there's always movement in the garden...no stasis...not even in winter...it is one of the things that keeps me coming back...panders to my need for novelty in a way that is at least constructive...the random order of the photos is a reflection of the non-linear course of events out there so i will attempt to adjust the narrative to their sequence...the jerusalem artichokes are beginning to bud...fairly soon ( by the end of the month certainly) there will be big yellow flowers lending a sunny countenance to the garden ( at least until the plants begin to die back...then it takes on an addams family sort of look)... the beets and turnips are long gone and i am taking out the spinach as it dries, so there won't be anything for the sunchokes to stunt as they fill out and cast larger shadows...i'll put the rutabagas in the winter wheat bed and the cowpeas will hold their own as they vine up the trellis...the second and third photos are of the difference in the size of the awn on spring wheat ( second photo) and winter wheat ( third)...after the seed heads shatter the awns stiffen and slacken in response to the humidity level in the air working the seed into the ground...obviously the spring wheat evolved in an area where there was a need for much larger awns to get the seed well worked into the ground...given the speed with which winter wheat germinates and produces a root system i can understand the lesser need...the maize is about to flower...i wish some teosinte was flowering as well, just to see what might happen...this far north i am not sanguine about that occuring...the chinese yam vine ( at least one of them) is moving along the trellis and it will be flowering soon as well and producing massive amounts of aerial bulbs that will have to be retrieved if the garden isn't going to become a war zone of competing invasive perennials...the reproduction season is beginning...always a treat.
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