Styggmann

I think this was a hike to the mountain Styggmann in the Skrimfjell close to Kongsberg (it's been a while so I am not completely sure anymore). The only trouble was going in November ... there wasn't that much snow but water had been running down the hiking path and was frozen so we would have been better off with ice skates or at least some spikes on the shoes. I guess it's a nice hike in summer though ;). Due to the extreme conditions we also didn't make it to the top.

New project

 

Field salad for the winter ... so looking forward to it :)

Summer visitor

Although there are no frogs spawning in our pond, we always have a few staying around in summer.

This one came out for a photo shooting.

Normally the best you get is a picture of lots of plants where you have to search for the head.

The picture is from last year but the frog might possibly be the same.

Sisyphus

Organic gardening is always a bit like Sisyphus - a lot of it is done in vain and you start from the beginning again. Especially depressing this year was the fact that some animal destroyed at least half of the seeds and from the remaining plants some other (or the same??) animal ate away the tiny first leaves of the new plants.

Some things however actually DID what they were supposed to so I have to document this for the future (that I only remember the good parts of gardening in a few years). The peas for example.

May bug

Yeah I know, it's June already - time flies as usual. The cockchafer has been found in May though and was saved from drowning. I tried to clean it a bit before taking the picture but some of the pollen which has accumulated in the water stayed on it.

Intersting hairstyle!

 This was attached to the fly-screen last night. It's the caterpillar of the garden tiger moth and apparently it has survived from last year and is supposed to pupate soon. What a cool thing!

Violets are not always blue

They can be white ;)

 

When the Japanese Cherry (Prunus serrulata) is losing it's flowers it almost looks like snow. 

 Forget-me-not in two varieties:

Vinca (gosh I never learned all these flower names in Enlish):

Bellis perennis (that sounds quite sophisticated for the flower we just call "goose flower" in German) or is that just an English daisy or maybe a lawn daisy ...

The appletree started out promosing as well. We are still eating apples from last fall and lots of bottles of juice are left as well so lets see if we have two "apple years" after another.

And last but not least pulmonaria or lungworts: