Ah, milkweed, I never get tired of you.

I had one more round of thistle-pulling this morning and now feel I've pretty much conquered the worst of it. In that one little area. For now. I've read that the seeds can remain viable in the soil for 22 years. *needs to go lie down for a minute*

Most of it was Canada thistle, which is pretty wimpy as far as thistles go, but this morning I tackled some bull thistle. This is a beefier thistle, and takes its job pretty seriously. The prickles pierce leather gloves as if they weren't even there. The flower heads are much bigger than those of Canada thistle:

Add a few ornaments to this one and you'd have yourself a nice Christmas tree:

Canada thistle spreads via its root and its seed, but bull thistles spread only by seed, so I can just cut the flowers off any more I come across without pulling up the whole plant. I just wanted to show off this big one.

A few updates:

- nail polish remover had no effect on the silver paint

- a couple of Beechwood stewardship alumni returned to pull some tansy the other day. They claim to have missed the smell of it. :/ Unfortunately, they didn't quite get it all, so I'll be continuing my efforts. All visitors welcome here at Beechwood, especially if they want to uproot stuff!

- we're beginning week three of the garbage strike. The pile near Beechwood that I mentioned earlier remains unchanged, but this has appeared at Pottery Road: