Real life cartoon characters in the garden

"Where have you been?"
"I've been around" was my answer.
"I hardly see you walking the dog these days" she pressed on.
"yes, we don't go for long walks at the moment. There are lots of things going on in our backyard,
....and the dog is having a great time enjoying the garden and chasing away those cats from hunting the birds that are nesting in there"
....that's just a bit of conversation that goes on between me and my neighbour while she was being dragged by her dog passing by the front of the house as I was dumping my trash bag into the garbage bin.

Dogs are man's best friend that requires long walk at least once a day, rain or shine. On the other hand, cats are wonderful pets because they are independent and don't require leash or long walk with their people. Actually they prefer to walk and roam freely on their own to satisfy their strong hunting instincts. Sometimes I wonder if these cats roam my garden hunting for vermins and bring home their catch to their people is actually an act of communication that they don't really enjoy the dry kibbles and canned food which their people hunted from the supermarket.
Kaboom is the nickname I gave to this cat. She has other name when she's back at her real home. Interestingly, when I call her "Kaboom", she came to me and nuzzles my ankle. Someone said to me once; you don't own a cat but the cat own you. In reality, I don't own any cats but all the cats in my neighbourhood seemed to own me! On good days, there can be at least 3 to 5 different cats that roam about in my garden, and I've named them all ending with the word "boom". There is one I called Baddaboom! but I can't seem to find his picture at the moment. Will insert it here when I find it in the photobank.

All the cats you see in this blog belongs to someone in my neighbourhood. There are not feral cats in my area because the council is very efficient and strict with this sort of things. They have exact record and statistics who own cats or dogs in the neighbourhood. All dogs are micro-chipped, registered and my Micro Marco Polo must also pay dog tax once a year and attend dog socialising class from time to time. The dog obedient school is not compulsory but dog owners are encouraged to socialise their dogs because in Switzerland, dogs are welcome all over the place in public areas including public transport, restaurants and hotels accomodation. As long as your dog's travelling papers and vaccination are up to date, travelling with dogs in Switzerland can be a joy for dog owners. In some hotels and restaurant, while you are enjoying your meals, they even serve the dog some water and food in a different corner designated for dogs.
Birds nest on lower tree branches are very vulnerable to these cats that came to roam the garden but the dog is more than happy to chase away the cats, provided there's someone around to watch the dog too. On his own, I probably will not see my dog for a couple days. This is why he is named Marco Polo, because he likes to explore and forgotten to call home. The microchip is actually very useful.

The good thing about not using pesticide in the garden means there are plentiful of grubs and insects to support the wild birds dietary. Of course some of my blooms are half eaten by those catepillars and other pesty insects, but that is part of natural organic gardening, allowing nature to check and balance itself. My part is to encourage the bio diversity of the wild life in the garden environment and learn to live with some heart breaking chewed up and decapitated buds.

I saw this bird several times in the last few weeks.
She wouldn't allow me to get close but one day I saw her with a beak-ful of those caterpillars from the rose bush.

First sign of spring!

The only sign of spring in my garden at the moment are from these pigeon chicks.

They are growing real feathers and probably counting days to fly away. I am happy they survived the coldest winter temperatures ever recorded in years.

Its amazing to see how much fertilizer they are making in their nest!! 2 inches of thick yuck covering a wide area of several square meters. I'm getting a little impatient waiting for them to grow up and leave the nest. This corner of the garden shed badly need spring cleaning and sprucing up. A lick of paint would be great too. Another task gone into the to do list!

Talking in my head

A few of my gardening friends in the US and the UK already sprung into spring and started their gardening activities. It will be another month here before the ground warm up and ready for plantings. We usually get snow up to the first week of March. 4 more weeks....and that feels like light years!!

I really feel like I'm slowly decomposing under piles of snow. Its getting a bit depressing with too many grey and sunless day. This picture below was taken during the early days of winter. There was still some colours at the beginning of winter. At the moment everything is just twigs and sticks.
Today, the weather is not really that bad, it started frosty grey but the sun came out this morning though it is frozen cold out there. This week we had a record freezing temperature since years. This will make the spring arrival even later than usual.

I went to check the forsythia to see if there are some fat buds unfortunately they too are still very sleepy. No signs of crocus or early spring bulb poking out from under the snow blanket either.

"Kaboom the cat" helped digging in the snow searching for some signs of spring

While the cat is busy working in the garden, the dog is having a great time in the snow. Read my other blog - Pooch: I'm not a toy dog. I'm just a midget!

The wild birds really brought some life to the very very sleepy garden......This is (don't laugh) Long Tail Tit or Aegithalos Caudatus, a very tiny bird and oh so sweet looking.As I put down my thoughts into words, I realised my gardening activities meant much more than a place I dig around and plant things. It is not only a place where I chill out amongst my plants collection but also a place I could connect myself to many many things in life.

The thing I missed most is the outdoor freedom, sights and sound of nature, surrounded by trees, wild birds singing, buzzing bees, all the insects, pest and slugs that eat up my seedlings and plants, far far away from honking noise, no hustle bustle shoulder brushing or getting my feathers ruffled the wrong way, no Q&A, no worry if I'm being politically correct or not, no staring into the closet and asking "what should I wear today" because the garden plants really don't care if I'm dressed up to the nines or not. It is my backyard and I can be as sloppy as I want.....and the birds don't care either
The other thing I missed most is TALKING IN MY HEAD. Sounds like a crazy thing isn't it? Maybe I am a nutcase! This "talking in my head" happen only when I'm doing something in a repetitious way such as pulling weeds or digging a planting hole. Going on the tread mill is also a repetitative movement but somewhat its not the same feeling like "talking in my head" while I'm toiling in the garden.

Some people talk in their heads while driving but I can't do that because my brain function differently to stay alert and concentrate on the ever increasing numbers of speed cameras that's popping up like mushroom all over the place.

There are others who talk in their heads while walking as walk is a repetitive movement but not me probably because my eyes are busy enjoying the surrounding views. Walking the dog can be a good time to reflect whatever that's in my mind but also that doesn't work because I have to constantly follow the pooch to make sure he doesn't roll on some stinky stuff. I still don't understand why my dog really like that "canal number 15"

Apparently, a lot of people talk to themselves whether loudly or silently in their heads. This is a big relieve to know. I thought I was going nuts or something but Nut is also ancient Egyptian goddess of the sky!

Interestingly, talking in the head is actually a sign that the person is sorting out his/her thoughts, kind of mentally organising their mental notes etc.

I don't feel too weird about myself anymore since I read this article
http://health.yahoo.com/experts/depression/12522/does-talking-to-yourself-mean-youre-crazy/

Clearly after 3 months of winter, and now the 4th month.....my lifestyle is getting a little bit crammed in the winter jackets and indoor heating. I'm entitled to get a little depressed and affected by the long dark grey days of winter. I probably would be in the loony bin without my glass house winter garden.

I think its about time I head south for some sun.....

From the land of the rising sun to the landlocked alpine Switzerland

A dear gardening friend from Japan sent me this photo yesterday. The golden yellow crocus already springing out in her garden. Wonderful news. That is really a short winter compared to mine. Thank you for sending me the sunshine. It cheered me a lot despite a very snowy grey day.

I woke up this morning to a new fresh layer of snow.
I saw our backyard birds flying around in circle chasing each other, defending their territory. It was very entertaining as I stood there sipping my morning coffee and then I realised they were hungry because the feeder was totally covered with snow. One of the suet nut feeder was also missing. Probably buried somewhere under the snow.

I was told the squirrel is likely the culprit for knocking the feeder off the hook but I have never seen this cute furry animal anywhere close to the garden even though we have a few clumps of hazel nuts trees. There was once in spring a very shiny black fur squirrel entered the house and ate the dog's kibbles. He must be very hungry after a long winter and that was the one and only sighting.

While outdoor is so grey, I am glad these eye candy primroses kept on blooming.

In an enclosed area of the winter garden, their sweet smelling fragrance filled up the air. The fragrant is almost like viola odorata.

I bought 10 of them in different colours (a bit like a handful of M&M for the big kid ) and it is still a lot cheaper than seeking treatment for winter blues....

Colour therapy according to http://encyclopedia.farlex.com/colour+therapy

Winter Wonderland

February is pretty much mid winter here and the meteological experts published their December and January reports which confirmed this year's winter is harder and colder compared to the last 2 years.

There is nothing much I can do in the garden other than walking around knocking the snow from flattening and breaking the brances of my garden shrubs and those standard rose trees. It is really the time of year when I really learn to appreciate the beauty of skeleton trees, twigs and watching birds.

I usually refer to this bird as the carpenter because of the hammering against the tree trunk.

I was told by Ken, another one of my gardening friend that this Great Spotted Woodpecker's tongue is approximately two thirds the length of it's body, and retracts into a special cavity in it's skull, and also has an "ear" on the tip which enables it to hear it's prey inside the tree.

Thanks a lot Ken for sharing your ornithology knowledge. I find this very interesting.

More info about this bird http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Spotted_Woodpecker