of the Faerie Guardian Tree

Upon considering my previous post, I felt that the special tree right in front of my home deserved a bit more of an introduction. I've lived so close to her for so long that she has really become a part of the household in her own right. She does protect me directly from the sun and the rain, and beyond that, I feel she has a spiritual guardianship role to this little spot. And yet I still don't know her name. I don't know the proper names of a lot of the plants up here, as they are different to the ones I know from the southern states. As for her personal name, as kind as she is to me, she hasn't chosen to share that with me yet. So she's just the Tree, with a capital letter to distinguish her from all the other trees.

When I first arrived, you couldn't exactly tell there was a tree there, so much as infer its existence by the presence of branches poking out of the top of an enormous tangle of weeds. An afternoon's work and a five-foot pile of compost later, I discovered the tree, and her family of bromeliads and bird's-nest fern that grow around the trunk. Not to mention the mysterious holes. I love holes in the trunks of trees.

So, here is my lovely Tree's graceful canopy.

And these are her delicate flowers.

 This is her shapely trunk, that is home to an entire ecosystem of living things in itself.

 And this is what I mean about the mysterious holes.

 Her space was loosely marked by a rough ring of stones around her base, but at some point a few months ago I got inspired. I started to go on regular rock-hunting trips along the edges of the waterways. I played around with them and this is what I ended up with.

 It's the first rock wall I have ever built, and I am so proud of it. I must have done a decent job of it, because it hasn't fallen down yet. I've filled it in with forest litter and cow manure and started a herb garden of those particular herbs that are known to be unpalatable to cows.

 So far I have thyme, rosemary, mint and lavender. They get morning and afternoon sun and seem to be thriving happily. Apparently, cows will not eat these herbs until they get really hungry, and the cows that come up here look so amazingly sleek and healthy and well-nourished that I don't think there's much danger of that happening.