Salmon berries are ripening. The much sweeter thimble berries aren’t far behind. I’ll nibble on a few salmon berries, but leave most for the birds. I’m spending hours in the garden every day, and the birds sing the entire time. If we picked all the berries, the birds might go elsewhere.

The cottonwood fluff is everywhere. A spider’s nightmare. With its web coated with cottonwood fluff, what’s a spider to do? It would probably be faster to spin a new web than to pick all the cottonwood fluff out of this one.

Ena 枝那 and Takuma 拓真 were in the garden with me today. I was weeding, weeding, weeding. They were playing and napping, playing and napping. Sometimes, I think life would be better as a dog. They are getting the idea that chasing chickens is a big NO, but that chasing wild rabbits comes with a reward. It’s ten days since they arrived. They are settling in and enjoying their new home. No more relying on handouts. No more worrying about where their next meal is coming from. I could be a dog.

This may be a pinnacle egg. Cognac laid this masterpiece yesterday. Is it food? Is it art? I think I should sell it to a psychologist to use in place of Rorschach cards. “Connect the dots in any order. There is no right or wrong way, just a sane way and an insane way. Let’s see if you are sane.”

A month early, the garlic are having fun with curling garlic scapes. I’m wracking my brain thinking of an evolutionary reason as to why they curl. Is there a pollinator that loves sliding up and down the curls? If the curls went straight up, would they get too high? If so, why not just grow a shorter scape? Why go the trouble of making lovely curls?

Maybe the whole purpose of the curls is to give cooks something to smile about. The purpose is to put art in the kitchen. It’s a mystery. Have a garden and some chickens, and mystery will find you every day.

The shallot buds are plump for picking. This is what good earth tastes like, delicious plants springing out of the ground. Garlic shoots are ready for pulling too. They have been growing all winter and are thick and juicy, perfect for chopping up to season dinner.

All looks calm and peaceful with the peonies’ mouths wide open. But along the edge of the pond the struggle for life and death plays out. A garden snake has caught a fish.

It’s an effort for the snake to swallow the fish. It takes a long time, swallowing a scale’s width and waiting until its jaw can stretch a bit more to get the next bit of the fish down its throat. How did it nab it? It must have been waiting at the water’s edge, hiding among the cattails to snatch the fish when it swam by.

Away from the pond, it’s calm and peaceful. The peonies are in full bloom and the chickens are enjoying the late afternoon sun.