What's Been Happening in the Garden?

Well, quite a lot has been happening in the garden. I jot some notes down as I go, but I'm not meticulously recording everything.

Early spring is all purple crocus
and yellow daffodils

This time of year, there is an enormous amount of work to do, but also I can enjoy the fruits of previous years' work. Since last I wrote in February, we've been through the extra-early witch-hazel and winter jasmine, and early to late crocuses. Daffodils are mid-season now, and the first tulips are showing color rather than foliage. (Two of the hellebores I transplanted last year are doing very well in the front bed along the house. I think I transplanted more than two, but I'm satisfied that at least two made it.)  Little plants are sprouting up everywhere, and I'm trying to remember what they will become. The redbuds and serviceberries have just started to bloom, and the dead leaves are almost down from the pin oak on the corner. Now is the beginning of the native spring ephemerals, quickly making chlorophyll and flowers and seeds before their associated native trees leaf out and shade them back into senescence. The virginia bluebells, the most showy example of these, are doing ok, but may not match the displays of some other years.

In early March, suddenly the weather turned nice, and we had two straight weeks of nice warm and sunny days - with no rain. It's not great to go that long without rain, but it sure was nice to haul the porch furniture cushions out and not have to pull them back in for many days in the row. Of course, the warm weather got me moving outside. I'm not sure, looking around, I have a lot to show for my efforts, but efforts there have been. Most of it, so far, has been cleanup and weeding, so not so dramatic as planting new things. 

I did, on impulse, buy some cold season vegetables and put them into the back vegetable bed. I haven't

Bloodroot - spring ephemeral

yet put up the net guard on that back bed. I planted four rows of vegetables in half the bed: onions, broccoli, chard, and some miniature chinese cabbage. Oddly, about two weeks later, the broccoli row was empty - something came through and ate just that. I need new plants to fill in that gap.

At the same time, I bought pansies - several different shades of purple. I put them in the pots on the corner, and as has happened before, something came by and uprooted some of the plants, leaving them lying on top of the soil with the roots exposed. I suspect deer are the culprits in both the missing broccoli and the uprooted pansies, though I haven't eliminated squirrels and rabbits as suspects.

I planted grass seed last year in the back yard, and for a while it seemed I might actually have a lawn in the back. But then, streaks of it yellowed and died. Now I have many spots of dirt in between actual grass. My research suggests a virus, but there wasn't much guidance about how to defeat it without spreading nasty chemicals. I also have some bare spots where my big dog pees multiple times a day. I did add some new topsoil to some low and bare spots, and then overseeded the whole area. That was just a few days ago, and I have no baby grasses sticking up yet, but I remain hopeful. I have to water at least twice a day now until the babies establish, or I declare the area dead. I have another area I want to dig up, add new topsoil, level out and seed, but it's a big job. I keep adding to the job, potentially making it bigger, by thinking about digging really deep and burying some drain pipes to be a dry well, as this is the low spot where the water accumulates before it finally surges over the edge and down the hill into my neighbor's basement.

I bought my first batch of perennials this week, and today's plans include planting them. I'm trying to hold off buying more until I get these planted. I do have a history of overbuying, and not getting them all in before they die. But first, I have to weed the places I intend to put them. 

The Grill-to-be

I've also bought things. My gas grill has been broken (sometimes usable) for two years, and two years of youtube fixit videos and spare parts finally made me give up in frustration. But the new one I bought came in a big, 175 pound box. I managed to wheel the box on a dolly to near where it was to go, and then it took many many hours to put it together. On my birthday, I went to Ikea (celebrating fully vaccinated!) and bought their only briefly available garden furniture - I suspect this stuff will be much easier to get together.

Really Need Snow Melt Soon

First crocus seen today in my yard
as the snow retreated
My neighbor had some up yesterday

We’ve had a terrible stretch of ice here. It snowed, then it rained, then it got very cold, and the snow packed down into concentrated ice. It started to get above freezing during the days, but back below at night, softening the ice and making it run down into low spots during the day, then freezing into hard smooth skating rinks at night- and on into the next day, as layers of ice built up.

I go on about this, because from a gardening point of view it shows in detail where the water flows (easier to see when the water is in its solid state), but mostly because it has been hell for Rocky, the aging Very Hungry Labrador. Knowing the cold was coming, I was right out there after the snow and before the deep cold to clean off my front steps and walk. They have stayed dry and safe. But the back yard became a treacherous skating rink for my poor old dog. The first cold morning, I opened the door to let him out and he went SPLAT. He couldn’t get up (this also happens in the house on hardwood floors) and I dashed out in my bedroom slippers and jammies to rescue him. I narrowly avoided a SPLAT myself by grabbing onto the fence. It wasn’t safe for me to try to lift his 75 pounds without leverage. Fortunately, I own some nanospike-shoe adapters - basically they fit on the outside of any shoes, and spike down into most ice. So I spiked up, went back out, and got the old man up and moving. Poor baby- but no broken bones, which given his overall condition might have proved fatal. Over the past few days he has fallen again more than once. I keep his harness on him (for a handhold) and have had my spikes on when I go out with him. But he has grown fearful of the suddenly treacherous back yard. Who could blame him, partially blind and arthritic, weak legged, but determined to eliminate outside because he is a VERY GOOD DOG. He takes my guidance on where to walk, but not completely. And he leans against me when he bends to poop.

The witch hazel is out right on time,
A cheerful burst of color

Bixby, by the way, just skittered across the top of the ice and snow, delighted to be out and patrolling the yard in any weather except rain.

So I am even more thrilled than usual to see grass and other plants poking up through the snow as it melts. Of course, much of the yard is a mud pit, but spring will be here very soon!

February Nice

 This is my living room mantel, decorated for February. The fans came in a box of armchair traveler stuff about Japan (Christmas present from middle boy) along with some loose green tea, a teacup, a book, and other stuff. The hearts may or may not have originated as Christmas ornaments. 

The daffodils I cut outside from the front corner, where they were about to bloom unseasonably early (and perhaps get ruined by the snow). 

First Harvest

 Guys, I made a salad from my indoor garden and it wasn’t tiny, it was lunch!

This is my harvest. You cut the outer leaves of lettuces,
leaving the interior rosette to keep growing.

Update to note: as of right now, my average cost per meal from indoor gardening is $99 per meal. Hopefully this will improve over time. 

Indoors

My Christmas cactus
bloomed when I brought it in
right before Thanksgiving

It's winter, and I can't go anywhere warm. I'm often swept along by trends (though I've avoided sourdough), and so I've upped my indoor garden game. 

I have a number of plants I take out and bring in each year. I had planned to try bringing in, digging up, or taking cuttings of some of the potted plants I had last summer, but never got around to it. 

Just cut back

However, I do have one big success story to report. I've had a tropical hibiscus, bought at Home Depot a number of years ago. I generally keep it inside the fence because it is apparently very tasty (according to the deer). Inside the fence means not quite enough sun. So it's been looking very sad for a few years.

This year, I put the hibiscus pot just outside the fence, snugged up against the porch, and there it got a lot more sun. It did well enough that I was emboldened to cut it way back when I brought it in. At first, it looked like a bunch of sticks with one huge anomalous blossom. But it has filled out from the lower branches, and I hope it will have a nicer shape this year. In the meantime, it brings lots of joy with many blossoms.

Hibiscus

I've also bought some new inside plants. I started by hitting a black Friday Amazon special, totally out of the blue and on impulse, which I was resolved not to do. I got 16 tiny succulents for $15 - what a deal! Now, with the additional purchase of special succulent potting soil and right-sized pots for them, I have 11 surviving succulents on my kitchen windowsill, a slightly less good deal. But I see them and cheer them on every time I use the sink, not such a bad thing.

Succulents

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I also ventured into modern hydroponics with Aerogarden. I gave my boys one each for Christmas last year, and had reports of good success. My sister-in-law has many (apparently adding more and more is common). So I gave one to my girl for Christmas, and got one for myself as well. Then, I added a second for myself, almost right away.

Later this week, I'm going to have a (small) side salad of lettuce and basil from my kitchen counter garden! How cool is that!

One of my "Cousin It" palms

The other one

Signs of Spring

My girl made street signs for me.
I'm hoping to help decrease wrong deliveries.

We've had a stretch of not-terrible weather - including some actual nice days. At this time of year, a "nice" day is one where it gets up to at least 50 in the sun, there is sun, and little wind. More sun and less wind allows the temperature to sag downwards from 50, as long as I dress for it. 

I've spent a couple of days in the yard, either finishing my fall cleanup or starting the spring cleanup, depending on how self-critical I'm feeling at the moment.  I'm also very focused on house-training Bixby - it's going really well - and we step outside for a few minutes nearly every hour we are home. This time outside allows me to search for and find even the tiniest hints of spring.

It feels like we've had no actual winter  though we did have one short-lived minor snow. These nice days make me long for spring, but it's really too soon.

Daffodil and crocus foliage tips are emerging, as they do every year at this time. My winter-blooming plants have not really come on yet. My witchhazel does have some buds but no blooms. My hellebores were all transplanted last year and I'm seeing some healthy foliage of some of them (and some died) but nothing that looks like the beginning of blooms. My winter jasmine, which hangs over the wall at the corner, has just a few little blooms and may come on stronger soon. 

Daffodil tips by the back entrance

There are several plants with green foliage year round, and these stand out. One gardening tip I heard but didn't act on as well as I would have liked last year is about how to use that to your advantage. Because certain weeds (onion grass, english ivy, vinca) are green when most plants around them are not, you can target them more easily for weeding right now. Because of the mildness of this winter, there are more things green than normal, but the principle still holds. 

This plant, golden groundsel, is NOT supposed
to be blooming yet, but it should be green

I successfully killed a lot of grass in my very back in the fall, and didn't get to planting the new grass. Therefore, there is a big mudpit waiting for me. I'm going to look up about how warm it has to be to plant new grass, and look for a 2-3 day window for taking on the big job.

Late Fall

 

Oak leaf hydrangea

A gardening book I just finished noted that almost any Fall foliage looks terrific when backlit. So true! And, a reason for planting good foliage plants on the west side of the yard, where the late Fall sun will be at a low angle and highlight it nicely. 

Almost all of the tree leaves are down - except for those that cling all winter like the pin oak on the corner. I've raked / blown / composted in the back a lot, but not so much in the front. I wanted to be sure to keep leaves off the new baby grass I planted. I do need to do a cleanup on the front, however, or they will mat down and smother things. 

NOT backlit - but still good -
St John's Wort

Aside from that, I may need to do some work on closing off the fenced part of my yard more securely, due to smaller, livelier dogs being able to escape.