Northeast Gardener

2010-11-13T15:14:00.011-05:00

2010-11-07T13:08:00.014-05:00

RI October 2010

2010-10-11T15:33:00.001-04:00

Tulipa 'Tinka'

2010-03-28T09:46:00.004-04:00

2010-01-16T13:48:00.000-05:00

January 1, 2010

2010-01-01T15:01:00.004-05:00

Camellia sasanqua and Carolina Wren

2009-12-26T12:18:00.005-05:00

Cannas, dahlias, glads

2009-10-25T15:43:00.002-04:00

Calendula blossoms

2009-10-20T18:48:00.003-04:00

Blossoms to spite frosts, their color all season never more vivid than today.

Neomarica longifolia - Yellow Walking Iris

2009-08-25T06:16:00.004-04:00

2009-08-17T14:58:00.003-04:00

Cross Creek

2009-04-29T08:50:00.030-04:00

There is of course an affinity between people and places. … the
consciousness of land and water must lie deeper in the core of us than any
knowledge of our fellow beings. We were bred of earth before we were born of
our mothers. Once born, we can live without mother or father, or any other
kind, or any friend, or any human love. We cannot live without the earth or
apart from it, and something is shriveled in a man’s heart when he turns
away from it and concerns himself only with the affairs of me.

Traveling down canopy covered backroads in north central Florida I could see why Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings found her place here at Cross Creek. The song of birds, the flowering and fruiting trees, the sound of rain coming across the hamaca, and the whisper of wind in the palms and pines. The place got under my skin, like the red ticks that embedded beneath our clothing.
Cross Creek has traveled home with me. When I hear the cardinals calling from the trees I think of their song in her citrus grove. When I lie in bed in the early mornings with the windows wide open I think of her bed on the screened-in front porch just a few feet away from her typewriter and writing table. As I spread leaf mould on the raised beds I recall how she dug leaf mould from hammocks to enrich her roses, camellias and gardenias. The magnolias are blooming here now. She describes how to carefully collect them and place them in jars of warm water where "they open in the house as on the tree, the cupped buds bursting open suddenly, the full-blown flowers shedding the red-tipped stamens in a shower, so that in a quiet room you hear them sifting onto the table top."
Rawlings lived at Cross Creek for thirteen years. It was where she felt she finally came home. But she admits she did not own it. The "red-birds" did. And the land belonged to the "wind and the rain, to the sun and the seasons, to the cosmic secrecy of seed, and beyond all, to time."

Garden Blogger's Bloom Day Delight

2009-04-15T17:01:00.020-04:00

Travels in Florida continue after a deluge night before last and yesterday that brought down buckets of tropical rain with lightning and thunder for hours and hours.

Today's weather is as bright and clear as the moon that shone in the tent window at 2:30 this morning. Perfect. Off to the Old Florida Highway (Route 441). Picked up a copy of Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings’ Cross Creek to read along the way. Discovered this lovely iris blooming in Micanopy on the way to Rawlings' homestead. So many flowers growing in the wild down here are white.

More birds to identify when given some time and good bird identification resources. Same with the flowers.

Tomorrow heading south down canopy covered backroads and see where our travels lead us. Saturated with the beauty of this country. Can see why Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings found her place here. The song of birds, the flowering and fruiting trees, the sound of rain coming across the hamaca, and the sound of wind in the palms and pines.

Wild Things

2009-04-13T15:11:00.028-04:00

Living on the edge of the wild down here in Florida and loving it. So many unusual plants and a wide variety of wildlife. Seeing more flora here that I ever have. Went down the 7 mile Juniper Creek run - 4 1/2 hours in a big canoe with canopy, trees, alligators and mini rapids to navigate.

Saw 2 alligators, lots of turtles the size of large frying pans, birds I can't identify and the same with white blooming lilies. Some very exotic looking.

Lizards and salamanders are everywhere if you stay still long enough. And we had a young raccoon join us for breakfast this morning. Couldn't understand why we wouldn't share the bacon and you could almost see the tears running down his face.

Yesterday, Easter Sunday started with a bird solo at 4:30. By the time a sunrise service would have been under way we had the entire dawn chorus performing a fugue to rival any master composer.

A pair of cardinals come and sit at all times of the day on the picnic table benches with a zealous catbird never far behind. And last night around 9:00 we ran into a young bear who high-tailed it over to the tree line, turned around and planted himself on the ground. All we could see were two bright eyes reflected in the flashlight beam back at us. Think the poor thing had his head down on the ground between his front paws.

Enjoying cooking outdoors where food always seems to taste better. Sleeping can be fitful with rustling nighttime visitors of all kinds though. And after all we've seen it's enough to have you sleeping lighter than usual!

Florida Revisited

2009-04-10T17:55:00.042-04:00

Retracing the trip I took in January with my daughters, only this time with my husband. We're headed back to the same National Forest with its precocious raccoons, the Florida black bear named Teddy, and old-time campground with private sites and ever-ready-to-lend-a-hand staff.

The road was familiar but with a fresh brush of green everywhere. And pansies blooming in incredible color ranges.

Meridian strips in central NC were planted with wildflowers – most stunning combination was a little airy lavender blossom mixed with the bright orange California poppy.

The dogwoods lined the sides of the highway from Virgina on south, their blossoms suspended on arching branches in the shade of tall pines. The bright purple blossoms of the Eastern Redbud trees were lovely too. And then there were the long racemes of wisteria draping heavily from treetops beside old barns and farm houses.

Setting up camp tomorrow with my husband. Many hours together in the car in our exodus from New England to subtropical forests in Florida. Hours (and I mean hours!) of time together between car travel and camping. And I'm looking forward to every minute of it.

2009-04-06T10:56:00.014-04:00

Pelargonium 'Designer Dark Red' blooming behind variegated geranium.

Nasturtium 'Alaska' seedlings under lights.

Canna 'Bengal Tiger' coming back to life.

Surprise tiny Cactus blossom hidden on the back side of the cactus garden.

Opuntia shoot.

Brazen back porch visitor.

Garden Bloggers' Muse Day - April 2009

2009-04-01T16:29:00.023-04:00

April, Remy Belleau
April, pride of woodland ways,
Of glad days,
April, bringing hope of prime,
To the young flowers that beneath
Their bud sheath
Are guarded in their tender time;

April, pride of fields that be
Green and free,
That in fashion glad and gay,
Stud with flowers red and blue,
Every hue,
Their jewelled spring array;

April, pride of murmuring
Winds of spring,
That beneath the winnowed air,
Trap with subtle nets and sweet
Flora's feet,
Flora's feet, the fleet and fair.

April, by thy hand caressed,
From her breast
Nature scatters everywhere
Handfuls of all sweet perfumes,
Buds and blooms,
Making faint the earth and air.

April, joy of the green hours,
Clothes with flowers
Over all her locks of gold
My sweet Lady; and her breast
With the blest
Birds of summer manifold.

Daffodil and eglantine
And woodbine,
Lily, violet, and rose
Plentiful in April fair,
to the air,
Their pretty petals do unclose.

Nay, but I will give my praise,
To these days,
Named with the glad name of Her
That from the foam o' the sea
Came to be
Sudden light on earth and air.

Dreamers of Dreams

2009-03-25T13:31:00.058-04:00

March is flying by like the wind that's been blowing out of the north lately, hard and fast. Today spring's here and welcome she is.

I'm not one for too many garden ornaments but Rufus, sitting here next to the budded Rhododendron 'Ken Janeck', is a welcome sign of great days ahead in the garden. Rufus is a "gift" from my three best friends who can't pass up an opportunity to play a garden prank on me when I least expect it. He spends the winter protected up next to the house on a shelf underneath the upstairs porch. So to see his beaming countenance back in the yard again is as welcome as spring.

Last weekend I made a quick trip up to see family in Maine. Cheese and pasta making, chicken fun ("More raisins, please!") and of course......

a trip to Johnny's! The place was packed wall to wall with winter weary gardeners mulling over seed selections in catalogs and on racks.

There was an army of great staff on hand available for consulting as well as offering their assistance with decision making. I thought I was all set for seeds this year but couldn't resist a couple varieties of calendula, an ornamental grass and a highly recommended broccoli raab. Lots of fun.

I realized on my drive up and back along Route 95 that over the next four weeks I'll have traveled through thirteen of the fourteen states (all but Rhode Island) that line the eastern seaboard. In April it's another road trip to camp in that Florida subtropical forest, this time with my husband.

On the first day of the year I didn't fully appreciate the degree to which I'd be living O'Shaughnessy's 'Ode'. And I'm loving every minute of it!

We are the music-makers, and we are the dreamers of dreams, wandering by lone sea-breakers, and sitting by desolate streams...

Garden Bloggers' Bloom Day - March 2009

2009-03-15T10:32:00.022-04:00

Blooms in the entryway - Oxalis triangularis.

At the kitchen sink - Cyclamen.

In the family room - variegated leaf salmon geranium.

Outside in the coldframe - Variegated Vinca.

And in the yard - Snowdrops to remind me it's still March.

For other celebrations of Garden Bloggers' Bloom Day, visit our host Carol at May Dreams Gardens whose central Indiana gardens are sprouting and blooming to greet the day.

Signs of Spring

2009-03-08T15:25:00.049-04:00

What a difference a week makes. Eight days ago I posted about looking for spring. After this weekend of milder temperatures in the low to mid 50s (not taking into account that stubborn March wind), the signs are there.

Standing out in color from everything else in the yard, the tough, spring-flowering Kerria japonica is greening up on the back hillside garden. Its strong southerly exposure brings it along nicely this time of year when the leaves are still off neighboring trees. I can already see its pop of orange double-flowered pom pom blossoms gracing arching stems in a couple months.

One of my earliest favorites, though, is the glossy, heart-shaped evergreen leaves of the European ginger. As soon as the snow melts, its lush leathery leaves greet you seemingly unaffected by the harsh winter weather.

And the old-fashioned primrose is sending up shoots of chartreuse, scalloped leaves. Its mahogany-red flowers with gold centers lend rich tones to the side yard shade bed in May.

This diminutive Heuchera 'Santa Rosa' is a new addition as of last fall. What a surprise to see it greeting spring so early. I'm pleased it made it through in such fine shape. Its pink blossoms will be a treat this summer.
Old standby perennial favorites in my garden, though, are the Lamb's Ears, Hens and Chicks and sedums. I've had these for more years than I can remember. Favorites too of my girls when they were young in the garden (Mr. Rabbit in the Lamb's Ears above is a remnant from that time). A long, long time they've graced the yard. And with their faithful hardiness they'll be early spring regulars for many more years I'm sure.

Calendula Morning

2009-03-07T07:48:00.010-05:00

Greeting me from the cold frame this morning with the sun and temperatures headed for the mid 50s today. Pure golden sunshine.

Winter Staples

2009-03-03T10:13:00.050-05:00

Appreciated as much as my favorite meals this season - beef pot pie with puff pastry tops in individual ramikins, Coq au Vin, ham and lentil soup made with a ham stock base, chicken noodle soup made with a little cream and parmesan, winter minestrone with pearl barley and cannellini beans - these reliable old plant friends continue to come through for me during the coldest time of year. At minus four degrees this morning, the bulbs, begonias, and coleus warm the heart.

Budded blue and white Grape Hyacinths and blue Anemones grace the coffee table in the family room. The Anemones' fern-like foliage unfold to greet the warmth like tiny arms stretching out to catch the rays of the sun.

Whether king of the begonia world Beefsteak or the compact, bushy wax begonia, both are winners for the indoor winter gardener. My Beefsteak has been in our family for years, originally started as a cutting off my brother's plant well over ten years ago.

With rich red-brown leaves plumped by summer rains,
Three divisions wrestled from the beefsteak begonia
Make a new start.
All for the coral blossom
Suspended on slender stem in February.

This low-maintenance wax begonia ('Cocktail Gin') with bronze foliage and rose pink blossoms is a constant bloomer. Sprigs hang in a vase at the kitchen sink, their bright blooms always welcome and the quickly rooted cuttings potted up for shade beds in spring.

Coleus are mainstays, their foliage pleasing to the eye all winter long.

They root alongside the wax begonias at the kitchen sink making new container plants for around the yard.

These mix well with each other. I also like them in containers with a low-growing annual grass like Carex 'Toffee Twist'.

And last of the staples here are the seedlings. The Echinacea 'Pink Parasol' is six days old now with a high germination rate.

Indispensable as beef pot pie and Coq au Vin. Essential as winter minestrone and chicken noodle soup. Bulbs, begonias, coleus and seedlings. They're how I get through 'til spring.

Garden Bloggers' Muse Day March 1, 2009

2009-03-01T09:47:00.064-05:00

Annual Miracle
by Edward J. Fitzgerald

This is the brittle season. Darkly
now
The dry leaves lift their barren
branches high
And scratch against a gray and
leaden sky.
The world lies stiff and frozen. Chill
winds blow
From every hilltop, and the eye can
see
No sign in shrub or grass or leafless
tree
Of slow revolving seasons or of
birth
Stirring beneath the brittle shell of
earth.
Nor is there hope of change till
suddenly
The green heart of the world starts
echoing
The distant baying of the hounds of
spring.

I found this piece by Edward Fitzgerald, a Victorian writer from Suffolk, England, in the March 1939 issue of Ladies' Home Journal. Although not known for writing "nature" poetry, evidence of it existed in his letters to friends:

"I get radishes to eat for breakfast of a morning: with them comes a savour of earth that brings all the delicious gardens of the world back into one's soul, and almost draws tears from my eyes."

"The trees murmur a continuous soft chorus to the solo which my soul discourses in."

Visit Carolyn who hosts Garden Bloggers' Muse Day on the first day of the month: http://sweethomeandgardenchicago.blogspot.com/

* * * * *

I bought a set of Ladies' Home Journal issues from the 1930s and '40s for my mother last year. In these issues one of my mother's favorite Connecticut writers Gladys Taber has her column "Diary of Domesticity", an informal account of country living, pets, family, gardening, and cooking. She wrote of the changing New England seasons and the sophisticated beauty of New York City. Lemonade punch with thin orange slices and Virginia style fried chicken. The vulnerability of love and the intangibility of the pursuit of happiness.

Taber's column in the March 1939 issue includes her musings over the fields around her home. She writes,

I walked over the fields last Sunday, where all the hollows are dark with water and the winter grasses hide the green growing shoots. Green is laid over the hills like a low wave; the swamp has a new color, red and yellow budding bushes. There is a kind of delicate mist along the trees, and the old gray rocks in the pasture are wet as seals.

Farther north than Taber's Stillmeadow farm, we've yet to see the green laid over the hills and the yellow budding bushes. But the pussy willow I went outside to photograph this morning has swelling buds despite another nor'easter pummeling up the east coast setting sights for a direct hit over New England by tomorrow morning.

I did buy these magazines for my mother. But they've since come back to sit here in my study, instead of on the shelves in her home, where I find myself consulting them for one reason or another. I also have one of her Gladys Taber cookbooks with our favorite "Company Chicken" and "Old-Fashioned Applesauce Bars" recipes. This cookbook is full of good reading as well as good recipes.

Polly and Hugh Johnson have a house in Wellfleet, overlooking the magical expanse of the salt marsh, laced with silver streams. One could sit all day and watch the mystery of the marsh, but Polly finds everyone who comes in is always hungry and she likes to have freshly baked bread on hand!

Old-Fashioned Applesauce Bars (My Own Cook Book From Stillmeadow and Cape Cod, Gladys Taber)
½ c butter
¾ c sugar
1 egg
½ c thick applesauce
1 tsp vanilla
1 ¼ c unsifted flour
½ tsp soda
½ tsp salt
1 tsp cinnamon
¼ tsp nutmeg
1/8 tsp cloves
½ c chopped walnuts
½ c golden raisins
Cream butter and sugar. Add egg and beat well. Add applesauce and vanilla, and blend. Sift four, soda, salt, and spices. Add to creamed mixture and blend well. Stir in nuts and raisins. Spread in a greased and flowered pan 13”x9”x2”. The batter will be stiff. Bake in a 350 degree oven about 25 minutes. Cool slightly. Dust with confectioner’s sugar.
MAKES 30 bars 3”x1”.
These are from Mabel’s kitchen. She says she sometimes uses light brown sugar, omits the cloves and adds 1 teaspoon of instant coffee. The cookie bars stay fresh in a tight container and also pack well.

Looking for Spring

2009-02-28T15:24:00.016-05:00

My third, and last, camellia is finally in bloom. This one is from my father. He has spent years cultivating camellias - from cuttings and seed. He has more patience and talent in these areas than me. What a beauty it is with a little splash of white in the center. This is my first year with camellias and, having followed his growing directions and advice, I'm hooked.

We had a beautiful day yesterday. I was able to get out for a walk without gloves and heavy winter coat and smelled spring on the breeze when it wasn't coming off the snow banks to the west. A warmth came from the sun that had some substance to it. Today, though, the gloves and coat were back on and the walk much shorter with another storm predicted for tomorrow and Monday. We're all tired of winter and it's hardly over yet it seems.

Tulips!

2009-02-23T06:50:00.036-05:00

When I ventured into this world of hydroponic tulip propagation in November - http://northeastgardener.blogspot.com/2008/11/hydroponic-tulips.html - I did so with hopes of having better luck forcing tulips than I had in the past. Previous attempts to manage the conditions necessary to produce flowers had proven unsuccessful. Attaining their essential period of cold without having pots frozen into the ground, providing appropriate transition conditions from outdoors to in, too much water, not enough water. Considerable effort with nothing but mushy bulbs or a pot full of leaves sans blossoms to show for it.

Well six bulbs survived the refrigerator treatment. I lost about a dozen to molding. These bulbs were purchased from a local home store. The six that made it were from a reputable source. Lesson learned there.

Once out of the refrigerator, these six sat on cold south window sills from January 24th until February 17th when they started blooming. I moved them to my favorite spot for blooming plants - the north window behind the kitchen sink. There's just something special about having flowers at the kitchen sink.

I enjoyed the dim early morning light on their buds, watched them open to the warmth of kitchen lights and cooking, followed their tracking the sun across the day as they changed position in the vases, and appreciated their open faces as I cooked dinner all week long. I'd catch their scent while washing up dishes, never enjoying kitchen clean up as much as this week.

This morning the tulips are still going strong. Their fresh fragrance and color a defiance of gusting winds with 8 degree readings outside the north kitchen window. Go ahead and blow you old north wind. We're celebrating spring, my tulips and me.

Garden Bloggers' Bloom Day - February 15, 2009

2009-02-15T15:09:00.031-05:00

In the early morning light shining through the family room window, this semi-double red camellia greeted me over morning coffee to celebrate the February Bloom Day. I've had the camellia just about a year and have watched its swelling buds with anticipation since it was brought indoors last September.

The blossom opened on Friday (photo below) and you can see how its petals have unfurled over two days' time to a become fuller blossom.

And there's even a blossom outside today in the coldframe. The flowering cabbage is blooming and I'm hoping it will set seed that I can harvest for sowing late spring. Its yellow blossom reminds me I need to bring in some forsythia branches for forcing.

Cabin Fever

2009-02-13T07:48:00.044-05:00

I know I've got a bad case of cabin fever when I start propagating everything around the house except the cats.

The winter starts off for me with normal propagation methods - rosemary cuttings in soil, a couple favorite begonia cuttings in a glass of water. By mid-November, though, I can't resist the urge to try something a little different. Like the hydroponic tulips in the refrigerator for example (see November 14th posting).

But after the turn of the year, winter's grip is on me like a steel trap. Something odd happens and I become a thing possessed with a kind of propagation madness. Just the other day I resurrected a method discovered mid-winter in 2006. An easy do-it-yourself humidity chamber for salvia cuttings. All you need is a short glass vase and two plastic containers (click on photos for larger view).

Snip off a couple top branches of a salvia that's getting leggy (3-4" long stem tip cuttings). I used the Pineapple Sage I'm wintering over under lights. Pinch off the lower leaves and put the cuttings in the vase with water. Fill the bottom plastic container of the chamber with about an inch or so of water and place the vase inside it. With a spray bottle, mist the leaves and the inside of the top plastic container and close the chamber. Within a week you can have a rooted cutting ready to pot up.

It wasn't more than a day later, though, that I was struck with another fit of propagation madness. The airplants had been dispersing fluffy seedheads for a couple weeks now and I hadn't taken much notice of them floating around the house until a friend mentioned them. I pulled my American Horticultural Society Plant Propagation book off the shelf and sure enough I found this simple statement: Raising bromeliads from seeds is rewarding for the gardener...

That's all the encouragement I needed. I studied the suggested method (conifer twigs, such as cypress or juniper, tied into a bundle with raffia and a little sphagnum moss; seedheads pressed evenly into the moss, misted and hung in a warm location with 100% humidity) and got busy improvising.

I pulled out a salvaged Southern Magnolia seed pod, a piece of palm fiber and some raffia. I tied the palm fiber around the seed pod with raffia, misted it with the spray bottle, pressed the fluffy seedheads into the fiber and wrapped a couple more pieces of raffia around it to hold the seedheads in place. I misted the entire thing and hung it in a sealed baggie in a warm spot.

My family's obviously used to this kind of thing. No one has even asked after the odd-looking contraption. Not a rolling of the eyes, puzzled glance. Nothing.

Next it's the baggie seed germination method on some Echinacea and triple yellow Datura seeds. Let's hope spring comes soon or I'll be stuffing the smallest Siamese into a damp coffee filter inside a gallon-size baggie.

2009-02-07T15:40:00.023-05:00

The Aeonium blossoms are opening in the cold frame this weekend. They haven't minded the single digit nighttime temperatures, below zero wind chills and daytime 80+ degree extremes when I forget to open the top of the cold frame on sunny afternoons. What a gift for early February.

This morning the bird feeders were empty. On closer inspection it became clear why. Shortly after these shots were taken a cat fight ensued and they scared each other away. Juncos filled the hydrangea below the feeder within minutes and goldfinches, titmice and chickadees followed.

This afternoon the pampered indoor cats crowded in a tangle of legs and fur on the sunny end of the couch.

Feeble attempts to stare down weighty bodies were ignored.

Not worth the energy for a cat fight here, warmth and comfort won out.

In Contrast

2009-02-03T10:22:00.026-05:00

In contrast to snowfall that came in overnight on a northeast wind, I could hear at first light the clear whistling "fee-bee" of a chickadee and the canary-like song of a goldfinch, both I associate with gardening outdoors in much finer weather.

In contrast to my desire to stay under warm covers, I forced myself out of bed and went outside to take pictures of:

Contrasting prints of bird feet and cat paws.

Contrasting thoughts of the Bavarian planter under a fresh cap of snow. . .

and overflowing petunias of last July.

And the arbor bench tucked in beneath barren intertwining twists and turns of wisteria. . .

giving way to cool June green.

All that is noble is in itself of a quiet nature,

and appears to sleep until it is aroused

and summoned forth by contrast.

- - Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

Garden Bloggers' Muse Day February 1, 2009

2009-02-01T09:47:00.016-05:00

Open afresh your round of starry folds,
Ye ardent marigolds!
Dry up the moisture from your golden lids,
For great Apollo bids
That in these days your praises should be sung
On many harps, which he has lately strung;
And when again your dewiness he kisses,
Tell him, I have you in my world of blisses:
So haply when I rove in some far vale,
His mighty voice may come upon gale.

- John Keats, 1884

The simple daisy like blossom of the calendula is a member of the Asteraceae or Compositae family. I've come to realize this is my favorite flower family. The sunflower, aster, osteospermum, gazania, anthemis, yarrow, helenium, bidens, cosmos, tithonia, dahlia, rudbeckia, gaillardia, ligularia, zinnia. The single varieties of these capture my heart in their perfect simplicity.

For other musings of the day visit Carolyn at the home of the Garden Bloggers' Muse Day.

What shall I do in January?

2009-01-28T09:26:00.050-05:00

Although reading of gardens is closely akin to working in them, this is not such a book... In this book the attempt is made to answer the commonest inquiries in the briefest language so that the reader may get his answer and go back to his garden work.
- Alfred C. Hottes, April 1930 -

I enjoy combing the shelves in used book stores for gardening books. I found this little gem in Amherst, MA this past spring. It's an illustrated guide book of over 1,000 questions compiled by Alfred C. Hottes and answered using the "experiences of many lifetimes" of authors, nurserymen, and experienced gardeners. I've been mulling over the calendar section for January ("What shall I do in January?"). Divided into four areas, it tells you what you should do in the library/living room, the home orchard, the small greenhouse and in the garden. Here are a couple snippets:

In the Library or Living Room

Read, mark and inwardly digest the catalogs. They are written for you and published at great cost. Treat them as literature and preserve them for future reference.

In the Home Orchard

Prune out cankers from apples and pears, and black knot on plums

In the Small Greenhouse

Seeds of pansies, English daisies, forget-me-nots, Vinca rosea and snapdragons may be sown for bedding.

Start taking cuttings of geraniums, coleus and other bedding plants.

Disbud the carnations and roses.

Propagate the Lorraine type of begonia with leaf cuttings.

In the Garden

Shake the snow from shrub or evergreen branches which are bent to the ground.

Save the coal ashes to mix with the heavy soil of your garden.

Build a birdhouse.

And I'll add one more item to the "In the Garden" list before I get outside to deal with this morning's weather detail:

Shovel out the cold frame.

Catching Up

2009-01-25T11:33:00.057-05:00

Attempts to catch up with life around the house, overlooked for two weeks with the road trip and a busy work schedule upon return, have been fitful at best.

We've had a couple of cold days with bold sunshine. The Narcissus 'Tete-a-Tete' appreciates the warmth coming in the south windows.

And the hydroponic tulips on trial here have come out of the refrigerator to sit on the window sills.

But it was with trepidation I opened the cold frame that had been sealed shut in a blanket, tarp and 8" of icy snow for fifteen days. I expected freeze-dried remains but was greeted instead with a brave calendula blossom.

The Aeonium extended lanky bud stems ready to burst.

And the thyme looked fresh as spring.

The secret to their survival? Two 40-watt long life appliance light bulbs my husband mounted to the back of the cold frame. With temperatures plummeting over night to low single digits and worse, in the cold frame it remains in the upper 20s/low 30s. And once that sun rises and heats things up inside it can get to 80 degrees in the afternoon. I can then prop the lid open slightly with a scrap of lumber to allow some air to circulate.

Back inside, plants and bulbs aren't the only things enjoying the south facing windows. We all spend our days in the family room during the winter with the sunshine. It's my favorite room. The girls were raised in this room, all those long winters growing up. And it's the one room in this drafty old Victorian, with it's tall original wavy glass windows and high ceiling, that gives off the comfort and warmth of a soft old flannel shirt when it's filled up with plants in the fall to join us for winter. It adjoins to the kitchen with an extra wide open door frame. Food, sunshine, family, cats, plants. Truly the heart of our home.

Cyrtanthus mackenii (Ifafa Lily)

2009-01-22T06:58:00.025-05:00

I purchased this little beauty in 2003 from Logee's Greenhouses in Danielson, CT and mid-winter it never fails to prove its worth. It's a plant you can easily forget about as it sits quietly in its pot with nondescript grass-like foliage. A self-maintaining bulb that you take for granted and feel a bit guilty for the neglect you've cast on it for months when it suddenly bursts into a glory of dainty, sweet-scented tubular blossoms during the bleakest time of year.

The name Cyrtanthus refers to the curved flower tube and is derived from the Greek kyrtos meaning curved and anthos meaning flower. This species is named after Scotsman Mark McKen, a horticulturalist who became the first curator at the Durban Botanic Gardens in 1851 in South Africa. The Durban Botanic Gardens website refers to him colorfully as fiery, hard drinking, and rough and ready. Called "the professor", McKen was one of South Africa's classic plant hunters. Many of the indigenous plants at the botanic gardens still carry his name in their scientific plant names.

In addition to its ease of care, propagation is simple. Offsets are easily separated from the mother bulbs and its seeds germinate pretty quickly. I usually scatter them around the base of the bulbs and let them spring up freely from where they land.

I love this lily. It is a plant that demands nothing, makes for easy sharing with friends and family by popping a few offsets into a pot, and provides such satisfaction this time of year with its blooms. What a gift to the New England gardener's winter soul.

Florida Road Trip

2009-01-18T14:48:00.051-05:00

Woke up in my own bed, for the first time in over a week, to falling snow this morning that made our road trip seem all but a dream. I find it hard to take the time to write when traveling on short trips. But I did better this trip and I'm thankful for the cryptic notes I took when time allowed. And the pictures taken to accompany the notes.

On our way south we felt the sun blazing in the windshield all the way. By the time we reached Florida it was 78 degrees. Reports from home included tales of temperatures heading below zero for the week.

The campground was full of unfamiliar plants and trees, a subtropical forest and our home for the week. California Fan Palms enveloped us like a jungle making the sites private. Carolina wrens and squirrels rustled the undergrowth. Southern Magnolia fruits littered the ground like pinecones. And the ground was coarse and sandy. On our first night we went to bed to a moon so bright we didn't need flashlights.

Two young raccoons drifted into our campsite with a proprietary air making themselves very familiar with our belongings. One afternoon we came back to tracks of wet paw prints across our air mattresses. They were determined to find food no matter how carefully we hid it from them. The park attendant told us about their mother falling out of a tree a couple weeks ago and breaking her neck. He said he knew of another mother with babies, loaded her in a cage and transported her up this way where the orphans were. She took to them with no problem and treated them like her own. Went right over to a berry bush and started showing them how to look for berries.

One night coming into camp we were greeted by "Teddy" the resident Florida black bear. Someone left a bag of garbage that he’d helped himself to. Gorgeous 500 pounds of mounded black fur hulked away from the dumpster as we stopped the car and shone the high beams on him. We were so spooked as he headed slowly into the woods toward our campsite we turned on the only radio station we’d been able to locate earlier in the day, country western, rolled down the windows and turned up the volume. Drove at 15 mph the rest of the way to the campsite blasting the music to let him know we were back. But we couldn't get up the nerve to get out of the car so kept driving until we saw the park attendant out on his cart making rounds. He assured us Teddy wouldn't bother us and went off to find him. Later he came to our campsite from trying to find Teddy. We had just heard raccoon chatter and scolding across the road to the north and figured Teddy had encountered the raccoon. The attendant said Teddy was more likely to be harmed by the raccoon rather than the other way around. He asked if we had wood and suggested we start a fire. Teddy would stay clear if he knew we were around. We bought a stack of wood off the back of his cart and started a great fire even with damp paper and intermittent showers going on.

We also heard from our friendly park attendant that a photographer for National Geographic comes three times a week to take pictures. Arrives around 7:00 am loaded with camera and gear and makes his way around the campground. He took pictures of the mist rising off the spring first thing in the morning following a particularly cold night. But the raccoons are his favorite.

The house seems quiet after coyotes yipping and raccoons quarreling in the palms at night. Life on the road's been great but those flannel sheets sure felt good last night.

Road Trip

2009-01-13T21:17:00.008-05:00

Life's been circumvented by an impromptu road trip to Florida with my daughters. Not so bad at all. Missed out on 8 inches of snow last Saturday and temperatures that are headed down to the single digits tonight.

Camping in a wonderful forest, wonderful even in the rain in 45-50 degree weather at night. We'll be having our own cold snap though. Friday night will be in the upper 20s! A taste of home.

In the meantime I'm enjoying the hibiscus that are blooming, the roses, the palms, the resident black bear who is less of a threat than the domesticated raccoons.

Life on the road is good. More to follow when time allows.

January 1, 2009 Garden Bloggers' Muse Day Tribute

2009-01-01T13:10:00.026-05:00

Ode
We are the music makers,
And we are the dreamers of dreams,
Wandering by lone sea-breakers,
And sitting by desolate streams;
World-losers and world forsakers,
On whom the pale moon gleams:
Yet we are the movers and shakers
Of the world for ever, it seems.
- Arthur O'Shaughnessy

The new year greeted me with crystals and ice.

And gave me time to reflect on the year ahead. The time to build my list of new year's resolutions. A list involving music and dreams, sea-breakers and streams.

O'Shaughnessey's second stanza of Ode states, in essence, that art of any form can build up great cities, the power of a dream can conquer a kingdom, and a new song can replace an old or entrenched art form.

So, in 2009 I resolve to make lots of music, dream millions of dreams, wander miles of lone sea-breakers, sit by an endless number of desolate streams and watch with anticipation the great movers and shakers of 2009 who will shape the course of history in the year ahead.

Welcome new year.

Snowdrops

2008-12-30T13:57:00.021-05:00

Wow. Look at that. Right through the snow. Nobody ever gets bored with snowdrops...

Henry Mitchell, One Man's Garden

The snowdrops last year were well ahead of their time. This photo was taken last December 16th. I have shots of them in full bloom from other years but this was the earliest year ever. The year before I have pictures of them blooming in late January and again in March.

I never planted these little gems. They've been part of the gardens around the house longer than the 19 years I've been digging here. Gifts from the previous gardener who worked this yard.

With a stiff wind making it feel barely 20 degrees right now and a good 6 to 8 inches of snow expected tomorrow, today the snowdrops are brave enough to show just a couple inches of growth. But it's enough for me. As legend would have it the snowdrop is a sign that summer and sunshine will come again.

Savory Holidays

2008-12-28T10:24:00.033-05:00

With us the holidays are always about food and family. No surprise really since we've had so many years of family holiday celebrations to perfect our favorite dishes.

For Thanksgiving we had a brined turkey that was so tender it literally fell right off the bone. And it made the darkest juices for an especially rich gravy.

For Christmas we had a ham that was hand-picked by our local grocer and cooked to the specifications of Cook's Illustrated magazine "Holiday Ham 101" article (Nov./Dec. 2007). The results were worth the little bit of extra work required for keeping the big ham moist. Delicious.

Family gift giving involved lots of food, naturally. My brother from Maine sent a beautiful wheel of homemade cheese along with other goodies, including sweetly aromatic raw honey from their apiary.

My other brother provided us with a host of New York City delicacies in a go green reusable shopping bag. The Italian dry salami didn't last long in this house.

My father made creamy mints for everyone harkening back to the days we would visit his uncle's candy store in Modesto, California. It doesn't matter how young you are when it comes to remembering a candy store. Those memories are well ingrained. And we're looking forward to using the gift certificate we received from my parents to the country farm market up their way. Locally grown produce and an endless variety of specialty foods.

As usual, the desserts we had for the holiday were plentiful. Raspberry trifle, chocolate fondue and lots of cookies. Suffice it to say, no one went away hungry.

So that leaves for today, after existing on ham since the 25th, the making of a fine ham split pea soup. I found a great recipe online that uses lots of ham: Hordes of Ham Split Pea Soup http://timeinthekitchen.com/2008/12/hordes-of-ham-split-pea-soup/

Even after all the food, all the eating, all the ham, I'm still looking forward to a hot bowl of soup using fresh thyme from the cold frame and dried bay leaves off my bay plant. Because just as with family and food, it wouldn't be the holidays without great meals made from leftovers.

Solstice Sowing

2008-12-21T13:36:00.035-05:00

Seven years ago I unearthed a group of people as crazy about gardening as I was. Wintersowers. Long Island gardener Trudi Davidoff created a system for wintersowing using recycled containers for mini-greenhouses that resulted in a loyal following from across the country. They reside on GardenWeb with their own forum http://forums2.gardenweb.com/forums/wtrsow/ and on Trudi's Wintersown.org site that followed http://www.wintersown.org/wseo1/index.html.

In celebration of the winter solstice, Trudi invites wintersowers to sow four sets of seeds on the day of the year that marks the lengthening of daylight hours:

Remembrance - seeds that remind us of someone we knew but who is no longer with us

Life - seeds for plants that will provide nectar for birds and butterflies in our gardens

Mother Nature - seeds to produce trees that will clean our air and give shade to the soil and us

Faith - seeds for plants that are beyond our zone in warmth and represent our belief in the power that Mother Nature possesses to produce miracles.

I have records of seeds sown for the winter solstice dating back to December 21, 2002. And the seeds I've sown today are similar to those I sowed seven years ago.

Remembrance - Eschscholzia californica 'California Poppy' for my California grandmothers

Life - Buddleia 'Butterfly Bush' seeds collected off my parents' bush

Mother Nature - Ornamental maple seeds collected from around our cottage last Christmas in Ontario

Faith - Salvia coccinea 'Texas Hummingbird Sage' hardy to zone 7

To take time to celebrate the solstice in this reflective manner on the day of the year when the light begins to lengthen again is an investment in memories as well as in what lies ahead. Time well spent.

Garden Bloggers' Bloom Day December 2008

2008-12-15T20:01:00.013-05:00

Two blossoms are open on one of the camellias my father gave me. Also a single Desert Rose blossom. The color is appreciated with gray skies today and more rain coming in tonight with the promise of a short blast of snow expected in the morning. And it was 56 degrees here this afternoon! How good the breeze felt without scarf, winter coat and gloves.

2008-12-15T14:02:00.022-05:00

Over the weekend we went to check on my brother's house 20 minutes north of us. The storm came through last Thursday night leaving us sopping wet and raw. But just north of us was a different story.

Two days after the storm ice still gripped every surface. The force with which it struck was numbing. Yet the beauty of the ice was remarkable.

2008-12-11T09:25:00.060-05:00

As the landscape's changing with the weather I'm missing the hikes and walks from the fall. In early October I walked the countryside with friends visiting from Germany.
(Click on photos for close ups)

We hiked alongside waterfalls in the cool rain,

found quiet overlooks of rivers and lakes,

explored covered bridges and

stone turrets.

And after they left I hiked with other friends closer to home.

One is an art teacher who sees color palettes in gray rocks.

Another friend agreed to walk with me along the freedom trail and visit John Brown's birthplace.

But there's one hike that's been special. It's a hill that I've looked out on for nearly 20 years since we've lived in this house. You can see it from the main staircase inside. I've spent a lot of time sitting on these stairs with a girl or cat in my lap. Or alone. It's a good place to think. And I've watched this hill over the years and noticed how storms wrap around behind it from the north and spill over the valley. And how the east sun makes it glisten in the early morning light following a snow storm.

I've had time this fall to walk and hike. When you have time you can do things you haven't had the chance to do before. Like walk that hill and its granite lined trails.

The time to get off the path to look inside tree trunks.

Time to examine closely the perfect ferns growing out of stones and fallen trees.

And best of all, time to look at life from a different perspective and appreciate the beauty that lies outside your doorstep.

First Snow

2008-12-08T06:19:00.026-05:00

The first snowfall of the season came over the weekend. Looking out the bedroom window yesterday morning icy sap-sicles dripped from a maple branch. Chickadees, titmice, and squirrels have been regular visitors on this branch drinking the sap.

Holly berries cluster along stems beneath dark green leaves. Perfect for decorating the season.

The Joe Pye weed wears a crown of snow out back on the hillside. Their stalks tower above the echinaceas and New England asters swaying in the sharp wind.

A snow-tufted echinacea seed head punctuates the side bed like a startled emu bird.

The arrival of the first snow announces it's winter.

Siamese Philodendron

2008-12-05T15:20:00.009-05:00

Our cats are not allowed up on tables, countertops or other surfaces. Normally they're very respectful of this. But occasionally the smallest of the six Siamese considers herself exempt from all rules but those she makes up for herself. This happens to be one of her rules today.

2008-12-03T13:09:00.055-05:00

The holiday brought a stop to normal rhythms of the house with girls home, in and out at all times of the day. This morning the local grocer asked about them, both former clerks of his. He remarked on all the activity brought in with everyone coming back home. "Hubbub" he called it. Now it's quiet again.

Pots are finally stacked on shelves, containers emptied, drying rack hung in the rafters, and the last seeds collected. Catalogs are pouring in with new offerings and I have no energy to look through them at this point. A few weeks of winter will take care of that.

The Autumn Fern in the shade bed adjacent to the woods is thriving. It loves the angle of the afternoon sun at this time of the year.

In the cold frame the aeonium is producing tiny offshoots. I picked sage, thyme and parsley for roast chicken on Sunday and today it looks like they were never touched. And two more calendula seedlings have germinated.

We've had too much rain and too many clouds lately. A day like today with sun shining from daybreak all the way into late afternoon is a gift. It makes the cold tolerable and the email correspondences from a contact attending a conference in Phoenix slightly more bearable.

On the Eve of December

2008-11-29T14:51:00.032-05:00

Thanksgiving celebrations are done, the wreath has been made and cold raw weather has settled in.

The bird feeders have been busy this past week except for one afternoon when a sharp-shinned hawk visited.

And the cats spend most of their days now in a heap on the end of the couch.

Bringing the Garden Indoors

2008-11-20T09:27:00.013-05:00

In more late Augusts than I care to remember I've brought the garden indoors for the winter. I've wrestled enormous beefsteak begonias to get them to part with a division, potted up rosemary layerings snipped from parent plants, rooted geranium cuttings (instead of jamming big plants into small pots, 1970s Victory Garden host Jim Crockett's words), combined peculiar pairings of succulents and cacti into shallow clay pots (Agave Mr. Ripple meet cactus Fairy Castle), uprooted and hauled in lush bananas, plucked baby elephant ears pups, took fast-rooting cuttings like Persian Shield, coleus and begonias for the propagator.

The only pampering this collection of "houseplants" gets is a couple of jury-rigged plant lights (shop lights from my husband's workshop in the basement) and one or two plastic saucers of water and stones for a little extra humidity which don't do much in our drafty Connecticut Victorian. I water once or twice a week depending on how much sun comes in the south facing windows and I feed them once a month if I remember.

With little consistency in temperature from one room to the next, most of them do tolerably well in the cooler indoor climate though. The camellias are budded and ready to burst. The oleander, lavender and bay laurel are hanging in there. Leaves picked from the catnip stuck out of paw's reach between ivies and a mandevilla are keeping the six cats amused. Three woody brugmansia cuttings are leafing out. The low maintenance Ifafa lily will be blooming shortly. Three bamboos are sending up new shoots. And even the 7+ foot banana sports glossy gray-green leaves.

As much as my family has groaned over the years about the house becoming a jungle each fall, one daughter finally admitted that she loved the plants closing in the house at the closing in of the year. And the other daughter made me promise as she was getting in the car to head back to school late August that the Dwarf Cavendish banana in the side yard would be brought indoors. Or it would have to be crammed into the packed car right then and there to go live with her in the dorm.

Coldframe/Hoop House Musings

2008-11-19T10:16:00.055-05:00

I've been chronicling the coldframe project every few days now on my camera. And each time I check in on things one more plant ends up getting tucked inside. Variegated Vinca major for containers next spring, 2 of them, went in on the 14th. Yesterday an ornamental cabbage was added. This has to stop soon.

I've also been talking further with my brother about his hoop house in Maine as my coldframe collection of plants continues to grow. He purchased his Hoop House Greenhouse Kit from Hoop House Stuctures http://www.hoophouse.com/. He remarked that, "the service was terrific and they were very responsive, friendly, and good at answering questions." Quite an endorsement.

Ralph Bartlett of Hoop House Structures provides a personalized approach offering to accommodate special requests such as adding a few inches in length to a greenhouse. This low-tech business is located in Mashpee, MA on Cape Cod just over a three-hour drive from where I live.

When I contacted him his reply included a brief statement about finding this blog "of interest". That's a good thing since I certainly find his Hoop House Greenhouse Kits of interest too.

Fall Chrysanthemum Show at Smith College

2008-11-16T20:42:00.015-05:00

What a final hurrah of color we saw Saturday at the Fall Chrysanthemum Show at the Botanic Garden of Smith College in Northampton, MA http://www.smith.edu/garden/Conservatory/mum-show.html. On a rainy day that ushered in a severe cold front including tornado watches, we stepped into the Lyman Conservatory and drank in towers and cascades of color. Although a bit late with some blossoms fading, it was a real treat. We enjoyed voting for our favorite hybrids resulting from crosses made by horticulture students. The Fall Chrysanthemum Show has been celebrated at Smith College for nearly a century. Pictures were taken by my daughter on her Sony Ericsson phone since this was an impromptu visit and I didn't have my camera along.

Hydroponic Tulips

2008-11-14T08:05:00.074-05:00

Rooting bulbs in the refrigerator . . . has worked well for me, though rather messily, and I feel you need a second refrigerator.
~ Thalassa Cruso, Making Things Grow: A Practical Guide for the Indoor Gardener

Thalassa Cruso was known as the Julia Child of horticulture. Her ascerbic wit and unpredictable manner made her PBS show Making Things Grow a hit within seven months after it went on the air. The American Botanical Council referred to her as an unofficial custodian of the public horticultural trust.

So what would Thalassa have to say about refrigerator rooting tulips for hydroponic production? She'd be ecstatic!

According to the 2002 issue of the horticultural trade magazine Flower Tech, the success of hydroponic production of tulips in the Netherlands has gone through the roof. From virtually nil in 1997 to 40% in 2001, it was predicted at that time that hydroponic production of tulips would rise to 90% by last year.

So having dinner with a friend of mine last night we came up with our own version of refrigerator rooting tulips for hydroponic production.

I purchased 'Apricot Beauty' and 'Queen of Night" on sale at our local home store since I heard these varieties worked well for forcing. Some cultivars are not suitable for hydroponic production though. Whether either of these is on the list I'm not sure. Time will tell.

I purchased eggs in a clear plastic egg carton, putting the eggs in an empty cardboard carton I had sitting around. Special bulb holders called Hydro Trays have been developed for use in the Netherlands that have projections or pins to hold the bulbs in place in the trays. This plastic egg carton seemed a good substitute for the Hydro Trays.

I put a little pea gravel in the base of each cell in the egg carton to hold the bulbs up off the bottom surface. Then I put 12 bulbs on top of the pea gravel and set them in the back of the refrigerator (away from fruit) to break dormancy. ~A pan of bulbs alongside peas and meat has, in some way, a curious psychological impact. Thalassa Cruso
Water will be added in a few days and the bulbs will remain in the refrigerator until they produce roots of about 1 1/2 " long. The roots only need to be long enough to take up water. This process will take about 3 weeks, maybe less.

At this point the bulbs will be brought out of the refrigerator and transferred to decorative glass vases and propped up with river rock. The vases will be filled with water up to the roots and placed in a warm location.

In 1968 Time magazine said Thalassa could make the most mundane chores seem like "an adventure in the bush country". Like Thalassa and my friend Alice T.A. Quackenbush, I garden for the adventure of it. We three are cut from the same gardening cloth. So whether or not I'll be joining Dutch cultivators in celebrating hydroponic tulips remains to be seen. It's the adventure I'm after.

Minding the Cold Frame

2008-11-11T14:15:00.035-05:00

The thermometer says 46 degrees but it feels more like 40. Overcast and gray, the skies have been looking like November lately. We've enjoyed a mild fall but the wind out there today means business. I think we've run the course of our luck on warm weather.

I've been training myself to mind the cold frame over the past 10 days. Outside in slippers and pjs at dawn or dusk more than once to prop open or close the lid depending on conditions. Last night it got down to the mid 30s. I covered the cold frame with a blanket yesterday evening and found things comfortable inside this morning with a little condensation collected on the top and sides. Tonight it's heading down into the 20s so we'll see how things fare in the morning. I'm curious how the cluster of 10-day old calendula seedlings will do. They're hardy right now and growing like weeds.

We have indoor/outdoor thermometers all over the house but do you think there'd be an intact working one in the bunch? The outdoor sensors seem to spring legs and walk. Pursuit of one to put in the cold frame has reduced itself to the quest of the Holy Grail at this point.

Leek Tart

2008-11-08T18:00:00.002-05:00

For the second consecutive Saturday night we've savored on leeks from the garden. Found an excellent recipe that uses a little bacon, fresh garlic, gruyere, parmesan, and a pinch of nutmeg along with eight leeks, yes eight. Not finding it in myself to wipe out the last of this crop quite yet, I followed the advice of a good friend and used a couple small Spanish onions and just five of the remaining leeks. Pulled them out this afternoon in the mild rain, they smelled so good. The onion substitution worked well. Great texture and even better taste. Shared it with my parents tonight and enjoyed it with red leaf lettuce and grape tomatoes. I was planning on getting a picture of the whole tart but it disappeared too quickly. This is all that was left after nibbling our way through kitchen clean up. A real winner.

What's All the Hoopla?

2008-11-06T07:46:00.000-05:00

I just found out last week what my brother in Maine used his 2008 economic stimulus tax rebate check for. Yes, a hoop house greenhouse kit. I guess I really wasn't too surprised since his work with home garden hoop houses had been going on for well over a year now. Last October he built himself an 8' x 5' cloche-type hoop house out of pvc conduit pipes, rebar pipes and 4 mil plastic polyethylene sheeting. He was able to keep his Swiss chard going as well as the thyme, tarragon, sage, and parsley. He also grew lettuce and spinach that germinated for him by the end of October.

And then I heard all about his seed starting plans for the hoop house in January. I even salvaged a number of 4" pots with heavy duty plastic fitted trays from my parents' house who were clearing things out. These trays would make it easy for sliding in and out of the hoop house for watering I told him.

So when I heard about his purchase - the "large size" model - and plants he was wintering over, the parsley, three varieties of sage (one of them Salvia elegans), thyme, tarragon, winter savory and a rosemary, I began to work on plans of my own.

It started out simply enough when I emailed my brother on Saturday. "I have a beautiful purple sage that you've got me thinking about. Will bring up the cold frame tomorrow and put it in there. "

My husband built the 4' x 2' cold frame for me in the fall of 2004. Usually we would haul it up early spring in preparation of sowing sweet peas in March. But this year I decided I needed to winter over that purple sage. And so much for waiting until the next day. I pulled my husband away from his Saturday afternoon college football game and out we went.
After setting it up on the raised bed outside the back door in went the purple sage, then parsley, chives, oregano and thyme. I found a couple calendula seedlings when digging the parsley that joined the herbs in the cold frame and scattered some of the seed in there for good measure. And then I noticed the salvias - greggi and blepharophylla - still holding their own despite the killing frosts we'd had last week. In they went too. I finally made myself stop when dusk arrived. Dirty, tired but content I sent myself to the showers.

I got up early the next morning and checked on things in the cold frame. All was well. But then I took a walk around the yard looking at the frost-bitten gardens and noticed how silver-blue glorious the Aeonium arborens looked in the morning light. They wouldn't make it past the end of this month I was certain. And the Provence Lavender in its clay container still fuzzy gray and looking as if it was mid-summer. Sure enough they found room in the cold frame too.

What had possessed me to practice a round of extreme intensive gardening in a 2' x 4' enclosed space in early November? After a moment of careful self-introspection I was able to identify two sources responsible for my behavior. Alice T.A. Quackenbush's "sport" of gardening fueled by pure unbridled hoop house envy.

2008-11-03T17:37:00.000-05:00

I missed the goldfinches late summer in the sunflowers and yellow Tithonia. The chickadees were all over them but no goldfinches. No sweet hum of their "per-chic-o-ree" song, a sure sign of summer's waning.

This morning I happened to look out back to the bare stalk remains on the hillside and noticed the stems of a stand of Echinacea 'White Swan' swaying madly back and forth. I thought there was a large animal at the base of the plants but on closer inspection I noticed the seed heads were inundated with a flock of goldfinches. I opened the window to the cold chill of 34 degrees and in came their joyful humming up off the hill and into the house. I looked to the other stands of Echinaceas and found they were full of goldfinches too. It was a rousing morning chorus of goldfinch song.

I watched them cruise around the yard until mid-morning, lighting alongside chickadees on the hanging tray feeder and scratching for seed in the leaves below. Then I lost track of them.

I'll look for them tomorrow and enjoy their feasting on the same flowers I feasted on all summer - a visual feast of pure whites, magenta roses and golden honey yellows.

November Harvest

2008-11-01T18:29:00.000-04:00

Saturday night dinner - sauteed chicken with leeks. Delicious! Started growing leeks in our first garden back in 1986. Over 20 years later I planted them this spring in a raised bed for the first time since and what a treat. Pulled out three for tonight's dinner. I love their mild sweet scent.

Dinner: Sauteed boneless chicken breasts in olive oil and a pat of butter for 10 - 15 minutes. Seasoned with salt and freshly ground pepper and removed them from the pan to a warm plate in the oven. Put the leeks in the pan with another pat of butter and sauteed them for 3 to 4 minutes - fresh and tender they cook up quickly. Next I added a little Pinot Grigio to deglaze the pan and, yes, one more small pat of butter to bring on the sauce. Returned the chicken to the pan to get the flavors flowing for a couple minutes then served up the chicken and leeks alongside a crispy piece of ciabatta and some mesclun. Can't beat it.

I'm planning to extend the harvest into winter by mulching heavily and digging these mild members of the onion family as needed. Won't wait another 20+ years to grow them again. With their savory flavor fresh in mind and the anticipation of browsing through seed catalogs this winter, I'll be checking out early varieties promising the added ease of direct sowing in May.

Matthiola/Mattioli

2008-10-30T11:00:00.000-04:00

Matthiola incana 'Cinderella Mix'

This choice early variety will be the belle of the ball in your favorite flower bed. Delightfully fragrant drifts of color range from magenta to lavender to the purest of whites. Plants are multi-branching and sturdy with numerous flower spikes on each plant. Easy to grow and excellent as a front of the border plant. Recipient of the Award of Garden Merit by Britain’s Royal Horticultural Society.

Matthiola, named after an Italian botanist, has been referred to as “the one stock which pays rich dividend no matter what the whimseys of the market.” This cottage garden favorite performs well under cool conditions and requires just moderate watering.

* * * * * *

I was talking with my brother the other day about this catalog mock-up I put together as part of a sample spread, sharing with him the quote "the one stock which pays rich dividend no matter what the whimseys of the market". My friend Alice T.A. Quackenbush again, The Annuals of Flowerland (1927). I remarked to him how appropriate her comment from 1927 remained today in light of current market woes. But he was more taken with the reference to Italian botanist Mattioli. As a coincidence it turns out my brother purchased some hand-colored illustrations by Pietro Andrea Mattioli published in 1568. Mattioli was responsible for the transition of the study of plants for medicinal purposes to the study of plants as objects of interest themselves. To find out more about these illustrations and

Pietro Andrea Mattioli visit http://www.ddonihue.com/pietro_andrea_mattioli/index.html

The 'Cinderella Mix' was purchased from Chiltern Seeds in Cumbria, England and proved itself worthy all summer long of being a recipient of Oxfordshire's Garden Centre Association's "Fragrance of the Year" award. The scent of stock still transports me back to early girlhood years in northern California where my parents grew stock as a garden staple.

Urban Environmental Stewardship

2008-10-28T09:02:00.000-04:00

Urban Environmental Stewardship initiatives are on the increase in the northeastern part of the country. Just such an initiative can be found situated on the main campus of a centrally located Connecticut urban community college. 55 acres of land that was originally intended for a sports and physical fitness complex was left undeveloped after the property was more fully sited and it was determined that resources would not support the facilities.

In the late 1990s a local scout proposed to develop a two loop trail system to meet the education, recreation and fitness goals of the college and surrounding communities. Remedial clean up work was completed with the help of scouts, college staff and community volunteers and trails were cleared. Subsequent development and system maintenance resulted in the trail system evolving to the next phase. College course activities involving the trail system were integrated into science programs. Summer enrichment programs for children included orienteering classes. Non-credit introductory courses featured hiking methods and college faculty, staff and area community members began using the trail for fitness and recreation.

I hiked the circuit trail yesterday afternoon to familiarize myself with the current state of development of the system. Despite leaves covering the trails and in some cases the trail markers themselves, I was able to make my way to the wetland area, across the boulder fields, through open woods to the upper access road, back down through a large stand of Christmas ferns and below to the trailhead. The trail was not easy to follow in some areas and the terrain steep, especially near the beginning of the trail. But the land was full of signs of wildlife and an abundance of healthy native plants. Very much well worth the effort of the avid hiker or curious nature walker willing to take and hour or so to explore this, as of yet, still somewhat undeveloped trail system.

And here's the best news. This year the college prepared a long range plan for the trail system. The plan outlines a number of projects necessary for the college to meet its objective of making this valuable resource a healthy educational and recreational forest environment for students, faculty, staff, and community members for years to come. An impressive strategic master plan includes projects such as a wetlands boardwalk for observation and study, an outdoor amphitheater for classroom instruction, the development of a Science Teacher Institute to focus on the environmental sciences at the elementary and middle school levels, a management system for ongoing trail maintenance and, yes, even gardens!

How exciting to see such a creative and comprehensive plan of responsible stewardship for 55 acres of forestland located in one of the state's largest cities.

Gourdy Details

2008-10-26T11:18:00.000-04:00

On vacation last April in southern Virginia I marveled at a set of jewelry made from miniature bottle gourds in a local artisan's shop. Clever tiny dried shells painted and threaded with earring hooks and pendant chains. Lovely.

Came home determined to grow buckets of the little ornamental babies. I ordered seed online, started them on propagation mats under lights on May 18th and planted the seedlings in the raised bed on June 1st.

All summer long I tied them up on their two trellises - first the tiny tendrils then thick fuzzy stems and by August they were snakes creeping along trellis tops and spilling into the forsythia hedge behind them. White blossoms appeared by the second week of the month and I began pinching out the growing tips daily only to have new snakes emerge and thrive. By the end of the month I gave up and let them have their way. The forsythia, weighted down by the vines, didn't need a second pruning as in past years. Worked for me.

I harvested 15 bulbous beauties last weekend ranging in size from 2" to 5". To help with the curing process I've been faithfully wiping them down every day with rubbing alcohol to keep their outside skin clean. I found the passive air vent in the living room makes a great drying rack but the location is conveniently situated within reach of the cats. Lost the tiniest 2 incher mid-week to their fun and games. What a racket they made with it on the hardwood floors. The house sounded like a bowling alley and they reduced the little thing to a pulp.

Now I'm left with 14. And they're not as tiny as those little southern Virginia gems. Suggestion from the same disbelieving garden reality show friend - a themed calendar. Works for me.

Gardening for the Adventure of It!

2008-10-23T15:05:00.000-04:00

I was talking with some friends this morning about the current state of affairs for garden writers with less demand for quality articles than there used to be. And now even the gardening shows on television have much less to do with gardening than they do with home decorating in reality show formats with a little landscaping work thrown in on the side. One of my friends laughed at me when I told her I could write a reality gardening show. Just you wait.