TICKtock...It's time to play with poisons!

It’s spring!  Looking out my windows, lush green surrounds me as my gardens rejoice in rebirth when warmer weather rolls in.  Granted, part of that lushness is weeds, but it's still soothing to look at.  Walking out on the front porch and down the steps into the gardens, fragrances of blossoms float through the air here and there to greet me.  The hum of carpenter bees out and about with business of their own fills the air around blooms that have opened, and the melody of a chirping robin on the fence post is lovely music to my ears.

The noise of a hundred lawn mowers in the yards around me are a necessary nuisance, I guess, but when the mowing is completed, it is heavenly until the neighbors kids come out to play.  A marathon of screaming, yelling, sobbing and momma cries will fill the air for hours.  I love it when school is in session.

  

Nevada was my home as a child, and we never had to poison our pets to repel ticks and fleas.  They just weren’t there.  I only saw one tick in the mountains hiking in the 30 some years it was my home.  Colorado was the same…pets could stay poison free, except for heartworm medication…mosquitoes were everywhere no matter where I lived.  Seven years of hiking trails and areas of no trails and never ever one tick or flea.

THEN…

Panama, Central America…anything with 6 or 8 legs will live there and does.  Dog walked across the yard and we had to remove tens and tens of ticks from her head and body.  She was banned from the yard, newspaper on the floor in the walk-in pantry became her potty place, and her mode of exercise was walks on the sidewalks and streets.  Insecticidal shoes were a necessity in the yard; you know, shoes sprayed with a layer of bug killer, and when I needed a break from that, a gardener was hired to play with the ticks and fleas.  Enough said.

      

Nashville Nashville Nashville…must be a sister of Panama.  It’s back to insecticidal shoes and insecticidal knee socks pulled up over the pant legs.  Husband thinks I rock the look, I think I look like a dork.  It works, unless a tick drops off a tree onto my head :`(

The south and northeast seems to be the hot spots to be murdered by this little arachnid that is resistant to being squashed by anything, except maybe by that Norse god with a hammer.  I’ve found four ticks in the house this week, or more precisely, four ticks have hitchhiked into my house this week and bypassed my husband zeroing in on me.  This has never happened before.

I freaked out with the third one when I was sitting in my arm chair and felt that little sucker walking across my arm towards dinner; and then, today while downloading garden photos I just took onto the computer, one moseyed across my lower arm in need of a lunchtime snack.  Appears the only way I can play in my gardens this year is suited up in hazmat gear.

Robin's Plantain - new flowers have a honey fragrance.  A bit weedy, but easy to pull, so it is allowed to grow in the gardens.  

Yellow Woodsorrel - considered a weed, but easy to pull where not wanted

Azalea "My Mary" growing in a large container on patio

Native Ninebark

Real Byzantine Gladiolus  

Solomon's Seal blooming. Each flower will turn into a blue berry.

I think this is a yellow evening primrose - they popped up on their own this year.

Small Flowered Wild Geranium 

Marsh Marigold

Copper Iris

Lyre-leaf Sage

Carolina Allspice Bush "Athens"

Native Mock Orange - no fragrance

Euonymus americanus (Hearts-a-bustin) flower with ant

Wrenched my neck in the garden and feeling a bit crapo...arf barf.

Mommy took me to the doc,

 and I'm a bit looney loopy after my muscle relaxer shot.

I'll be flying high on meds for the next two weeks.

Mommy wonders what happened, but I'm not talking.