Janet's Garden

Another way to get rid of lily beetles

2009-08-06T15:15:00.002-04:00

Joyce sent me an email with her solution for killing lily beetles. She says it works on both the adults and the larvae.

She takes one cup (250 mL) cooking oil, 1/2 cup (125 mL) Sunlight dish detergent, puts them in a one-litre bottle and fills it up with water. She sprays the insects directly and reports that they die within seconds.

I haven't tried it myself yet, but if I did, I would be watching to see if there are any negative effects on the plants too. While this spray sounds like it certainly would kill just about any insect on contact, it might be a bit intense for at least some plants.

If you try it, let me know what kind of results you get.

And thanks, Joyce, for sharing your spray recipe with me.

Fun Contest: Funky Nests in Funky Places

2009-06-14T23:18:00.004-04:00

This just in from the Cornell Lab of Ornithology:

You find them in hanging flower baskets…an old boot…a garage shelf…or under a bridge…birds build nests in the strangest places! That’s the theme for the newest environmental challenge from our Celebrate Urban Birds project: Funky Nests in Funky Places! As you may know, Celebrate Urban Birds is a free, year-round citizen-science project from the Cornell Lab of Ornithology, focused on birds in neighborhood settings.

For the Funky Nests in Funky Places challenge, we want you to take photos, do a painting, write a story, or shoot a video showing a bird’s nest built in some out-of-the-way or out-of-this-world place.When observing nests please be sure to avoid touching them or disturbing the birds.

For the list of prizes and further details visit the contest website.

You have until July 31, 2009. Do make sure you read the Terms of Agreement.

Missing in action

2007-10-17T15:20:00.000-04:00

I'm sorry about the lack of new posts here this year. Between various circumstances in my life and my determination to write a novel, I have not been able to stretch myself far enough to keep up with active gardening or active blogging. My energy is unfortunately rather limited. Happy gardening to all of you.

If you want a bit of an idea of what I'm up to, you can check out The Walrus Said, but posts are not very frequent there either.

Gross picture warning!

2007-05-30T18:59:00.000-04:00

I was hoping not to be able to show you this. But now that I am able, I am obliged. It's that stupid sense of public duty.

My lily beetle hunting expeditions were quite successful this year. I must have squished 30 or 40 of the pretty little nasties, often two by two. I scraped off the occasional clutch of little orange eggs, after dutifully posting the pictures here.

But one of them eluded me. Yesterday, my eye caught sight of a severely chewed leaf and I knew. I just knew. And here it is, complete with chewers.

One word. Ew.

That disgusting mass of goo contains a lily beetle larva which has successfully made itself extremely unappetizing. The easiest way to deal with these revolting creatures is to rip off the leaf and drop it into soapy water. Or grab a twig and knock the larvae into the same soapy water. Personally, I don't care to soil my shoes by dropping them on the pavement and stepping on them, but what you do with your shoes is your business. But do get them out of there quickly. Left unchecked they can wreak incredible damage. Fortunately, I seem to have only one leaf's worth. Being vigilant during mating season has paid off for me.

Technorati tag: Lily beetles

I hate my snowball bush!

2007-05-19T09:10:00.000-04:00

To the point that I am thinking of digging up my Viburnum opulus roseum. I planted this baby two years ago. Last year it showed every sign of settling in well, despite the attack of the mad arborist. This spring - oh joy! - flower buds. Visions of big fluffy floral snowballs floated in my head.

Then I read online that this particular viburnum is subject to aphid attacks. I was pretty sanguine about it. I hadn't seen the slightest sign of aphids in two years. Two days later - I kid you not - I followed the trail of some over-enthusiastic ants to find colonies of black aphids at the growing tips.

This is patently unfair! I should give up reading on the Internet; it appears to be bad for my plants. I pulled out the all-purpose spray, which is definitely fatal to aphids. The problem is, these bugs are very good at protecting themselves. As they attack a leaf, it curls around them and makes them very difficult to spray. You can see the curled leaf in the photo. It's virtually impossible to get them all, no matter how good the spray is. So I'm going to go out and snip off all the affected parts and drop them into soapy water. If that doesn't work the temptation to dig the thing out will grow even greater.

Perhaps a Japanese maple...

Technorati tag: Viburnum

Struggling up the ladder

2007-05-17T17:41:00.000-04:00

I was feeling morose a while back. My beautiful Jacob's ladder (the Bressingham Purple) looked deader than a doornail. Polemoniums normally come through the winter with most of their foliage intact, but all I could see were dead stubs. I was, quite frankly, miffed. I'd grown rather attached to this particular form of Jacob's ladder, with its purplish cast and long-lasting flowers. It looked particularly nice with a frothing of deadnettle at its feet.

And then the other day I was doing my normal poking around and what did I see? This.

None of the reading I've done on this cultivar mentioned that it was a late riser or that it behaved differently than other Polemoniums. So as a public service I'm letting you know you shouldn't give up too quickly on this baby. It remains to be seen if it will come back as strong as last year. If it doesn't, I'll conclude that it's only borderline hardy in this zone, and make sure I mulch it well next winter.

For now, I am happy to see that it is coming back at all. There are a few residents of my garden that are missing in action or a bit worse for wear. But I'll tell the sob stories later. For the time being I am looking at my bleeding heart with a real sense of awe. A square metre they said it needed. Piffle! This thing is more than a metre across in its third year and the poor grape-leaved anemone behind it is feeling a bit crowded. Not for nothing that all its new shoots have sprouted further away from its rather overbearing neighbour. But I love it all the same.

Technorati tag: Jacob's ladder

Squill and friends

2007-05-16T15:37:00.000-04:00

When I hear the word "squill", it evokes in me images of something vaguely unpleasant, perhaps squirmy and slug-like. Fortunately, the pretty little spring flowers so named are much more pleasant to look at. They are known as good naturalizers but I do believe I'll help nature along by ordering an extra set of bulbs this fall. You can't have too many of these little beauties.

This is Siberian squill, or Scilla siberica. The vibrant blue is a welcome jolt of colour in a spring garden, and blue marries so nicely with almost any other colour that might be popping up. Some people grow these in their lawns, but I find that they are still going strong by the time the first mowing is due, so I prefer to leave them in the flower beds where they can continue unmolested.

Striped squill are lovely little white flowers striped with pale blue, which gives them an almost ethereal quality. They flopped over a bit in my back yard, probably from insufficient sunlight. I'll try to find them a slightly sunnier spot. Still, they were a joy.

As you may suspect, these are not the freshest of pictures. I'm running a bit behind here, and most of my squill have finished blooming especially in the front, where spring comes a bit sooner.

Some of you are wondering (those of you who actually read titles): but what about the friends? Here they are:

Minnow is a mini daffodil that hasn't really captured my heart. Many of them didn't bloom for me, and I found the colour uninspiring. In a close-up, it doesn't look bad. In the garden, it looked washed out. This one is not joining my must-have list.

Squirrels appear to be very attracted to Anemone blanda bulbs. Last year not a single one came up. Being a bear for punishment, I tried again, and this time about half of them survived the loving attentions of the tree rodents. I love the brilliant white, especially next to the deep purple blooms of the hyacinth you can see off to the left. I do hope it succeeds in spreading.

Technorati tag: Squill, Daffodils, Anemones

Tulip mania

2007-05-14T18:54:00.000-04:00

As promised, I am back with a picture of my Daydream tulips once they had faded to apricot.

I love the colour, but I was a bit disappointed with how quickly they wilted.

On the other hand, the Emperor tulips not only bloomed again this year, but they had actually increased in number since last year. Their blooms started early, held up for quite a long time, and were strikingly beautiful too. What more can you ask for? Emperor tulips have definitely joined my list of things I will want to include in any future gardens.

Technorati tag: Tulips

'Tis the season to be wary

2007-05-08T21:46:00.000-04:00

I was sitting in the sun yesterday minding my own business, when my eyes strayed to the right and discovered the horror of an alien invasion! A brilliant red exoskeleton, twitching black antennae...

I did what any red-blooded defender of the planet would do and squashed the alien forthwith. And then I squashed its brother (sister? mate?). Too late I remembered my duty to the rest of the human community and realized that I should have photographed the intruders first to help others in the identification of the enemy. Fortunately, or unfortunately, depending on your perspective, I soon had the opportunity to redeem myself.

So be forewarned, inhabitants of the planet Earth, or at least the lily-growers of planet Earth, this is the enemy. It is known as the lily beetle, the red lily beetle, or Lilioceris lilii.

They are often found lurking at the base of a lily leaf, where their brilliant red nail polish colour is not so easily spotted. Small holes in the leaves are a tell-tale sign of their presence. They are very easy to catch by hand and drop into soapy water or squash. Being the squeamish sort, I usually drop them onto a hard surface and step on them, rather than dispatching them with my fingers. They are emerging from the soil at this time of year and if the battle is won at this time, we can breathe easily for the rest of the season.

If not...

They lay clutches of orange eggs, usually on the underside of the lower leaves where they are harder for human-sized eradicators to spot.

These are easily scraped off with a fingernail and if you can get all of them, you can breathe easy for the rest of the season.

If not...

Well, fortunately for me, I don't have a picture of the consequences. I might have in a couple of weeks if a clutch manages to escape the loving caress of my fingernail. The larvae are truly hideous and truly destructive. They usually start at the bottom of the lily stalk and work their way up, devouring as they go. I don't recommend dealing with them bare-handed, as they have the very nasty habit of piling their own excrement on their backs to discourage (very effectively) any predator who is considering them for lunch. It's been a few years since I've had to do it, but I normally handle them by holding a bowl of soapy water underneath them and knocking them into it with any twig I can get my hands on. I sincerely hope I won't be able to inflict their beauty on you, but if I catch them in my garden, I know what my duty is.

Lily beetle hunters of the world, be diligent. The survival of our lilies depends on you!

Technorati tag: Lily beetles

Technical stuff

2007-05-03T19:07:00.000-04:00

I'm going to be gradually adding labels to my old posts. For subscribers to my feed, this means you are going to be seeing old posts coming at you as if they were new. My apologies. On the other hand, they are more or less seasonal. ;o)

I am still alive

2007-05-03T18:14:00.000-04:00

And so are most of the plants in my garden, amazingly enough.

I owe everybody an apology for not posting earlier. I took on the added task of writing a novel (over 81,000 words at this point) and it overloaded my circuits. Blogging was the main victim. But I am still here, I've reactivated my email account, and I thought I'd start this year off with some of the early bloomers in my garden. I doubt if I'll be checking in daily, but I will make an effort to do better.

Dasystemon tarda is a charming botanical tulip that seems to interest squirrels less than the showier varieties. It's supposed to come back year after year and spread itself around a bit too.

My Pasque flowers have responded very happily to the better treatment they got last year by flowering profusely and prompting at least one neighbour to beg for seeds. And unlike all the spring bulbs blooming along with them, the squirrels ignore them entirely. I approve.

I planted a good number of these Daydream tulips last year, but only two survived the solicitous attention of the local squirrels. They opened a rich, buttery yellow with a black throat, making me think I'd gotten the wrong variety. They have since "faded" to a lovely apricot colour, which is what I was aiming for. Not that I disliked the yellow.

Previous post on the topic of Pasque flowers

Technorati tag: Tulips, Pasque flowers

Easier than planting with a shoehorn

2006-11-01T16:49:00.000-05:00

Well, I did it. I got the last of my spring bulbs into the ground! Tulips and mini daffodils, squills and irises, hyacinths and anemones, crocuses and alliums - when I write the list out I understand why it took me so long! This is the gardener's equivalent of having eyes bigger than your stomach...

The last planting session went smoothly because I discovered a little trick. Those of you who figured it out years ago can laugh quietly in front of your computer monitor, or loudly for all I care, I can't hear you. Just gloat with class, that's all I ask. Those of you who haven't figured it out yet, well, I'm about to pass on my newly acquired enlightenment, and you can all look sophisticated and experienced when you pass it on in your turn, and not have to put up with the gloaters. If you know how to do it with class, you could even do a little gloating of your own.

The trick is quite simply this. Jam your trowel in under the edge of a patch of ground cover, fold it back and pop your bulbs in. If they need to be buried a bit deeper, that's easily done. Then just fold the groundcover back over the bulbs and pat it back into place. Soooooooooooooooooo much easier than digging individual holes in all the tiny little spaces between your overpacked perennials. Well, between my overpacked perennials, anyway. When you don't have much space, you overpack plants because you don't want to deny yourself. Well, I do anyway. All you disciplined gardeners who know how to limit your palette and design with restraint can now have a turn to gloat too.

And you'll get another chance or two to gloat at my expense come spring, when I'm busy asking you to help me identify all those strange little green leaves popping up. I didn't keep any records of what I planted where. A disciplined gardener, I'm not.

Technorati tag: Bulbs

Green Thumb Sunday

2006-10-29T08:49:00.000-05:00

Join Green Thumb Sunday

Palace Purple heuchera still in bloom in October.

Previous post on the topic of Heuchera

Technorati tag: Heuchera

I succumbed to temptation

2006-10-28T17:16:00.000-04:00

In theory, I'm not buying any more plants now, right? I don't have much room, and besides, if I'm going to be moving there just isn't any point, right? Right.

Wrong. How could I say no yet again to an Apple Blossom amaryllis at supermarket prices? Especially when it was freshly arrived and hadn't had time to deteriorate under their tender care? My last amaryllis was a supermarket buy too, and it has been happily blooming for me for years now.

Which puts me in a dilemma. I have three sleeping amaryllises. When am I going to wake them up? One thing for sure, I'll do it one at a time, to stretch out the pleasure over the winter.

Did you know that there is no botanical necessity to push your amaryllises (say that three times quickly...) into dormancy? I put mine out every summer to charge up on solar energy, keeping them well fertilized with a high phosphorus fertilizer (the middle number represents phosphorus) so the bulbs will bulk up as much as possible. But I often let them keep growing when I bring them in. They happily keep chugging along and bloom on their own schedule somewhere around early spring. This year though, I left them outside quite late, and they reacted to the declining sunlight and temperatures by going dormant all on their own. I'll just leave them in their pots and store them in a cool, dark place until it's time to prod them into growth again. Say, one for Christmas, one for mid-February, and one for the end of March? That sounds about right, but I'm willing to bet I won't be able to hold out quite that long. Still, with both my Christmas cactuses (cacti, if you like Latin plurals) and my cyclamens sporting flower buds, I might be able to tough it out a bit longer, grey gloomy weather or no.

Previous post on the subject of Amaryllis

Technorati tag: Amaryllis

Sitting pretty

2006-10-27T15:01:00.000-04:00

I wish I could take credit for the little pumpkin, but I can't. Everything else was gathered from the back yard: heuchera and dogwood leaves, pine twigs and cones, and one tiny maple leaf that had not yet started curling. A nice centrepiece for my son's birthday!

I know it doesn't look like a professional arrangement, but I'll let you in on a little secret - I like it better this way. Somehow, if it's too perfect I almost don't see it anymore. Like all those models in make-up ads, they start to look the same and, as beautiful as they are, anonymously bland. I like to see a little quirky personality.

Technorati tag: Pumpkin

Warm me up, Wilma!

2006-10-26T15:13:00.000-04:00

It's starting to get chilly around here! See how red my cheeks are getting? You've got a nice warm fuzzy sweater, give me a big hug!

As you can see, the sundrops turn red at the first light touch of frost. It was a very light touch too; the ones in the more sheltered back yard are still green and the roses near the house are still blooming.

Strangely enough, the tuberous begonias have been zapped and the hanging begonia hasn't. I don't know whether the hanging begonia is naturally tougher, or that the fact it's about four feet off the ground made the difference.

The lamb's ear, Stachys lanata, (alternative botanical names:, S. byzantina, S. olympica) is the common invasive variety. A neighbour gave me a couple of babies this spring in a supreme act of selflessness. I dug up the ones she would have weeded out and took them home... (It's always a bit of a warning when neighbours will happily part with a plant, you know.)

It was quite a shock to me earlier this year to discover that earwigs and sowbugs like munching on the leaves. You'd think the hairy texture would deter them, but no. I will have to remove the outside of the clump in spring to keep it under control, but I really do love the effect of the fuzzy grey leaves against the glossy green rose leaves behind them.

To my mind, lamb's ear is a great companion plant, providing a nice contrast in texture and colour to just about everything. On its own, it's not too exciting, but it does great backup. Doesn't have the voice for solo, but she can sure lay down a mean harmony. If I get fed up with its rambunctiousness, I'll probably go out and get one of the tamer cultivars. I just like the effect too much to give it up.

(Sorry I've been AWOL again. After being overly busy, I got overly tired and needed a couple of days just to rest.)

Previous post on the topic of Sundrops

Technorati tag: Sundrops, Lamb's ear

Green Thumb Sunday

2006-10-22T13:40:00.000-04:00

Sunset and cat (photo credit to my daughter)

First snow (but still no frost!)

Previous post on the topic of Green Thumb Sunday

Technorati tag: Sunsets, Sedum

Confessions of a cranky gardener

2006-10-19T12:26:00.000-04:00

The weather's fair! The air is warm, the sun is shining! All's right with the world! Seize the day and the trowel and get your procrastinating butt out into the glories of nature and plant all those abused bulbs that have been sitting in their delivery box, lo these many days. Weeks.

Well, that's what I did.

But my back is not a happy camper and I quickly realized that planting those bulbs among the rosebushes was not going to be easy, even if I had a good back. The front beds needed a complete reorganization. Not going to happen.

I persevered and managed to get all the bulbs for the front squeezed into absurd little corners, discovering in the meanwhile that there are still spots in my garden that feel more like concrete than loam, despite all my attempts to amend the soil so far. These will get special attention with compost and leaves, but in the meanwhile...

Before heading back inside - and leaving the backyard bulbs for another day - I decided on the spur of the moment to pop the cannas out of the large pots at the end of the sidewalk. How hard could it be?

Stop laughing. It's not nice.

Those modest little tubers had exploded, giving no aboveground signs of it either, other than one puny little sprout. Not only had they anchored themselves with a ferocious determination to stay put, they had tangled their roots in with the ivy, geraniums and sedums as if to say, "I dare you!"

I was not to be outdone by mere tubers, and in the end I prevailed, growling and muttering, but I have never in my life had such difficulty prying plants out of pots. (Yes, that was growling and muttering, not cursing. I don't swear, but there are times when the temptation to do so is severe. This was one of those times. I'm glad you didn't choose that moment to walk by.)

I've set them on newspaper to dry for a few days, and then I'll find the coolest spot I can to store them. Of course, after all of this I looked up cannas and found that most people recommend leaving them in the ground till frost has taken the foliage. Like, NOW they tell me. *grumble, grumble* Still, I have found many times that plants can be very forgiving, as well as illiterate, and as long as I don't let these babies either rot or dessicate, they should be quite impressive next year. Wish me luck.

Now I'll go nurse the scratches on my hands and rest my poor aching back. Why on earth do I do these things to myself? And there's still the back yard to do... *snarl* At least there's no roses back there.

Previous post on the topic of Cannas

Technorati tag: Cannas

October bouquet

2006-10-18T14:04:00.000-04:00

The refugees I am harbouring right now are not only in pots. When frost was threatening (an empty threat as it turned out), I ventured forth, clippers in hand, to bring in some of the nicer offerings of the October garden. In my case, that means roses, as the other inhabitants still sporting blooms are not the kind that prosper in a vase.

Another tiny vase is filled with mini-roses exclusively. And seeing as the frost is holding off, I think I'll go out again in a few days and bring in another selection of just-opening roses.

This is a treat I don't indulge in during the summer. For one thing, it is easy to step outside and enjoy them whenever I want, and for another, my garden is just too small to be able to fill a lot of vases and still look good outside, especially because most of the perennials are just in their first or second year and blooms are still rather sparse. So I'm particularly enjoying this little display. Park a couple of candles around it and set it where the lace curtains form a backdrop, and it's almost as good as sitting in the garden.

Previous post on the topic of Roses

Technorati tag: Roses, Bouquets

Refugees

2006-10-17T11:48:00.000-04:00

They huddled by the back door, begging for mercy. So I let them in and they are now undergoing the fate of refugees everywhere, jammed together in temporary and inadequate accomodations while the government - me, in this case - decides what to do with them. Coleus and caladium, amaryllis and crown of thorns, ivy and oleander, cyclamens and ah yes, the cyclamens. These are not miserable, starving refugees at all. Their summer outside has agreed with them, and they are plump-cheeked and bright-eyed and much bigger than when they went out this spring.

These are my seed-grown cyclamens, now about a year and a half old. I would be thrilled if they flowered for me, but the leaves are so beautiful, flowers are not necessary to attract admiring glances. I'll put them in a northeast window. I've tried southwest in the past, and they scorched. Although, come to think of it, having come in directly from outside, these ones might be able to handle it... Hmmm. I think I've talked myself into trying.

This tiny crown of thorns will definitely join its mother in the southwest window. These were cuttings I took as anti-theft insurance, (the big one was out front not far from a busy sidewalk) and it spent most of its summer tucked among garden plants as a cat deterrent. It stayed healthy, but didn't grow much in its not-so-sunny location. Crown of thorns often drop their leaves in response to an abrupt change in light and temperature, but after finishing their snit fit they grow a lovely new set, so it's not a major problem. So far the larger mother plant, much to my surprise, has accepted her new surroundings calmly, and other than cranking her flowers around to face the window, has maintained her poise admirably.

I might even let the Christmas cacti in soon too. I noticed this morning that the big one is putting out flower buds already. Pregnancy is always helpful when trying to sway immigration officials.

Previous post on the topic of Cyclamens, Crown of thorns cactus

Technorati tag: Cyclamens, Crown of thorns

Foundling

2006-10-16T12:36:00.000-04:00

You know what a foundling is, don't you? The whole "abandoned baby on the doorstep" thing? I bet you thought that only happened in 19th-century novels. Well, I'm here to tell you that it still happens today.

A couple of days ago, I opened my door on a chilly - though not freezing - day and I found this little darling shivering on my doorstep! I hustled in right inside into the warmth and took this picture to prove it.

I still haven't figured out if it's a boy or a girl. Or one of each.

What I do know is that I now have a potful of two varieties of pothos, which has got to be the closest thing to a foolproof houseplant in existence. It is very hard to make a pothos unhappy, although a severe spider mite infestation will do it. But pothos will survive low light, indifferent care, no fertilizer and even no soil. I've known people who have grown it for years in vases full of water.

I'm not too sure where this baby came from, although I have my suspicions. I am pleased to say that it is in perfect health. I've grown pothos before, golden pothos to be precise, which has a deep green leaf with bits of golden variegation to brighten it up. No golden pothos in this pot, but I will confess to having eyed the pale-leafed type with real envy at my local bank, so I am truly pleased to have my own. It's even better with the plain-leafed variety in the same pot for contrast.

I've also used pothos as a great filler in outdoor pots, although it does have to be handled with a little care in these circumstances. Full shade is best, or at least in a spot that gets afternoon shade. And it will have to be hardened off carefully, more to the light than anything else, or the leaves will scald. Start by setting it out in deep shade and expose it gradually to weak sunlight. Once it's acclimatized, morning sunlight should not cause any problems, unless you're in a hot climate with intense sun.

Now if I'm really lucky, one of my knowledgeable readers will come along and tell my precisely which varieties I have, which will save me doing the research. ;o) And in the meanwhile, I'll have to decide in what room to give this baby a permanent home.

Technorati tag: Pothos

Garden portraits for October 15

2006-10-15T16:19:00.001-04:00

Green Thumb Sunday

Unlike other parts of the province, we haven't had a proper frost yet, let alone snow, but we've gotten close enough to inspire different plants to pull on their autumn coats.

English ivy:

Cinnamon fern (the spinulose shield fern is still bright green and will stay that way all winter):

Who knew? Morden Sunrise produces beautiful orange rosehips:

JoinGreen Thumb Sunday: Gardeners, Plant and Nature lovers can join in every Sunday, visit As the Garden Grows for more information.

Previous post on the topic of Cinnamon ferns, Morden Sunrise rose

Technorati tag: Ivy, Ferns, Roses

Chemical fertilizers

2006-10-13T17:35:00.000-04:00

I have never been a fan of chemical fertilizers, at least not since I stopped to think about it for more than a second or two. Here is part of the reason why.

Dead zones can encompass areas of ocean 100,000 square kms in size where little can live because there is no oxygen left in the water. Nitrogen pollution, mainly from farm fertilisers and sewage, produces blooms of algae that absorb all of the oxygen in the water.

Thanks to Stolen Moments of Island Time for pointing me in the direction of this article.

Now I recognize that home gardeners individually don't have much of an effect; it's more agribusinesses that need to address the issue. But still, I am also a believer in the value of doing my own small bit to make the world a better place, and that includes not pumping my tiny little corner of it full of toxins and artificial chemical stimulants. Just like taking drugs, they provide an immediate rush, but you pay for it later in one way or another.

Yes, it was too cold to go out and garden today. ;o)

Technorati tag: Fertilizers

Venturing out into un-English waters

2006-10-12T16:02:00.000-04:00

Anybody up for a challenge? How about a Danish gardening blog? At least I think it's Danish. That's my best guess. Or Swedish. Even if you can't read a word of Hagedagbok fra parsellen i Bergen, the pictures are great. Like this one of brugmansia, affectionately known as brugs by those who grow them (I wish):

The blog includes videos, and fortunately uses Latin names often enough that you can know what you're looking at.

If French is more your cup of tea, Martine Gingras in the Montreal area has a marvellous blog/website/forum, Banlieusardises.com that covers gardening, cooking and motherhood. She's become known as the Martha Stewart of Quebec and has even been written up in the newspapers. Click on the "Jardinage" tab for the gardening section.

Unlike Martha Stewart, she's not at all intimidating and has a wonderful warm style. Lots of recipes too, if you and your bilingual dictionary are up to the challenge. And she does all this with a full-time job and a toddler too. OK, so maybe she's a LITTLE intimidating.

Previous post on the topic of Recommended blogs and websites

Technorati tag: Martine Gingras

Everything's coming up roses

2006-10-11T16:57:00.000-04:00

OK, that's a bit of an exaggeration. But every time I look out my kitchen window, I catch a glimpse of roses, and it provides that little jolt of joy that ensures I will not abandon gardening any time soon. On a cold, dreary, rainy October day like today, that's no small benefit.

The Morden Sunrise that I still have mixed feelings about is really at its best in cool weather. The flowers fade quickly in the heat of the summer, but now they can delight me for days on end.

All my roses, in fact, are still blooming merrily away, seemingly oblivious to the waning of the season. The mini roses in particular are sending up thick sprays of new buds, bless their little hearts. I'm watching the weather forecasts carefully; when frost threatens, I'm going to go out and clip myself some bouquets.

In the back yard, the indefatigable Rozanne geranium is the star performer, rivalled by the grape-leafed anemone and the pink wax begonias, all of which are providing the colour I crave. The occasional bright red maple leaf drifts into the yard to provide an extra jolt. I don't think for even a second of raking them up; there aren't enough to smother the grass and the vivid splash of colour is welcome. I don't have enough autumn colour, but it's difficult to touch all the bases in so little space.

And those are the musings of a northern gardener who can only enjoy her yard through the windows today. But I've really got to get all those bulbs planted...

Previous post on the topic of Morden Sunrise roses, Orange Kordana roses

Technorati tag: Roses

Plants as natural air scrubbers

2006-10-10T17:00:00.001-04:00

Larry at Growing Up, a neat little blog from another nurseryman (move over, Trey) has NASA's list of the best plants for scrubbing indoor air clean of toxic chemicals. I've read this information more than once over the years, but I'd forgotten where to find it. NASA has done extensive testing of plants as natural air filters in their quest to provide interior environments that are safe for extended periods of time. You sure don't want to have Sick Building Syndrome in outer space...

So tootle on over and find your plant shopping list for cleaner air, as well as a link to the original research. And if you live in Regina, Saskatchewan, you can tootle on over to the nursery, Sherwood Greenhouses, too and scold him if he doesn't carry all ten! ;o)

Technorati tag: Air filters, Sherwood Greenhouses

Fennel seed harvest

2006-10-10T12:32:00.000-04:00

My purple fennel plants didn't put on much of a show this year. I'm not complaining too much; a perennial has the right to settle in. Still, they did put out some nice flowers, even if the plants themselves were not impressive. Those flowers are all turning now to seed, so I went out and harvested those that were dry. They look a lot like caraway seeds at that point, for those who are not familiar with them. They're used in baking and sausage-making, among other things, and have a mild, licorice-like flavour. My mother-in-law is a great fan of fennel.

Here is a spray of seeds that are not quite ready.

You can see that they are still green and plump. I'm afraid some of the ripe seeds did fall to the ground, so I'm going to have to mulch well with the leaves I'm already mooching off my neighbours to prevent having scores of eager seedlings in the spring.

Previous post on the topic of Fennel

Technorati tag: Fennel

Guilt and remorse

2006-10-09T19:29:00.001-04:00

I'm positively wallowing in it. And of course, you're dying to know why. You'll have a chance to appear understanding, while on the other side of the computer screen you're really thinking: "What kind of a gardener does she think SHE is?"

Well, a procrastinating, go-with-the-flow kind of gardener, that's what kind. Going with the flow isn't so bad, and I can usually get away with procrastinating somewhat, but I overdid it this time.

You see this?

That is the pile of the remains of my datura. The back-from-the-dead datura that I soft-heartedly allowed to stay in my garden. It filled an entire yard trimmings bag to the brim.

I kept saying I was going to remove it. It was growing too big and healthy, and despite the little fence I put in front of it, smothering my new hydrangea. But my neighbours - it must have been a plot - kept enabling my procrastination. "But it's so lovely," they protested and I foolishly listened.

Today being shirt-sleeve and shorts weather, I finally stopped listening to my own excuses and went and cut the whole thing out. At this point in the season it's hardly flowering anyway. I am not going to show you a picture of the hydrangea and the Oriental poppy that had been trying to survive under its exuberant canopy. They did survive, but they look so woebegone, it's going to take me a long time to live down the shame. *sigh*

The moral of the story is, brazen hussies take advantage of soft hearts. Don't listen to them. And next year, if the darn thing defies the odds and comes up again... Off with its head!

(When they tell you how nice gardeners are, they're lying. The best gardeners are brutal.)

Previous post on the topic of Daturas

Technorati tag: Daturas

Chill out, CC!

2006-10-06T14:47:00.001-04:00

And I will make sure you do it!

CC, in this case is Schlumbergera bridgesii, known to most mortals as a Christmas cactus. And I am indeed making sure that it "chills out" in the most literal sense of the term.

Even as I am bringing in my various houseplants - oleander, crown of thorns cactus, hibiscus, amaryllis - the poor oppressed Christmas cactus remains shivering in the cold. I do plan on bringing it in on frosty nights, but I won't leave it inside until the days are frosty too, or until I get tired of moving it back and forth. This is not gratuitous sadism on my part. I have my reasons.

Christmas cacti are called that because normal bloom time is around winter. Declining light and temperatures are its cue to flower. So by making sure that it gets a good case of the shivers, I should be getting beautiful blooms just at that time of year when I'm starved for light and colour. At least it's worked the last few years!

Technorati tag: Christmas cactus

Paradise in a bathtub

2006-10-05T12:34:00.000-04:00

Citrus paradiso, to be precise. And here you thought I was talking about some home spa experience, right? Well, maybe for my grapefruit plant(s). For once, I'm coddling my houseplants as I haul them in from the great outdoors.

Now, coddling in my mind is basic care in the mind of any responsible houseplant owner, but I'm not very good at boring maintenance things. (Hence my enthusiasm for perennials, which more or less take care of themselves while I sit and admire them.) I'm vowing to reform though.

Unlike last year, when I just brought my plants in from the great outdoors and plunked them in front of a window - and ended up with a nasty infestation of spider mites - this year I'm giving them the "treatment". So the grapefruit was gently placed in the bathtub and sprayed all over with soapy water. I couldn't find my insecticidal soap (stop laughing, I never claimed to be organized), but a little clear dish soap in a litre of water should do the trick. Then I laid it carefully on its side and sprayed the undersides of the leaves. I feel so responsible.

I decided not to repot it, as it isn't severely rootbound and I don't want to stimulate new growth at this time of year. I'll do that in late winter when new growth is starting and all things gardening are irresistible. I did pick off some of the lower leaves, along with the battered ones, to start giving it a more tree-like appearance, but I didn't get too ambitious. Not too much stress for the poor thing all at once.

These little grapefruits were started from seeds a few years ago and grew very slowly for a couple of years. This year I potted it in a mix of plain vanilla potting soil and sheep manure, and got serious about keeping it fertilized (or what passes for serious in my world) and it responded by doubling in size. I might actually be getting the hang of this.

Citruses in general are happiest in fairly arid climates, so overwatering is a good way to be nasty to them. They don't seem to mind getting pretty dry now and again, although I somehow think that keeping them that way for too long would not be appreciated.

If anyone has any experiences with citrus plants in particular or good advice to pass on, please feel free!

Technorati tag: Grapefruit plants

Water Roots

2006-10-02T19:15:00.000-04:00

It does happen that I succumb to vanity. Very seldom, of course. *ahem* But in those moments of weakness, I'll occasionally run searches to find out if anybody outside of the Technorati world has noticed my website. What can I say? It feels good to know people are listening, I guess.

In one of those searches, I came across this very interesting site, Water Roots. The lady who set this site up grows all her houseplants in water, a system known as hydroculture. She has simplified the standard procedures and had good results, so she shares them with the world. Her photo gallery is very impressive (and extensive) featuring page after page of plants brimming with good health. I am green with envy.

Fortunately she doesn't just show off. She has lots of practical information on setting up the system, shopping for supplies, dealing with pests and so on. Check out her site and settle in for an enjoyable session. Be forewarned: you will develop a severe case of envy.

Technorati tag: Water Roots

I've been AWOL

2006-09-30T10:07:00.000-04:00

Sorry about that. Between a bad cold, bad weather and plenty of distractions, I just haven't been able to wrap my head around gardening the last little while.

But I'm coming back. My focus is obviously going to shift for the winter. I plan on posting a little less than daily, spending some time sharing the better gardening sites with you, doing final evaluations on some of the inhabitants of my flower beds that got a little less attention through the gardening year and doing a little more thinking-about-gardening kind of posts. You will get a few of my misadventures with houseplants and the like. We'll just have to see how it all shakes out.

The first frost whitened our roofs last night in this part of town, but didn't work its way down into our protected yards. That's like a kick in the rear to get moving before it's too late.

Little green fingers

2006-09-22T12:15:00.001-04:00

Muscari aka grape hyacinths are strange little members of the spring-blooming bulbs. Strange, because unlike tulips or daffodils or crocuses, they like to poke up little green fingers in the fall, to get a head start on stocking energy.

And so they are the final installment in my list of new beginnings in the autumn garden. The little green fingers are poking up in all sorts of odd corners in my garden, many of them hidden by the riots of foliage around them, but visible if I stoop and look.

Grape hyacinths are a wonderful addition to the spring garden. They will tolerate rather more shade than many other spring bulbs and add a wonderful grace note of blue that harmonizes with virtually anything you throw at them. And they will come back and even increase year after year, which is something I always appreciate.

There's only one thing that calls to my mind the glories of an early spring garden better than grape hyacinth leaves - and that's my soon-to-be-delivered order of bulbs!

I can hardly wait!

Technorati tag: Muscari

Name that plant!

2006-09-20T11:33:00.001-04:00

This little plant is yet another example of why my planning never really seems to work. I just can't resist the occasional impulse buy. This is probably why I am already facing the necessity of either getting rid of some plants or expanding my beds.

But back to the little plant. It is also an example of the new life stirring in the flower beds as the season winds down. You may recognize the crinkled, greyish leaves of a poppy plant and recalled that it is the Orientals that pull a disappearing act in the summer, only to pop up again as the season winds down. (You may also notice the little rosette of Oenothera fruticosa hiding to its left. That's one that I will be moving. Good thing I took a picture. I honestly didn't notice it when I looked with my own peepers.)

This is 'Beauty of Livermere', what I thought was an orange Oriental poppy when I bought it, based on the picture on the label, but apparently will really be red, according to Internet descriptions. I haven't seen the blooms yet, so my own evaluation just has to wait.

Oriental poppies, Papaver orientale, are the perennial member of the Papaver genus. There are others that make that claim, like Iceland poppies, but it's a little tenuous. Iceland poppies can behave much like annuals or biennials, reappearing more often from seed than from the root. Orientals, on the other hand, can easily last decades. I have a friend in her 80's who still has a clump she initially sliced off the edge of her mother's. She's given me seeds, but I was impatient... Don't worry, Audrey, I've saved them for the next house.

Orientals are also the biggest and the boldest of the poppies, silken beauty writ large. They bloom in mid-to-late spring, produce the big round seedheads that are decorative in their own right (and are often used in dry flower arrangements, au naturel or spray-painted) and then slowly die back, leaving a gap in the flower bed. The gap can be dealt with in various ways, like allowing tender annuals to grow over it, but I just plunked a potted coleus right on top of it. That meant frequent checks for new growth, but seeing as the light-weight pot kept blowing over whenever it dried out, I have not been obliged to curse my absent-mindedness. The new growth has started, and the coleus has been shifted to a new position on a stepping stone.

It's enough to make you eager for spring! I hope Alice grows poppies...

Technorati tag: Poppies

New beginnings

2006-09-19T13:13:00.000-04:00

As if to counteract my autumn melancholy, several of the inhabitants of my garden are reminding me that the slide toward winter is just setting up for next year's glories. Case in point: sundrops, which I have been known to call sunshine on a stick.

Sundrops have a slightly different modus operandi than most perennials. They rise from a basal rosette in the spring, and flower throughout May and June. So far, nothing exceptional. They spend the summer soaking up solar energy and then start sending out lateral roots that produce a fresh crop of basal rosettes in late summer, fall, and even throughout the winter. These are now popping up in various places throughout my flower beds.

What makes them a bit different is that the mother plant will quite simply die away. No new rosette will emerge from its base; they will all emerge at a distance. Mind you, with other sundrops in the vicinity also sending out rhizomes, there's a good chance that new plants will take over the space anyway.

While sundrops are still in the rosette stage, they are very easy to pull up and move around. A rosette yanked by hand can be unceremoniously dumped in a small depression scooped out by hand, and recover quickly. They will pop up sometimes in places where you don't want them, but they're easily removed.

At this time of year, it cheers me to see something showing new life, so I just smile indulgently at them, as long as they're not infringing on the space of another perennial.

Previous post on the topic of Sundrops

Technorati tag: Sundrops

How to say sorry to a forget-me-not

2006-09-18T14:27:00.000-04:00

And not your standard run-of-the-mill forget-me-not either: a water forget-me-not. Myosotis palustris syn. Myosotis scorpioides.

It looked really great back in March, didn't it? I don't normally buy flowering perennials in March - and I really don't recommend it either - but the horticultural students at Algonquin College were having their annual flower show and there was no way I could walk past this plant without buying it. It's not easy to find and I like it so much better than the standard Myosotis sylvestris.

"Why?" you ask. "What's so special about it?"

I always love it when you set me up for what I want to say like that.

Because this is a perennial, more or less evergreen forget-me-not, which will even rebloom a bit throughout the season. As the name might lead you to believe, it does prefer to stay damp, but it doesn't require boggy conditions. Dappled light in moist soil will keep it quite happy. It is more or less on the edge of its range here, so it's wise to make sure it's mulched during the winter if the snow cover isn't reliable. That's how I lost my last clump - a good thaw followed by a prolonged very cold snap did it in.

These greenhouse-grown perennials (I bought a white-flowered one too) had to be hardened off which was difficult to do when it was still basically winter. I'd almost succeeded very nicely too, and was leaving them outside even overnight as the weather warmed when we got a good cold night. I forgot to bring them in. Absent-mindedness is one of my worst garden pests, let me assure you. Unfortunately, they don't sell sprays for it.

The plants survived, but they were weakened and a bunch of opportunistic aphids moved in and clobbered them even further. I got rid of the aphids once I noticed them and then put the plants in the ground. My bleeding heart more than doubled in size from last year and overran the poor things. Are you beginning to see why an apology or five was in order?

Well, that's what I'm going to do. I'm going to make it up to them. The survivors anyway. I'm digging up my meadow anemones with some real regret, but I just don't have a good place for them. They're too tall where I've got them in front of the Jack Frost brunnera, so I'll put the forget-me-nots in their place. It should make for a lovely cloud of blue come spring, with both the FMG's and Jack Frost displaying their matching blooms at once.

Previous post on the topic of Jack Frost brunnera, Meadow anemones

Technorati tag: Forget-me-not

Spring in the land of Oz

2006-09-15T14:01:00.001-04:00

In the northern hemisphere, even if it is still technically summer (and the weather here is reverting to summer for a few days) in the heads of all gardeners at least, it is the season of decline. Annuals are tuckering out, most perennials are past blooming and the leaves are starting to look old. Our thoughts are turning to red leaves and yellowed grasses, dried seedheads and ripe berries.

Not so Down Under.

I've shamelessly lifted this picture from Alice's blog, A Growing Delight, but to do penance, I'd like to suggest you take a quick trip to the Southern Hemisphere to view her many other photos. You'll be treated to spring blooms, cockatoos at bird feeders, and lots and lots of sunrises. I know I'll be checking in frequently over the winter, just to refresh my eyes.

And I think Alice is such a charming name for an Aussie, seeing as my first introduction to Australia outside of geography classes came courtesy of Nevil Shute's novel A Town Called Alice. It must have been a really good read, because I can still recall scenes from it, more that 30 years later.

Shield ferns

2006-09-14T13:09:00.000-04:00

I haven't written before about my spinulose shield ferns aka Dryopteris spinulosa (how's that for a name and a half?) There's a reason for that. They just don't draw much attention to themselves. They're not exactly superstars in plant catalogues either - I haven't seen them anywhere. These were dug from the wild and given to me, or I never even would have heard of them.

But they're solid little workhorses, providing dependable clumps of green in shady corners with the elegance one associates with ferns. Being semi-evergreen, the colour lasts a long time too. Semi-evergreen means that when the snow clears out in the spring, you will find green fronds in place. But they're bedraggled and flattened and you might just as well clip them off. A new crop is coming anyway.

Quite honestly, I would make no great effort to find spinulose ferns if I didn't already have them. But if I wanted medium-sized, dependable ferns, I'd happily spring for one of the close relatives that are more commonly available, like male ferns or wood ferns. In the meanwhile, I have them tucked into all kinds of corners as fillers. As any regular reader of this blog knows, I plant as tightly as possible, to make it as difficult for my cat as I can, so anything that will thrive in poorly lit, out-of-the-way corners is welcome. The one in the picture is pretty well the only one that gets a foreground role.

Previous post on the topic of Ferns

Technorati tag: Ferns

Hope for the future

2006-09-13T16:35:00.001-04:00

I had to move around to find an angle to make this group look good. But in the future, when the variegated weigela has grown enough to dominate the corner, and the Sparkling Burgundy heuchera has bulked out a bit more, they will have enough presence to make this corner attractive from any side. The purply blue of the Rozeanne geranium and the purply red of the heuchera play just wonderfully off the chartreuse highlights of the weigela aka cardinal bush.

What is it about gardeners that we see not only what is, but also what will be?

Previous post on the topic of Weigela, Sparkling Burgundy heuchera, Rozeanne geranium

Technorati tag: Weigela, Heuchera, Geraniums

Definitely better than alien eyes!

2006-09-12T17:45:00.001-04:00

We'll just have to call her Annie the Alien, I guess. Anemone tomentosa 'Robustissima' has opened her first blooms, and I love them! They'd probably make great cut flowers, but I don't have enough to spare.

We've been getting some cooler weather here the last little while, and Rozeanne has reacted by getting all blue. It really struck me when I went outside today. The pink flush normally so visible has diminished considerably. It gives a whole new meaning to turning blue from the cold!

Previous post on the topic of Anemones, Rozeanne geraniums

Technorati tag: Anemones, Geraniums

Thanks Stuart!

2006-09-12T17:07:00.000-04:00

Stuart over at Gardening Tips 'N' Ideas showcased me as his gardening blog of the week earlier today. Much earlier, seeing as he's in Australia and it was still yesterday here. I always fine it interesting looking at blogs from Down Under. Although they don't have anything much of what I would call a winter - they're always so delightfully horrified when they get frost! - they are moving out of it about now, so they'll be all full of the enthusiasm of spring when we're winding down and feeling nostalgic.

Sometime about four months from now, Stu, I'll post a picture of the snowdrift in my flower bed out back, just so you can see what winter is supposed to look like.

He said nice things about my pictures too, which is pretty much guaranteed to get him on my good side. But really, the truth is, I mostly just point and shoot. I know how to use the macro and the auto-focus and Canon makes good cameras. My husband better hope I don't get too serious, because then I'll start wanting zoom lenses and such, and we'll never get to the end of it. Actually, I already wish I had one, but it's on the list of things I won't get around to any time soon. Too many higher priorities.

So tootle on over and have a look at what Stuart is up to. He had to revamp his entire site, as a certain publisher took offense at his Gardening for Dummies theme...

Technorati tag: Gardening in Australia

One measly cluster!

2006-09-11T14:44:00.000-04:00

That's all that my oleander is giving me in the new beginnings department! And that's all I've managed to squeeze out of it all year.

It's mostly my fault, of course. But I will plead my case; I put it in too shady a spot for two excellent reasons.

First, the front yard with its western exposure would have generated a lot more of the lovely, vanilla-scented blooms but it also would have increased the likelihood of my plant going for a walk with somebody else and not coming back! It's like toddlers, you have to watch them all the time.

I was perhaps being paranoid. Nobody walked off with the neighbours' hibiscus plants which were much bigger and nicer than mine. In my defence, they bought theirs already mature, while I started mine from a cutting. But back to the point, maybe I should put the pot out front next year, earning me bragging rights as well as being a better environment for the oleander. Two excellent reasons...

The other reason I had it in the shade is that it looked so nice up against the house. Call me an aesthete with a fine eye for composition. It won't be true, but it will make me feel good. In any event, the horticulturalist eventually won out over the aesthete, who grudgingly allowed a small move to the other side of the patio at least. Too little, too late, but I have been rewarded with this one small cluster of buds, which will likely not open till I've brought the plant inside. I have suffered worse fates.

Oleander buds take an astonishing length of time to form and eventually open. I've never actually timed it, but you need a calendar, not a watch, and expect to use more than one page. I'm still not sure I've managed to figure out the intricacies of growing them well, but seeing as they do manage to stay healthy and even flower when I give them enough sun, I must be doing something approximately right.

Having read conflicting information on fertilizing and watering, I chose the path of moderation. I water moderately and fertilize moderately and it seems to be working.

Technorati tag: Oleanders

Here's looking at you

2006-09-08T18:55:00.001-04:00

In this, the season of endings, there are still new beginnings happening in Janet's garden.

My grape-leafed anemone has produced a couple of clutches of flower buds, vaguely reminiscent of alien eyes, but promising to be so much more beautiful. Not that I have any personal experience of staring into alien eyes, you understand. I may be a bit of a science fiction fan, but not to the point of being delusional.

This is another candidate for relocation, as the foliage stays somewhat lower than I expected. In front of some lilies might be good, as the anemone would stay lower than the lily blooms earlier in the season, and mask the less interesting foliage later on.

Previous post on the topic of Grape-leafed anemone

Technorati tag: Anemones

Halcyon days

2006-09-07T12:03:00.000-04:00

Halcyon is such a wonderful word. It is invariably associated in my mind with the phrase "halcyon days of youth". It's a great word for a garden, too: tranquil, peaceful, joyful. So it's entirely appropriate that this is the name of the first hosta I ever owned. In honour of that fact, I planted another one when I moved into this house. (I do tend to get a little sentimental in my plant choices. They often have connections to former homes or particular people.)

Halcyon is a prize-winning hosta, and there are good reasons for that. Its thick sturdy leaves are slug-resistant and of all the blue hostas, it keeps its blue colour the longest. My picture, I'm afraid, doesn't do it justice. Like almost all hostas, it's tough and uncomplaining, and is happiest with only a little sunlight. The flowers, while unspectacular, are charming and much beloved by bees.

It is sterile however, so it won't set seed. This is an advantage if you don't want volunteers and a disadvantage if you do want them. It is also very slow to establish. In my last house, it took four years to get up to five eyes.

All this makes it sound like a rather placid member of the garden club, but it does have a quiet sense of humour, as I discovered last year. I'd bought a bare root plant by mail this time and I became quite convinced that they had sent me a mini hosta instead. The leaves were much smaller and narrower than I remembered them. I concluded it must be a Blue Cadet, seeing as it was the only mini blue this particular catalogue offered, and labeled all my pictures as such.

Well, it came up with bigger, wider leaves this year and I have since learned that an immature Halcyon does indeed look different. I could almost hear the darn thing snicker as I changed all my pictures back to the Halcyon label, both on my computer and online.

Still, no hard feelings. I'll probably move it to set it to better advantage to prove it.

Previous post on the topic of Hostas

Technorati tag: Hostas

Gardening myth: dangerous raindrops

2006-09-06T17:00:00.001-04:00

Myth: Don't water during the day, because water droplets on the leaves will focus the sun's rays and burn holes in the leaves.

This one was in the newspaper again last weekend. In print. In the gardening column. *sigh*

OK, let's stop and think a minute. How many of you found holes or burn marks spread over your entire garden last time the sun came out after a summer shower? Lift your hands. ... I thought so. By that logic, virtually every gardener who ever lived should have experienced massive burning at some time or another.

Now, I don't know about you, but when I use magnifying glasses to burn holes in paper, I have to hold the magnifying glass some distance above the paper to get the focus right. Putting the magnifying glass directly on the paper just doesn't work. So, when was the last time you saw water drops suspended in the air above your leaves?

Lesson: just because somebody says it, doesn't necessarily mean it's so.

On the other hand, it's true that it's not a great idea to water in the middle of the day, especially with sprinklers, because evaporation rates will be way up and you'll waste a lot of water. But your leaves will be just fine.

Technorati tag: Gardening myths

Caladium schmaladium!

2006-09-05T22:49:00.000-04:00

I have a love/hate relationship with caladiums. The leaves are so cool and so striking, how can you not love them? And I do love them.

I also hate them. Stubborn little blighters!

I say this because the caladium corms won't sprout till they are nice and toasty warm. Now, I don't have all kinds of fancy equipment like bottom heaters to bring the little darlings up to their preferred temperatures, which are definitely significantly warmer than my preferred temperatures. There's no way I'm cranking up the thermostat to sub-tropical conditions for their sake.

Why don't you stick them on top of the fridge, you ask? Because it's you asking, I'll answer politely, instead of growling in frustration. My fridge is new, so it doesn't generate the heat the older models do, so parking caladiums on top of the fridge is a no go for me, and probably for most people nowadays. (If you've been wondering why you weren't getting the promised results for your caladiums or heat-loving seeds, now you know why. Your fridge is too efficient.)

I pot them up early just the same, hoping against hope. I put them in a sunny window, thinking the solar energy might persuade them. No dice. Weeks go by and nothing happens. So I determined to give up on the stupid things. Yeah right. Like I am going to throw out something living that has a chance. The last little corm that had survived past abuses got shoved unceremoniously into a pot with a bunch of other things and forgotten about.

When I got back from my vacation IN LATE JULY, two bright red leaves were there to greet me. That's how long it took. Sheesh! Why do I even bother?

Because those red leaves are sooooo pretty. And when you stop and think about it, shoving it into a pot with other things and forgetting about it is not that great an effort, now is it?

Technorati tag: Caladiums

Garden portraits for September 4

2006-09-04T13:24:00.000-04:00

Ernesto's clouds and rain have not yet pulled out, so I won't do much labouring in the garden in honour of Labour Day. So here are a few of last week's sunnier photos.

Bloom on potted hibiscus.

Burgundy pansy

Red Flash caladium

Previous post on the topic of Hibiscus

Technorati tags: Hibiscus, Pansies, Caladiums

I am a heartless gardener

2006-09-02T22:49:00.000-04:00

Literally. And here is the proof.

In my mini-frenzy of cleaning up the other day, I started whacking back the shrivelled brown leaves on my bleeding heart. Then I said, "Why not?" and whacked back the yellow ones. It looked so pitiful after that, I just went ahead and cut off the remaining ones that still had a slight flush of chlorophyll left in them.

Which left me with two gaping holes in the same bed. Fighting the urge to plant something else in those holes wasn't easy, so I had to use the gardener's equivalent of a nicotine patch.

The patio is looking pretty bare, but that's OK. One of the reasons I fill so many pots in the spring is for back-up like this. Even if many of them have been a bit of a disappointment this year, they still provide a few leaves and colour. And help me curb the urge to put in plants that would just get overrun next year. You fight your addiction any way you can.

Previous post on the topic of Bleeding hearts, Container gardening

Technorati tags: Potted plants, Bleeding hearts

It felt like moving all of Siberia!

2006-09-01T10:55:00.000-04:00

Even the queen of procrastinators eventually gets off her butt and moves. I could no longer stand the dishevelled clutter of the back bed and the gaping hole left by the removal of the overbearing, white fly-infested greater celandine in the side bed. You do get the connection, right? Too much stuff in one bed, big hole in another? I can connect dots too, and the obvious remedy was to move something from one place to the other. I'd been putting it off because August heat is not prime plant-moving season. Gardeners (this makes it sound like it's not just me, so humour me) are in a heat-induced stupor and it's hard on the plants. Which means gardeners don't have to confront their laziness, because the welfare of the plants comes first, right?

A couple of weeks of cooler weather was beginning to make that argument wear thin though, even to my own ears, so I seized the day and the shovel and sallied forth. I have determined not to buy any more perennials until the moving issue is settled, so the empty corner had to be filled with plants on hand. Not a hardship.

A Siberian iris that was supposed to be Caesar's Brother but which was inexplicably taller and lighter than the others (and naturally, at the front of the bed) was a natural candidate to be moved, so I dug the baby up. This wasn't easy. The soil was dry and dense (my lawn had cracks in it, as I realized during this whole procedure) so I had to lever the clump out from both sides with the shovel, through masses of deadnettle and Rozeanne geraniums. The clump just went into giggles of derision when I tried it with the trowel.

Once the clump was pried out of the ground, I split it up, just by cracking it apart with my bare hands.

Then I trimmed the plants back. This helps prevent dehydration, as the roots are in some shock after this kind of treatment and can't draw moisture up as well.

I popped them into planting holes augmented with sheep manure and bonemeal, then watered them in well.

In front of them went a tiny PG hydrangea I had grown in a pot from a piece that had broken off the bigger one I planted in the front this spring. And in front of THAT went a Patriot hosta, well chewed by slugs and totally overwhelmed by its overbearing neighbours in its previous location. I finished the job by sprinkling some bloodmeal around to keep the squirrels away, a necessary measure in this neck of the woods.

I want to boast a bit. That big chunk of bare dirt is uncovered primarily because the royal fern nearby lost most of its leaves as collateral damage in my war against white flies. I SUCCESSFULLY RESISTED THE URGE TO PLANT SOMETHING IN THAT BARE DIRT! This is significant, because one of my besetting sins is to overplant. I hate to see an empty space.

It took some compensatory measures, but more on that tomorrow.

Previous post on the topic of Siberian iris

Technorati tag: Irises

Sedum creeps up on you

2006-08-31T09:28:00.001-04:00

Or at least it crept up on me. My original clump was grown from a few branches I brought home from a walk along the bike path. Someone had obviously "donated" their clump to the city because it grew only in that one spot, and it isn't exactly a native plant. The little branches got shoved unceremoniously into the flower bed using the poke and plant method. Fingers being the original all-purpose garden tool. They prospered.

I've had stonecrop in my garden for a number of years now, constantly moved around, new patches being started from a handful of cuttings. It doesn't get much easier than that. I stuffed quite a few into pots this year because I was getting a little bit tired of spending money on yet more plants, and this made for free and easy trailers.

Some even got thrown in the pot with the cannas, although I had reservations. I think of stonecrops as nice, no-care, drought-resistant plants, and I was a little afraid they'd rot out with the constant watering regime that came with the cannas. But the price was right, and I had lots more where it came from.

Now I ask you, does that look rotted out to you? No, me neither. Note to self: "drought-resistant" doesn't necessarily mean "prefers it dry". Sedum spurium is obviously delighted to take advantage of near-constant moisture, rich soil, and frequent fertilizing.

I'm hoping Pennisetum reacts the same way, because I'm thinking that next year I'd like to reuse these same sedums with fountain grass and coleus and a white geranium or two...

What would a gardener do without fantasies about next year?

Previous post on the topic of Stonecrop

Technorati tag: Stonecrop

Happy pot heads

2006-08-28T15:17:00.000-04:00

I don't know about you, but looking over my potted plants around this time of year is a rather discouraging exercise. And no, I'm not going to tell you about it in detail. There's only so much battering my ego can take.

Fortunately, there is an encouraging story or two, so that's what you're going to hear today. Maybe I'll feel better afterwards...

Some of the happiest pot-dwellers I have right now are my seed-grown cyclamens. The tiny bulbs have been happily putting on weight and putting out beautifully marked foliage that earn them a spot at my place even without flowers. The ones I put in the ground have put out fewer, but larger leaves. Cyclamens are supposed to prefer cool weather and even to go dormant in hot weather, but I find they are very happy to spend the summer outside, even when it's blisteringly hot. They are also perfectly happy to sit with a puddle of water in their saucers, though all the books will tell you to pour it out. I usually do eventually, but it's only to do my bit in keeping the mosquito population down - the cyclamens thrive with wet feet.

Another tender bulb that thrives on a summer outside is the amaryllis aka Hippeastrum. This particular plant, which I've had for quite a few years now (about six) has survived the trauma of being separated from her daughter bulbs very nicely. The foliage grown outside tends to be much less floppy because of the greater light intensity. I haven't yet decided whether I'll force this one into dormancy soon to stimulate a Christmas blooming, or whether I'll just let it continue growing to bloom on its own schedule, some time around Easter.

Yes, folks, you heard right. You do not HAVE to make your amaryllis bulb go dormant. The only point of the dormancy is to be able to impose your schedule on the bulb, or to save the space indoors that a mature amaryllis (or several) will take up.

And yes, that is yet another self-sown anise hyssop at its feet. I let the volunteers (and there are many when it comes to this Agastache) grow a bit, then make another batch of licorice tea out of them, iced of course at this time of year.

Technorati tags: Cyclamens, Amaryllis

Garden portraits with a difference

2006-08-28T14:47:00.000-04:00

Going to seed is not always a bad thing. Although I tend to view deadheading as a form of recreation - the winding-down kind - sometimes I let things go a bit, either out of persnicketiness or even a genuine desire to harvest the seeds. So here is a series of garden portraits with a difference.

Impatiens balsamina has projectile seedpods, like all the impatiens family, which I suspect is how they got their name. Brush up against one of these babies when it's ripe and it will pop open, shooting the seeds quite a distance. They don't turn brown to let you know either, so the best way to find out is to squeeze them very, very gently, with your hand wrapped around to catch the flying seeds. If the seeds are brown, they're ripe. If they're still white, they're not, and you squeezed too hard. The seedpods on the more common impatiens are similar, but dark green and shiny. I find they tend to set very little seed earlier in the season, but when it starts cooling off, they grow me all kinds of little pods.

I missed deadheading a single Lemon Pixie lily earlier this year and when I noticed it, I left the seedpod there on a whim. I've never saved lily seeds before, so I don't have any experiences to share with you. I may even try to grow them just to see what I get out of it. Probably something different from Lemon Pixie, but it could be good anyway.

These are the seeds of yellow meadow rue.

A single flower on one of my Patriot hostas set seed this year. I'm letting it go out of curiosity. Again, this is a first for me.

This is a bit of an oddity. When I first noticed it this morning, I thought a garden snail had crawled all the way to the top of one of my Brunello lilies. But when I took a closer look, I realized it was a bulbil, a sort of mini-bulb that grows in the leaf axils of certain lilies, especially tiger lilies. I was taken aback. I'd never heard of bulbils on an Asiatic lily before, and only one of the plants - the biggest and strongest - had produced any and even then, only two. Click on the picture for a closer view.

Previous post on the topic of Balsam, Lemon Pixie lily, Meadow rue, Brunello lilies

Technorati tags: Hostas, Balsam, Meadow rue, Lilies, Seeds,

My last word on daturas

2006-08-26T16:14:00.000-04:00

How is this for one honkin' big bouquet?

We don't normally think of daturas as cut flowers. Or at least I don't. But the winner of Survivor - Ontario has done its surviving with so much vigour that I'm obliged to whack off a couple of major branches every week or two just to get in the front door, and to give my PG hydrangea a chance of surviving. Rather than just pitching the trimmings in the compost, I throw them in my largest vase and enjoy them for a few days indoors. The smaller buds usually get dropped, but the bigger ones will proceed to open on schedule, and will normally last longer than outside, being away from the sun. (For an idea of the scale of the bouquet, each blossom is wider than my hand. The table it's on is 3 feet wide.)

The little wire fence I erected in lieu of stakes is straining severely under the weight of the plant which is now about 6 feet tall and leaning more and more toward the light. I am probably going to have to uproot it in a couple of weeks when the angle is too great. And then I will shovel prune the whole thing. I love it dearly, but I just don't have the space. In an ideal world, I'd give it a good 9 square feet in full sun (where it wouldn't lean) underplanted with spring bulbs. They wouldn't object to being smothered from July on, the late-rising datura doesn't require copious watering so the bulbs wouldn't get rotted out when they're dormant, a win/win scenario. I may yet do it in the future.

In the meanwhile, I will collect fresh seeds, even though I already have some stored, because it might be several years before I plant them again. The seedpod you see to the left is not ripe yet, but it won't look much different when it is. It will be a bit bigger, but it will split and spill the seeds without advance warning, while it is still green. There will normally be some clinging to the inside (they look like large pepper seeds) but if I want to catch more of them, I can just slip the foot from some old pantyhose over it. The thorns (which are usually too soft to cut but stiff enough to be uncomfortable) will hold it in place.

My very last word about datura is that it is indeed toxic and hallucinogenic, as you may have heard. No part of the plant is safe to ingest. But no matter what you may hear elsewhere, it is safe to handle. I do it barehanded all the time. It has to be taken internally to be dangerous. Even then, minute quantities won't have much of an effect, unlike castor bean seeds. I wouldn't keep it if I had pets or small children that liked to chew on leaves or teenagers stupid enough to want to try it for a high. Seeing as I have neither, I've grown it with no problems whatsoever.

Previous post on the topic of Daturas

Technorati tag: Daturas

Annuals that didn't work

2006-08-25T22:55:00.000-04:00

While we're on the subject of how not to grow things...

I started several annuals in flats and plugs this spring, to be fillers in the flower beds. Very few of them worked. The sweet alyssum caught hold eventually, but that's about it. The poppies and California poppies both have languished, barely growing and producing sparse, tiny blooms, if any. The African laceflower (Ammi majus) has mostly disappeared, and even the balsam hasn't done too well, except for the ones I sowed directly into the flower beds.

So what did I do wrong this time?

First, I sowed too late in the season. And I sowed outside. If you want to sow outside, you should do it very early in covered flats, aka wintersowing. The poppies I sowed in cardboard tubes (a home-made equivalent to peat pots), to avoid disturbing their roots later on, but it didn't help much. They survived, but never flourished.

Second, I put them into beds where I hadn't yet solved my earwig problem. In my defence, I hadn't yet realized that's what the problem was. Be that as it may, the laceflower in particular got chewed up almost as fast as I put it in the ground.

Other than that, I honestly don't know. I could succumb to perfectionism, and feel miserable about this. But there are more important things in life to feel miserable about, so I think I'll just feel glad that, while far from perfect, my flower beds are still providing beauty to the neighbourhood and a lovely place for my morning coffee.

Which won't stop me from trying to do better next year!

Technorati tag: Annuals

How not to grow a hardy geranium

2006-08-24T11:58:00.000-04:00

I have not been kind to my bloody cranesbill. So it has responded in kind, rewarding me with one measly blossom all year which I didn't even manage to capture on film, er, in pixels.

Well, if you can't be a good example, be a horrible warning. So here it is, your primer on how not to grow Geranium sanguineum. Album in my case, which is Latin for white, because my bloody cranesbill is white. I feel a rant coming on, but I've already done it, so I'll spare you. (The flowers in the picture are alyssum, so don't be fooled.)

Pack the plant in tight between larger taller plants that won't give it much of a chance. Tell yourself that the cranesbill will squeeze between the lily stalks and give them a pretty little cloud of white to emerge from. Tell yourself whatever you like. The plant isn't listening.

Plant and/or divide and/or move around your bloody cranesbill in the spring. It blooms relatively early, so this will put it off and you won't have to contend with any distracting flowers.

Let your cat -or dog - dig in close proximity to freshly transplanted specimens.

Despite having followed the preceding instructions to the letter, my bloody cranesbill is still alive and green and fresh-looking, so I haven't quite mastered the art of killing it, although I've certainly done quite well in depressing it.

I'm going to make a last attempt to grow the stuff properly. The one I moved out front will stay. It suffered mainly from being moved at the wrong time, so it will probably do fairly well with benevolent neglect. The poor crowded specimen in the back will get moved. In the fall, not the spring. Either that or I'll remove the meadow rue that's crowding it, seeing as I'm pretty unhappy with the meadow rue anyway. Sigrun has pleaded with me to leave it, so maybe I'll move it elsewhere and give it a second chance.

Previous post on the topic of Bloody cranesbill

Technorati tag: Cranesbill, Geranium, Hardy geraniums

Garden portraits for August 23

2006-08-23T13:52:00.000-04:00

Orange Kordana bloom close up. The orange is most vivid when the flower is fresh and then fades to a more reddish colour.

The lacy bloom of the fennel plant, beloved by bees and other pollinators.

Datura blossoms open in the evening and last until the sun hits them. This one, shown in the late morning, is curling up and will soon wilt as the sun hits it.

Late summer colour. That coleus has been a lifesaver!

Previous post on the topic of Orange Kordana mini roses, Purple fennel, Datura, Coleus

Technorati tags: Roses, Fennel, Datura, Coleus

Next year - or not

2006-08-23T13:21:00.000-04:00

There's a sort of melancholy settling over my garden as mid-summer moves into late summer. I don't have enough fall bloomers, although the roses, daturas, four o'clocks, Rozanne and a few annuals are keeping enough colour to be somewhat respectable. My grape-leafed anemone is sending up its first flower scapes, so I'm looking forward to those blooms, although they will just be a hint of what is to come in future years. But most of the perennials are done for the year, the bleeding heart foliage is turning yellow and the freshness of spring is a distant memory.

And there's a melancholy settling over the gardener too. Gardeners learn to take a bit of a long view, at least if they deal with trees, shrubs and perennials. There is a definite satisfaction to putting something in the ground, but the real payoff is a year, or two, or ten down the road.

And therein lies my problem. I am probably moving next summer, so I have to keep curbing my impulse to plan, to plant, to improve. There isn't much point in doing any of that. The next owner could very well tear it all out, so although the gardener in me is crying out for rudbeckias and asters, the realist in me keeps saying, "Forget it, chickie. All improvement plans are shelved!"

The frustration is exquisite. I haven't even got this garden properly established and I have to rein myself in. And I am discovering more and more how much gardeners think and dream of next year, because I'm having to be as ruthless with those dreams as if they were weeds.

I consoled myself by ordering bulbs. At least I will be able to enjoy them for one spring.

Technorati tag: Next year

Winning the cat war

2006-08-22T09:30:00.000-04:00

Kitty cat, kitty cat, where have you been?
Down to my litter box, where did you think?

I am declaring victory in the war with my cat! It was a hard-fought battle, but my superior weaponry prevailed in the end.

Pine cones piled liberally in her favourite corners, the occasional batch of twigs and branches planted vertically in the beds, and potted plants snuggled in between perennials to provide physical barriers in those tempting spots without striking any discordant notes.

I am one happy camper, er, gardener.

Of course, cleaning out the litter box more regularly hasn't hurt either.

Previous post on the subject of Cats in the garden

Technorati tag: Cats in the garden, Cats

Busy as a bee - or not

2006-08-21T07:15:00.000-04:00

We all think of bees as indefatigable little workers, slaving away non-stop. But every now and again there's a non-conformist.

Like this one.

This fat little bumblebee was sleeping on the job, on a warm mid-morning in August. Bees have been known to sleep right on the flowers when the evening temperatures drop below their functional level and resume in the morning when the sun warms them again, but this little lady had no such excuse. She snoozed for so long I had time to go back inside, find my misplaced camera and take several shots.

It's not the first time I've caught bees sleeping on the job. I suspect that they are more likely aging bees who just really need a break, but I have no way of verifying that. If any of you are beekeepers or entomologists, please fill me in.

Technorati tag: Bees

Becky beckoned and I came running

2006-08-19T11:02:00.000-04:00

Being the Perennial Plant of the Year isn't always a guarantee of a marvellous plant. Once you take into account different growing conditions and different tastes, one man's fish is another man's poison. Lists of favourite and least-favourite plants on gardening forums often contain the same names. "Goldsturm is lavish in its bloom when the garden is winding down." "It self-seeds all over the place. I hate it." "Russian sage is a beautiful ethereal plant." "It flops and looks bedraggled."

So even if Leucanthemum 'Becky' was the Perennial Plant of the Year for 2003, I wasn't prepared to jump on the bandwagon. But after hearing a lot of rave reviews on gardening forums, I decided that adding Becky to my garden was a bit of a no-brainer and I bought a plant in June. Within a week or two it was blooming. It's tuckering out now, but it's been a good run. Non-stop bloom for a good seven weeks is awfully hard to beat.

The plant had a single stem when I bought it, but new growth at the base took little time in appearing. The flowers you see in the picture all come from the single flowering stalk (and they're just the tail end - there were more before), so next year's show should be quite spectacular. Unlike oxeye daisies, which spread by rhizomes and can be a bit invasive, Shasta daisies like Becky are clumpers. My only concern is that the heavy soil of Ottawa might be a bit hard on it in the spring, but seeing as it's planted fairly far back in the bed where it's drier, I'm quite optimistic that it will overwinter just fine.

Earwigs have been rather fond of the pollen, but damage to the petals has been minimal. I have seen no other signs of disease or pest damage. After a first season in the garden, I am very pleased with Becky's performance. Let's see how it does over winter and spring, which is always the acid test in a northern climate.

Here's Becky with her friend Brunello in June.

Technorati tag: Daisies

Orange Kordana roses

2006-08-18T12:30:00.000-04:00

The orange Kordana mini roses have been flourishing and are just about to launch another flush of blooms. This is my first year with them, so I wasn't too sure what to expect. They have been doing very well, perhaps too well! They are several inches taller than the Hit Parades, which means I am going to have to move them. They're almost as tall as my Iceberg rosebush, for crying out loud! The front of the border just isn't working too well for plants of this height.

Previous post on the topic of Orange Kordanas

Technorati tag: Roses

Ha! I knew it!

2006-08-18T11:49:00.000-04:00

Leafing through the current issue of Prevention magazine, I was scanning the 25 points in their anti-aging article. #4 was "get a pet."

"Harumph," thought I, rather petulantly. "What about 'get a garden?' That should easily be just as good as getting a pet." Even as I grumbled to myself, I turned the page and there it was: Number 8.

8. Stop and plant the roses
Gardening or being around plants bears fruit. In one study, blood pressure jumped in workers given a stressful task--but rose only a quarter as much if there were plants in the room. And patients who had a view of trees as they recovered from surgery left the hospital almost a day sooner than those with a view of a brick wall.

It doesn't get much more official than that.

But we knew it all along, didn't we? Still, I'm willing to bet they would have found even more benefits from actually DOING the gardening, not just being around plants.

Technorati tag: Gardening therapy

Comments on gardening blogs

2006-08-17T17:42:00.000-04:00

Hanna of This Garden is Illegal is wondering why gardeners don't leave comments more often on gardening blogs. I sometimes wonder the same thing, but I think part of the reason is that people who go to gardening blogs are primarily gardeners and not bloggers. Most of the blogosphere is a great web of discussions, with constant references to posts on other blogs or in the news and very active - often extreme - discussion going on in the comment section. I get the impression that most of the visitors to my gardening blog are not really part of that culture. Am I right or wrong? Why do you comment or not comment?

And if any of you are interested in issues outside of gardening, please check out my other blog, The Walrus Said, where I reflect on topics outside of gardening. And leave a comment if you have something to say, even if it's on an old post. I, at least, will read it.

Technorati tag: Comments

Borrowed clematis

2006-08-17T12:54:00.000-04:00

Sometimes a borrowed view becomes a borrowed plant.

This generous little clematis twined its way over from the neighbours' when I wasn't looking, but I can't say that I'm complaining too much!

Previous post on the topic of Borrowed views

Technorati tag: Clematis, Borrowed views

Rosa incognita

2006-08-16T14:46:00.000-04:00

Some girls just don't know when they're not wanted. We dug this baby out this spring and quite a job it was too. The root was so thick and woody we had to go at it underground with a pruning saw! But even that wasn't enough to keep it from coming back.

I'd given this rosebush a chance when I moved in, in case the lack of flowers was due to a lack of care. But after a season of pampering, there still wasn't a single flower to be seen and it was obvious this was a rose coming back from rootstock. Despite my respect for tough survivors like this one, I do want at least a minimum of a show, so out it came.

Not that I'm surprised it came back. We'd left chunks of root in the ground, because it was just too hard to dig it all out. I'll just keep cutting it back until the root has starved to death, much as I do with other perennial weeds. I'm very leery of adding more toxins to the environment and snipping it back every now and again really isn't that much of an effort.

Technorati tag: Roses

Rozanne

2006-08-16T02:17:00.000-04:00

Rozeanne is in her full glory now. I've had to whack her back a couple of times, as she was lying all over the lawn. (Boy, if you reread that, it could sound really bad!) If she wants to overpower the sedum and lamium, that's OK by me; they were there to fill in until the other things hit their stride anyway. I'll pull them out in a month or two and plant spring-blooming bulbs there, knowing that Rozeanne will take care of covering the dying foliage later in the season.

Previous post on the topic of Rozeanne geranium

Technorati tag: Geraniums

White flies - the good news and the bad

2006-08-14T10:32:00.000-04:00

It looks like my battle with white flies is coming to an end much faster than I expected. After digging out the infested greater celandine, there were clouds of the little critters all over the garden, settling especially on the royal fern and the bleeding heart. So I sprayed them quite liberally with the all-purpose spray, expecting to have to do this repeatedly for a while to get rid of them. As it turns out, I can't find any more live ones to spray. Awww, shucks!

That is the good news. And now for the bad news:

The royal fern obviously resented being doused in the spray. I'll trim away the shrivelled leaves, but I doubt if there will be any permanent damage. It's probably going to look pretty rough for the rest of the season though.

The sensitive fern got a little spray on it too, and it is also looking a bit crispy, so this might be a generalized problem with ferns. In the future, I'll make sure that I don't spray ferns with the all-purpose spray. If need be, I'll do an experiment or two to find out which of the active ingredients they're objecting to - the mouthwash, the soap or the baking soda - so I'll know what I can safely use on them. I may not need to; I've never had a problem with ferns that required spraying before.

So any fans of the all-purpose spray, be warned. Keep it away from your ferns.

Previous posts on the topic of all-purpose spray, white flies and royal fern

Technorati tags: All-purpose spray, White flies, Royal fern

Time for four o'clocks

2006-08-12T15:59:00.000-04:00

Yesterday I beat back the gorilla-sized datura that was terrorizing my tiny front bed to give the PG hydrangea and the four o'clocks a chance to breathe. I am telling you this, of course, merely as a ploy to give myself a chance to talk about four o'clocks alias Mirabilis jalapa. But you already guessed that, didn't you?

Four o'clocks are tender perennials usually grown as annuals in Canada. Their somewhat fragrant little trumpets open in late afternoon - hence the name - and come mostly in vibrant pink and yellow, although white and apricot are sometimes seen too. The occasional plant is unable to make up its mind between yellow and pink and will bear flowers in both those colours, as well as blooms that are "broken", showing both colours without mixing them. All of these will appear at the same time on the same plant, which I honestly didn't believe until I checked it carefully myself.

The way I prefer to use four o'clocks is to seed them over spring-blooming bulbs and around the Asiatic lilies that die back earlier in the season. They'll get off to a slow enough start to let the bulbs strut their stuff without competion, then hide their dying foliage before it gets to be too much of an eyesore. This doesn't work as well with the very early bulbs, but is great for mid-to-late season tulips and the like.

They are also a great companion to evening-blooming daturas, echoing the shape of the flowers, but providing a size and colour contrast.

Four o'clocks aren't particularly drought-resistant, but they'll let you know when they're thirsty with limp leaves and spring back none the worse for wear when you water them. They are advertised as full sun, but as is often the case, will take considerably less if they have to.

They are very, very easy to start from seed just about any way you like: winter-sowing, starting indoors, sowing directly in the garden, or just letting them reseed themselves. Easy is good. The seeds look like little black grenades and sowing them would make a great project for kids, as they are big enough - about the size of large grapefruit seeds - to be easy to handle and have an excellent germination rate, even after several years in the fridge.

Four o'clocks are also tougher than you may have been led to believe. I've had self-sown seedlings happily survive a spring snowfall and one time even had one grow back from last year's root. (I'd mulched rather heavily with leaves before the ground froze, although not with the goal of saving the Mirabilis.) You can, if you wish, dig up the thick, fleshy root in the fall and save it to plant out in the spring, but seeing as I have never done this successfully, I can't tell you anything more about it. Truth be told, they are so easy to grow from seed, I haven't bothered to try saving the roots more than once.

After all that, I guess I don't really need to tell you that four o'clocks somehow manage to work their way into my garden almost every year.

Technorati tag: Four o'clocks

Ants and aspartame

2006-08-11T08:26:00.000-04:00

And now for something completely different...

Doug Green is asking for people to participate in an experiment. After hearing that aspartame was an effective ant poison, he researched it on the Net and discovered that all references led back to only one source. He'd like all interested parties to try fighting ants with aspartame and send him a report on the results so we can find out how reliable this information is. Click here to go to his site and read the details.

Ants are not normally a serious pest in the garden, so I normally leave them alone. If they're swarming a particular plant, I look closely. It's often a sign of scale or aphids, so they can be a useful indicator. My benevolence dissipates quickly when I find them in the house though. An effective, eco-friendly ant trap can be made by mixing icing sugar with Borax and leaving it in a shallow container along the path the ants take. It will take a few days to be effective, so be patient. Mixing baking soda with icing sugar is also supposed to work, but I find it to be somewhat slower. Your mileage may vary. Who knows, aspartame might be another effective solution. I have no idea if it qualifies as eco-friendly.

Technorati tags: Ants, Aspartame, Borax

Canadians and Voodoo

2006-08-10T11:55:00.000-04:00

I wrote earlier this year about my meadow anemones aka Canadian anemones which are considered by some to be invasive. Invasive is one of those terms that gets used differently by different people, so I thought I would show before and after photos to help the evaluation. To the left, my clump in June, to the right, the same clump in August.

They have been expanding much more enthusiastically than they did at my last house, which is probably due to the fact that I have been much more pro-active in improving the soil this time around. I've had to start pulling up around the perimeter already, as the anemones have been trying to spread into the brunnera and into the lawn, which is admittedly very patchy at that spot.

I have deliberately planted a number of "spreaders" because tightly packed plantings are part of my "cat management strategy", fully expecting to be replacing them bit by bit over the years. I wanted good coverage quickly. It looks like I may have to consider pulling up and possibly eliminating these anemones sooner than expected.

You may recall the very different problem I was having with my Voodoo stonecrop, that of the smoky purple foliage. Sedum spurium is normally a very quick spreader, although very easy to pull up, so not what most people would consider to be invasive. Most of my seed-grown Voodoos didn't survive the winter and the tiny specimen that did make it wasn't exactly prospering.

As you can see from these June/August photos, it has managed to put on a little weight, so there may be some hope for it after all. It looks like Voodoo is made to order for those people who like their plants on the timid side and if it ever bulks up sufficiently, it might make a good replacement for the more enthusiastic ones that tend to encroach on their neighbours. I do have concerns about its winter hardiness here, so I'll likely take a cutting this fall to overwinter inside as insurance. I'd be curious in knowing how gardeners in warmer zones have fared with this cultivar.

Previous posts on the topic of Canadian anemones and Voodoo sedum

Technorati tags: Anemones, Sedum, Invasive plants

The dirty deed is done

2006-08-09T15:30:00.000-04:00

My greater celandine has been uprooted and bagged. I was absolutely appalled to see how bad the white fly infestation really was! Many of them migrated to the bleeding heart and the royal fern, so daily sprayings are probably going to be part of my routine for a while. *groan* I hope I will not pay too dearly for not noticing this infestation much earlier. I've never had a white fly infestation in more than a single potted plant, so this was quite a shock to my system. Mind you, there are some very happy spiders in my garden whose webs were in the direct line of flight of panicking white flies.

In the photo, you can see the white fly damage on the leaves, which were very sticky from the honeydew produced by the flies. You can also see the vivid orange sap, characteristic of greater celandine and believed by herbalists to be a remedy for warts.

Technorati tags: White flies, Greater celandine

Overwatered containers

2006-08-09T03:42:00.000-04:00

Here is graphic evidence of the results of overwatering on potted begonias. The pots on the left were sheltered under the eaves, the ones on the right got the full brunt of several successive thunderstorms. These pots were planted to be identical and other than the different exposure to rainfall, have had identical conditions.

My hanging begonia has suffered a similar fate. A week of over-zealous watering by my plant-sitter followed by days of heavy rain was extremely hard on them. Normally, my habit of putting wadded newspaper in the bottom of my pots to hold the soil and moisture in is successful, but this year it seems to have caused problems for some of them.

Technorati tags: Begonias, Overwatering, Potted plants

Battling invasives

2006-08-08T12:16:00.000-04:00

Over at the Willow Garden, they're fighting Clematis orientalis and have provided a step-by-step picture guide of how they're doing it. I was particularly intrigued by how they covered the plastic with soil, to make their weed-fighting efforts more esthetic.

Technorati tag: Invasive plants

Garden portraits for August 8

2006-08-08T11:05:00.000-04:00

Now that the earwig population has been reduced to a reasonable level, this much-abused Marcus salvia has put forth a lot of healthy new foliage and even the occasional spire of blooms.

Ladybugs are always welcome at my house. You won't hear "Fly away home" from me!

The humble wax begonia.

Rosemund Cole canna in bloom

Technorati tags: Salvia, Ladybugs, Begonias, Canna

The last straw!

2006-08-08T10:23:00.000-04:00

OK, enough is enough! The greater celandine is going to go, probably today. Leaf and root, it is coming up and getting stuffed unceremoniously into a garbage bag. It won't even get the chance to justify its existence by feeding the compost bin.

Have you ever noticed how you can look at something and not see it? It occurred to me during my morning coffee, after the caffeine had started to kick in and lubricate my brain again, that there were white spots on the greater celandine. (Somebody has really got to invent a snappier name for that plant! Chelidonium majus isn't any friendlier.) I had been staring in that direction for a good 15 minutes without seeing them. So I moved over to take a closer look and discovered - yikes - white flies!

The only good thing about white flies is their colour - an incredibly pure white. The eggs, tucked on the underside of leaves, are almost too small to see, once they hatch, they damage leaves and suck sap, weakening the host plant and inviting infection. Not only that, they exude honeydew, attracting other pests. Yellow sticky traps can be helpful to prevent an infestation from taking hold, but they're not too effective once a population is established.

The decision when I saw them was instantaneous. You could practically hear the snap of the camel's back. White fly can be battled, but it involves spraying insecticidal soap or my favourite spray on both sides of the leaves and repeating twice a week, in case any of the eggs survived. Seeing as the flies tend to take to the air when the foliage is disturbed, it's tricky getting them all. For a treasured plant, it's worth the effort. For one that is hogging too much space and has survived only by virtue of my procrastination, there is no way.

Technorati tags: White flies, Greater celandine

Urban gardening and the fine art of camouflage

2006-08-07T21:50:00.000-04:00

Those of us gardening in restricted spaces face some unusual challenges. When all you have is one small rectangle, it is really heartbreaking to sacrifice any of it to a garden shed.

So you don't. That's when a barbecue comes in handy. Yes, you heard correctly. A barbecue. It is amazing how much stuff you can hide under the skirts of a barbecue cover, particularly if you've only got one propane tank. Like a bag of manure, a compressed bale of potting soil, a garbage bag, various stakes and empty pots.

A folding chair screens the compost "bin" and a chair bedecked with plants provides some distraction from the gas meter and various tools tucked in behind it.

This is a low-budget strategy (OK, so it was a no budget strategy - I'm not willing to put money into patio furnishings right now) but people who are actually willing to spend money can do some very nice things.

So if you've done some garden camouflage you're proud of (beating mine shouldn't be too hard), let me know about it and I'll see if I can post about your solutions or link to them, whatever works best.

Technorati tags: Urban gardening, Camouflage, Screening

Anise hyssop - just because

2006-08-04T14:10:00.000-04:00

Crack cocaine for bees.

Technorati tag: Anise hyssop

Technical difficulties resolved...

2006-08-03T12:12:00.001-04:00

with a new modem and a new "slam", for you technogeeks who would actually understand that. I understand the modem part.

My apologies for the delays, but I haven't been able to get online very often in the last two days, and then usually for about five minutes at most.

Pretty in pink

2006-08-03T12:12:00.000-04:00

Take out your pinking shears, ladies! And men (and other non-sewers), take a look. Pinking shears are scissors with zigzag blades, that cut cloth to a - gasp! - zigzag edge. This lessens fraying, in case anybody was wondering why we bother.

So when somebody many years back was admiring the flowers of the Dianthus genus with their highly serrated petals, it was a natural to label them "pinks". One thing led to another, as often happens, and sooner or later the name for these charming little flowers was popping up on whatever their equivalent of Crayola crayons was. And so the word "pink" migrated from scissors to flowers to colour. (The French also named the colour in question after a flower - "rose".)

Now, not all pinks are actually pink, but most of them are, at least in part. They run the range from white to crimson, with pretty well all the shades in between. Some crazed hybridizer some day will undoubtedly develop an orange pink which will become the must-have plant of the year until everyone discovers that it can't survive a winter in Georgia, let alone Saskatchewan. Sound familiar?

The rest of us are just happy with the ones we have. I only have two kinds in my garden at present, with a third unlikely to survive its transplantation just prior to the full fury of July heat. (Never look a gift plant in the mouth, I always say.) My Chinese pinks are officially annuals, but they will pull through a winter rather nicely if given some protection. Mine even made a desperate attempt to come back for a third year this spring, but they hadn't been sheltered at all and couldn't make it through the vagaries of spring weather in their weakened state. Fortunately my deadheading had been a little sloppy last year, so their children are now growing happily in my pots.

Dianthus barbatus or Sweet Williams are the only species in the genus that are officially biennials. William may be sweet, but he doesn't think much of officialdom and will cheerfully come back a third or fourth or fifth year if he approves of his living conditions. I finally pulled mine out at the last house, because it was mostly white and I needed more colour. William wasn't volunteering to bow out on his own.

I put in a little clump of the Arctic Fire variety of Dianthus deltoides this year. It is a perennial that will come true to seed, but will also bloom itself to death if you let it go. So I sheared mine back after collecting a few seeds, and it is still throwing up the odd little bloom to thank me. It is said to spread well without becoming invasive. I hope that this is true, because its tiny little flowers create a better effect en masse and they've kind of grown on me.

All pinks prefer full sun, but many will get by very happily with somewhat less and sometimes even considerably less. They are delightful, no fuss plants, that seem almost impervious to pests and disease. You can draw your own conclusions, but mine have a standing invitation to return, even if officialdom says their lease has expired.

Technorati tags: Pinks, Dianthus

Technical difficulties today...

2006-08-01T19:55:00.000-04:00

I've spent hours today, first with the phone service provider, then with the Internet service provider, plugging and unplugging phones, moving the modem from one jack to another, swapping phone cords... We're not at the end of it yet, but after many hours of trying, I finally got online at least.

All of which is to say that I hope things are back to normal and this blog back on track tomorrow. My apologies.

Confessions of a messy gardener

2006-07-31T11:30:00.000-04:00

I'm in the middle of the summer doldrums. All through spring I'm very gung-ho and eager to work in the garden. Then summer heat hits.

Not only is muggy weather a natural invitation to laziness, but it's not exactly the best time of the year to be moving plants around either. At least that's the way I rationalize it.

To my significant amazement, I've got several places in my beds that are badly overgrown (after only two years!) and need a substantial decluttering. My problem is that some of the plants I'd be uprooting I would want to save elsewhere. The general messiness has been exacerbated by a week's vacation followed by a several-day visit by an old friend I hadn't seen for over 20 years. It goes without saying that the garden was neglected. Mind you, the vacation and the visit were wonderful, so I guess it was worth it.

I won't bore you - and embarass myself - with a list of all the things that need tending to. But I do believe I have come to a decision.

I don't need to impress anybody, so I won't try. I'll pull the occasional excess plant, but I'll wait for cooler days to start juggling, so that poor Captain Kirk hosta is likely to stay overwhelmed for a while. After all, the garden is for my enjoyment, so as long as it's not a question of the plants' health, I'll resist the urge to pretend I'm a gardening diva and just enjoy it, messy as it is.

Come fall, I'll make room in my "composting can" by spreading all the usable stuff, and then fill it up with the rejects from the beds. This of course makes another wonderful excuse not to take action now: "The compost can is too full! Where would I pile all that stuff?"

Here's to the lazy, crazy, hazy days of summer and iced coffee on the patio!

Technorati tag: Garden maintenance
(or not)

Filling in the gaps

2006-07-29T00:17:00.000-04:00

Sometimes an entire flower bed refuses to cooperate. I've got one of those this year. This time last year it was a joyful riot of annuals, roses and lilies. The roses and lilies are still there, but nothing much else has gone according to plan. The bee balm has actually shrunk compared to last year, and is sick and chewed up. Perennials I've put in are still too small to put on much of a display and several have been fighting the plague of earwigs that I didn't recognize until too late. (Hey, I'd go out with a flashlight and I wouldn't see them...) The annuals didn't reseed because of the mulch I'd laid down, so I started some in containers to transplant. A little on the late side. When I did put them in, the earwigs chewed most of them down.

On top of it all, I've had to shelve my expansion plans, seeing as the probability of a move next year is very high. There's no point in putting in a bunch of perennials that won't hit their stride until I've been gone for two years, especially not knowing if the next owner would even keep them.

Although individual elements have been enchanting me, the bare patches were really getting on my nerves. So I succumbed to temptation some time back and came home with three large coleus plants. I generally prefer to seed my annuals, but it was way too late to start over. Two of them went into the ground, the other stayed in a pot so I could perch it on a stepping stone. An added benefit is that they have large leaves, adding very nicely to the texture of the garden as well. This particular bed is still far from being an example of good garden design, but it has perked up somewhat and a little shuffling of plants in a more propitious season should help a lot.

I was a wee bit concerned that the coleuses would find it hard going in the hot afternoon sun with the added heat radiation from the parking lot, but so far they're doing pretty well, although they do require a little more water than their neighbours (who rarely get any supplemental water) and I have had to trim off a few leaves that were browning under the relentless sun. All in all, these are minor irritations, and I am pleased enough that I'll likely take cuttings to bring inside for the winter.

Technorati tags: Coleus, Potted plants

Leaves and garden design

2006-07-27T07:00:00.000-04:00

An intriguing new (for me) idea in garden design has been changing the way I look at my garden, and seems to be making a long-term change in the way I will choose my plants in the future. I learned a long time ago to think about the different heights of my plants, and their bloom times and colour. Then I got a little more sophisticated and I started thinking about playing up the contrasts in the size and shape of plants and the size and shapes and colours of their leaves. Ferns and hostas are a natural combination in this department with the broad, bold leaves of the hostas contrasting so nicely with the tiny, lacy leaves of most ferns.

But though I had paid lip service to the idea of varying leaf sizes, I realized after reading a posting in a forum some time back that I spent much more time looking at leaf shape and colour than I did at size and that my garden was indeed chock full of plants with small leaves - long, slender ones, finely dissected ones, tear-shaped ones, but - with the exception of a couple of hostas - all small ones.

For those of us who live in more northerly areas, this is an easy situation to fall into. There just aren't many large-leafed plants that grow naturally or easily around here. Gunneras, bananas and taros just don't figure in the natural flora. And that's a pity. Because the more I mull it over and the more I stare at my gardens, the more I realize that all those small leaves contribute to an overly busy, cluttered effect. What I really need is a lot more large-leafed plants to provide a break from all the fine details and give my garden a better balance.

In honour of this new-found wisdom, I went out and bought a couple of bergenias to replace some ground covers and chose a trio of coleus with huge leaves to fill in the gaps in my front bed. I will also be eyeing some of my under-performing plants and contemplating replacing them with some of the bigger hostas. Those cannas may move out of the pots and into the beds (yes, I know, this isn't novel but I'd never thought about it before as a leaf issue) and who knows, maybe a rhubarb patch in the ornamental border might be an idea worth playing with.

On the other hand, that datura may have nice big leaves, but I do think it's time to make a little less room for it nonetheless. Where did my secateurs go?

Technorati tag: Garden design

Let me introduce you to balsam

2006-07-25T12:55:00.000-04:00

Impatiens balsamina, also known as balsam, is a versatile and easy-to-grow little annual that doesn't seem to get talked about very much. Sharing many of the characteristics of the other impatiens plants, such as exploding seed pods and easy germination, it will tolerate more sun than the more commonly available impatiens. Commercially available seeds are normally for the double variety but I have the single variety because the seeds were given to me. In the picture to the right you can see the resemblance of the flowers to jewelweed or Himalayan balsam. Watching bumblebees squeeze their fuzzy bulk all the way into the orchid-like bloom in search of pollen is one of those forms of entertainment that only gardeners seem to appreciate.

The plants in the picture are relatively young, but given a fair bit of sun and adequate moisture, they will grow to be quite bushy. On the other hand, I find balsam to be a great filler in shady and semi-shady areas, where they tend to stay narrow and fill in little gaps around developing perennials quite nicely. They will self-seed to some extent, but excess seedlings are easily removed. The seeds will also keep for years in cool dry conditions and have a very high germination rate.

Ideal conditions would be damp, rich soil in a partly shaded environment. They tend to wilt under intense sun, but will spring back once the sun has left them. Powdery mildew can be a bit of a problem later in the season, so care should be taken to water the soil rather than the leaves. I would say to leave good air circulation around them, but seeing as I myself pack my beds ridiculously tight, I can assure you that they will adapt to tight living quarters.

Technorati tag: Balsam

Lily Parade - Part 6

2006-07-24T16:18:00.000-04:00

You leave for a week and the lilies have a party!

Girosa lilies are spectacular!

Golden Stargazer

Freak Stargazer with only four petals

Snow Queen Easter lily

Dizzy Oriental lily

My white Stargazer lilies always have stained petals

Technorati tag: Lilies

Growing luscious begonias

2006-07-24T15:42:00.000-04:00

Tuberous begonias are a great friend to shade gardeners who want a splash of bright colour in the shade all summer long. In spite of the fact the tubers have to be stored overwinter, I just can't resist trying to grow them. Over the years I've managed to make just about every mistake in the book with these babies, so I was flattered no end when Blackswamp_Girl asked me for my secret for growing them so large and healthy. Flattery will get you everywhere with me...

First, at the risk of appearing obvious, buy good tubers. Grocery store stock does not qualify. I got mine this year from Botanus, which is a great source but only available to Canadians. They probably deserve most of the credit for my success this year.

Second, good soil. I mix a plain Jane potting mix (mostly peat) with bagged manure to provide extra nutrients.

Third, start them early for longer colour. March isn't too early in my opinion. They start well and easily inside with no extra lighting needed in a northeast window and then they are just about ready to bloom when they go outside.

Fourth, don't overwater! My non-gardening son who tended my plants while I was gone was so afraid of things dying in the heat that he was overgenerous with the water. The begonias suffered visibly from this excess of love as you can see in this photo, although most of the potted plants didn't much mind. Earlier in the season identical begonias in identical pots were growing quite differently, with the ones under the eaves doing better in their dryer location.

Fifth, don't attempt winter storage in a hot location. Mine come through the winter just fine in the pots I grew them in outside, but last winter the heat of the furnace room killed them. Normal room temperature or a little cooler has always worked well for me, but excessive heat is obviously a no-no.

Why is it that the path to successful gardening is littered with so many unsuccessful attempts? You know the saying: "Good judgment comes from experience. Experience comes from bad judgment." I'm offering the results of my bad judgment in the hopes that they might provide you with a short-cut in the process. And because Blackswamp_Girl is deft with her flattery.

Technorati tag: Begonias

Vacation time

2006-07-14T12:00:00.000-04:00

I'm taking a week off for a real vacation. No computer, no garden, no house, no offspring, no responsibilities. Hope you're having a great summer, and I'll be blogging again once I'm back.

The arborist returns to the scene of the crime

2006-07-13T16:15:00.000-04:00

That's actually a bit of wishful thinking on my part. It was his boss, somebody below the manager, but above the rank and file. A foreman, I suppose.

He was a pleasant young man and was properly contrite. He did offer to replace some plants, but I didn't really see much point to that. They're all going to come back, they're just kind of battered. What I've lost here is not the plants, but some of the enjoyment of the beds for the rest of the year.

So out came his secateurs to trim back the damaged parts. Now he's off to the garden centres to buy a number of stakes to tie up all my leaning towers of Pisa so they don't break off in the next rain. Tomorrow he'll be backto install them. What I really wanted was to have my garden back the way it was before, but of course he can't give me that, and I wasn't foolish enough to ask for it. He did give me a sympathetic ear to complain into and a willingness to do what he could to make amends, which is about as much as I could hope for. With a compliment for the yard in passing, which was really good psychology and maybe even sincere.

Since the first shock of this morning has worn off, I've realized that they trimmed back a lot of the branches that overhung the yard, reducing the amount of shade I'll be getting in the back. The Jack Frost brunnera is going to get quite a shock, as it's going to be exposed to more midday sun than before. And it will be a challenge to find a new place to put the hummingbird feeder where it doesn't cook in the sun. I had a lovely shady place for it, hanging from a branch out of reach of the cats, but I'm not sure there's any appropriate place left.

On the upside, the lilies (those that didn't get broken off, anyway) and the viburnum will doubtless appreciate the extra dose of solar energy. It's an ill wind that blows nobody good.

Now, back to our regularly scheduled programming... This blog wasn't set up as a place to vent, but I have to admit, it does help. Hopefully, I won't have anything to vent about again for a long, long time.

Technorati tag: Arborists

Victim of a hit and run arborist

2006-07-13T11:19:00.000-04:00

A tree care service was out this morning removing dying pines and trimming dangerous branches on the common property. Unfortunately one of those trees overhangs my property and my largest perennial bed was hit with Weapons of Horticultural Destruction. My snowball viburnum was broken off nearly to the ground, lilies were broken and flattened, Siberian irises transformed into ground cover...

The workers took no protective measures, nor did they advise me ahead of time so that I could. Worst of all, they removed the branches from my property and left without informing me or even closing the gate! Need I add they weren't authorized to come in my yard?

I've contacted the property manager (had to leave a voice mail) and the arborist service. Fortunately I'd seen their truck, so I knew who to complain to. The manager is supposed to phone me back. At least the receptionist was pleasant.

There are more pictures here. They aren't good, but I needed documentation.

Why oh why do I keep assuming that people will act like professionals and do their jobs properly? I should have been out there making a pain of myself as soon as I heard the saws.

To be continued...

Technorati tag: Arborists

Eye candy (complete with peanuts)

2006-07-13T09:40:00.000-04:00

The Begonia pendula in the wall urn reminds me of fireworks, well-urned praise indeed!

Begonias and friends.

First bloom on self-sown Chinese pinks.

Peanut plant courtesy of your friendly neighbourhood squirrel!

Euphorbia milii blooms

Technorati tags: Begonias, Pinks, Peanuts, Crown of thorns

Saving seeds

2006-07-12T20:25:00.000-04:00

The season is upon us again: harvest time.

For those of us not fortunate enough to have the room and conditions for a vegetable garden, we are talking about a harvest of seeds. Picky people are already thinking, "But seed-harvesting season lasts from spring through to late fall, depending on the plant in question." The picky people are right. But it's on my mind right now, because a number of my perennials are finishing their season of blooming, meaning that I am collecting seeds. For me, it is primarily a form of insurance, seeing as I don't have room for expansion.

So without further ado, here is a quick primer on how to harvest and save seeds. Bear in mind that there are exceptions to pretty well everything I'm going to say here, but these steps will work for the vast majority of seeds.

1. Seed pods are ready to be picked when they are turning brown and looking a little dry. If you wait until they split, you may lose the seeds inside, except for those pods thoughtful enough to open at the top and then wait for you to turn up, like poppies, rose campion and Jacob's ladder. Some nasties, like daturas and impatiens, will split when the pod is still quite green, so it is sometimes necessary to put something over the seed pod, like the foot cut off of a pair of pantyhose, to catch the seeds. This is quite effective, both at catching datura seeds and making your neighbours think you have totally lost it. The sight of a large plant draped in amputated panty hose feet is quite striking in the midst of an ornamental border. The pods on impatiens can be very gently squeezed and if they are ready, they will spring open and eject the seeds, so be prepared to catch them. As a general rule, seeds are ripe enough to harvest if they are turning dark. If they are white or light green and juicy looking, it's not yet time.

2. The harvested seed should be left to dry for a week or two in open containers at room temperature. If they haven't been sufficiently dried, they will tend to go mouldy in storage. Not good. An out-of-the-way place is obviously best. You don't want kids or pets (or let's face it, yourself) to scatter them on you. And do I have to say that identifying the seeds in some way is also a good idea? You can mark it directly on disposable containers, or write it on a piece of masking tape stuck on the side or even just throw in a slip of paper, but do write it down. When you remember the seeds hiding on the top of your bookcase in mid-December, you will not be able to remember which one is which in most cases. Trust me on this one.

3. I then put the dried seeds in homemade envelopes made by folding squares of paper and taping down the sides. Templates for these can be found all over the internet, but really, the shape doesn't matter very much. As long as it works. It's an extremely good idea to identify the seeds on the envelope and a very good idea to note the year they were harvested. Seeds can also be stored in small air-tight containers like film containers, but then you must be VERY sure they are dry enough. My little envelopes then go in a rectangular plastic container with an airtight lid I keep at the back of the fridge. There are very few seeds that require freezing, and considerably more that will be killed by it (tropicals and tender annuals generally), so putting them in the freezer is not recommended as a general rule. Storage in the fridge will keep most seeds viable for a number of years. I am still getting good germination from some seeds that are five and six years old, while other conk out after two or three. Don't use silica gel to keep them dry; it'll suck the life right out of them.

Exceptions to keep in mind: Peas and some other kinds of seeds turn tan or white, not dark. Tree seeds do not do well in dry storage at all, but I'll let you look up storage methods as I don't have any direct experience. Some seeds will keep quite nicely at room temperature for astonishing lengths of time, but these same seeds will generally do well in the fridge too. Some seeds need to be sown fresh, but these are less common plants generally grown by more advanced gardeners.

Technorati tag: Seeds

You learn something new every day

2006-07-11T08:54:00.000-04:00

Earwigs, it would appear, in addition to their diet of rotting vegetable matter and any seedlings I particularly prize, are also inordinately fond of pollen.

I had never come across this fact in any of my reading, but as I was conducting my nocturnal earwig/slug raids, I couldn't help but noticing that I would keep finding them in the dead center of my Becky daisies.

My suspicions were confirmed when I turned my attention to my lilies. There, on each pollen-bearing anther, was one very happy little earwig. I didn't think to take a picture at the time, and when I returned the next night with my camera, the pantry was apparently pretty picked over, but I still managed to find one malfeasant picking at the leavings.

Back inside, I googled "earwigs pollen" and discovered that yes, indeed, earwigs are known for their pollen-eating habits, which are disruptive primarily to hybridizers.

About the only difference this makes to me as a gardener who doesn't dabble in hybridizing is that I have to resist the urge to spray them right on the flowers. While leaves hold up for the most part quite well under the ammonia/soap spray, petals take to it much less kindly. So it's best to find a way to knock them into a bowl instead, which is a little more difficult when holding a flashlight. On the other hand the little beasties will often hide out in any available crevices of flowers such as lilies and roses for the day, making this a prime spot to catch them during day-time raids.

Technorati tags: Earwigs, Pollen

Still needing your help

2006-07-10T16:02:00.000-04:00

I have spent a ridiculous amount of time today trying to chase down the source of those pop-ups, without any real success, by adding possible sources on a dummy website. I'm now going to start trying to find them by eliminating them here, but this is a little trickier. They don't appear every time, so I really need you to drop me a quick comment or email if you do notice one. If you do, that means my most recent deletion was not the culprit.

Thanks again and I apologize for this intrusion into the normal subject matter of this blog.

Technorati tag: Pop-ups

They warned me... updated

2006-07-10T10:33:00.000-04:00

...but did I listen?? Noooooooo!

Creeping Jenny will invade the lawn, said they. Whatever, thought I.

In previous years I had no problem, as my former back yard had no grass, and I'd just give it a haircut now and again when it spread too far on the patio. Last year it was not a problem, as I had it in a dry little corner that dampened its enthusiasm. (Lovely little gardening paradox there, but I'll let you chew on it without any further help.) Then I moved it out from under the overhang and the games began.

OK, so this is an overdramatization. I watched it spread into the lawn for at least a week or two before I cared enough to do something about it. At that point some of the runners were easily extending a good 12 inches into the lawn. Feeling a little sheepish at my inaction, I picked up a standard pair of household scissors, cut along the dotted line and easily pulled up all the little runners that were starting to root in the lawn. Reports of its invasiveness are greatly exaggerated.

Mind you, if I were gardening on an acre or two and had fifteen large beds to maintain, I would probably have a very different attitude. Then I would definitely avoid planting creeping Jenny near grass. But it would still be lovely along a retaining wall or tucked into containers.

And this is one of the nice things about Lysimachia nummularia aka moneywort aka creeping Jenny. If you grow a patch or two in your garden, it is an easy matter to take a handful or two and plant it in containers as a trailing plant. In mid-summer, you'll get lovely little yellow flowers as a bonus. I didn't do too much container-stuffing this year, as my patch was very small, but next year I'll likely do quite a bit more. For now, I've underplanted my potted royal fern with creeping Jenny and Johnny-jump-ups. I'll post a picture later in the season when more of it is dripping over the sides.

My original plant came from cuttings taken in the woods, as this is a native species. It does best in partial shade; too much sun tends to dry it out and not enough sun makes for fewer flowers. Mine doesn't get quite enough, but I can live with fewer flowers. The cultivar normally sold in garden centres, L. nummularia 'Aurea', has golden leaves, requires more sun because it has less chlorophyll, and is less vigorous in its growth. It would probably be a little easier to control.

UpdateI erred in calling Lysimachia nummularia a native plant. Please read Xris's comment for correction and further info.

Technorati tag: Creeping Jenny

Don't fence me in!

2006-07-08T13:26:00.000-04:00

You may recall the story of my resurrected Datura meteloides, the indomitable survivor that survived a Zone 4 winter. I generally just cut off my annuals at the soil level and leave the roots to rot and add extra organic material to the soil. This root refused to rot.

I really hadn't been planning on growing datura this year, because it ran rampant over all the other residents of this bed last year, which some of them did not appreciate. But I couldn't say no to that kind of grit, so I left it. The problem is, there's now a young PG hydrangea smack dab in the middle of the bed and an aggressive datura coming at it from behind can't possibly be good for it.

So in the spirit of "good fences make good neighbours,"I put in a fence. (Robert Frost must turn over in his grave every time that line is quoted, as everybody always misses the whole point. But this is not a poetry blog, so I'll leave it there.) I took a section of the same kind of wire fencing that is protecting my beds from dogs and delivery boys and drove it into the ground in front of the datura which was already starting to overwhelm the PG. Because of the size of daturas, I used the tallest kind I could find.

A little trimming of spare branches and voilà! Much easier and probably much more effective than staking. I may have to add another section later in the season, but it looks to me like it's going to work. These kids might be able to play together nicely after all.

Technorati tags: Datura, Staking

I need your help!

2006-07-08T12:02:00.000-04:00

I have noticed to my horror that when I access my blog in Internet Explorer (which I seldom do - I prefer Firefox), I sometimes get pop-up ads, despite a blocker! I loathe pop-ups and I certainly don't want them on my website.

My problem is I don't know where they're coming from. I was under the distinct impression that Adsense doesn't use pop-ups. As far as I know, the other third-party add-ons I use don't use them either.

I'm determined to track down the source and eliminate it, so if any of you noticed when this started (and have retained the fact), I'd appreciate knowing, because that could help me find the culprit and eliminate it. You can post a comment here or email me.

Failing that, I'll have to eliminate the possible offenders one at a time and find out what works, so letting me know when they disappear would also be very helpful.

Thanks a lot.

Technorati tag: Pop-ups

Lily Parade - Part 5

2006-07-07T11:45:00.000-04:00

Well, I couldn't leave a picture of a spider and a slug at the top of the page for very long, now could I? ;o) But seeing as you're here, do check it out if you're not too squeamish. It really was quite cool, particularly if you're not fond of slugs.

My very first trumpet lily started opening yesterday and was fully deployed by this morning. I love the peachy orange colour, but you'd already guessed that I have a weakness for orange flowers, hadn't you? The fragrance is not as nice as a longiflorum, but definitely better than an Oriental. In my humble opinion.

Technorati tag: Lilies

Slug haters of the world, rejoice!

2006-07-07T11:25:00.000-04:00

We are not alone in this war! But I must confess to some amazement when I spotted this spider and its hapless victim in the back bed yesterday morning. How on earth the spider managed to haul the slug to the centre of the web is beyond me.

By contrast, the slugs I sprayed with ammonia the night before now look like bird droppings on the hosta. For those who missed it, I mix one part ammonia to nine parts water and add a good squirt of dish detergent before heading out at night with the spray bottle and a flashlight. The ammonia dispatches slugs, and the soap is fatal to earwigs. Seeing as you will often find them on the same plants, it's handy to have a double-barreled weapon.

I also use Safer's Slug and Snail Bait, a garden and pet-friendly slug bait containing ferric phosphate, a substance toxic only to slugs and snails. I believe it goes by the name Sluggo in the States.

Other common ways of battling slugs, which I do use from time to time, are crushed eggshells or diatomaceous earth placed on the soil around plants that slugs are fond of. Both work by piercing the slugs' skin, causing them to dehydrate, although I don't think even slugs are stupid enough to try crawling across the eggshells. This is of limited value if the slugs are hiding in the soil inside your circle of eggshells. Used coffee grounds are somewhat helpful as a deterrent, but liquid coffee is apparently better, as I posted a couple of days ago.

Still, as you go to war against the slugs, it is nice to know that you've got allies out there, isn't it?

Technorati tag: Slugs, Spiders

Morning on the patio

2006-07-06T10:39:00.000-04:00

It makes me happy every time I look out and see this. Coffee in hand, I head out to start my day and listen to the noisy delight of the sparrow family in my neighbour's birdhouse.

Technorati tag: Morning light

Still blooming after all this time!

2006-07-06T10:32:00.000-04:00

This trooper has now been blooming for two months non-stop. Granted, after the first flush, there are fewer blooms, but secondary stalks keep producing new buds. There are still some unopened buds waiting for their turn. I've been very pleased with the performance of Polemonium 'Bressingham Purple'. Although shorter in height than P. caeruleum, one of its parents, it has just as long a bloom time, which I was a bit concerned about when I picked it up on a whim.

Not to be outdone, even the bleeding heart has managed to squeeze out one last drop, as these new blooms show. Unlike the Jacob's ladder, it truly is on its last beat. Not that I'm criticizing. It's been a great run.

Technorati tag: Jacob's ladder, Bleeding heart