On Friday morning I was up at 4AM and got the post up, cleaned the kitchen, and messed around on the computer trying to create a new home page for my browser. It had been a long time since I’d done that and I’d forgotten how.
Soon 6AM rolled around and I headed out to the garden as my intern #2 was due. I got out all the equipment and headed to the 7th Fence garden. The goal was to get the brambles cut down and start the deep digging needed to remove bramble roots.
I got to work removing the brambles and finished about 7AM, when my intern #2 finally arrived. She’d overslept. See? There really was an iris bed under that mess. There were even some daisies that had survived.
So she and I started digging. She’d do the standing and digging with the shovel and we’d both work on sections pulling out roots. I had the side in the yard, she was by the driveway.
I have dug these 14’ x 4’ beds before by myself and it would take me between 8 – 12 hours do complete one. I just hoped we could get part of this one cleaned out.
I had planted bulbs along the yard edge years back and to our amazement, I pulled out dozens and dozens of bulbs. They were all kinds of daffodils. I have enough to plant 3 gardens, at least.
As we got a 3’ section finished, I would heel in the plants we’d dug and put the bulbs in trenches.
We finished right at noon and got cleaned up. After she had gone I decided a shower was needed, so I got in. While in there I was trying to remember what day it was.
Oh, Friday! Oh, oh, I’d forgotten to do the milk order! Anything else on for Friday? Oh crap! The van was picking me up at 12:45PM to go to the Senior Center to see Birds of Prey!! And after that, taking me to PT! Double crap!! And I had no time for lunch! Triple crap!!
So I raced through the shower, got the milk order called in and the van arrived and I headed to the talk.
Our family had had connection with Tom Ricardi and his rehab center for birds of prey for decades. He uses the un-releasable ones (due to injuries) for education, if their personalities allow.
Here is Tom with my son in April of 2001 with a barred owl. We saw him often at demonstrations he’d do in the area, had visited his aviaries (now numbering 28), and sent our butchering remains to him to feed the birds. When my husband went out fishing for the first time each year, we’d clean out the freezer of the old fish and get it to Tom.
In 2023 a storm destroyed some of the aviaries and a GoFundMe raised over $20,000 to rebuild them.
Tom Ricardi has spent the last 50 years nurturing thousands of injured birds of prey back to health at his Birds of Prey Rehabilitation Center in Conway, MA. He was the first person in the U.S. to successfully breed permanently injured bald eagles in captivity and has released dozens of eaglets into the wild.
He had 2 little fuzz balls that he had rescued when they fell from nests this year and couldn’t be returned. One had been the size of a half dollar, found in a quarry. The other had blown out of a tree in someone’s yard during the recent storms and the nest couldn’t be found. Both will be released into the wild once fully grown and acclimated to similar birds in a dedicated aviary. Now they are bonded with Tom as he feeds them.
I hadn’t seen Tom in a few years, since my husband died. It was nice to connect again. But I had to leave before he finished, as my PT appointment loomed.
Fortunately, the PT person took pity on me and didn’t work me hard. I got home around 3PM and just rested until it was time to make supper. In bed by 8PM as my general helper will be here at 7AM on Saturday morning.
I plan to finish planting the 7th Fence garden, and hopefully we will have time to plant the ginger and get the hoophouse up. It’s to be another lovely day, cool, sunny, and in the 70’s.