Snakes, Bees, and Cats-Oh My!

Strolling through the gardens can be an eye opening experience. Such was the case when I happened upon a garter snake near the house on the north side.

I was almost pretty much in shock because I rarely see snakes in the garden. When I do I always get very excited as snakes are good! Of course this garter snake will not bite me and inject poison into me so I consider this one to be good. I have occasionally seen copperheads in the garden, but they are rare and are usually tiny so I just move on. I would never ever intentionally kill a snake when given an alternative, because I consider all snakes beneficial in that they reduce the rodent population. Of course they might also reduce the frog population too; which is not so good but overall I tend to leave snakes be in the garden.

Many people have a fear of snakes. I will not say fearing snakes is irrational, because I cannot possibly know what a person feels who is afraid of snakes. I will say though, snakes can be fascinating given half a chance. At big amusement parks like Busch Gardens there are always snake shows, and I find it truly neat just how a snake feels up close and personal. They are not at all slimy and icky like slugs as some might think. They can be pretty cool in the garden too in that they help control pests and add a different element to the garden.

Now this fella is cool too. He helps with the rodent population but we are having difficulty with him and our resident orange tabby cat called Orkin. While Smokey boy has not attacked Orkin (he has no claws) he does tend to bother her to the point that she will simply stalk off or attack him. It is a frustrating time for us. Especially since Smokey is a stray and has no home and as you can see he is always hungry. We want them both to feel at home in our gardens and hope the situation works itself out to the good for both cats. 

Another cat has also shown up in our gardens. We call him Cloud and he will be taking a visit to the veterinarian's clinic next week to be neutered and vaccinated. He is a good boy, but he is not as friendly as Smokey. 

Please, if you have pets get them spayed or neutered to prevent all of these unwanted animals roaming around homeless. These two new cats would not be hanging out in my garden if they had a good home or even a home where they were fed and given basic necessities. It is not fair to let dogs and cats fend for themselves and is quite an issue here in my area of Tennessee. Thousands of animals are killed each year simply because they are homeless. If we reduce the population by spaying and neutering perhaps we can reduce the euthanasia rate as well. 

I normally don't grow sunflowers since there is not an awful lot of sun here, but occasionally some will sprout from the bird feeders. Such was the case of this little sunflower. The amount of bugs buzzing around it was a nice treat. I snapped these few pictures in the same session. The bees just seemed to take turns on the sunflower which I thought was very cooperative of the bees.



Look at this big bee. It came in as soon as the little bee took off and they would rotate around on the head of this sunflower....


in the garden....

Don't forget about Skeeter's Giveaway post for a Troy-Bilt found here. Time is running out!
 

 Words and Photos Property of In the Garden Blog Team, In the Garden

Chairs but not this Snake

BY SKEETER

Look what I spotted on the roadside. Yep, some ding-a-ling had discarded these old ladder back chairs right on the side of the road. Difficult for me to believe such things still happen in this year 2012...
I passed them by several days before getting the notion to clear the county right of way of this debris.
The Saint was kind enough to toss them into the back of the truck and bring them to our Georgia Gardens... Too old to sit upon but not to old to recycle into a thing of beauty. I failed to snap a picture of the chairs alone after I had worked my magic on them.
But here they are with a fresh coat of red paint. They are now on display in my woods to greet everyone that drives past our house.
The bunny's clothes were bargain finds at the Goodwill store.
I always have fun picking out the decor for the woods display and had wanted to add chairs to change it up a bit from the hay bales. What luck that the awful person that tossed these chairs on the roadside, tossed them near my home! Now I need to find a discarded table but hopefully, not tossed on the roadside.
Look what else we spotted over the weekend. Our first Copperhead snake in the garden!
Since this one is poisonous, we feared risk to the neighbor kids, cats, dogs, horse's and yes, ME too! So we killed this one. Sorry Mr. Snake but your triangle head really did give me the creeps when snakes normally do not bother me at all. I like my new CHAIRS BUT NOT THIS SNAKE, In the Garden...
Words and Photos Property of In the Garden Blog Team, In the Garden

Whimsy

BY SKEETER I have a bit of Whimsy here in my Georgia Gardens. This is my latest bit of fun. I have lost 2 Azalea's in the Driveway Island. I cut down the mostly dead one yesterday and decided to do something unique to take the eye off the empty spot. Flowers are my solution to keep the eye busy while looking at this Island. Bicycle baskets were too expensive to purchase. I remembered an old wicker basket in my storage closet. Can we say recycling? Ta-da... I hope these two containers of flowers fill in really well in time. I have a vision of full baskets draping over the sides. This bicycle once belonged to the Saints parents. They purchased it at Sears back in time when Sears was the place to buy most things. Remember when Sears had a Catalog and even sold house's? Wow, that was many moons ago. I knew when I saw a bicycle in Tina's Tiger Gardens, (Click HERE to see) that I had to have one of my own. Plus our next door neighbor is really into biking. I mean REALLY into biking as he has biked cross country. He is a biking fanatic and I got his thumbs up approval for this display. Thanks Mom B for keeping this bike out of the land fill and passing it along to us. No you cannot have it back either. Hee hee. In the past 3 days, I have seen 4 snakes in our yard. I fear it is going to be a bad year for snakes seeing so many this soon. I am hoping that maybe with this abnormal hot weather, that many critters are waking from winters naps sooner and they are on the move for food.


This Rat/Chicken Snake was doing a dance for me. It was the neatest behavior I have ever seen with raising his head like a King Cobra. I believe it was looking for food. It was funny as I went out to snap pictures and then it took off into the woods. I came back inside and no sooner had I sat down at the computer and I spotted it back in the same spot. As if that critter knew exactly where it was going. I watched it for a while then lost track of it. Sheba kitty had her eye on it the entire time and so wanted for me to let her out to play with it. My indoor only kitty wanted to have some WHIMSY, In the Garden...

Words and Photos Property of In the Garden Blog Team, In the Garden

Wild Kingdom

By SKEETERPrimrose thriving from self seeding in my Georgia Garden.
With the missing Oak Tree and lack of shade on our patio, we erected a Canopy. We used this canopy in our German Gartenplatz while living in Germany. It has been in our storage shed for the past 9 years. Finally, we have a use for it. I am not too happy with the blue color as I would prefer green. I believe it would blend in with nature better then the bright blue. What do you think?
It did not take the squirrels long to check it out. I hope they do not rip a hole in the canvas with their sharp claws. Grrrrrrr, go to a tree you stinker!
I spotted our first Snake of the year last week. A Rat Snake so I did nothing more then snap a few pictures of this creature. Notice the raindrops on its head.
This Snake was keeping an eye on me as I in return. Even though not a poisonous snake, it has teeth and will bite for defense. Ouch, stay clear...

Here is a video of the snake roaming in the Butterfly Bush Island.This snake is welcome in my garden as it eats rodents such as rats, mice and squirrels. I am not happy that it will also eat eggs and baby birds, sigh. The Rat Snake is also known as the "Chicken Snake" because it eats chicken eggs and chicks. I do not like the idea of this creature being under my house! Snake skin found in the crawl space during bathroom renovations. Yikes, I hope it is not under there now. A Deer and Rabbit eating corn together in my gardens.

Such harmony between the two as if long time friends. Stay away from my flowers you cute little cottontail!Renovations continue in our house. Plumbing and Electric to be tended to then we can start the building process! Exciting but scary taking this on our self.



Sheba has enjoyed all the boxes we keep bringing home during this renovation process! In this video, she is chasing her tail while in her latest box. She is a mess and keeps me laughing every day with funny antics.




Lastly, Video of a little tree frog going to bed for the day. We have half screens on our windows and I keep them raised on windows we do not open for a clearer view outside. The frogs take advantage of the windows and sleep during the day behind the tracks.

Flowers blooming, House Renovations and WILD KINGDOM, In the Garden...
I have never loaded 4 videos at once and I hope they all worked for you today...
Words and Photos Property of In the Garden Blog Team, In the Garden

Do you roll your Garden Hose?

By Skeeter

I had another post ready to go today but need to add something else to it. Blogger does not like to let me drag pictures like it once did. I am finding it difficult to add a new picture to a post so since it will take time to add my new picture, I will just write a quick new blog for today!

Okay, the topic: Do you roll your Garden Hose after each time you use it? I wish I lived in a perfect world where I have an underground watering sprinkler system. This water would come from the lake that my dream house sits by. Now, since I don't have this dream house or a lake in my back yard, I must rely on Nature to water for me. When Nature is not cooperating with me, I must unroll the hose and drag it all over the yard to my many small gardens scattered about.
We are lucky to have a water spigot on both sides of our house. But even at that, each faucet has 200 feet of hose attached to it. It is a pain in the butt to drag the thing around the yard in the Heat and Humidity of a Georgia Summer. So once I am finished with the watering bit, I am so tired from dragging the heavy hose around that I some times think I should leave the hose lying on the ground for the next time I need it. But nope, Miss Organised and likes everything in her place, (that would be me) has to roll up the hose each time she uses it.

So I would like to know, DO YOU ROLL UP YOUR GARDEN HOSE? In the Garden...


We spent about 8 hours in the yard on a 92 degree day yesterday! Here is something we spotted in our driveway culvert to get us to slow down and enjoy more wildlife. This one was a biggie in my book! Thank goodness for zoom lens or I would not have this picture!

A beautiful shade of orange-red on the belly side and rather large in size. We did not see the entire thing stretched out as it slithered back into the culvert when it saw me. I looked in our snake book and the best we can tell, this is a Red-Bellied Water Snake! Yep, water snake in our yard! It was in the water run off area (dry creek) so normal it was following the water stream looking for Frogs, Salamanders and Toads. They can grow up to 4.5 feet long and they are NOT poisonous. That's good to know as this was an intimidating snake but now that I know what it is, I will be less fearful if I see another one in the future.

After a long hot day in the yard yesterday, we are headed to the lake for a boat ride to relax! Maybe we will see something else fun to share with you!

Everyone have a Good Day!

Unexpected Visitors

Garter snake, aka Thamnophis sirtalis. A snake commonly found in gardens and backyards in North America. As a child I used to capture these guys and handle them with no fear. We used to have a grass snake as a pet for awhile, but not a garter snake. This particular fella was napping under a piece of plywood in my vegetable garden. I was certainly shocked when I picked up the board and found him. I grabbed my camera and had the Jimster pick up the board while I snapped away and researched this type of snake. This snake has eaten fairly recently. If you look closely you'll see a bulge about 6 inches away from its head. The website I used said garter snakes eat all kinds of things, small mammals, insects, toads, earthworms, snails and slugs. I hope its meal was a vole but I am betting it is a toad. We have tons of them in the garden.

While working on my computer in my second story room, this lizard calmly crawled around my window on the screen. I found out it is a male broadheaded skink, aka Eumeces laticeps. For more info on it check out this website. I have previously posted on skinks as well. They are VERY common in my garden. The website says these guys eat earthworms, grasshoppers, butterflies, cockroaches and small beetles. In my opinion they are good to have around! This skink can be differentiated from the blue tailed skink by being larger and having more labial scales. Their nests are found under rotting logs and in sawdust. Its appearance may be attributed to the recent move of a large pile of firewood in my garden. Unfortunately for this skink, it was not faster or smarter then my little pest control named Orkin. Orkin captured him and was playing with him when Mr. Fix-it intervened. We hope the skink moves on because Orkin is pretty good at her job. She was QUITE miffed when her toy was taken away.

Both of these unexpected visitors WILL bite, but they are not poisonous and will not harm people (other than what could be a painful bite if the critter is big enough). I was bit by a blue tailed skink but it more surprised me than hurt. It did not break the skin, but I think this skink may do more damage and I will not be handling it. As long as these visitors do not eat my plants and don't pose a threat to us, they are welcomed

in the garden....

What You Don't Want to See in Your Birdhouses!

I have heard of snakes taking up residence in birdhouses but have never seen it. Skeeter has and has the picture to prove it! I think no birds would stand a chance of surviving should they decide this is where they want to make their home! Do you suppose the rat snake had dinner in mind when it took up residence here?

in the garden....