Even though I wasn't in a great mood at bean planting time and wasn't even sure I wanted to deal with it, I planted beans. A few inside, a few outside 3x too deep, a few outside the right depth. ALL of them came up and I gave 3 plants away. There are now 23 bean plants in my garden and they are the happiest beans I've ever grown even though none of them were named or got to "write" any poetry.
I guess they knew all along that they were beans, not Tang Dynasty Chinese Poets, and that being a Scarlet Emperor Bean is quite enough, thank you.
Last night I got to eat the first small handful from these plants. It was as delicious as of their forbears.
Today I was out watering their besties -- the sunflowers on whom they rely to help attract pollinators and on which they wind the later vines of the summer. The sunflowers seem to like them, too. There were dozens of bees and then, out of the corner of my eye, I saw a very tiny hummingbird of a type I had not seen before. I was pretty sure he was a Rufus Hummingbird, but not being a legit birder, how would I know?
Hummingbirds love the red flowers. The little guy fed on the nectar of the highest flowers, enchanting to watch. I didn't move, I just kept watering. Later I did my research (like a good non-birder) and learned that I was right about the type and that he's migrating. I thought of the wonder of how my beans reach 10 or 12 feet and bloom their hearts out just at the moment hummingbirds are traveling through.
Nature's clock is so much more subtle and wondrous than spring, summer, fall and winter. Each being has its clock that tells it where it needs to be and what it needs to do. When things go haywire -- like the blizzard we had on September 9, 2019 -- every being suffers. Bear and I didn't suffer, but I did have to deal with downed trees in my yard. That was a kind of pain. $$$
I remember being out at the Refuge and seeing a mountain blue bird hovering at eye level, looking me as if he were saying, "Help!" There was no food for him and he wasn't supposed to be there. That year was a massive die off and what blew me away is that it took so long for people to see the obvious reason. Millions of migrating tiny birds caught in a blizzard.
But here's my new "friend." Audubon.org
I love these beans. They've taught me so much. I think they "know" me and my role in their existence. I look on the green pods I pick, cook and eat as a gift. "Thank you, Martha, for saving seeds and planting us so we can grow and do our thing." After 5 generations I guess they've specialized to my yard. Every year they are taller and more productive. Their little garden is a small bean cathedral.
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