all creatures great and small

A snails pace

As home owners one thing we almost all have in common is fixing and making our homes look the way we really want, as opposed to how it looked when we brought the place. I've done much over the years, and have so much more to go.

One thing I changed many years ago was the rose bushes in the front of my house. Nice as they looked when blooming. When they weren't it looked just like a large bunch of dead brush staring me right in the face every night I came home. So I let my neighbor's son across the street dig them up and re-plant them in his mother's garden as she just loved them whenever we'd run into each other in the street, and started chatting.

Then I paid a landscaper to put up a nice stone wall enclosure in its place about 3 ft high, and then paid the Wiesner Bros. of Staten Island to fill it with soil and plant bushes that would look nice all year long whether they flowered or not.

Each summer I plant flowers in between the bushes. This year I did cone flowers. Once a week in addition to the daily watering of all the plants in my garden, I also feed them plant food. I use the nice wide ledge of my raised bed to put my watering cans, plant food and tools while I tend to my garden.

Today while I was putting plant food in my watering can, I spotted a snail crawling across the ledge. Not wanting to constantly check where it was so I didn't accidentally smush it by dropping one of my full watering cans on top of it I decided to move it out of harms way.

I could have put in in the mulch or the soil of one of my flower pots. But in a moment of mischievity I decided to stick it on top of one of my cone flowers, and watch it try to find a way down, while I watered my plants.

After a moment or two of watching it circle around the flower it suddenly found itself stuck on, it occurred to me that this would be a fun thing to capture on film.

Staten Islandmy front yardsnailssummerNYCnatureflowerscone flowers