I am broken down, and so is the tiller. Not a very good start for what appears to be an early spring. And yet these warming days and unpredictable nights are lovely, as is Mt. Baldy when he peeks out of the clouds. "Springtime in the Rockies" is the old song that runs in my head now.; so very welcome after all the grey skies of a northern Rockies winter.
So, what to do? I can at least get the tomatoes started, and some lettuce and peas outside. I soak the peas between damp paper towels until they have sent out their little first root, then they do not have to stay in the cold ground so long before sprouting. They germinate freely this way/
There is so much clean-up still to be done; shredding and moving compost, digging what must be done by hand, and if the tiller is not back soon, then finding another to rent or borrow, for I cannot do it all by hand anymore. I hate to admit it, but the years are taking their toll even though I beat them back with the biggest stick I can wield!
On touring the garden, I find that spring is here, ready or not, for the daffodils are up, the lilacs are budding, and the forsythia, in its fourth year, is covered from head to toe with bright yellow blooms! How I have waited for this forsythia to find its place and begin to really perform.
In my life I have planted too many forsythias and too many roses, and then moved on, leaving them for someone else to enjoy. This is not a bad thing to do. Giving, even of plant life, is what we should be doing, and so I look back and admire that string of roses and forsythia; after all, what can one do with one’s favorite plants except plant them, even when it takes several years for them to become truly worthwhile, and when you already know the gardener is a gypsy, a basically incompatible situation.
I had a woman bring m4e her house plants recently; a sorry lot, though basically healthy. At the encouragement of her husband she had decided to find them a better home. I know the feeling; sometimes it is better to remove one source of endless guilt when life becomes too demanding. I am happy to report that each one is doing well and that a beautifully planted basket is flourishing to the point where it must be separated. It has a Dracena, a small red striped one, very good looking among the pothos and ivy. I just gave a friend a Dracena that is fully seven feet tall, for her new high-ceilinged house. So it seems that I am launched on another several years of growing this new Dracena through all its interesting stages.
Life is full and, shall I say, rewarding? Even though sometimes the tiller breaks down and is not ready for spring plowing (in 35 years, this is not the first time this has happened) and even though I am not at my own usual 100% level, but only somewhere near. Spring and new growth, and help from my friends. What can be better in this life?
Thursday, March 29, 2007
Tuesday, March 06, 2007
A View From My Garden
During our last storm I stood in the main corridor of the hospital, IV pump by my side, and watched the wind blow. Just outside, framed by the corridor window, grows a European white birch (Betula pendula) of size and proportions I have seldom seen. It is truly a perfectly beautiful tree.
The IV pump? Simply the result of an overly stubborn nature which managed to turn a minor infection into a major pneumonic crisis. Thus a stay in our hospital and an attachment to an IV pump following me in unphased devotion wherever I went. Thanks to the skilled people at our hospital and to miraculous antibiotics, I am home now and on the mend. A hard lesson learned.
But on that dark late afternoon as I watched the white birch dance with the wind, I was reminded again of how little intercession on our part it takes to make a happy and healthy plant. This European import is a good example.
I don't know who planted it or when. I asked around a bit but so far have no answers. I also cannot orient myself in the new hospital so that I can say for sure what its relationship to the old core buildings was. But however it happened, the tree was planted where it stands, a number of years ago judging by its size, and for better or worse, there it has grown into a nearly perfect specimen; the sort of tree gardeners and landscapers dream about.
Now, the new buildings have grown up around it; suddenly changing its habitat radically and requiring in maturity that it make some new adaptations. If I study a map of the new construction, I see that it has always been sheltered from the northeast, and that the major change in the white birch's world is that it is now partially shaded to the southwest by the large and tall new main entrance. During the time I was there, there was also a pipeline being laid beside it, to serve the new whirlpool in Physical Therapy. A small bobcat and another small tractor were doing the work, even in the blowing rain and snow, and seemed to practice careful consideration for the tree, as nearly as possible.
You see, they are our victims, really, these imported and nursery plants of all kinds. They are not allowed to make any sort of decisions as to where or under what conditions they will grow. We put them there, they are expected to do well, and when they do very well, as has this dancing black and white poem to what a European white birch should be, then we tend to take them for granted. Some of the very most important decisions we make in this life are concerned with where trees are planted.
Did some of the same caring hospital staff who took such good care of me, who provided me with just the exact conditions I needed for my continued welfare, did they also think of the welfare of the white birch? It stood outside the Emergency Department and Radiology before, now it graces Physical Therapy and the wing of administrative offices. It would seem it has been promoted. Except there is this question about that southwest exposure; so important to our northern plants; providing that last ounce of sunlight when the dreary long winters are upon us. Underground there is the new pipeline and a matter of torn roots to replace and to mend.
Still, the birch dances with the wind, and shakes off the driving sleet and rain with a practiced shrug. Without a shred of self pity, with no complaint, it takes the next slice of life it has been handed and goes to work on the necessary adaptations. A new pipeline, a new two-story building, it is all the same to the birch. And so it dances. And so must I.
The IV pump? Simply the result of an overly stubborn nature which managed to turn a minor infection into a major pneumonic crisis. Thus a stay in our hospital and an attachment to an IV pump following me in unphased devotion wherever I went. Thanks to the skilled people at our hospital and to miraculous antibiotics, I am home now and on the mend. A hard lesson learned.
But on that dark late afternoon as I watched the white birch dance with the wind, I was reminded again of how little intercession on our part it takes to make a happy and healthy plant. This European import is a good example.
I don't know who planted it or when. I asked around a bit but so far have no answers. I also cannot orient myself in the new hospital so that I can say for sure what its relationship to the old core buildings was. But however it happened, the tree was planted where it stands, a number of years ago judging by its size, and for better or worse, there it has grown into a nearly perfect specimen; the sort of tree gardeners and landscapers dream about.
Now, the new buildings have grown up around it; suddenly changing its habitat radically and requiring in maturity that it make some new adaptations. If I study a map of the new construction, I see that it has always been sheltered from the northeast, and that the major change in the white birch's world is that it is now partially shaded to the southwest by the large and tall new main entrance. During the time I was there, there was also a pipeline being laid beside it, to serve the new whirlpool in Physical Therapy. A small bobcat and another small tractor were doing the work, even in the blowing rain and snow, and seemed to practice careful consideration for the tree, as nearly as possible.
You see, they are our victims, really, these imported and nursery plants of all kinds. They are not allowed to make any sort of decisions as to where or under what conditions they will grow. We put them there, they are expected to do well, and when they do very well, as has this dancing black and white poem to what a European white birch should be, then we tend to take them for granted. Some of the very most important decisions we make in this life are concerned with where trees are planted.
Did some of the same caring hospital staff who took such good care of me, who provided me with just the exact conditions I needed for my continued welfare, did they also think of the welfare of the white birch? It stood outside the Emergency Department and Radiology before, now it graces Physical Therapy and the wing of administrative offices. It would seem it has been promoted. Except there is this question about that southwest exposure; so important to our northern plants; providing that last ounce of sunlight when the dreary long winters are upon us. Underground there is the new pipeline and a matter of torn roots to replace and to mend.
Still, the birch dances with the wind, and shakes off the driving sleet and rain with a practiced shrug. Without a shred of self pity, with no complaint, it takes the next slice of life it has been handed and goes to work on the necessary adaptations. A new pipeline, a new two-story building, it is all the same to the birch. And so it dances. And so must I.
A View From My Garden
This morning I awakened to sunshine pouring in all the windows. The dogs and the cat saw it too and began romping and chasing each other, trying their best to get me involved. I thought about it. Maybe it would be a really good idea to set all other responsibilities aside, load the dogs in the pickup and take off for our favorite spot along the river. Then I looked at the thermometer and had a second thought. I was right, I guess, because the clouds have now moved in and it will be another dreary day with the dogs and the cat sleeping and me at the computer in this nice warm office. There has not been enough writing in recent weeks and at least that can be corrected.
There is so much to be done in the garden, and yet the ground has just now thawed and the worms have certainly not yet turned; the robins wait impatiently while they finish the last of the tiny apples on the ornamental crab along with a few bright red currents on the high-bush cranberry.
High-bush cranberry is probably one of the best illustrations of why we really ought to use the botanical names for plants. This is not a cranberry; cranberries grow in bogs in the wild but moderate climates of the coasts of Oregon and New England. High-bush cranberry is one of the large and varied Viburnum family which also contains the currents and hydrangeas, and maybe the chokecherry. I will have to look that up to be sure. A friend gave me a start from a plant he called a cranberry, and I said it looked like a red current to me, but he insisted. So, I thought maybe it was another high-bush cranberry which has done very well in this garden, or maybe another variety of that very nice ornamental. I did not want any more red currents because the ones I have are afflicted with some virus or another which spoils their foliage and I do not grow them for the berries, except that the birds like them. My friends shrubs turned out to be red currents. Close, but no cigar!
The local birds, the ones that over winter here, are plentiful around the feeders these days, along with a flock of pine siskins and an occasional flock of juncos. The siskins are of the finch family so they sit on the feeders and drop a messy pile of black oil sunflower seeds whole, as well as hulled, while the juncos jump and scratch like chickens underneath them, finding the good seeds and gobbling them down. It is a beautiful example of symbiosis. Neither of them knows they are creating it, of course, nor cares.
The flickers, the hairy woodpecker and his diminutive cousin, the downy woodpecker, have all been nibbling steadily at the GORP I put out. It is a mixture of peanut butter, mollasses, corn meal, oat meal and lard, with a few raisins for the occasional early spring blue jay. (No need to worry about these energetic winter denizens having high cholesterol counts!) I spread it into the hollows on their feeder or onto the bark and natural holes in the old gravenstein apple tree outside the livingroom window.
Soon it will be time to put the GORP away, for the starlings love it also, and while I do not subscribe to practicing genocide against these extremely successful immigrants, for they did not make the decision to come here from the Old World but were brought by the colonists. That would give them as much right as I to tear up the countryside. Still, I do not encourage them. I much prefer that the chickadees and the violet-green swallows, and the robins nest here. Starling flocks are a dependable sign of spring and as yet I have not seen any. Perhaps you have, for my real birdwatching days are over now. Still, I like to have the news and I am grateful when someone stops me on the street or in the store to tell me they have robins in their yard, or that the redwings are back, or even that the starlings have arrived. By such signs do I count my days, even now.
There is so much to be done in the garden, and yet the ground has just now thawed and the worms have certainly not yet turned; the robins wait impatiently while they finish the last of the tiny apples on the ornamental crab along with a few bright red currents on the high-bush cranberry.
High-bush cranberry is probably one of the best illustrations of why we really ought to use the botanical names for plants. This is not a cranberry; cranberries grow in bogs in the wild but moderate climates of the coasts of Oregon and New England. High-bush cranberry is one of the large and varied Viburnum family which also contains the currents and hydrangeas, and maybe the chokecherry. I will have to look that up to be sure. A friend gave me a start from a plant he called a cranberry, and I said it looked like a red current to me, but he insisted. So, I thought maybe it was another high-bush cranberry which has done very well in this garden, or maybe another variety of that very nice ornamental. I did not want any more red currents because the ones I have are afflicted with some virus or another which spoils their foliage and I do not grow them for the berries, except that the birds like them. My friends shrubs turned out to be red currents. Close, but no cigar!
The local birds, the ones that over winter here, are plentiful around the feeders these days, along with a flock of pine siskins and an occasional flock of juncos. The siskins are of the finch family so they sit on the feeders and drop a messy pile of black oil sunflower seeds whole, as well as hulled, while the juncos jump and scratch like chickens underneath them, finding the good seeds and gobbling them down. It is a beautiful example of symbiosis. Neither of them knows they are creating it, of course, nor cares.
The flickers, the hairy woodpecker and his diminutive cousin, the downy woodpecker, have all been nibbling steadily at the GORP I put out. It is a mixture of peanut butter, mollasses, corn meal, oat meal and lard, with a few raisins for the occasional early spring blue jay. (No need to worry about these energetic winter denizens having high cholesterol counts!) I spread it into the hollows on their feeder or onto the bark and natural holes in the old gravenstein apple tree outside the livingroom window.
Soon it will be time to put the GORP away, for the starlings love it also, and while I do not subscribe to practicing genocide against these extremely successful immigrants, for they did not make the decision to come here from the Old World but were brought by the colonists. That would give them as much right as I to tear up the countryside. Still, I do not encourage them. I much prefer that the chickadees and the violet-green swallows, and the robins nest here. Starling flocks are a dependable sign of spring and as yet I have not seen any. Perhaps you have, for my real birdwatching days are over now. Still, I like to have the news and I am grateful when someone stops me on the street or in the store to tell me they have robins in their yard, or that the redwings are back, or even that the starlings have arrived. By such signs do I count my days, even now.
A View From My Garden
This morning I awakened to sunshine pouring in all the windows. The dogs and the cat saw it too and began romping and chasing each other, trying their best to get me involved. I thought about it. Maybe it would be a really good idea to set all other responsibilities aside, load the dogs in the pickup and take off for our favorite spot along the river. Then I looked at the thermometer and had a second thought. I was right, I guess, because the clouds have now moved in and it will be another dreary day with the dogs and the cat sleeping and me at the computer in this nice warm office. There has not been enough writing in recent weeks and at least that can be corrected.
There is so much to be done in the garden, and yet the ground has just now thawed and the worms have certainly not yet turned; the robins wait impatiently while they finish the last of the tiny apples on the ornamental crab along with a few bright red currents on the high-bush cranberry.
High-bush cranberry is probably one of the best illustrations of why we really ought to use the botanical names for plants. This is not a cranberry; cranberries grow in bogs in the wild but moderate climates of the coasts of Oregon and New England. High-bush cranberry is one of the large and varied Viburnum family which also contains the currents and hydrangeas, and maybe the chokecherry. I will have to look that up to be sure. A friend gave me a start from a plant he called a cranberry, and I said it looked like a red current to me, but he insisted. So, I thought maybe it was another high-bush cranberry which has done very well in this garden, or maybe another variety of that very nice ornamental. I did not want any more red currents because the ones I have are afflicted with some virus or another which spoils their foliage and I do not grow them for the berries, except that the birds like them. My friends shrubs turned out to be red currents. Close, but no cigar!
The local birds, the ones that over winter here, are plentiful around the feeders these days, along with a flock of pine siskins and an occasional flock of juncos. The siskins are of the finch family so they sit on the feeders and drop a messy pile of black oil sunflower seeds whole, as well as hulled, while the juncos jump and scratch like chickens underneath them, finding the good seeds and gobbling them down. It is a beautiful example of symbiosis. Neither of them knows they are creating it, of course, nor cares.
The flickers, the hairy woodpecker and his diminutive cousin, the downy woodpecker, have all been nibbling steadily at the GORP I put out. It is a mixture of peanut butter, mollasses, corn meal, oat meal and lard, with a few raisins for the occasional early spring blue jay. (No need to worry about these energetic winter denizens having high cholesterol counts!) I spread it into the hollows on their feeder or onto the bark and natural holes in the old gravenstein apple tree outside the livingroom window.
Soon it will be time to put the GORP away, for the starlings love it also, and while I do not subscribe to practicing genocide against these extremely successful immigrants, for they did not make the decision to come here from the Old World but were brought by the colonists. That would give them as much right as I to tear up the countryside. Still, I do not encourage them. I much prefer that the chickadees and the violet-green swallows, and the robins nest here. Starling flocks are a dependable sign of spring and as yet I have not seen any. Perhaps you have, for my real birdwatching days are over now. Still, I like to have the news and I am grateful when someone stops me on the street or in the store to tell me they have robins in their yard, or that the redwings are back, or even that the starlings have arrived. By such signs do I count my days, even now.
There is so much to be done in the garden, and yet the ground has just now thawed and the worms have certainly not yet turned; the robins wait impatiently while they finish the last of the tiny apples on the ornamental crab along with a few bright red currents on the high-bush cranberry.
High-bush cranberry is probably one of the best illustrations of why we really ought to use the botanical names for plants. This is not a cranberry; cranberries grow in bogs in the wild but moderate climates of the coasts of Oregon and New England. High-bush cranberry is one of the large and varied Viburnum family which also contains the currents and hydrangeas, and maybe the chokecherry. I will have to look that up to be sure. A friend gave me a start from a plant he called a cranberry, and I said it looked like a red current to me, but he insisted. So, I thought maybe it was another high-bush cranberry which has done very well in this garden, or maybe another variety of that very nice ornamental. I did not want any more red currents because the ones I have are afflicted with some virus or another which spoils their foliage and I do not grow them for the berries, except that the birds like them. My friends shrubs turned out to be red currents. Close, but no cigar!
The local birds, the ones that over winter here, are plentiful around the feeders these days, along with a flock of pine siskins and an occasional flock of juncos. The siskins are of the finch family so they sit on the feeders and drop a messy pile of black oil sunflower seeds whole, as well as hulled, while the juncos jump and scratch like chickens underneath them, finding the good seeds and gobbling them down. It is a beautiful example of symbiosis. Neither of them knows they are creating it, of course, nor cares.
The flickers, the hairy woodpecker and his diminutive cousin, the downy woodpecker, have all been nibbling steadily at the GORP I put out. It is a mixture of peanut butter, mollasses, corn meal, oat meal and lard, with a few raisins for the occasional early spring blue jay. (No need to worry about these energetic winter denizens having high cholesterol counts!) I spread it into the hollows on their feeder or onto the bark and natural holes in the old gravenstein apple tree outside the livingroom window.
Soon it will be time to put the GORP away, for the starlings love it also, and while I do not subscribe to practicing genocide against these extremely successful immigrants, for they did not make the decision to come here from the Old World but were brought by the colonists. That would give them as much right as I to tear up the countryside. Still, I do not encourage them. I much prefer that the chickadees and the violet-green swallows, and the robins nest here. Starling flocks are a dependable sign of spring and as yet I have not seen any. Perhaps you have, for my real birdwatching days are over now. Still, I like to have the news and I am grateful when someone stops me on the street or in the store to tell me they have robins in their yard, or that the redwings are back, or even that the starlings have arrived. By such signs do I count my days, even now.
A View From My Garden
These dark mornings of the New Year with all their gloom, fog and snow, represent the turning of a page. It is time to plan a garden, time to start lettuce plants under the grow lights in the lean-to greenhouse (guaranteed to be free of E. coli!) and eaten in baby lettuce salads during February. I have been receiving one gorgeously colorful and tempting seed catalogue per day and the stack is approaching record height. There are all the old faithfuls along with a few new ones - some I asked for and some I did not. Never mind, they all make great browsing; the very stuff that dream gardens are made of.
I only pay real attention to the nurseries that grow their own stock above the 47th parallel. It is a belief I have which transcends the US Department of Agricultures time-honored zone system. My experience has shown me failed zone 4 plants and scant germination from seeds grown in the south. They just do not understand. Here in the northland it is already time to be up and doing! No naps until fall (well maybe now and then, at least in July).
Seriously, my insisting on stock and seed from northern nurseries pays off for me. On that basis, I can cut that pile of catalogues by at least two-thirds, although the pages of southern-grown roses are wonderful to look at and to dream over. But I have lived in zone 8-9 country and I know there is a down side to those gorgeous but tender types. The bugs are endless, and the viruses and molds are not far behind. It takes a real winter to keep the foe at bay, for plants and for humans, also. How often we say, "We need a good freeze to knock back the cold and flu bugs." Not very scientific, I guess, but nevertheless, perhaps true.
At the beginning of the cold weather, I dug the carrots and packed them in slightly damp, clean sand in a large Styrofoam cooler in the basement. There were 45 pounds of scarlet Nantes in all and they are keeping well. When they need moisture to keep them from wilting, I put an ice cream bucket full of ice cubes on them. Never enough to truly wet the sand.
Near the carrot cooler is the bench that holds potted geraniums and a couple of other tender perennials which over-winter well under fluorescent tubes. The lights are about 15 feet away from the cooler which sits on the basement floor against the north wall. When I went to the cooler yesterday to bring a supply of carrots up to the refrigerator, I noticed that the lid was lifted about two inches on the front side, facing the grow lights. When I lifted the lid away I found a small jungle of carrot tops, most scrawny white things, but still strong enough to lift the lid of the cooler. And, this is to me the real miracle, a few of those tops, closest to the lifted edge of the lid, were a pale green and formed into real carrot leaves!
We take our plants so much for granted; I, at least, think little of pulling them up and storing them to suit my needs, but there they were, even confined in a dungeon, given only the tiniest chance to actually grow, they were nevertheless, growing. I paused for a moment, with a mental nod toward these sturdy, dedicated, totally honest root beings. Later, while crunching them in time with the games of Wildcard Weekend, I noted that their sweetness had increased - or maybe it was my appreciation that made the difference.
I only pay real attention to the nurseries that grow their own stock above the 47th parallel. It is a belief I have which transcends the US Department of Agricultures time-honored zone system. My experience has shown me failed zone 4 plants and scant germination from seeds grown in the south. They just do not understand. Here in the northland it is already time to be up and doing! No naps until fall (well maybe now and then, at least in July).
Seriously, my insisting on stock and seed from northern nurseries pays off for me. On that basis, I can cut that pile of catalogues by at least two-thirds, although the pages of southern-grown roses are wonderful to look at and to dream over. But I have lived in zone 8-9 country and I know there is a down side to those gorgeous but tender types. The bugs are endless, and the viruses and molds are not far behind. It takes a real winter to keep the foe at bay, for plants and for humans, also. How often we say, "We need a good freeze to knock back the cold and flu bugs." Not very scientific, I guess, but nevertheless, perhaps true.
At the beginning of the cold weather, I dug the carrots and packed them in slightly damp, clean sand in a large Styrofoam cooler in the basement. There were 45 pounds of scarlet Nantes in all and they are keeping well. When they need moisture to keep them from wilting, I put an ice cream bucket full of ice cubes on them. Never enough to truly wet the sand.
Near the carrot cooler is the bench that holds potted geraniums and a couple of other tender perennials which over-winter well under fluorescent tubes. The lights are about 15 feet away from the cooler which sits on the basement floor against the north wall. When I went to the cooler yesterday to bring a supply of carrots up to the refrigerator, I noticed that the lid was lifted about two inches on the front side, facing the grow lights. When I lifted the lid away I found a small jungle of carrot tops, most scrawny white things, but still strong enough to lift the lid of the cooler. And, this is to me the real miracle, a few of those tops, closest to the lifted edge of the lid, were a pale green and formed into real carrot leaves!
We take our plants so much for granted; I, at least, think little of pulling them up and storing them to suit my needs, but there they were, even confined in a dungeon, given only the tiniest chance to actually grow, they were nevertheless, growing. I paused for a moment, with a mental nod toward these sturdy, dedicated, totally honest root beings. Later, while crunching them in time with the games of Wildcard Weekend, I noted that their sweetness had increased - or maybe it was my appreciation that made the difference.
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