Gardening Question of the Day for Tuesday, December 11, 2007

(Via Gardening Question of the Day (from the Old Farmer's Almanac))

Posted by admin to Uncategorized on 2007-12-10, 20:00:00

What is the best way to get rid of thistles? (answer).

From The Old Farmer's Almanac.

Round 2–ICE

(Via Girl Gone Gardening)

Posted by admin to garden, girlgonegardening, seeds, trees, weather on 2007-12-10, 19:11:00

34*, 70% humidity, ESE 3 mph wind, Haze, Freezing Rain Advisory Sunday's round of ice had a laugh at my expense as I slipped, arms flailing, belongings flying in all directions, in a quite comical landing. A twisted ankle now haunts me. The ice storm didn't even bother to make things pretty either. There was not magically sparkling trees, no seed heads captured in frozen pearls to dangle in the

The Wild Garden

(Via Snappy's Gardens Blog)

Posted by admin to before, garden, new house on 2007-12-10, 15:53:00




This was the First day photos of the Wild Garden. Nature had been left to run amok with brambles, fireweed, grasses, and various weeds. The fence had been pulled down by numerous brambles clambering over, under, and in between fence posts.
A washing line sits amidst all the weeds, and the only evidence I saw of a gardener were some geranium flowers, and an enormous Viburnum with blue berrys and pink flower buds shaped like pink stars.
I thought I saw one edge of a raised border, but did not know for sure what lay beneath the neglected gardens. The tall hedges and orange sickly fir trees overlooked the back garden.
The paving stones were barely visible and caked in mud and lichen. It was quite damp underfoot.
I spent a great deal of time walking back and forth. Counting twenty steps from the backdoor ro the back fence, fourteen steps across from one fence to the delapidated one.
The moving day meant moving between the flat and the house. Unloading boxes then returning to the flat for more.
I unpacked a few things and the garden sat waiting. I whispered to the brambles enjoy your last day growing wild :)

Xmas Light Don’ts and Do’s

(Via grow this)

Posted by admin to Noel, Xmas lights, creche, santa on 2007-12-10, 14:51:00

“Power, time, gravity, love. The forces that really kick ass are all invisible.”
David Mitchell, Cloud Atlas

To that list of invisible forces, add Xmas Spirit. After dinner one night last week, we went driving through the local “Candy Cane Lane” – blocks of insane people who conspire to put up more Xmas lights than their neighbors. Upon passing the 1.5 houses per block that has no lights, the stock joke used to be, that’s where the Jews live. Now, in a sign of the changing demographic on the not-so-new millennium, it’s either the Jews or the Muslims.

Anyway, driving through this fresh hell after dinner out one recent evening, I was subjected to K’s punchline: “Jeee-sus, Maaa-ry, and Joe-sef!” every time we passed a home with a crèche with JM&J up in lights on their front lawn. Which is bad enough on its own, but it’s worse in a six square block slow ride, a parade of autos with their lights out, when you’re having second thoughts about the second and third cups of wine and coffee for dinner.

But what’s worse, is putting Santa in the crèche scene. It looks pathetic: just don’t do it. Either make a stand for keeping Christ in Xmas or for washing him aside in a flood of tired generic “season’s greetings” from inflated snowman. But, Jesus Christ, stop having Santa kneel, cap-less, in line behind a shepherd or Balthazar, or Disney character.

I wonder what happened centuries ago as neighborhoods became more diverse. Did pagans and druids and what-not once campaign through the candy cane lanes of their pagan neighborhoods to keep Christ out of Winter Solstice?

Upon returning home mildly dazed by the lights, or by the high blood sugar after two mini-éclairs, or just simply relieved to make it, we decided to make our own Xmas light sign, and we opted for non-religious to avoid offending unbelievers, or as they prefer to be called, the “differently faithful.”

It took K all day, including a trip to three stores that weren’t Wal*Mart™ before he found the makings of the “L”. With due respect to religious parochialism, there’s something to be said for celebrating a generic Xmas where we wish one another peace on earth.

(Don’t make me spoil the joke by telling you. Hint: it’s in French.)

Only Agapanthus could grow and flower here

(Via Gardening Tips 'n' Ideas)

Posted by admin to Bulbs, Corms, Rhizomes & Tubers on 2007-12-10, 14:27:02

agapanthus-flower.jpg
Growing agapanthus must be the best test of a gardening green-thumb. For if you can't grow this plant - taking into consideration that others nearby can - then you may want to consider finding a new hobby.

Just before the start of spring I dug up all my agapanthus bulbs and moved them to another part of the garden where nothing else would grow. Being the start of summer, they're now flowering their heads off and looking very healthy.

Although I was able to fit most of my agapanthi (is that a word?) into their new location I had a few spare and so tossed them into the pruning pile. There they would sit until I finally found time to compost them with the other garden refuse.

Not content with their new habitat, these bulbs began to grow and are now in the process of producing flowers - albeit on top of a rubbish heap! Only agapanthus could grow and flower here.

Apart from any soil that was still attached to their root system they have basically grown in air. They've had no water, apart from natural rainfall, and they've been given absolutely no fertilisers, no TLC and certainly no attention whatsoever. Yet they're flourishing.

Could this be the plant to end all plants? Certainly, if it were to escape into our native vegetation it could become an environmentalist's worst nightmare. But, if you're like me with a garden bed where every previous plant has died or failed then this could be your answer.

And you're not limited by colour either. Traditionally agapanthus flowers have been predominantly blue but now they travail the blue to purple hues bookended by the darker Black Pantha. Then the complete showstopping white can be mixed and matched and to add another dimension to your garden beds is the dwarfing varieties.

Sure, these are 'grandma plants' ...the type of plants you remember growing in her garden during your childhood years. And while you struggle to quantify the time period that's elapsed, you realise they've been around for awhile. Are they going to disappear off our landscape radars in the near future?

Not likely. Certainly not if they can survive the inhospitable rubbish heaps we discard them on.

I Love And Hate Gardening

(Via Home and Family: Gardening Articles from EzineArticles.com)

Posted by admin to Uncategorized on 2007-12-10, 13:59:45

I have this problem with gardening - I love it, but I also hate it. I don't know what is wrong with me. How can I love something so much, but hate it as well? Let me give you some examples, so you can see just how bizarre my thinking can be.

A Look At Composting and Composting Toilets

(Via Home and Family: Gardening Articles from EzineArticles.com)

Posted by admin to Uncategorized on 2007-12-10, 11:19:35

Sometimes known as biological toilets and waterless toilets, composting toilet systems are useful when there is an urgent necessity to control the composting of toilet paper, food wastes and excrement. Composting toilet is different from the septic system because a composting toilet system is depended on conditions of unsaturated level such as the materials cannot be immersed completely in water. When operating to its full capacity, composting toilet is competent to easily break down the waste into somewhere about 10 to 30 percent of its actual volume.

Caring for Orchids - Where Do I Cut the Flower Spike When the Blooms are Finished?

(Via Plant Care)

Posted by admin to Indoor Color, Plants - General, orchids on 2007-12-10, 10:15:35

With the popularity of orchids found in about every garden center today, this question is becoming more common. Most likely this question is being asked of the Phalaenopsis Moth Orchid or Denbrobium. (...)

Musky Bananas?

(Via An Iowa Garden)

Posted by admin to Uncategorized on 2007-12-10, 07:38:00

Muscari macrocarpum is ... well, odd. Rather than the usual round purple flowers of most of the other muscari (hence, the common name grape hyacinths), this species has flowers which start out greyish-purple, changing to bright yellow, and looking more like a little bunch of bananas. My bulbs are specifically the cultivar 'Golden Fragrance', brought to the commercial market by the Dutch bulb growers a few years ago; at first rather pricey, it is now down to about a dollar a bulb. It is said by some to smell like ripe grapes in the sun; others say like ripe bananas... to me it has a faint sweet smell reminiscent of nothing in particular (I think my nose has no imagination or skill). The genus muscari is endemic the the area around the Mediterranean and up through Turkey into the Caucasus; the muscari page of the Pacific Bulb Society states that this particular species grows in the warmer, more southern range of the genus, in SW Turkey through the Aegean to Crete. Thus, it is rated as somewhat tender (some say zone 7), but three Iowa winters (5a) have not ruffled its feathers. It's also said to be frost sensitive, but I've not noted that, either. I may have unwittingly saved my plants from late spring frost damage by planting the bulbs in a spot that's a bit too shady, so the growth is retarded a little in the early spring. In nature, Muscari macrocarpum grows on rocky, sunny, rather dry cliffs. The downside to my bulb placement is that my plants are a little floppy and probably bloom a little less profusely than they might have in full sun. This next summer when the foliage dies down, I may dig up the bulbs (which are surprisingly large, being about the size of a tulip bulb) and move them to a spot on a sunny slope. I have read they have rather long roots, so I may try it with just one of my three bulbs... these are the same three bulbs I started out with, as this muscaris (in contrast with many of its brethren in the genus) is very slow to multiply, which is the reason it is somewhat more expensive than the various grape hyacinth types of muscari. The foliage of Golden Fragrance is greyish green and rather daffodil-like.
If you don't already grow this bulb, it is worth obtaining for its unique coloration... then you can tell me what you think it smells like.
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Back Online

(Via Snappy's Gardens Blog)

Posted by admin to garden, hyacinths, new house on 2007-12-10, 06:26:00

One of my new plants flowering in the Kitchen A Blue Hyacinth. It smells like a cross between lavender and candy sticks.I bought one pink hyacinth bulb, and the Blue bulb. I still have bulbs to bring from the flat that are sat in a dark cupboard...
First post for twelve days.I have been busy moving, unpacking a few boxes, but mostly doing the Back garden. Everyone at work seem suprised that I can spend all my time in the Garden when its been wet, and cold...
The winter project continues. So much to blog about. I have photographed my progress from day one untill now. There has been work too in between the renovation, plant shopping, and transforming the garden.
I'm back online!