A Season for Giving

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This fall, the garden has been giving many gifts that add meaning to my daily routine and to my overall well-being. The fall migration brought surprise sightings of new “friends” stopping by during their fly-through: A pair of Gilded Flickers spent a week visiting, and seemed particularly fond of sips & dips in the clay saucer birdbath under the Ash Tree, and several Blue Grosbeaks spent a few days enjoying the seed mix we’ve started spreading each morning on the stone metates that are scattered through the garden. 

  

A covey of 10 Gambel’s Quail have also been enjoying the new “snack walk” as they go from one metate to another to scoop up breakfast, then stay around the garden to scratch though the wood chip mulch for ants.  I love their distinctive call and the whirring sound of their wing-beats as they take off into the wash below the garden. They’re the only birds I’ve seen so far who can boss around the Eurasian Collared Doves too!

 

Daily magic
For the past few weeks, a very tame Roadrunner has been spending parts of each day roaming the garden, not seeming to care one bit if I’m out there weeding, pulling the hose around, or doing other projects.  One day it came super close even while a bucket of concrete was being mixed to patch our raised bed!  To honor this bird, I used the leftovers to make a special steppingstone with a big X-shaped track in the middle.

 

Pine Siskins and Lesser Goldfinches

On recent cool mornings while looking out the windows of the sunroom, sipping coffee and petting kittens (what a life!), I’ve seen flocks of Lesser Goldfinches and Pine Siskins at the thistle feeders, Curved-billed Thrashers digging through the wood chip mulch for their own “ant snacks, Northern Cardinals decorating the Ash tree’s bare branches like ornaments, Green-tailed, Albert’s, and Canyon Towhees darting back and forth through the chain link fence from the garden to the nearby Mesquite trees, and over a dozen White-crowned Sparrows jumping in and out of our “Lotus Pond” birdbath like they ought to be accompanied by a toy piano!
Watching the Roadrunner

 

 

 

Whether seeing the first visit by a Bridled Titmouse or the hundredth visit by a hummingbird, getting to see and hear all this beauty is a gift to the spirit during any year, but especially in this one with all its extra stress and worry.    

Watching a pair of kittens grow up, with their curiosity about every inch of the house, all kinds of "circus tricks", and warm snuggles, is a pretty great gift too.  The arrival of Eva and Tootsie (like our other cats, they are named after some of our late aunts) was originally a birthday present for our playful 5 year old cat Margie, but has certainly given us all many happy hours together!

 

View from the Pine tree

 

At the same time, I am reminded that these wonderful birds visit my garden each day largely because of the plants living in it, many of which were gifts too: the big Ash and Pine trees planted by previous owners of this property, the cacti, agaves, aloe, penstemon, and asters that came from the Arivaca gardens of Alice, Brad, Ari, Sandra, and Laurie.  I am in gratitude to the birds, animals, and wind too, for their gift of planting the nearby Cottonwoods, Willows, and Mesquites.  

 

I also appreciate the TLC that the staff of Desert Survivors, Civano’s, Native Gardens, and Honey Lane nurseries gave the plants I’ve purchased from them, to start their lives off well.   

 

Porch garden

The same is true for the veggie and herb starts I got from Les and Jay, Ralphie, Sandra, and Mark, which are now growing in containers on my studio porch, and helping sustain my body as well as my spirit.   

 

View from the fire pit

More times than I can count, I have thought of Jerry and Tom when in the garden, and remembered with gratitude all the work they did to build the "strong bones" of the garden in 2016-2017.  

 

 

And thought of Andy and Nancy, for all the trips made to their driveway to pick up the small boulders that line the garden paths and retain the soil in the bermed beds.  I never forget to be thankful for the Arivaca sun and heat that made my "old NW bones" feel young enough to move hundreds of pounds of those rocks into place too!

My thanks also go out to to Jon, Dave, Ari, Alice, and Will, who’ve added their energy and goodwill into helping build and care for the garden over the past 4 years as well.

Sometimes it's hard for me to even remember when it was just a 2000 sq ft. barren expanse of crushed rock over landscape fabric, covered with a "creeping sea" of scraggly Bermuda Grass.  I'm pretty sure the birds, bees, butterflies, lizards, beetles, coyotes, foxes, and other creatures who now wander through the paths and beds like it a lot better now, at least as much as we do or moreso!

 

Prickly Pear love

Our garden plants are now big enough to provide gifts for others too, by saving and sharing my veggie and flower seeds, potting up aloe and agave pups, slicing off prickly pear pads, and dividing asters and other perennials. 

 

I am very happy to now be a part of the Arivaca circle of garden giving and receiving, giving and receiving… making every time of the year a season for giving.

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