seeds and paint

On the last day of class Deni, a wondrous girl of 15, came to class with fabric paint and flower seeds for our garden.  Deni is a brilliant artist, the oldest in a family of 4..Melissa-the-entomologist who has turned  into a very fine artist and Josh, a smart, sweet lad who builds boats, bird houses and paints.

Adali made a hummingbird feeder out of clay. As soon as we hung it a humming bird came to drink! It works! She also made an amazing hummingbird sock puppet and an angel out of coffee filters and a mustard lid.

Genesis painted beautiful shirts. She and Jasmine have become art sisters. Genesis wants to be a photographer. I share her garden pictures here. This girl needs a camera!

I have amazing kids!  It’s very cool.

Holiday Miracles

One of our residents came to the class today. She had bought 4 seed packs,broccoli, cauliflower, mustard and cabbage for our garden. Adali made a hummingbird feeder out of clay, and as soon as we hung it, filled with 1 part sugar and 3 parts water, one came and drank!

Miracles abound when you don’t watch too closely.

plants have brians!

I have monarchs hatching in my bedroom.2 girls and a boy… also a
couple of parasitoid wasps…sometimes if a plant is being heavily
chomped, part of the plant’s sap mix with the saliva of the
caterpillar.
This sends out a fragrance that certain parasitoid wasps are very
attracted to. The parasitoid wasps fly to the rescue of the plant like
some John Wayne bomber squad…. kill the caterpillars and lay eggs
inside the carcasses wow… if it is intelligent design that’s one
scary mind!

stories and bugs

A little girl who finished all of my horror tales today in class and began one of her own
” The was once a little girl who kept all the memories of her families in a leaf that she carried with her, because her family had all died.”

She went to the forest  that I had established in an earlier tale…

 

The tale…

Once there was a bride who died on her wedding day, but she wanted to be married so much she rose from her grave to meet her groom at their alter.

But she was dead, so her eyes were only empty sockets and her hands that reached toward her groom, were of bone. She tried to call to him, but, because she was dead, instead of words, all that issued from her mouth was dust.

When her love saw here he was so scared that he became petrified. Now petrified can mean very, very scared, but it can also mean ‘turned to stone.’ He was both. When the bride saw her lover was now a block of stone she began to weep. But, because she was dead, instead of tears, worms fell from her eyes. Now,  as you know from our garden, worms make the earth rich and fruitful. So when the worms fell onto the dust of her words, it too became fruitful. Out of the once dust, now rich soil plants began to grow, vines crawled up and encased her bridegroom. Small animals built their homes in his crevasses.

Birds came to dwell in the hollow eyes of the dead bride. They used shreds of her wedding veil to make their nests. A great jungle grew up around them and engulfed the village where the bride and groom had lived. All the creatures of the earth, that had been displaced by cities and now had nowhere to live  came to  the jungle. Often animals escaped from zoos or circus and ran to find refuge in the forest.

 

“and” said my student “the little girl who kept all the memories of her families in a leaf that she carried with her, because her family had all died. came to the forest to live. There she met a little boy who also had a leaf, with all the memories of his dead family inside it. Together they lived with the creatures in the forest.”

 

Whew!

 

today we sakinds of butterflies: gulf fritillary, w 5   yes 5!  monarchs, cabbage whites and a fiery Skipper.. also the coolest, biggest, yellowest crab spider I have EVER seen and the usual panoply of lady bugs larva and  a gulf fritillary laying eggs.

 

there was also a tale of a little girl who could build rainbows into heaven. A angel climbed down.and could only be see in starlight

she had hollow bones like a bird which were filled with magic which radiated out of her fingers when she touched someone.

She can only be seen under the moon and stars not in daylight.

But under the night sky she gleamed like a star… she meets the little girl and they play at night until the little girl grows up and can no longer see her. For grown – ups lose the vision of magic and miracles..

The angel wanders lonely until the once little girl, now woman  has a child who can see and play with the angel at night.

Some families don’t celebrate Halloween because it’s the devils bday. It was always my favorite

wings take flight

A young mother and her 5 year old daughter attend my class now. Sometimes the father brings her. Also, a longtime student now comes with her sister and her mother comes with her autistic son.
The first day the young mother and her 5 year old came, I showed them the garden. We saw ladybug, lava, pupa and adults,
I showed them aphids and explained about parthenogenesis (reproduction of females, by females, for females.) How aphids grow wings and change to males at summer’s end.

How ants “milk aphids for their “honeydew,” the sweet excretion from their cloacae (rears.)

The mother marveled at all the tiny miracles of life that surround us, unnoticed and unknown.

Then a flock of parrots circle overhead. Dozens of them, circling like noisy green and red dreams. They perched in a nearby silk tree, squabbling over fruit, then took to the sky again, circling and circling overhead.

The young woman bent her head skyward and said her thanks to God for the beauty above and around.

And I, in my doubting soul gave thanks too, for this gift of transformation and light.

And for more about aphidsJ
People don’t like aphid, but they have a remarkable life cycle and fascinating history.

So before you look down upon the lowly aphid read on…

The Manna from Heaven that the Israelites ate while strolling through the desert might well have been honeydew from aphids or other insects!

Aphids produce a sweet sticky substance called honey dew, if you don’t believe me, go feel the plants where they have been… sticky.

If you are still skeptical, lick your fingers (euee gross.) In the ancient Oaks and Olives, large quantities of honey dew would freeze in the night. When the sun arose and warmed the frozen dew…, bonk!

Manna, right on your noggin! It’s a wonder that the Jews didn’t come up with the idea of gravity. (Was Newton Jewish?)

Man” is the common Arabic name for aphids, and man es simma (the “manna of heaven”) for honeydew.

In the Mideast, people still collect the sweet excretions (which is a nice word for phoo) of scale insects that feed on tamarisk. They call it “man” and make halva out of it. (Lest we feel superior in our culinary habits, a large portion of bee honey is actually honeydew harvested from the surface of plants.)

Aphids pierce the phloem tubes of plants with their sharp mouthparts and suck out the sugary goodies in transit there. (Phloem is the tube that transports food, mostly sugar to all parts of the plant. Xylem transports water.)

Aphids process this food and excrete drops (honeydew) rich in sugars, free amino acids (the building blocks of proteins), proteins, minerals and vitamins. Move over Whole Foods!

Some aphids shoot this waste away from their bodies, but other species of aphids have learned to excrete a drop on from their rear end when an ant taps them with foreleg or antennae. Then the ant eats it (and you thought humans were kinky!)Later, the ant will regurgitate part of the honeydew for it’s nest mates.

You could try this if you’re not worried about what the neighbors might think.

Sometimes aphids are called “ant cows”.

Ants like honeydew as much as the Israelites did. Through the winter, some ants take aphid eggs down into their colonies to protect them, bringing them up to graze in the springtime. If you look closely, you may see small cowboy hats on the ants… or maybe not.

Each aphid species has its own life cycle, but there are some features uniting nearly all of them.

One feature most species share is that they are incredibly prolific, worse than rabbits!

Wingless adult female aphids can produce 50 to 100 offspring. A newly born aphid becomes a reproducing adult within about a week and then can produce up to 5 offspring per day for up to 30 days!

If all the descendants of a single aphid survived the summer and were arranged four abreast, their line would exceed the circumference of the earth at the equator! Now that’s a lot of honeydew!Dentists LOVE them.

Even more amazing is that most of this reproduction takes place without the interference of males!

This is known as parthenogenesis. (From the Greek parthenos, “virgin”, + genesis, “creation”.)

When mother aphids reproduce parthenogenetically, instead of laying eggs they give birth directly to smaller editions of themselves. An “average” aphid life cycle goes a little something like this: (stop me if you’ve heard this one.)

In spring, an egg hatches, producing a wingless female aphid who almost immediately begins parthenogenetically producing new wingless females. Generation follows generation of wingless females; I think I saw one wearing “an aphid without a male is like a fish without a bicycle” tee shirt.Then hot weather arrives, or maybe the plant they are living on dies, some of the females grow wings and fly off.I wish I could do that!

This new generation of female winged aphid find a plant host of a completely different species from that on which their spring generations have developed.

Typically, when it’s time to move back to the plant species on which aphid winters, (kind of like wintering in the Hamptons) some aphids develop into males.

Sexual reproduction takes place, but apparently, it’s nothing to write home about because when the eggs hatch (in the spring) there are no males in sight.

Try explaining that in Spanish! The kids take this in stride.

But the dads don’t like it. One said, “Thank God I’m not an aphid.”

Usually parthenogenesis is followed by a brief bout of sexual reproduction just to keep the gene pool fresh.

A young mother and her 5 year old daughter attend my class now. Sometimes the father brings her. Also, a longtime student now comes with her sister and her mother comes with her autistic son.

The first day the young mother and her 5 year old came, I showed them the garden. We saw ladybug, lava, pupa and adults,

I showed them aphids and explained about parthenogenesis (reproduction of females, by females, for females.) How aphids grow wings and change to males at summer’s end.

How ants “milk aphids for their “honeydew,” the sweet excretion from their cloacae (rears.)

The mother marveled at all the tiny miracles of life that surround us, unnoticed and unknown.

Then a flock of parrots circle overhead. Dozens of them, circling like noisy green and red dreams. They perched in a nearby silk tree, squabbling over fruit, then took to the sky again, circling and circling overhead.

The young woman bent her head skyward and said her thanks to God for the beauty above and around.

And I, in my doubting soul gave thanks too, for this gift of transformation and light.

E

And for more about aphidsJ

People don’t like aphid, but they have a remarkable life cycle and fascinating history.

So before you look down upon the lowly aphid read on…

The Manna from Heaven that the Israelites ate while strolling through the desert might well have been honeydew from aphids or other insects!

Aphids produce a sweet sticky substance called honey dew, if you don’t believe me, go feel the plants where they have been… sticky.

If you are still skeptical, lick your fingers (euee gross.) In the ancient Oaks and Olives, large quantities of honey dew would freeze in the night. When the sun arose and warmed the frozen dew…, bonk!

Manna, right on your noggin! It’s a wonder that the Jews didn’t come up with the idea of gravity. (Was Newton Jewish?)

Man” is the common Arabic name for aphids, and man es simma (the “manna of heaven”) for honeydew.

In the Mideast, people still collect the sweet excretions (which is a nice word for phoo) of scale insects that feed on tamarisk. They call it “man” and make halva out of it. (Lest we feel superior in our culinary habits, a large portion of bee honey is actually honeydew harvested from the surface of plants.)

Aphids pierce the phloem tubes of plants with their sharp mouthparts and suck out the sugary goodies in transit there. (Phloem is the tube that transports food, mostly sugar to all parts of the plant. Xylem transports water.)

Aphids process this food and excrete drops (honeydew) rich in sugars, free amino acids (the building blocks of proteins), proteins, minerals and vitamins. Move over Whole Foods!

Some aphids shoot this waste away from their bodies, but other species of aphids have learned to excrete a drop on from their rear end when an ant taps them with foreleg or antennae. Then the ant eats it (and you thought humans were kinky!) Later, the ant will regurgitate part of the honeydew for it’s nest mates.

You could try this if you’re not worried about what the neighbors might think.

Sometimes aphids are called “ant cows”.

Ants like honeydew as much as the Israelites did. Through the winter, some ants take aphid eggs down into their colonies to protect them, bringing them up to graze in the springtime. If you look closely, you may see small cowboy hats on the ants… or maybe not.

Each aphid species has its own life cycle, but there are some features uniting nearly all of them.

One feature most species share is that they are incredibly prolific, worse than rabbits!

Wingless adult female aphids can produce 50 to 100 offspring. A newly born aphid becomes a reproducing adult within about a week and then can produce up to 5 offspring per day for up to 30 days!

If all the descendants of a single aphid survived the summer and were arranged four abreast, their line would exceed the circumference of the earth at the equator! Now that’s a lot of honeydew! Dentists LOVE them.

Even more amazing is that most of this reproduction takes place without the interference of males!

This is known as parthenogenesis. (From the Greek parthenos, “virgin”, + genesis, “creation”.)

When mother aphids reproduce parthenogenetically, instead of laying eggs they give birth directly to smaller editions of themselves. An “average” aphid life cycle goes a little something like this: (stop me if you’ve heard this one.)

In spring, an egg hatches, producing a wingless female aphid who almost immediately begins parthenogenetically producing new wingless females. Generation follows generation of wingless females; I think I saw one wearing “an aphid without a male is like a fish without a bicycle” tee shirt. Then hot weather arrives, or maybe the plant they are living on dies, some of the females grow wings and fly off. I wish I could do that!

This new generation of female winged aphid find a plant host of a completely different species from that on which their spring generations have developed.

Typically, when it’s time to move back to the plant species on which aphid winters, (kind of like wintering in the Hamptons) some aphids develop into males.

Sexual reproduction takes place, but apparently, it’s nothing to write home about because when the eggs hatch (in the spring) there are no males in sight.

Try explaining that in Spanish! The kids take this in stride.

But the dads don’t like it. One said, “Thank God I’m not an aphid.”

Usually parthenogenesis is followed by a brief bout of sexual reproduction just to keep the gene pool fresh.

4 O’Clocks and Dirty Faces

I was outside today with the very sweet child whom I often refer to in my head, as Dumbest-Child-In the World (or d.c.w.)
“ A white, furry spider is flying at me!” she screamed in a high C that shattered all the glass in the nearby buildings.
There are no white furry spiders,” I said.
“There!!” she pointed, in dulcet tones, which caused a mini-sonic boom.
It was the milkweed seeds which proliferate like bunnies along our garden. She has seen them daily for at least 3 years. I have given lessons on them…
With her knowledge really does lesson from day to day!

While gardening with kids today a woman stopped by.
“I love what you are doing with this garden,” she said.
“I own the big brick building at the end of the street, the street being the corner of Bonsallo and whatever runs parallel to 23rd,
“I would like it if you would plant outside my building. I will pay for plants, and if you want to try to install a dip I’ll pay for it.”
“Can we mosaic too?” I asked.
“Yes,: she said, I give you permission to get as creative as you like.”

There is a long stretch of land on the mystery street. On Bonsallo there is another long stretch broken by cement cobbling. We could faux marble these.
I will, of course give her an estimate and not purchase without a check or cash in hand.
But it’s a lovely offer.

It’s nice to know that all our neighbors aren’t like the “environmentalist” next door, who wants to pave their stretch of parkway.

More lovely neighbors! Our lovely neighbor and master Gardener, Vanessa has planted agapanthus in our garden a purple surprise!
Agapanthus is known as “Lily of the Nile”, because it is not a lily. All species of Agapanthus are native to South Africa
And some of my kids planted Mirabilis jalapa (The four o’clock flower or marvel of Peru)

Nice, as I feared the garden might be dead!

Mirabilis in Latin means wonderful and Jalapa is a town in Mexico. Mirabilis jalapa is said to have been exported from the Peruvian Andes in 1540.
This plant is “wonderful,” because there are flowers of different colors on the same plant.

Different color variation in the flower and different color flowers in same plant.

Variegated flower on a four o’clock plant.

Naturally occurring color variation on four o’clock flowers.
Additionally, an individual flower can be splashed with different colors. Another interesting point is a color-changing phenomenon. For example, in the yellow variety, as the plant matures, it can display flowers that gradually change to a dark pink color. Similarly white flowers can change to light violet.

The flowers usually open from late afternoon onwards, hence the common name, 4 O’clock, then producing a strong, sweet-smelling fragrance.
Despite their appearance, the flowers are not formed from petals – rather they are a pigmented modification of the calyx. (A calyx is the plural of sepal. A sepal is a part of the flower, usually green, that are under (or around) the more conspicuous petals. )Both sepals and petals are modified leaves.
4 O’clocks, like most night fragrance plants are pollinated by long-tongued moths of the Sphingidae family, such as the sphinx moths or hawk moths and other nocturnal pollinators.

The Gulf Changes

As we watch in class… literally…. We see the Gulf Fritillary and the monarch metamorphosis.

We got gulf

We have Gulf Fritillary caterpillar metamorphosing into chrysalis. These resemble dead leaves so they don’t get eaten.

When you’re a caterpillar you gotta think like a bird. A bird with the munchies.

Adali creates