticking with the black duck.

    Nature is mysterious. And the ducks aren’t talking to me to tell me what happened.

    There are new chicks too. Caroline decided to go broody just a few days ago. For weeks, Maureen was sitting on eggs. But at the last minute, Caroline decided to brood with Maureen, just in time for the chicks to hatch. And now the two are co-parenting a brood of chicks.

    Every season I see hens come up with new ways of raising broods. It’s no wonder species diverge and new ones arise. There are frameworks creatures tend to follow, but there are always those trying out new things.

  • First Potatoes


    First potatoes, the first potatoes of many. The nice thing about growing your own potatoes is that you can pull them out of the soil without pulling the whole potato plant out of the ground. All it takes is digging gently with a few fingers until you find a decent size potato. Pull it out and let the potato plant keep producing more potatoes through the season. These two made for a wonderful summer lunch.

    Nothing compares to potatoes fresh out of the ground. Their skins are so delicate you have to handle them carefully or your fingers will rub the skins off.




    Fragrant lilies are opening too. These lilies were a gift from friends so it is a pleasant surprise to see them open for the first time.

  • Cool Again

    It is cool again. The heat has passed. Cool air from the Pacific has pushed the heat to the east. We were lucky. The hottest it got here was 90ºF (32ºC) on Monday, the first time it was gotten that hot in the 16 years we have lived here.

    Initially the forecast was for much hotter temperatures, but we are close enough to the bay that afternoon sea breezes tempered our heat. Short distances to the east, temperatures soared.

    But what will it be like ten years from now, twenty? Will we look back to 2021 and long for summers when it only got to 90º?

    Snow and the other hens are sitting on eggs. The last time I looked, Snow had five eggs. Five ducklings I can handle. However, Duchess, is sitting on 12 eggs. Grey Queen must also be on a nest, but where? And how many eggs?

  • Cool to Hot


    A cool, foggy morning belies what is about to come. In the 16 years we have lived here, it has never been 90ºF, 32ºC. But Sunday and Monday, the forecast is for temperatures high above that. It is just for two days, but a harbinger of hotter summers that will transform the cool, gentle climate we love.



    The ducks are blissfully unaware of the upcoming heat wave. They do have plenty of water to paddle about on a hot day.



    I discovered Snow’s nest this morning. It’s positioned precariously at the drop off into the pond. It wouldn’t take much for an egg or two to roll out of the nest and into the pond. I stole a few eggs for breakfast. Until she decides it is time to roost, I’ll sneak a few off from time to time. I don’t mind her hatching a few ducklings, but not twenty or so.


  • Do It Differently


    We don’t have just a handful of flower types. We have an endless variety of flower types. The grass flower above is other worldly. Researches estimate the origin of grasses to roughly 77 million years ago. So how many million years ago did this marvelous flower take shape? No doubt this splendid flower has been blooming long before we humans appeared.


    It is the height of garlic scape season. Maybe the best time of the year. Though, really, what time of the year isn’t great?


    A surprise in the garden was finding a glob of regurgitated salmon berry. The nearest salmon berry is so far away, the only way this little blob of salmon berry could have landed in this spot in the garden is if a micro meteorite hit a salmon berry at just the right angle to send a bit of berry flying over the fence and into the garden. Could happen. 37,000-78,000 tons of meteorite mass fall onto the earth every year. It’s not impossible for a tiny grain of this 78,000 tons of matter to strike a salmon berry nearby and send it airborne.

    Though most likely a bird regurgitated it. Perhaps a robin hopped into the garden after nibbling a salmon berry and spit out the blob to make room for a fat worm it saw.



    This season of endless flowers is a gentle reminder that there are a million ways to bloom.