under the crabapple tree
This morning I took a break from thinking and writing and went out to resume planting my shade garden. The story of my shade garden... ahahaha. The short version is that last Memorial Day -- that is, in 2010 -- I picked up several dozen shade plants going cheap. I managed to get about half of them planted in the second half of June, and then life stuff happened and -- well, I suspect it will surprise no one that when my gardening time gets limited, the vegetable garden takes priority, and all the other plants are left to fend for themselves. (This is why my main flower garden is a garden of native prairie plants, which handle neglect very well.) So the remaining shade plants languished unplanted and (I assumed) died. And then I didn't even have a chance to pick up the pots last fall, because we got heavy snow very suddenly and it never melted. So the sad little pots stayed huddled against the side wall of the house under all that snow all winter.
As it turns out, this is about the best thing that could have happened to them; a few weeks ago I was out weeding and discovered that some of the pots (which I still hadn't cleaned up) had green sprouts that didn't look like dandelions or any of the other irritating little weeds with which I am all too familiar. Turns out that more than half my neglected little plants (mostly hosta, but also some Siberian iris and harebells and columbines) were cheerfully, if slowly, asserting their continued existence.
This kind of tenacity is exactly what I require in an ornamental plant.
So I spent the morning digging holes and watering and mulching and so on, and while I was at it I transplanted a bunch of ferns from other parts of the yard -- the ferns are actually doing so well that they are producing little colonies, which I have now relocated.
It turns out that the yard has become an object of considerable interest among the neighbors, many of whom stopped by this morning to say hello, offer grass clippings and plant divisions, and admire the quamash and columbines (dark purple fireworks all over the place!). Even the postman stopped to look. "Looks like the green thumb's still green," he said, which made me laugh; "Well, at least it hasn't gone completely black yet," I said, "so there's hope." I think some of them are fascinated by the vegetable garden (of which one can catch glimpses from the front sidewalk) and others are sympathetic because of the visible difficulty of maintaining the side yard that adjoins my neighbor to the east (whose approach to the property is best described as aggressive neglect).
The veggie garden, at any rate, is doing pretty well: strawberries fruiting, peas and beans and corn sprouting, garlic and shallots and sunchokes thriving, tomatoes and peppers and eggplants surviving (which is all I expect from them at this point). The lettuce and spinach got planted late and are sulky as a result, but the herbs are making up for it; the oregano, in particular, has developed a plan for world domination.
So -- lunch, and then I have a few last things to put in the ground, and by then I hope that the reading and thinking and writing I have to do today will feel like a welcome respite from kneeling and digging.
Originally posted at Dreamwidth || Read
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As it turns out, this is about the best thing that could have happened to them; a few weeks ago I was out weeding and discovered that some of the pots (which I still hadn't cleaned up) had green sprouts that didn't look like dandelions or any of the other irritating little weeds with which I am all too familiar. Turns out that more than half my neglected little plants (mostly hosta, but also some Siberian iris and harebells and columbines) were cheerfully, if slowly, asserting their continued existence.
This kind of tenacity is exactly what I require in an ornamental plant.
So I spent the morning digging holes and watering and mulching and so on, and while I was at it I transplanted a bunch of ferns from other parts of the yard -- the ferns are actually doing so well that they are producing little colonies, which I have now relocated.
It turns out that the yard has become an object of considerable interest among the neighbors, many of whom stopped by this morning to say hello, offer grass clippings and plant divisions, and admire the quamash and columbines (dark purple fireworks all over the place!). Even the postman stopped to look. "Looks like the green thumb's still green," he said, which made me laugh; "Well, at least it hasn't gone completely black yet," I said, "so there's hope." I think some of them are fascinated by the vegetable garden (of which one can catch glimpses from the front sidewalk) and others are sympathetic because of the visible difficulty of maintaining the side yard that adjoins my neighbor to the east (whose approach to the property is best described as aggressive neglect).
The veggie garden, at any rate, is doing pretty well: strawberries fruiting, peas and beans and corn sprouting, garlic and shallots and sunchokes thriving, tomatoes and peppers and eggplants surviving (which is all I expect from them at this point). The lettuce and spinach got planted late and are sulky as a result, but the herbs are making up for it; the oregano, in particular, has developed a plan for world domination.
So -- lunch, and then I have a few last things to put in the ground, and by then I hope that the reading and thinking and writing I have to do today will feel like a welcome respite from kneeling and digging.
Originally posted at Dreamwidth || Read
comments on Dreamwidth