Also called European Euonymus or burning bush. The Winged Euonymus is also sometimes called burning bush to add to my confusion. This is from Humber Bay.
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Spindle Tree
Sow Thistle
I’m used to seeing field sow thistles as summer wildflowers. They grow tall and spindly and look kind of like dandelions on steroids. I wasn’t sure what this was when I saw it – low to the ground, with gorgeous magenta foliage. Fortunately, we were on one of Miles Hearn’s excellent nature walks, and Miles assured me this was a sow thistle.
Northern Mockingbird
Hooded Mergansers at Humber Bay
2 Cardinals
I snapped these at Humber Bay East today.
500
Today The Agency Podcast achieved a milestone (a modest one, perhaps but a milestone none-the-less), its 500th download. We have a long way to go before our little podcast will be anything near popular, but there is a regular group of listeners who keep on coming back for more!
I want to take a minute to thank our listeners (who are obviously the best listeners in the history of listeners). Thanks for having faith in this project. As well, each week, some of you have taken the time to send us an email and offer up your $.02. Your notes are tremendously encouraging and they often spark new discussion for the next episode, so please keep them coming. If there are any topics you’d like the Agency to take on, let us know, or if you have any questions you’d like to ask me or Candy, feel free to ask (and if you write to us, be sure to request a fashionable The Agency camo trucker’s cap, available while supplies last) .
Thrashers, Threshers & Heists
Thrashers, Threshers & Heists, the new episode of The Agency podcast is now available on Apple Podcasts/iTunes, Google Play, Tune-in and Podbean.
This episode comes to you from Toronto and a chicken coop in Iowa, with special guest Steve Warbasse.
Thank you for your emails! We love to hear from you. Write to The Agency by emailing us: theagency.podcast@gmail.com or drop us a line at:
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Girl to City by Amy Rigby
Girl to City is a recently published memoir of singer-songwriter Amy Rigby. I discovered the existence of this book more or less by accident. One day when I was surfing the YouTube, I got stuck on watching performances by Amy Rigby, including several with Wreckless Eric. Somewhere in among those videos was one promoting her new book.
I’m not exactly sure why, but I knew right away I wanted to read it. My exposure to Amy Rigby’s music has been fairly recent, within the last year or so. Her songwriting is very compelling and her somewhat raw performance approach disarming. I ordered up the book online. It arrived very quickly and I gobbled it up just about as fast.
Much of the book is set in NYC in the 70s and 80s. Art school. Clubs. Learning to play music along the way. An array of fascinating characters. Struggling to find some glimmer of success in a difficult and fickle business.
Girl to City is beautifully written, and Rigby’s pacing is great – I couldn’t put this book down, and I felt as if I was right there as she told her story. Perhaps I was drawn to this memoir because I’m about the same age as Amy Rigby, I’m a music lover, and I also went to art school – only here in Toronto rather than in NY. I stuck with it because it’s an excellent book.
Twenty Seventh Street recommended.
Sparrow Housing Renovations
Work is finally underway on some critical house sparrow nesting boxes – after the local Backyard Sparrow Association called in the nesting inspector and threatened to start tweeting on the subject. Representatives would not confirm that a petition has been sent directly to the mayor’s office. Rumours have abounded that the landlord had no intention of initiating the renos at all and in fact had a secret plan to raze the building and sever the lot.
The inspection revealed numerous violations that needed to be addressed. When finally contacted, the landlord said the local contractors have been booked solid. “I finally had a general contractor and a structural engineer on site the other day. The truth is, these units need to be rebuilt, but we’re held up at Committee. Crews are starting immediately on some stopgap measures to keep things comfortable for the sparrows for one more season”.
A representative from the Backyard Sparrow Association welcomes the renovation work. “We have a big squirrel problem”, she said. “Our doorways need to be bolstered. And the flooding has been terrible after every rainstorm. I can’t tell you how many times this year we’ve had to sit on wet nests. This has to be fixed right away!”
The property owner has promised new units will be built after the 2020 nesting season. “We’re taking into account the feedback we’re received from the association. We understand there are families nesting here and their comfort is our number 1 priority”.
Garlic
This year we had a very successful garlic crop – in our front yard. Last summer, I visited my friend East Texas Red near Perth Ontario, where we went to the Perth Garlic Festival. There I bought a few different varieties for planting. I talked to various growers about the different varieties and listened to all sorts of recommendations. In the end I simply chose a few different ones to plant.
A more organized gardener than I would have carefully labeled each variety so I could track which produced the best garlic or the most robust bulbs. I didn’t do that. As it turned out, the garlic I bought in Perth produced a great yield of quality bulbs. We’ve been using it in the kitchen since I harvested in summer, and we have enough to last us well into the winter. I can’t say that any of the garlic I planted is superior to other bulbs. It’s all really excellent. I can say that there is a range of bulb sizes, but that may have had more to do with the spots they were planted than the variety. I don’t know.
Normally in our environment, garlic should be planted in the fall the for following year’s harvest. In past years I’ve planted in mid to late October. This year I waited just a little longer. Today I chose examples of the biggest bulbs to plant for next season, and this afternoon I planted them in a few different spots out front.
27th Street 