It's about a week before Christmas. Returning from buying groceries I walked to the backyard to check out the garden. I remember a few years ago, in early spring, pushing aside some mulch, that's just fall's leaves raked onto the flower beds, and seeing a plant coming back to life, it already had some new green leaves. Since I know where most of my plants are in the garden it was like seeing an old friend, it was actually a happy occasion and similar to how I feel when seeing honey bees in the garden, I don't generally like insects but I have a love and fondness for honey bees because I was once an amateur beekeeper. Mulch is the way to go if you garden, don't rake and bag and discard those leaves, rake them onto your flower beds. Mulch protects the plants during our very cold winters, just a layer of leaves will save some of your plants from dying; it doesn't cost anything and most gardeners will recommend doing this. Then, as I was taking some photographs of the mulched flower beds (as seen below) I saw a hawk in the cedar hedge at the very rear of the garden. At first I wondered if he was injured, sitting right in the cedar hedge. But he wasn't injured at all, he jumped out, walked a few feet across our neighbour's backyard and then took off into the sky. What a great sight that was. Nature restores the soul, nature returns us to the essentials of life. And that is why we need to protect every vestige of nature we have left.
