Mike's Garden

Once upon a time, I married Mike. We had a 1300sf house with a huge backyard, large deck and bricked in grill, lots of mature landscaping and no irrigation. We made a deal - I take care of the inside of the house; Mike takes care of the outside. Pretty sweet deal really. I'm handy with a plunger, and I know how to change a light bulb; my standards of cleanliness are much higher than Mike's, so I beat myself up over housecleaning long before he would ever notice the grime. I don't like to sweat or get dirt under my fingernails. I hate bugs.

Fast forward 12 years and 8 addresses. Oddly enough, although we've mostly lived in apartments for the last 7 years, Mike has clung to this deal. So even when exterior maintenance is covered by landlords or HOA's, our deal stands. (Doesn't seem quite fair to me, but a deal's a deal, right?) So now we own a townhouse (exterior maintenance part of the HOA responsibility) and we have a teeny, tiny back patio. The majority of the patio is the sidewalk from the carport to the back door (our main entrance), the rest is split between the a/c unit and some little spaces of dirt. This is now Mike's domain.

I have to admit, it's pretty amazing what he's done these last few months with that space. His vision is to have a butterfly garden, and he's spent much time and effort to get just the right plants (you need caterpillar food and butterfly nectar). I am partial to orange flowers, so I really like the Mexican milkweed (a must for Monarchs) and the potted hibiscus.

A few days ago, Mike noticed a sticky residue and bugs on the milkweed. Then I pointed out the webs, and that pushed him over the top. The internet research frenzy began. We have aphids and maybe some kind of spider mites. You can't use pesticides if you want to have caterpillars, so Mike began trying to spray off the aphids with water and wipe down the leaves, etc. Plus there were lots of little nibble spots on the leaves. And then! He saw these little tiny wormy things that he thought might be aphid larvae or something. More research! Wonder of wonders, they're Monarch caterpillars! Eureka! We have caterpillars! They're growing like crazy (at the expense of the milkweed, which was the point after all)! I haven't seen Mike this excited in a long time. I don't think he's named them yet, but he's pretty sure there are four of them, and he checks on them regularly.

The garden continues to flourish and we look forward to lots of butterflies this summer. For our 12th and 1/2 anniversary we got ourselves a little (really little) patio set, so we can sit outside and enjoy the fluttering. So, all in all, I think our little deal has been ok. Besides, once I set the trash outside the door, it becomes exterior maintenance and Mike has to walk it to the dumpster.