One of the most nerve-wracking aspects of gardening is the waiting that comes after seeding. You water, water, and water the bare ground and wonder if anything will sprout. And then it does. The basil was a little sluggish, but here it is, at long last… Okra is also taking its sweet old time about…
Earlier this year, I lamented the sloppiness of my front yard mesquite tree. Has the tree cleaned up its act? Nope. Take a look at what’s all over the branches. Not just spring leaves, but the beginnings of quite a pod crop… And where are all of those yellow fuzzy things going to fall? All…
The winter of 2013-14 was a warm one in Tucson, Arizona. To the point that my hot pepper plants survived the brief cold spells of January and February. But for some yellowing in aged leaves that are about to fall off, the pepper plants are in great condition. And they’re producing! I’ve been pleasantly surprised…
With daytime temperatures reaching the nineties, my gardening thoughts are now focused on summer. Time to get the summer seeds planted, starting with okra in this basin. The lattice of branches is there to keep the feral cats out… Can’t get through the summer without basil. Seeds in this pot… Now, a quick check on…
This past Sunday dawned bright and sunny. Typical Tucson weather, and it was perfect for a bicycle ride. So, I boarded the Official Bike-tography Bike and joined 20,000 of my best friends on Cyclovia Tucson’s South Side route. This five-mile ride featured a little bit of everything. Kids learning how to ride a two-wheeler. A…
The gales of yesterday brought a stranger into town. Its name? Well, it’s called Rain. A real rarity around here. It left a little bit of evidence in my garden… A few minutes after I took this photo, the rain ran away from Tucson. So much for our warm welcome and unforgettable hospitality. In other…
My “No Gas” photo print has made the bigtime! It’s in today’s “Arts Speak” show at the Tucson Museum of Art. Here are the specs: Archival-quality 19.5” x 29” Giclée print in 38.5” x 29” frame. Which begs the question: How do you transport something that big when you don’t have a car? Meet the…
Have you been for a ride on The Loop? It’s an off-road path that’s being built around the Tucson valley. The Loop will make it possible for cyclists, walkers, and runners to avoid motorized traffic. This past Sunday, the first-ever Old Pueblo Gran FUNdo took to The Loop. It was a windy morning, no doubt…
Found three uprooted globe mallows during yesterday evening’s walk around the neighborhood. I’m trying to re-root them in a pot… Will they make it? I don’t know. Call this project an experiment.
Looks like it’s time to wrap things up on the winter gardening front. My kale is going to seed… This weekend’s forecast calls for big drops of water falling from the sky. That’s what people in wetter climes call R-A-I-N. Looking forward to it!
At this time of the year, my mesquite tree is a bit of a slob. It’s losing its leaves, which means that my yard is full of duff. Here’s what I’m talking about… If the tree limited its duff sharing to the yard, I’d be happy. But no. Duff on the driveway. Duff on the…
After I did a little hand washing, I put the laundry outside. Where it dripped all over my porch. Which is right next to my thirsty container garden. Time to give three of those cilantro pots a little drip irrigation…
I had the best of intentions last fall. Neat, orderly garden rows. But nothing sprouted. Time for Garden 2.0. Where seeds sprouted wherever I tossed them. Looks like this Jumble Garden thing is working…
Been in a long-term drought here in Southern Arizona. Thus, scenes like this are always welcome. Especially in the garden…
We had one of the warmest Januarys on record. So, Tucson’s plant life responded by blooming early. Here are two eager beaver plants from my yard. First, the aloe… And the feathery senna. How could it pass up a party like this?
Here’s the conclusion to my annual series of “What I Did On My Christmas Vacation” posts. Cold outside! This really was the temperature at the Retallick family home in Westtown, Pennsylvania… Mom’s back from seeing if the newspapers had landed at the end of the driveway. None of them had… Okay, so we can’t read…
Continuing with my annual series of “What I Did On My Christmas Vacation” posts. Here’s the fourth. There’s a farm down the street from my folks’ house… The farm is part of a private school’s property, and the athletic fields are adjacent to the cornfields. After the geese chow down in the cornfields, they adjourn…
Continuing with my annual series of “What I Did On My Christmas Vacation” posts. Here’s the third. A leafy one from eastern Pennsylvania. I guess I should do Mom a favor and remove those beech leaves from the screen door. But they’re so photogenic…
Continuing with my annual series of “What I Did On My Christmas Vacation” posts. Here’s the second. I spent the latter half of my grade school years at Penn Wood Elementary. Which had a nice woodsy setting that was full of distractions for a budding artist. Like textures and colors – the building blocks of…
It’s time for my annual series of “What I Did On My Christmas Vacation” posts. Here’s the first. Day after Christmas was a great one for planting the Retallick family’s tabletop Alberta spruce. Off with the pine cone decorations… And into the ground… Mom takes the one-gallon pot away before I tamp soil around the…
Four years ago, I launched my first photography website. At first, Bicycle Stock Images was sort of a grab-bag for all kinds of photography. Last year, I brought it back to its original focus. This year, the all-bicycling-all-the-time site makes its first foray into the world of responsive design. Which means that Bicycle Stock Images…