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Monsters in the Garden (a collection).

June 27, 2013 by Exangel

by Debbie Naples

 

If Godzilla stepped in your garden you would know it, the enormous foot print would be a dead giveaway: “wow” you would think a “a monster was in my garden.” Depending on the size of your garden he might have squashed whole thing…  Still if a bratty kid treads through your bed of prized and exotic delphiniums you might also exclaim, “who let that monster in my garden”…it’s all so relative. Pesticides kill pests (whatever they are) but also kill fish, it says it right there on the label, your fish, in your ornate Japanese fountain, your Koi found dead…monstrous, to say nothing of those ‘burny’ herbicides accidently sprayed on tomato plants… the monster theme continues to unfold. Was the serpent in the Garden of Eden a monster or just a tragic conversationalist out for a good time, did he really think she would eat that apple? Just who are the monsters in the garden, let’s explore…

Every one thinks insects and bugs are monsters, so why not add this little character to our monster fun pack?

One day in the middle of June, the Iris Borer quit Weight Watchers and here is his story:

The Iris Borer is a simpering little sod of a 1⁄4 inch long larvae that climbs up an iris leaf and eats its way in until low and beware it grows into a fatter more pinkish whitish grub. This debauched creature then continues its eating frenzy through the rhizome, that is the root, the heart of the iris, until the iris is quite dead or just plain gone. If other borers disturb it they too may be devoured! You can find him or her eating slowly and surely in the summer, all summer. They lie inside the rhizome, faces covered in crumbs, slime covering their leg-nubbed bodies, plant material crammed into their maws. Later to further the insult and continue the arrogance it will presume to transform into a moth and as a moth it will lay eggs in the area of its crimes.

And then there are the plants themselves. There are literally thousands of weeds that will take over an entire garden in less than a minute. Little monsters and big… Godzillas of the plant world.

Allow me to explain my favorite weed. Convolvulus arvensis or more commonly referred to as Bindweed. It sports a lovely white or pink flower on a tiny thread of a vine, so irreproachable and small, and yet has no trouble strangling the most innocent bystander.  This little beauty can send down roots to nine feet. I have seen a variety of objects covered by this wily creature. At first sight it is both interesting and intriguing how a plant so diminutive and seemingly vulnerable can be such a deep rooted and unruly prankster, a monster perhaps. It will hide a rose, cover a clump of daisies, or bury a small Veronica, as Veronicas are often small in this zone. It will smother vast groupings in a matter of days: impressive.

In our world, in suburbia, in this century, the final conflict always ends in the backyard. As my last note regarding ‘Monsters in the Garden,” I will discuss the growing issue of: Giant overbearing shrubs. I am not sure if anyone has looked into this, but there is a mounting horror in the suburbs of actually sighting a neighbor, or other people.  And so we engage what I call The Genghis Khan Strategy. We plant a shrub that behaves like a marauding villain, killing and/or covering everything in its path. Quick, efficient, and bad tempered, threatening, and sucking up all the nutrients in its area, possessing a fantastic root system that cannot be killed even with black tar poison spread over its stumps! So forget about Godzilla, think Mongols, Mongols also repelled tar. But why do people need giant overbearing shrubs that resemble a group of calculating barbarians of the Medieval period? Well, because they block out other people’s giant overbearing shrubs and more importantly, the giant overbearing people, as well as pets, tasteless patio furniture and everything about the next door neighbor. No one ever considers that giant shrubs that take over the earth are against the Bible. As it clearly states to: love thy neighbor, not screen-out thy neighbor. Below I will leave you with two of my most favorite giants of the suburban property lines.

Lonicera fragrantissima (aka The Invader) or more commonly known as: Winter Honey Suckle, which grows as big as Chevy van in thirty minutes. Will take over the back of the backyard, will not be stopped by a beginner’s pruners. Can take a beating without even a second thought, withstands fire. And has scented dainty white flowers tra la la. As we walk the property line (of defense) we find another immense specimen: Forsythia x intermedia, and/or Forsythia  suspensa with no suspense. If you don’t know what a Forsythia is, go outside. There it is, over there, that long gangly thing that looks like a collection of thin whips coming up out of the ground, a huge mass of tangled stems, kind of alien space-hair-like. Adults run from Forsythias, ignorant of how to prune them; children and animals hide in their hollowed out undersides, including skunks. If you are lucky, in spring, you will catch sight of the small yellow flowers running up and down the‘whips’; if you are really lucky you won’t see through to the neighbor’s house.

Well folks that’s all there’s time for, tune in again for more chatter about Pearl Bushes of the deep Exochorda racemosa, The lily leaf beetle Lilioceris lili, at home, and Rumex Crispus, Yellow Dock, member of the Weed A-list, ‘Ruler of the Roots’.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Filed Under: EAP: The Magazine, Summer 2013: Monsters.

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In This Issue.

  • Who Was Dorothy?
  • Those Evil Spirits.
  • The Screaming Baboon.
  • Her.
  • A Tale of Persistence.
  • A Conversation with Steve Hugh Westenra.
  • Person Number Twelve.
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  • The Greatness that was Greece.
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  • Confession.
  • Francis Coppola’s Apocalypse.
  • Sometimes you die, I mean that people do.
  • True (from “My Life with Dogs”).
  • Fragmentary musings on birds and bees.
  • 12 Baking Essentials to Always Have in Your Poetry.
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  • My Forked Tongue.
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  • Singing against the muses.
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In The News.

That cult classic pirate/sci fi mash up GREENBEARD, by Richard James Bentley, is now a rollicking audiobook, available from Audible.com. Narrated and acted by Colby Elliott of Last Word Audio, you’ll be overwhelmed by the riches and hilarity within.

“Captain Sylvestre de Greybagges is your typical seventeenth-century Cambridge-educated lawyer turned Caribbean pirate, as comfortable debating the virtues of William Shakespeare, Isaac Newton, and compound interest as he is wielding a cutlass, needling archrival Henry Morgan, and parsing rum-soaked gossip for his next target. When a pepper monger’s loose tongue lets out a rumor about a fleet loaded with silver, the Captain sets sail only to find himself in a close encounter of a very different kind.

After escaping with his sanity barely intact and his beard transformed an alarming bright green, Greybagges rallies The Ark de Triomphe crew for a revenge-fueled, thrill-a-minute adventure to the ends of the earth and beyond.

This frolicsome tale of skullduggery, jiggery-pokery, and chicanery upon Ye High Seas is brimming with hilarious puns, masterful historical allusions, and nonstop literary hijinks. Including sly references to Thomas Pynchon, Treasure Island, 1940s cinema, and notable historical figures, this mélange of delights will captivate readers with its rollicking adventure, rich descriptions of food and fashion, and learned asides into scientific, philosophical, and colonial history.”

THE SUPERGIRLS is back, revised and updated!

supergirls-take-1

In The News.

Newport Public Library hosted a three part Zoom series on Visionary Fiction, led by Tod.  

And we love them for it, too.

The first discussion was a lively blast. You can watch it here. The second, Looking Back to Look Forward can be seen here.

The third was the best of all. Visions of the Future, with a cast of characters including poets, audiobook artists, historians, Starhawk, and Mary Shelley. Among others. Link is here.

In the News.

SNOTTY SAVES THE DAY is now an audiobook, narrated by Last Word Audio’s mellifluous Colby Elliott. It launched May 10th, but for a limited time, you can listen for free with an Audible trial membership. So what are you waiting for? Start listening to the wonders of how Arcadia was born from the worst section of the worst neighborhood in the worst empire of all the worlds since the universe began.

In The News.

If you love audio books, don’t miss the new release of REPORT TO MEGALOPOLIS, by Tod Davies, narrated by Colby Elliott of Last Word Audio. The tortured Aspern Grayling tries to rise above the truth of his own story, fighting with reality every step of the way, and Colby’s voice is the perfect match for our modern day Dr. Frankenstein.

In The News.

Mike Madrid dishes on Miss Fury to the BBC . . .

Tod on the Importance of Visionary Fiction

Check out this video of “Beyond Utopia: The Importance of Fantasy,” Tod’s recent talk at the tenth World-Ecology Research Network Conference, June 2019, in San Francisco. She covers everything from Wind in the Willows to the work of Kim Stanley Robinson, with a look at The History of Arcadia along the way. As usual, she’s going on about how visionary fiction has an important place in the formation of a world we want and need to have.

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