Better Left Alone

 We've been blessed with wildflowers on our property. If you were to walk in spring behind our barn, you'd think we'd planted acres of azaleas. But if you looked more closely, you'd notice the flowers aren't quite as big, and the bushes are nestled off the beaten path, and near rocks as big as Buicks.

Some of them are deep pink, some are light pink, almost the color of a healthy baby's cheeks. Others are dogwood white. These bushes aren't azaleas, but what we call wild honeysuckles.
I've learned in my Master Gardener's class that they are in fact, kin to azaleas.
Through the years we've tried to transplant some of the bushes in our back yard, but we've never been successful. Even though we pampered them, lovingly worked their roots with rich compost and store-bought munch, they all died.
Two years ago, we decided to give it one more shot. We hung a pink ribbon on a small honeysuckle in the spring, and that fall we made our way back down to the back of the property with a sharp shooter shovel and a wheelbarrow.
We dug that baby up and brought it up to our back yard and planted it near the corner of our fence. We   filled in around the roots with the dirt we'd removed when digging the hole. We didn't use any fertilizer, but we did add water and we put pine straw around the roots to help it through the winter.
Last summer when the August wind was hot and dry as talcum powder, we watered the little honeysuckle.
Last week when Jilda stepped out on the deck to pinch some rosemary out of the herb planter, I heard her gasp.
I thought she'd grabbed a spider, but when I stepped outside, she pointed our little honeysuckle. I can tell you, the sight of that little plant made my day.
I just goes to show you that some things are better left alone.