Weather, plants and a freeze

     Well as everyone knows this has been a crazy weather season. People used to snow not getting much, some getting too much and the same with rain. Some with freezing weather and some with not enough of that either.

     We did not get more than two inches of snow. We really need some rain and will hopefully get some. Was supposed to rain yesterday and did not. We have well water and if we when it gets low we start getting some grit in our taps. Need to change filter outside more often when that happens. So far we are good with that.

     Our regular season for our plants that come up every year is usually late April. Well, my hosta's are full, our dogwoods are in bloom with the wild ones down the mountian also popping out. If we get a freeze the hosta's are done for however the dog woods will survive.

   
      The radishes I planted two weeks ago are coming up already. The scallions are showing no sign of growth. I start these from seeds. My hubby's potato plants he put in are not doing anything but it takes them a while anyway, although we have volunteers coming from last years plantings. He is waiting to put in cherry tomato, regular tomato, squash and green bell peppers.  I want to try some silver queen corn this year also.

    
     With the weather being near 80 for over a week it can be scary as the last time this happened we had a hard freeze in late April. That hard freeze took out a lot of plants and I am not looking forward to replacing 73 hosta plants should they get hit. Even my angel trumpet plant is ready to pop. It can be moved inside if that happens.    
      
      If you know what Kudzu is there are people here who are now using it for feed for their animals. Some even cook it and eat it themselves. I am not interested, thank you. There are also wild ramps that grow here and from what I have been told about them I am not interested in them either.


     This has been the strangest year and it will be interesting to see what survives. If you plant a food garden I hope you fair well. For those of you who do not plant some of your own veggies, you are missing all the great benefits of planting it, nurturing it, watching it thrive and finally picking it and having the best you can get and the pride of doing it yourself.
   
     So for me I will continue to pray for no hard freeze. Too much to lose but then some would love to see colder weather for a while longer. It is beautiful here today and hoping it stays that way.

      After you are done with your ourtside work I hope you take some time and visit my store at http://ola.com/store/chateycathey as I now have it in order, some new items listed and all pictures are where they are supposed.

    Please comment as all are appreciated.



    

    

     

Garden History - Chapter 5

Chapter 5

Now that the palate of the yard is clean and we are starting from scratch we planted the grass seed on the sides and back yard. Also, while landscaping we saved buckets of bulbs. Narcissus, double and single Jonquils, Daffodils, Snowbells and, much to my delight, Spider Lilies in hot pink! (I had been trying to find that plant for years but never knew its name!). Then my husband and I planted some of the plants I toted with me through the years. Chinese Holly, Irises an Cannas’. They might have to be transplanted, eventually, because I wasn’t quite sure what the sun would be doing throughout the year. We, then, waited through the winter season to see what would pop up in the yard come spring.

Now, while I tell you part of this story, I want you to know that I am married to a lovely man that loves grass but knows absolutely nothing about what a plant looks like! His theory is… if it is green, it is grass. I had to draw smilies on my fence so he wouldn’t mow down my spider lilies when they come up in the late summer! With that thought in your minds, everything that has been planted in this yard is very low maintenance or IT CAN BE MOWED and will come back!! I call it Man Friendly. If it cannot be mown down it is protected with some sort of divider.

Much to my surprise there were a lot of plants that were very hardy and had survived all the landscaping! There were, also, a lot of assorted wild plants growing in the grass and yard. I don’t know all the names of them but there were wild violets, a very pretty, petite, five pointed white flowering plant that, I later, found out was a variety in the onion family. (They were all over the place. I imagine that some people would love to plant them in a flower bed.) Then, there was a beautiful low growing plant that had leaves which were clustered and round. That turned out to be an old fashioned variety of buttercups, also, a very prolific plant!

Originally, there was raised, three foot high, hand built patio on the back of the house. It had beautiful yellow jasmine and morning glory vines growing up a privacy lattice structure. Unfortunately, we had to tear it down because it was a termite heaven! A bit of never, never advice. Do NOT build a landscape timber box, filled with a dump truck of sand, then put bricks on top to create a raised patio!! This structure was a wonderful environment for termites! It, also, holds rain water that will, eventually, leach into one’s basement. NOT GOOD, trust me. The homeowner, builder, of this patio did not put anything next to the wall of the house to protect it from the water draining into the side of the house then to the basement floor. Very bad.

As I had mentioned, in the previous post, we had to have a fence installed. Along the base of the fence, I took all the buckets of jonquils, daffodils, and narcissus and planted them in the lawn. I used these plantings to cover the 2×12 boards at the bottom of the fence. The blossoms are pretty in the spring and the greenery lends cover to the boards which elevated the fence. Then when they have turned brown in the early summer, all can be mown with ease. Since I liked the Morning Glory’s I plant them in window box containers on the ground (that protects them from the weed eater) and let them trail up the lattice I had my husband attach to the fence. This coming summer we have a new plan for them.
I moved some of the buttercups and violets in spots next to the house to protect them from my mower guy.

Many of the plants I have in my yard I have received from friends. Bearded Irises, Peonies, Butterfly Ginger Lilies, Angel’s Trumpet/Brugmansia, variety’s of Cannas, orange Double Day Lilies, a variegated grassy planting that has a purple bloom in late summer and a Cedar Tree (three inches high when received!).

There are plants that had to be purchased, sometimes twice. Azaleas, fruit trees, ferns, cast iron plants, frizzle, winter daphne, figs, blueberry. Some of the fruit trees had to be replaced because I, originally, thought that I could use a standard tree. NOT! In a small space, one has to use grafted dwarf trees, lol. My hubby was not too thrilled while digging up fruit trees, that were established, because the wife said they were too big. He was not a happy camper!!

Garden History - Chapter Three

Chapter Three:

Ahhh... The Blackwater Years. My mother, and her husband, owned and rented a house on 20 acres in the country. A very rural area of Virginia Beach and very close to North Carolina. When the tennants moved out and the property became available my kids and I moved in and rented for about 3 1/2 years. My children were now teenagers who were working and driving. I had lots of luck trying to get them to stick around and help out with a garden!
Nine acres, cleared, were leased to a local farmer who used a crop duster to control some vermine on the corn, wheat and soy bean crops. Two acres, where the house sat, was mine to maintain as I wished. I never used more than seven dust on my vegetables and, much to my suprise, the years that plane flew over my house and garden I never had a pest problem! Only problem was that during the summer months the grass grew in over-drive. Mowing became a major ordeal!
The former tennants had a rabbit farm, of sorts. So, I thought the most logical place to start my new vegetable garden would be right where those cages sat! The droppings provided great furtilizer, lol. Eventhough, the ground was furtile it was clay and hard as a rock!! If it was too wet it was mud. If it was dry it was like the desert. Tilling, even with my trusty horse, had to be done at the optimal times. It was a challenge but well worth it because once the seeds were down it was a most productive and beautiful garden. I only planted a spring and summer garden. I froze the crops and made jams with the fruit. There is where I started to become just a little knowledge about fruit trees. My horse, pony and goat ate the ones I had planted in the fields in chapter two.
Just a little note here. I had some very old, large, box wood bushes on this property. Instead of cutting them back in a square or round bush, I turned them into large style bonsai type bushes. They weren't very hard to maintain at all. Just a little nipping two or three times a year.
Now, when xmas season came around. I have to mention that we decided to fetch our own tree from the wooded section of the farm, for the holidays. I must admit that tree brought a lot of humor in the house because, quite frankly, it looked pretty darn small in the woods! Let me just say... trim, trim, trim. *giggling* I had no idea just how enormous that goofy tree was till we tried to get it into the house. Even after it was trimmed and pruned it still took a large portion of the living room space.
Then, the kids go to college, I move into a one bedroom garden apartment. My tiller is in storage and my hot tub is in my dining room. Extremely large tropical variegated hibiscus plants, fichus trees and an assortment of favorite outdoor plants move with me onto my little outdoor patio. It was not too bad because the landlord even let me plant a lilac bush in front of my bay window. I did have to get a little creative with my Japanese holly so that it was safe in my 3 x 6 foot garden plot that was provided at the edge of a concrete patio. I even dug up and took my canna lilies with me to give me a little more privacy. It is amazing what can be done with plants to make even the most dower of places more attractive to live in. And taking the time to move things with you saves so much money!
Ta Da, next chapter coming soon. New home (historical and adventure in its own right) and the man-proof garden.

Blackwater. After I moved out my parents leased it to a potential buyer. They had no clue that they would turn the house into a barn for livestock! The place that I had my bonsai boxwoods gone and overgrown.
This is a picture of how overgrown the place had become when renter left. All the fruit trees and shrubs were totally overgrown. This is one of the better scenes. The poison ivy had totally taken over. Eventually, the house was demolished because it could not be salvaged!

Garden History - Chapter One

Welcome to My Garden History and Journal - Chapter One

Let me begin by saying that I have been an amateur gardener since Moby Dick was a minnow! My mother gave me green bean and radish seeds when I was 7 or 8 years old and she let me plant them on the side of the house. I guess she figured that those would germinate quickly because a small kid would want to see things grow fast Pretty, smart on her part! As I grew older she would let me help her in the little plot garden she had created, every spring. It was always so much fun when the first radishes came to harvest and we could have, open face, radish and butter sandwiches for breakfast! What an excellent treat. I look forward to those radishes every year.

Then the "teen years" and gardening went a little by the wayside because I was just too busy. But there were summers with my Grand Mother, who had a 50 acre farm, and we had to harvest the hay for the livestock, corn for the chickens and horses. Plus, there always seemed to be house plants to water. Plants and animals were always in my life but animals will have to take second place to this Garden room, :).

Got married... had apartment and asked landlord if I could plant flowers outside of my apartment window...they said yes... Okay... I did!
Baby to come... no room... First house ensued... Big yard... Stay at home Mom...
What to do... plant a garden. Boy, was it fun to watch newly weds dig a garden!!

This was the garden where I learned that no matter what the package of seed said go with the flow of the current weather in your area. I wanted to grow Iceberg lettuce, everyone around me said it was just too hot in our area to grow because the summers were too hot. So, I planted the seed in the late fall. I saw the small seed pop up and then forgot about the garden because all the leaves fell and just figured everything had died (we were too lazy to rake leaves!) Well, at the end of February, when it was a little warmer, I was strolling around and kicking some of the leaves aside (the leaves became an insulator) and WOWWIEE.... I found heads of Iceberg lettuce!!! What a surprise. You don't get a tomato with your lettuce salad at that time of year but the lettuce is still great.

This installment One....... This will be a continuing saga........ More to come!