#awalkintheparkmke – Brown Deer Park

I strapped Finn into her bike seat and visited Brown Deer Park almost two weeks ago. I meant to post sooner, but my phone was running out of storage and I inadvertently downloaded the photos off it before putting them on Instagram and bla bla, excuses, excuses. Moving along, here is one of our favorite local parks! We visited often, even before Finn came along, and now that she’s old enough to enjoy playgrounds Brown Deer has a pretty swell one to take her to.

Playground Equipment: 3.5

Overall, nothing is sketchy or dangerous, and the playground actually has some very interesting and unique features. However, some of the smaller pieces are missing in a few places (the rocket ship on the mural, for example), which is why I docked them half a point from Snail Crossing.

Aesthetics and Landscaping: 3

Brown Deer doesn’t have fantastic landscaping in general. I saw several diseased trees surrounding the playground (including another sickly, chlorotic red oak), and large rings of dead grass around the base of the trees where herbicide had been applied at too high a rate. This is a shame, because some of the older trees in the park that have likely been there since before it was a “cultivated” space are gorgeous, including lots of red oak and sugar maples.

Community Use: 4

Finn and I happened to be there during the afternoon on a weekday, so it was pretty quiet, with only 2-3 other families present. However, I’ve been there in the evening and on weekends, and I know for a fact the park is well-utilized.

Age Group: 3 – 12 years

Finn is just a little too small for most of the equipment. She can navigate the slides with help, and there are several toddler swings, but otherwise, she needs constant supervision/boosts up and down the equipment. However, I still think it’s a fantastic playground, with so many interesting activities. My favorite part is the giant rope gym. It’s entirely possible that I may have climbed to the top myself and left my pint-sized daughter to stare longingly up at me, wishing for the day her legs are long enough to do the same. I’m sure this is a playground we’ll be frequently in the years to come, especially once she grows into it a little more.

#awalkintheparkmke – Snail Crossing Park, Riverwest

Salutations. As I mentioned in my last post, Finn and I are embarking on a project this summer to visit and document at least 2 Milwaukee County parks per week, focusing specifically on playgrounds or areas where children would play. I’ve titled this project (quite lamely) A Walk in the Park. And I have a hashtag. Aren’t hashtags nice? Anyone can have a hashtag, and its free.

I’ve created a rating system of 1-5, five being highest, one being lowest, in the following categories: Safety/overall maintenance of equipment, aesthetics/landscaping of park, and how utilized the park is (i.e. how many people are playing there at time of use). I’m also going to note the age group the playground is targeted at, because I’ve noticed that more affluent parks tend to have separate play equipment for toddlers and younger children.

Our first park of the summer was Snail Crossing Park in Riverwest. When Mr. S and I lived in this neighborhood, we didn’t have children of our own. However, we have visited the park in the past when babysitting friend’s children. This was my first time visiting with my own child.

Playground Equipment: 4

All the equipment was up to date, safe, and maintained. It showed some general signs of wear (sneaker marks, etc), but that’s a good thing, in my opinion.

Aesthetics and Landscaping:2.5

I’m sorry, I have to rate this stuff. I’m a horticulture student, and poor landscaping detracts from my ability to enjoy a park. Snail Crossing looked as though, when it was first built, it was attractive in terms of landscaping. However, it hasn’t been well-maintained over the years, and there’s a good deal of weeds choking out the perennial plantings. I also noticed that some of the tree were ill-suited to their location, such as the pin oak and river birch, which don’t do well in our alkaline soils without lots of maintenance/amendments.

However, Snail Crossing does have a redeeming quality. The sidewalks are paved with beautiful mosaics from the community, as well as some interesting sculptures.

Community Use: 4

There were four-five groups of children playing there at any given point, in addition to Finn and myself. For a small corner park off a side street, it seems to be a popular place!

Age Group: 4-12 years

Most of the equipment was geared toward older children. There were a few toddler swings, and Finn was certainly able to navigate the slide with help. However, she was too short for many of the other activities. Given that she’s not even 2, this is sort of a normal occurence for us. It’s a good thing she knows how to have fun regardless.

 

Good intentions. Also, a new project

Well, once again, summer has arrived in all the sticky, bug-bitten, green glory its renowned for. I was driving back from a visit to my parent’s house in the Fond du lac area the other night, passing wheat fields just about to turn yellow, and the moon was full, the sky was hazy and lavender-colored, and I felt that deep settling in my chest, the one that confirms I probably never want to live anywhere but here. Midwest is best.

I had the best intentions to blog more over winter break. I also had intentions to find a part-time horticulture job this summer. I did neither. Winter break was simply laziness, and also I spent a lot of time shooting rubber bands out the bathroom window at the squirrels ravaging the bird feeder. Remaining exclusively mom-employed this summer was a bit more complex. My main motivation for working at all was to gain experience, so that when I actually do return to work full-time after graduation, I would have something substantial on my resume. But if I’m working, and Jason’s working, then that means someone else is working to take care of Finn, and that costs money. So, I really wanted my part-time-summer-job-for-the-sake-of-experience to count. I applied for a few through the county, a couple of internships, and promptly failed to follow up with the employers as I so kindly mentioned I would in my cover letter. That was part of the problem. The other part was my difference in attitude this summer versus last. Being home full-time with Finn was difficult last year. We were just starting to figure out sleep routines, regular meals, crawling, communication, etc, etc, and also, I wasn’t sleeping well, and also she needed to be carried/held/touched constantly, and as an overtired introvert, I struggled.

Please don’t misunderstand me. I love my child unfathomably, but I was never a woman who had aspirations to be a stay-at-home mom. A very good balance for us has been being home together part-time. I found myself looking forward to the fifteen or so hours a week she would be in daycare when classes started up again in the fall. And when those hours came, they were nice. Spring semester was also nice. And while I recognize working part-time over the summer in a career I know I enjoy would have also been nice…I’m handling the excess time with her in a much healthier way this year. She’s mobile and communicative. She takes regular naps, she sleeps through almost every night, and she eats three meals a day that don’t come by way of my boobs. In short, we’re both able to have more space, yet still enjoy each other’s company. She’s growing up, and I’m growing older and more accepting of some of the challenges that lumber alongside being a mother.

So, no job. I don’t know yet what’s going to happen after graduation next summer, and I’m really just trying to focus on enjoying this year with her, knowing we might not have as much time together in years to come.

To keep some sense of outside activities in both our lives, we’re embarking on a project that I’ve had rattling about in my head for some time. Now that Finn is old enough to enjoy playgrounds, I thought it would be interesting to explore and document various parks and play areas throughout the city, focusing on highlighting some of the differences (if they exist) between playgrounds in more affluent areas and playgrounds in areas where poverty is more of a reality. This will get us out and interacting with other people, it will challenge me to introduce my child to different demographics and neighborhoods, and it will give me and excuse (read: obligation) to blog regularly. We already started this past weekend, and I’ll have the post up sometime this week.

Also, I’m taking two summer courses. Also, I’m still editing that novel (FINAL FINAL EDIT I SWEAR! LIKE PASTING INTO THE PUBLISHING FORMAT FINAL!). Also, I’m still going to blog about gardening and horticulture-nerd-plant-soil-chemistry-stuff because my quarter-aged mind is simply brimming with all I’ve learned this past spring semester and I know you all want to hear about the pH of rainwater and the symbiotic relationships between mycorrhizae and plant roots, and how it can affect phosphorus uptake. In other words, I will do my best to blog regularly, but I should also do my best to be realistic.

In the meantime, here’s a picture of a cute thing I made. It’s a kid:

 

 

Updates – House Edition

Projects have been happening inside the house as well as outside, especially since cold weather set in. As I’ve mentioned, I’m a semi-stay-at-home mom now, and over the summer I was taking all online courses, which meant I had quite a bit of flexibility during the day to putter around. I didn’t do anything major, just a few little things here and there, like framing some of our photos and hanging them, shuffling furniture around, putting up a shelf…you know, typical housewife stuff, ha.

I even finished slipcovering the large couch. Finally! Slipcovers are essential when you have pets. And babies. Actually, they’re essential when humans are inhabiting your house in general.

Although I feel I have less large blocks of free time now, I do have more little bursts of it, and I’m actually in the house more often to tackle small projects. For example, I turned the entryway of our kitchen into a disco club:

See, there’s no overhead light in the entry, and the lighting in the kitchen itself is garish. I finally decided I’d had enough oppression, so I fixed it. I quite like the result. Mr. Smith found it entertaining.

Speaking of the kitchen, our small dining table got a bum leg back in June, so we swapped it out with a folding table we’ve been using for hangouts in the backyard. The idea was that Jason would fix the little table, but we all decided we liked the big white table so much that I gave it a fresh coat of paint and called it even.

I was hesitant to leave it at first; we don’t have a large kitchen, and I didn’t like the idea of taking up more floor space than necessary. However, six months later, I don’t regret making the swap in the least. It’s another surface to use when cooking, it looks awesome, and we can easily accommodate friends at a meal. The only downside of having a white table is that it begins to look “distressed” pretty quickly. Kid life, you know?

We’ve also been playing move the baby’s room for a few months. Finn started out sleeping in our bedroom. When she was about seven months old, we moved her into the nursery. It wasn’t a fun decision, but she was keeping us awake, and we were keeping her awake, and moving her into her own room actually helped everyone sleep better. Her nursery is the room that we were using as a sort of dining room/laundry room/game room/room to put random crap in. I never really liked it until it became hers. We got her a rug, and it was an incredibly cozy, fun space.

And then we moved her out of it.

Mr. Smith has been wanting to knock out the wall between the living room and her room for some time, and replace it with a two-sided bookcase. The rooms will still be separate, but the wall will become a built in. He started the whole process in December, beginning with moving Finn out while construction is underway. We did some shuffling with the office/art room, so now she’s tucked away under the eaves upstairs. My sewing supplies are still residing up there, as well as the guest bed (which comes in handy when your baby won’t go back to sleep at four in the morning and you just need to lie down). Mr.’s desk and all office-related furnishings are hanging out in the corner of what was her room downstairs, because the desk doesn’t need naps, and therefore isn’t affected by the wall being knocked out.

While I prefer her being downstairs, her little nook upstairs isn’t bad at all. It’s a pain trudging up and down the steps with a heavy baby, but she seems to enjoy where she’s at.

Also, we’re getting a bookcase! Do you know that we have about twenty boxes of books in storage? He’s building it out of maple, and designing it from scratch without a pre-printed plan. And no, Mr. Smith is not a professional woodworker. He’s learning as he goes along. He’s probably the only person I know who possesses just the right balance of meticulousness and raw bravery to accomplish such a feat, ha. I’m excited. I know he’ll do well, and I really can’t wait to unpack our books at last! To me, that will be the final stage of moving in.

Updates – Yard Edition

And, here we are again! I am sincerely sorry about the lack of updates. Being a mother and being a student is like working a full-time job and then punching in at a part-time job in the evenings. But, it’s winter break right now, and I finally feel like I’ve caught my breath again.

So, here are some things that happened since my last write. I have quite a few updates, so I’m planning on breaking them up into several different posts. Stay tuned, my dumplings.

Harvest totals

My harvest totals were a bit low this year. This being my fourth growing season, I’ve learned a few things about the general environment of my garden; what grows well, what doesn’t grow well, and why. In terms of what does well, tomatillos are an easy, prolific plant. I’ve grown them now for two years in a row, and I’m to the point where I find tomatillo salsa (salsa verde) preferable to tomato salsa. I use this recipe. The only downside of it is that it’s not acidic enough to can without a pressure canner. My dad also made a batch this summer and adapted it for water-bath canning, so I’ll have to give that a try next year. A word of caution with tomatillos: they take up a lot of space. They’re a floppy, leggy plant, and they often send up volunteers the next summer that don’t produce nearly as well. Now that I’m aware of this, I’ll be more diligent about pulling up the volunteers. Some of them nearly took over the potato patch this year. Other plants that did well were greens (kale, chard, and spinach), and root crops (beets and carrots). This is two years in a row that those particular crops have performed well, which tells me my soil health and texture is improving.

My garlic harvest was wonderful. My dad gave me some bulbs from a grower local to his area, and they produced the most beautiful, uniform offspring. It’s like stock-photo garlic. I don’t know the variety, but the gentlemen he bought it from is an Irishman by the name of Flaherty, so for the time being, Flaherty garlic is now my staple garlic. I seeded just a small row of some of the other heirloom varieties in the fall. We use garlic in basically every meal we eat, and although it’s fairly inexpensive to purchase at the grocery store, there really is no comparison between the two in terms of flavor and fragrance. I’m glad to have a big bag of it down in the basement.

I also grew pumpkins again this summer, after taking a break last year. I know they’re more ornamental than practical, but I like growing them. There’s something absurd about a giant orange pumpkin just hanging out in the vines. I grow ‘Cinderalla’ pumpkins, which are a French heirloom. This year, I had three large squash set, and three smaller ones. They decorated the front porch. If I had been a bit more diligent, I could have boiled some of them down for pumpkin mash, but, well, babies. Next year I’m growing another variety in addition to ‘Cinderalla’, so perhaps I’ll set some aside for boiling down.

The final thing that performed well was a new addition: broomcorn. I’ve had an old packet of seeds sitting around for a few years, and finally got around to planting them when the weather started staying warm. Corn is a tough thing for me to grow (more on that later), but broomcorn really did great. Now, granted, it’s another purely ornamental thing, but I enjoyed the bright brooms that it produced.

Not everything grew well, though. It was a bad summer for rabbit damage. They mowed down my corn, edamame, and beans. I tried to be diligent about spraying my pepper spray, but it was hard to keep up with it, mostly because I didn’t want to be handling it when I was out in the yard with Finn. I suppose it’s nothing a good fence won’t solve, though. I’ve tried growing popcorn for three years now, and I’m determined to make it happen someday.

After an amazing onion harvest last year, this year was awful. I’m almost certain it had to do with soil texture. I rotate my crops, and the particular triangle I planted them in this year really needed some amendments. The ground was hard, and didn’t hold water evenly. Next summer, I’ll put the onions in one of the areas I’ve been amending with green manure and compost. I really, really enjoyed having onions in storage all winter, and I would like to make that a regular thing. I’ve always had trouble with tomatoes, though. I have several theories on this. The first is that my timing is off in terms of seeding dates. I’ve been starting them around the first weekend in May, because I don’t want them to get leggy under the grown lights before its warm enough to put them outside. However, they’re never quite big enough around planting time, and so I’ve been transplanting them mid-June. This year, I’ll try earlier seed dates. My other theory (one I’m hoping is NOT true) has to do with the giant black walnut tree in our neighbor’s yard. Its crown just barely reaches the far southeastern edge of my garden. Black Walnuts have allopathic properties; that is, they secret a chemical called juglione which is toxic to plants in the nightshade family (tomatoes, potatoes, and peppers). If any of the fruit, leaves, or roots come into contact with these particular plants, it can either kill them entirely or inhibit their health. Obviously, I can’t do anything about my neighbor’s tree, so I’m crossing my fingers that this isn’t the case. I will say that I have better success with cherry/grape tomatoes than large fruits, and I also have no issues growing potatoes, so that gives me a bit of hope.

My overall consensus is that my soil still has a long way to go. I may have to pay for another load of compost/topsoil this spring, or look into spreading some gypsum. I think my nutrient balance is fine, but the heavy clay is difficult to work with.

Maintenance stuff

I did another ladybug release this summer. This is my third year in a row. I always have good success with them, and they keep the aphids at bay. We had an unusually warm fall, and curiously, I saw a good many ladybugs clustering along the south side of the house and garage. I don’t know if this means that they’re establishing themselves in our yard, or if it was weather-related.

I also did a weird, mad-scientist-type-experiment. I ordered some beneficial nematodes and sprayed the garden/yard with them. Basically, I got this sponge full of faint, grey powder, which I had to immerse in water. The powder turned into a sort of thin sludge. Those are the nematodes. They’re invisible to the naked eye. Once rehydrated, you distribute them via garden sprayer in the soil at the base of your plants. They burrow down, where they start feasting on the larvae of pest bugs. It’s really weird. But I do have to admit, I had very few pest problems this summer. Also, the little monsters are good for keeping flea populations down in your yard. We had a horrific flea outbreak last fall, just before Finn was born, and so I’m all for doing anything to keep that under control. In a neighborhood where dogs and squirrels run amok, fighting fleas in the yard is difficult. However, both the dog and the cat haven’t had a single flea on them for months. I don’t know if the nematodes have anything to do with this, but it certainly didn’t hurt anything to send them out into the gardens.

We had an excellent compost yield this fall. Enough to put a thick layer on one of the large triangles, and a thin layer over another. Compost is so beautiful. So loamy, and fragrant, and dark.

Finally, I continued on my quest of planting for pollinators. One of the easiest ways to do this is by bordering your gardens with marigolds and nasturtiums. These plants do double-duty; the bees love the bright red flowers, and they help repel pests. Guys, I had monarch butterflies in my garden this summer. I can’t remember the last time I saw a monarch butterfly. We had honeybees, bumblebees, and hummingbirds, too. The presence of so many pollinator is a sure sign that our yard’s environment is really improving.

Fence it in

Jason dug all the posts for my fence. Gah. I love that man. I love that he loves digging holes, and making fence plans. What a guy. The posts are untreated cedar. It’s quite pricey, but it lasts a long time without needing to be treated for weatherization. And it smells like the Garden of Eden. Hopefully this summer we’ll begin to set the actual fencing in place.

Ornamental gardens

Having been inspired by my first semester in hort school, I decided that our front yard needed some help. I dug up the mailbox garden and put in two quarter-circle plots on either side of the front walk, where it connects to the sidewalk. There’s some flowering bulbs out there, waiting for spring, as well as some hollyhocks and some vining plants.

I also re-dug the front foundation gardens and set the borders on a curve, lining them with some landscaping rocks I found on a vacant lot (which may or may not have been up for grabs. I’m still not sure). After re-doing the borders, I added some ornamental grasses, native perennials, and some flowering herbs. I did most of the work in the fall, so I’ll be interested to see what makes it through the winter. If all goes well, our front yard will look much better in the future.

Finally, I attacked the south garden. It was time. The rosebushes were getting leggy and sickly, the bishop weed was completely out of control, and what healthy perennials were managing to survive just weren’t worth it. I pulled almost everything up, leaving the healthy parts of the rosebushes, the clematis, and the honeysuckle vine. In place of the old plants, I transplanted my two lavender bushes, and purchased some ‘Elijah Blue’ grass, as well as some creeping thyme for the border. Further down, away from the concrete, I put in an ‘Annabelle’ hydrangea. It was a sad, tiny thing, on fall clearance, so we’ll see if it even survives the winter. The bishop weed is very difficult to eradicate. Since the initial clean-up, I’ve gone through four or five times already and dug up more rhizomes. I know it will be probably a good year or two before its completely gone, but I think it’s worth the effort. Bishop weed is invasive, not to mention unattractive. If everything survives, the south garden will be much more orderly and well-maintained.

Overall, it’s been the year of major design changes in the yard. We’ve lived here for enough growing seasons that I know what looks good and what is just ugly, easy-to-grow filler plant material. Next summer, I’m going to continue establishing perennials in the front gardens, keeping the south garden clear, and potentially starting a rain garden in the gully between our house and the next property to the north. As usual, there’s never a dull moment in our yard.

Dairy is back on the menu

We took a little trip up to Door County earlier this month. It would be a crying shame to visit Fish Creek and NOT have some ice cream, right? Right. So, I took a chance and indulged in my first taste of (cow milk) ice cream in three months.

Yeah, I order the little kid flavors. I’m over it.

The good news is that Finn seemed to do just fine. I had a few other tastes of dairy throughout the trip – some cheese, butter in various pastries, etc. A week later and I think we’re officially in the clear. I’m still planning on using almond/coconut milk for most of my baking/breakfast needs because I’ve come to prefer the taste and texture, but I can’t lie, I’m really looking forward to having ice cream and cheese in my life again, and to not worrying about menu ingredients when we go out to eat. Hurray Little Finn! Way to mature into your Wisconsin-ness.

No E(scape)

I know, that was terribly cheesy.

It’s garlic scape season in our garden. If you’ve never heard of scapes before, they’re the flowering part of a hardneck garlic plant. It looks like a long, curly stalk. They taste like garlic (duh) but without the bite. You can use them in stir fries, omelettes, or, like me, in soups.

The great part about scapes is that the garlic bulbs actually grow bigger if you harvest the scape, because it redirects the energy that the plant is expending into reproduction back into the root system. See, I did learn something in Hort class.

Anyway, you probably won’t be able to find them in your local grocery store, but if you can get to a farmers market, pick up a pound or two! Below is the recipe I used for soup. It’s a combination of a few that I read online, and in typical Johanna fashion, is mostly improvised.

Garlic Scape Soup with Red Potatoes and Kale

Ingredients:
2-3 cups garlic scapes, chopped into 3″ lengths
6 cups chicken stock (more or less, depending on how thick you want your soup)
10 red potatoes, chopped into thick chunks
1 pound kale, chopped into large pieces

Saute your garlic scapes in olive oil until slightly browned and tender. Add chicken stock and simmer for 10 minutes. Puree the stock/scapes in a full-size blender (immersions won’t do the job, sorry) and return to pot. Add potatoes and simmer until spuds can be pierced easily with a fork, then add the kale. Remove from heat and let the kale soften for about five minutes. Season with salt, pepper, and thyme to taste. You could also add sausage or bacon – if I make this again, I’ll definitely be doing that!

Cheese, Please

Up until about a month ago, Finn was exclusively breastfed. We started letting her try some simple fruits and veggies recently in addition to nursing. Somewhere around her 3-month mark, we realized that any time I had dairy, she had quite a bit of difficulty digesting what came through my milk for days afterward. Lots of throwing up, runny diapers, and general crankiness. So, I did something that’s been really, really difficult for a born-and-bred Wisconsin native to do: I gave up dairy.

It wasn’t hard in everyday life. Neither Boo nor I have regularly used cow milk for anything. He likes soy, I like coconut. And almost all of our recipes could stand some easy substitutions: coconut oil for butter, applesauce for yogurt, and so on. But where it got to be maddening was when it came to “treat” foods – eating out, eating over at friend’s houses, deserts, snacks…I hated being “that person” at get-togethers or restaurants. What’s more, it’s a little convoluted to explain. People ask, “Oh, so you’re allergic to dairy?” and I have to clarify that, no, I’m not, but I’m breastfeeding and we think our baby is at least lactose intolerant and we really don’t want inconsolable bouts of crying/throwing up, so please, allow me to pass on the butter.

But, I mean, just look at those rolls.

Anyway, I’m optimistic that dairy might not bother her as much anymore. For one thing, she’s spending quite a bit more time sitting up or on her belly, which makes digestion easier overall. Also, she’s had a good variety of fruits and vegetables, and hasn’t reacted negatively to any of them. I’m going to tentatively try re-introducing dairy into my diet again. And, honestly, I’m probably going to start with ice cream.

And then cheese. A dry, aged cheddar cheese. Heck, right now I’d settle for the $2.50 block of pepperjack.

Oh well, soon enough. I’ll probably look back on this time and wonder why it ever seemed like a big deal…right?

Backyard Camping

We have some camping plans for the summer, but weren’t quite sure how that was going to work out with a baby. So, to test the waters, we set up our tent in the backyard and slept outside last weekend. I’ll confess that we cheated a little bit; I put Finn to bed in her crib inside at the normal time, and brought the baby monitor outside while Jason and I had a bonfire and grilled out. When we got ready to go to bed, I brought her into the tent and tucked her in with me. I was sort of worried about where exactly she would sleep, but it turned out to be easy enough to share my sleeping bag. She occasionally ends up in our bed if she’s having a rough night, so I’m already comfortable co-sleeping. Plus, it solved the problem of how to keep her warm, as it got down almost in the 40’s that night.

She slept great, which, obviously, means that we both slept pretty good, too. Turns out that she seemed to really enjoy being in the tent. She kept looking around with wide eyes when we first brought her in, and we ended up playing in there for most of the next day.

Now, let’s hope that the real thing goes just as smoothly!

Finished!

Well, it’s actually been finished for awhile, but let me present the final layout of the vegetable garden:

Truly, I couldn’t be happier with how it turned out. I know that, technically, I could fit in more if I did a long rectangle with straight rows, but because I spend so much time back there, I wanted the garden to be something that was aesthetically pleasing. Eventually, we’re going to enclose it with a good fence, and incorporate some built-in benches and trellises. Right now, I’m just really proud that we got this far!

Some practical stuff: I use free mulch from the Milwaukee self-help recycling center. I know that not everyone is comfortable doing that, but we’ve always used mulch from their pile and never had any problems with it. I laid down thick layers of wet newspaper underneath to help smother the weeds. I do my mulching this way for two reasons 1). It’s free. Duh. 2) Both the mulch and newspaper decompose eventually, adding more organic matter to the soil. In essence, it turns a functional pathway into another potential thoroughfare for earthworms, which are really important in my heavy clay soil. I need to do all that I can to give them cool, damp spots in the garden!