gardening for groceries

first look at the garden for 2012

2012-02-13T13:52:00.001-06:00

the weather has been very warm and mild for winter. we have had the chance to garden all winter since the temperatures have been warmer than usual. the plants have survived and we have had plenty of chard, spinach, lettuce, kohlrabi, broccoli, bok choy, pac choy, carrots and collards. hoops on the beds have allowed us to plant several rounds and the seeds have germinated and thrived.

winter is the season for hellebores

both of these hellebores came from the garden of a fellow dcmg member who was thinning her beds. this is the first year that they have bloomed and we finally got to see what color they were.

from left to right; bunching collards, red cabbage and cauliflower

broccoli will continue to produce small florets if you let it. they are tender and sweet and we have been eating them all winter. the greens are good too-you can cook them like collards.

kohlrabi, another great veggie-the greens can also be cooked so if you plant enough, you can harvest some of the greens as the roots grow and you will have a nice, steady supply of vegetables.

spinach in the front and red and green chard in the back. harvest the larger leaves and leave the smaller ones to mature and again, you have a seemingly endless supply of greens!

our vegetable garden consists of 4 (4x8) raised beds and one that is about 6x7 for the strawberries and the asparagus is in an area that is 2x10.

an encouraging sign of spring-peach blossoms

over next to the herb garden where the flamingos are working hard, is the last of our raised beds. in this 4x8 hooped bed, we have planted peas and kale and are now hoping that they germinate!

summer update

2011-07-24T16:47:00.000-05:00

it's been a while since i have put anything up here and a friend recently asked my what was going on in my garden-she actually told me that i hadn't put any pictures up in a while...well dar, these are for you!

we have an unsightly bunch of rogue tomatoes growing in our front yard. they sprouted from the compost we put down. we practice cold composting-we do not make an effort to get the piles hot because it can kill off the beneficial enzymes that the plants need. my husband the wise guy decided to let them grow and see how long it took me to notice. needless to say, i wasn't very observant and they got pretty big. it will be interesting to see if they actually bear fruit.

market more 76 grows nice straight cukes

butterstick yellow squash

cowhorn peppers

my cukes grow on a sheet of plastic lattice work bent to form a tent and is held in place with metal stakes. underneath, the soil remains cool and i now have lettuce growing-a major miracle in the south!!!

asian long beans

various shades of swiss chard

the current belle of the ball is our little fig tree

it is covered in figs and they are beginning to ripen

all that remains of our bees. we were devastated by the loss-our colony split and the majority swarmed with the queen. the remaining bees were overtaken by small hive beetles, wax moths and invading bees that robbed the honey. we decided to wait until next spring and start all over and we may start two colonies.

we do what we can to attract birds too. here are some cardinals and a female goldfinch having some lunch.

the yard is in bloom-native hibiscus

foxgloves

balloon flower

rudbeckia-black eyed susans

butter and eggs also known as toad flax is a native alaskan wildflower and it can be invasive

echinacea-coneflower, magnus

echinacea-conneflower milk shake

native pink rose mallow

sundrops-evening primrose

rose mallow-white

joe pye weed

since we do make an effort to attract critters-we have added milkweed to feed monarchs. we also have butterfly weed-annual and perennial varieties and bronze fennel and parsley for other butterflies

honey bees and bumble bees love anise hyssops

native monarda, a favorite of bumble bees

stay cool in the garden! come back and visit to see what we have growing in the garden.

signs of spring

2011-03-16T13:45:00.000-05:00

peonies are one of the early signs of spring. the crowns send out new growth and if you are lucky like us, the seed heads you left on the plants last year drop seeds all over and new plants sprout in your lawn.

darry gathered a bunch of them and relocated them to a different area of the yard and in a year or two, we may have flowers.

grape hyacinth

peach blossoms

pink hellebores

we have filled all of the garden beds with plants or seeds and now we wait for the chance to harvest the vegetables. the large plants are those that overwintered. from the bottom-walking onions, left-kale, top right-red cabbage and center right-red russian kale.

on the top is the kale which was grown from seeds given to us by the folks at long hungry creek farm which is the farm run by jeff poppen, the barefoot farmer. the bottom is a close up of the red russian kale.

red cabbage

and one of our favorites, lilacs.

welcome spring!

2011-03-04T13:17:00.003-06:00

we had a chance to get into the hive, it was also time to medicate the bees. it is important to treat them and stay ahead of the varroa mites and tracheal mites. varroa mites are visible to the eye and happily, we didn't see any-not a single one! however, tracheal mites live in the tracheas of the bees and are not visible so you have to watch behavior to find signs of them. we are pretty sure that they are not having issues with them either. we saw lots of stored honey and both capped and uncapped brood! we will be putting on the honey supers soon and come summer, we will have honey for our use.

tonite's dinner

2010-11-17T16:57:00.005-06:00

i love it when i can walk out to the garden and pick something for dinner. the garden does not flourish during the heat of summer. we have much better luck in spring, fall and winter. tonight i walked out into the garden and picked some broccoli and shiitake. i cooked pasta and tossed it all together with a cheese sauce.

tonites veggies

a look at the rest of the plants in the garden

cabbage

and his little friend, parsley

kolrhabi

russian red kale

brussel sprouts, almost there!

broccoli

shiitake logs nestled under the broccoli and brussel sprouts

for my birthday, darry built me a hoop house for my raised bed garden. it is full of greens-both salad and cooking greens.

salad greens-arugula, salad cress, butter head, deer tongue and more awaits the next salad.

baby pack choi and japanese mustard-can you say stir fry?

things are surprising in the herb garden too-i still have basil! this is tiny purple basil

african blue basil in the front, valerian-back left and sweet fennel-back right

one of the true treats of fall-american persimmons. this little tree in our yard is chock full of fruit. today i gathered a small basket and after washing it, i will run it through the food mill and save the puree for a cake.

this week in our garden

2010-10-31T17:35:00.004-05:00

the shiitake logs are sprouting!!! we have been eating them too!

another log in bloom

broccoli

kolrhabi-this is the first year that we have had them in the garden. both the bulb and the greens are tasty!

habaneros-more than we can handle!

brussel sprouts-they come out in the space where the leaf meets the stalk. hopefully we will have some for thanksgiving.

the latest, greatest garden in nashville + a bee update

2010-10-23T19:45:00.005-05:00

things are a bit quiet in the bee yard. the girls are gearing up for winter and not much is going on.

and then we opened the lid and saw just why it is so quiet outside. the girls have been busy building comb all over the place!!!

a close up of the girls and their mess

and one of darry cleaning it...he is fully dressed this time, last time he was stung twice

darry set all of the comb he scraped off to the side to let the girls reclaim the honey. two days later, they had stripped that comb of every bit of honey-only the comb was left.

bees need to be treated preventively for things like mites. we placed some medication in the hive-it is mainly menthol and it smells like vapor rub. we will go back in to remove it in a week.

in the mean time, this is what is happening in the vegetable garden:

cabbage and kolrhabi, we've also got broccoli and brussels sprouts but i seem to have lost the photo...next time

a close up of the cabbage

tomatoes

kale from long hungry creek farm-home of the barefoot gardener, jeff poppen

peppers, lots of peppers

banana peppers-sweet of course

okay, i definitely had technical difficulties! i lost my photos of the serranos-hot peppers

eggplants

over in the raised tomato garden, things are sprouting. in the half at the bottom it is all salad greens. in the top half it is all asian greens like pak choi and japanese mustard.

see you soon, with all of the photos, i hope!

the latest news from the yard

2010-09-06T13:03:00.003-05:00

i am glad to see the intense heat of summer dissipate but i am not thrilled by the upcoming cold weather. as much as i dislike the heat and humidity, i would rather sweat than shiver. this is what is going on in the yard:

our little fig tree is gearing up for its first ever crop of fruit. we have a dozen or two of figs and we hope to have a chance to try them-squirrels, take that as a warning

remember last year when darry went shiitake crazy? we had some rain recently and he discovered that his logs fruited!

the scourge of the tomato garden-horn worms!!! there is one that is covered in parasitic wasp eggs and he will soon die and in front of it is a young one. he didn't last long after the photo shoot-we squashed him before he could do any damage.

we found two of them and here is the second one waiting to die as well.

bee update, 8/8

2010-08-08T16:59:00.005-05:00

today was a hot and sunny day and we entered the hive a little late in the afternoon. there were too many bees inside and they did not appreciate the interruptions! darry was stung twice as a result and more than once, i had them divebombing me-good thing i was covered with my bee suit and long pants! at today's beekeeper's meeting we asked an experienced beekeeper who is also the man who sold us our bees about some behavioral issues and he told us to add another box of frames-the girls are crowded! boy is he right on the money, just look for yourself:

the outside frames in the top box are full to the brim-no more room to build comb and store honey and pollen. we should have another box of frames tomorrow; we also ordered that while at the meeting today.

just look at all of those bees!

the view from the top down into the next box, crowded as can bee

darry looking at the frames, they were getting agitated and he was stung on the arms, twice

cleaning up the mess. the girls will build comb all over if you let them. darry scraped some off to keep it manageable.

all of the frames in the top box are full and capped, we really need to add more frames!

what bee happening in the garden

2010-07-05T08:48:00.002-05:00

it's best not to go into the hive frequently unless there are problems or illnesses to take care of. we haven't gone into the hive in a few weeks to look around, we do open the top to feed them 2-3 times a week but that is about it. today we decided to do a hive inspection and check on the progress of our girls. boy have they been busy!!!

they have completely drawn out all of the frames in both boxes. they were a bit cramped for space and started to draw out come in the feeder-that is the what the diagonal white line in the screen is. we were ready for this and we had a new box of frames to add.

this was one of the frames in the top box. when they draw out the comb, they generally start in the center of the box and work out to the sides. if the frames on the outside are full-as this one is, it is time to add a new box. don't know what you see here? in the top corners of the frame, the whitish cells are capped honey. the dark open cells are most likely pollen-their only source of protein. the yellow capped cells are brood-the next generation of workers(females). if there were some larger, bullet shaped cells, they would be drones-males, but i do not see any on this frame.

in order to get them started, we took one frame from the full box and replaced it with an empty frame from the new box and then put that full frame into the center of the new box. we then placed the new box on the top of the hive. here you see the girls, orienting themselves on the full frame in the new box. that big black stripe in the frame is a beetle blaster. we are lucky to say that our hive beetle population is under control. we do have them but not so many that we are in danger of losing our hive. we have a friend who lost her hive to the beetles last week.

what the hive looks like now, 3 (8) frame-medium (or illinois) supers.

what's in bloom

2010-06-15T13:41:00.004-05:00

here's a look at what is blooming in our garden right now. these are annual dahlias

hostas of all kinds are sending up blooms

tomatoes

clematis

coneflowers-"magnus"

white yarrow and blue spiderwort

lavender-grosso

native primrose

morning glory

miniature roses

goldenrod

and hidden around the plants are faces

some are napping

others are working-she is holding a plate that we fill with bird seeds

the latest buzz

2010-06-03T13:34:00.004-05:00

sooner or later you had to expect at least one bad bee pun...here is a shot of the hive. right now, we have two brood chambers and expect to add a third soon.

the girls are hanging out on the front porch.

a close up of the the girls

pretty flowers, coreopsis tinctoria

blackeye susan, rudbeckia hirta

my shade garden out front has lots of new plants. solomon seal, hellebores, hardy begonias, sweet woodruff, toad lily and more.

weeding is something we do a lot of. while doing just that, i came across the flowers for the heuchera-coral bells and it became so obvious why they are called that...

they look like tiny bells carved from pink coral.

the tomato garden. we had our herbs here last year but they have been moved back to the herb garden and the tomatoes have moved in. they are doing well, some have set fruit and they are all almost as tall as me.

this year we have built raised beds for the vegetable garden to see if that helps us improve the yields.

what's going on at our place

2010-05-13T14:32:00.006-05:00

darry's mom came to visit. gardening is something that she also loves to do so she spent some time gardening with us. first at the demo garden and then at the house. the results are a new look for the patio. she helped me do a bunch of weeding between the stones. what tedious work that is when weeding moss. you have to have a careful hand or you will rip out the moss. then she purchased plants for the area. 4 hostas and 3 different thymes.

hosta hanky panky

hosta orange marmalade

hosta high society

hosta lakeside elfin fire

for the holes in the block wall, linda personally planted the pink chintz, a creeping thyme

more of the pink chintz

the little sedum covered rock likes it's new home

the view from this end down to the other...

the new hosta bed is beautiful and i think it will look very nice with the hellebores that were already growing there. thank you again linda, i had fun gardening with you. (the other thymes, doretta klaber and elfin will be cut up and inserted between the stones as soon as i can get out there to do it!)

anything and everything you need to know about plants and gardening can be found at dave's garden, check it out!

got bees???

2010-04-25T19:23:00.002-05:00

we're not crazy, honest. we just have lot's of time on our hands...actually, a garden needs bees and bees need keepers so it all works. besides, the dog needs a new hobby.

spring wildflower walk, warner park

2010-03-28T10:11:00.005-05:00

we had the opportunity to take a guided wildflower walk in warner park yesterday. first, our guide deb beazley walked us around the nature center and showed us just what is actually growing in our lawns. we saw chickweed, bitter cress, red dead nettle, henbit, speedwell, bluets, black mustard, wild onions and field pansies.

these plants were all over the common area at the nature center and all are considered weeds. most of them are beneficial to honeybees and are also edible. we have many of them in our own lawn and we plan to keep them for the bees we will be adding soon.

after exploring the lawn, we ventured out around the other buildings on the site to look at the many plants in bloom. we saw many more than are featured here and we also saw many other plants such as sedum, many different ferns, shrubs and trees that are currently blooming or setting buds. there were too many to photograph and remember so i suggest that you go over to warner park and take a guided walk sometime, it is well worth the time.

bloodroot-sanguinaria canadensis

virginia bluebells-mertensia virginica

the creek that runs through the nature center was a beautiful sight.

at this point, we broke up into groups and travelled to the deep well trail head to hike on the mossy ridge trail and see what was in bloom.
it's not hard to see why it is called the mossy ridge trail. this is a north facing slope and there were many outcroppings covered in moss.

false rue anemones-isopyrum biternatum

stinging nettle...i was standing there and i looked down and asked ever so ignorantly-"what's this plant?" luckily, i was wearing long pants and didn't have to worry about it stinging me!

the bell of the ball, trout lily-erythronium americanum

look carefully, this hillside was covered in trout lily blooms

the largest tree in the park, a tulip poplar estimated to be about 150 years old

speedwell

we finished the day where we started, a picnic lunch at the visitors center with a table next to a small gravesite for the children who were born and died in the original house on the property.

get out there and see what's around you!

welcome back spring!!!

2010-03-22T16:45:00.003-05:00

you know it is spring when the hellebores bloom

the toad lily has begun to sprout

daffodils are blooming

the goldfinches are eating thistle seeds like there is no tomorrow and the males are now sporting yellow feathers

and it is warm enough for the shiitake logs to start pinning and fruiting!

critters that go munch in the night

2010-03-03T17:31:00.005-06:00

okay, i can admit it. things are a little out of control in the garden. darry was baiting the feeders to attract squirrels to entertain the cat-she stays indoors. he discovered that we have any number of interesting visitors at night...

the little bandit stealing squirrel food. actually, it is snacking on peanut butter sandwiches.

sorry about the photo quality, the only camera i could use at the time was the one in my cell phone.

on the left, bubba, the biggest possum we have ever seen and a dedicated snacker of peanut butter sandwiches.
bubba and rocky. bubba doesn't like rocky in his tree and he was turning around to try and bite him or at least scare him away from the sandwiches.
this little guy was out in the yard and he froze when i approached him to take his picture

a front shot of big bubba

we also have a fox that stops by but so far, no photos

GOT SNOW?

2010-01-29T13:18:00.003-06:00

as of 11am, this was the front yard. we are expecting about 6-10 inches...should be an interesting afternoon in the neighborhood. if the streets freeze up we won't be leaving the yard for a while!

holy shiitake batman!!!

2009-12-27T11:09:00.003-06:00

if you are following this blog, then you know about the shiitake logs. this is an update on the progress of the logs.

darry periodically soaks the logs in a baby pool if we have not had any significant rainfall.

while doing this, he found a pin-it is dead center in the photo

the whitish stuff is the actually mycelium, it is growing through the logs and on this one, it decided to fruit on it's own.

he found two pins and brought in the logs to monitor them and control the conditions.

fully grown-his first two mushrooms! we hope for a larger yield next time. keep watching for more updates.

it's indian summer, let's keep it going

2009-11-23T16:51:00.003-06:00

we have been so lucky the last few weeks. the weather has been wonderful, not hot and not cold with many days around 68 and some sun. we've had little rain and after all of the wet weather we had earlier this year, it was a nice break. as of today, we still have not had a true hard frost and our garden is still producing lettuce, greens of all kinds, peas and the cauliflower will hopefully produce heads soon too.

here's a look at what is still going on in the yard:

my crazy christmas cactus is always covered in blooms before thanksgiving!

they are so pretty while they last

this pineapple sage is still going strong and if the bees are out, they flock to it.

the moss is filling in the patio nicely

as the season progresses, i will fill in the gaps

the leaves are finally in the corral, or near it if you want to be technical

sugar bear is growing her winter coat and she looks a little plump, but it is all fur!

our new bell by the back door

leafing it up again...

2009-11-03T14:32:00.004-06:00

it's that time again...i'm sad to see the summer go but then again, it wasn't much this year. we had so much rain and cool weather that it never really felt like summer to me. now we move on to fall and all of the fun tasks it brings. what would that be you ask, in a word, leaves. we collect them all every year and use them for composting and mulching.

after 5 years of doing this by hand on a 2/3acre lot, we broke down and bought a blower/mulcher/vac to aid in the process. here is darry blowing the leaves into a pile so i can begin raking them up. most of the leaves he is blowing aren't from our trees. this gully is part of the storm drain system that runs through our neighborhood and leaves from the trees across the street seem to collect here. while it is annoying to have to clean up some other person's leaves, we get to keep them and compost them.

we still have to get them to the corral and we use a barrel to do it

darry's new toy. we wanted one of the back pack models but just couldn't pay the $300 it would have cost us.

the long walk uphill to the corral. look for the soccer net in the top right corner, the corral is right next to it.

the leaf corral

the compost pile. we use open pits and we have 4 different stages going at once. this is the first stage and we cover it with the leaves that we collect. consider composting leaves for your garden, it beats sending them to the land fill!!!

looky looky, they're heeere...

2009-10-05T08:18:00.005-05:00

its our own field of dreams story. we planted a butterfly weed plant (asclepia tuberosa) in the hope of attracting monarchs. what a joy it was to walk outside and see two, three or four of them fluttering around the plant and stopping for nectar and apparently more...

we have had multiple caterpillars so we know now that those butterflies did more than just flutterby, they made more butterflies!

oh so pretty!

when we went to florida last month, we wandered around pensacola and saw the largest crepe myrtles ever! to get an idea of how big those trunks are, look at the next photo

the trunks are larger than a fire hydrant and they are single trunks. most crepe myrtles are multiple trunks growing in a cluster. not these!

one of our favorite finds was the garden gate, 3268 fordham parkway in gulf breeze (FL). the little house is very inviting and the owner/staff are some of the nicest people we have met. they spent so much time with us answering all of our questions, showing us many plants and helping us to decide what to buy so we would have success with it in our garden.

so many beautiful plants to choose from!

more plants to check out

a funky mushroom in a fruit trees pot. we finally settled on a goldenrod and an iron weed for the big border bed we are building and a small selaginella (golden fern) for the front shade bed.

my beautiful roselle plant.

a close up of the roselle

wow-what a show the basil is putting on in the temporary bed!

the whole bed is bursting with herbs

they are hard to see but if you look closely at the rock, at about 10 oclock you will see the ironweed in the patch of dirt that touches the rock and at about 1 oclock is the goldenrod. these are the plants we bought on our trip. the little group is part of a larger bed that will eventually make a border between our yard and the idiot next door who will not mow his yard.

another cluster of plants and an interesting tree stump that are part of the border garden

just walkin' the dog

2009-09-21T09:28:00.004-05:00

on occasion, darry laments the fact that he is no longer a part of the trendy food scene. he has worked in many top notch restaurants, hotels and country clubs where the food must be of the current trends and fads or classically prepared from high end ingredients. however, he is reminded somewhat frequently of why he left that scene; scheduling and benefits. this was the case on labor day when we had a not so frequent monday morning together. what did we do with that opportunity? not much, we just took the time to enjoy a quiet and lazy day together, reading the morning paper with a cup of coffee and then walking the dog the long way around the neighborhood. we live in an old neighborhood, no new development in the last 20 years and it is right next to the nashville zoo.

pretty little flowers growing along the road, some call them weeds but i want some in my yard in the new wild flower border we are building.

persimmons on a tree by the road, we can't tell of ours have fruit but several in the neighborhood are loaded.

one of the treats of living by the zoo, seeing the giraffes as they walk from their house to the display area. look closely in the center of the photo and you will see one.

there goes another, they have 2 males and 1 female. they are all masai giraffes.

here you can see two of them walking

this one spotted us, most likely he picked up the scent of our dog

sometimes, they get confused and return to the house rather than go on to the display area. that meant we were able to see two of them up close at the same time.

heading the wrong way again!

it's falling and i can't stop it...

2009-09-06T13:08:00.004-05:00

it's labor day weekend and that must mean summer is over...living in the south means that we should have at least another 6-8 weeks of warm weather, warm enough that plants will continue growing and producing and coats will not be required to work in the garden. i like fall; the smells, the crispness to the air, the colors and the lack of high heat/humidity. even so, i will miss summer and i will wait patiently for it to return.

this summer we finally built our patio. we did it real cheap; free stones from a stone yard that manufactures architectural stones and moss plugs from our own back yard. now all we need is some outdoor dining furniture.

a preying mantis in the perilla plant in the herb bed

thai roselle plant, it is a member of the hibiscus family. if you are a fan of herbal teas, that big red calyx is what is used when hibiscus is added to teas.

nasturtiums and lemon verbena in the herb bed

our little fig tree has a little fig!

the little fig tree has more than doubled in size this year and we will most likely get a bunch of figs next year, i can't wait!

the bed out front has really filled in nicely. i like the morning glories that are growing on the metal bed frame better than last year's cardinal climbers.

now that fall is approaching, the flowers last longer into the day and i get to see them more.

our petunias and yellow flowers in the bed

seeds of change

2009-08-29T11:35:00.005-05:00

with summer winding down, many flowers are producing seeds. if you collect them, you can plant them and grow more of your favorite plants next year. sometimes, the seed heads are just as interesting to look at as the flowers themselves are. some are even beautiful in their own way. these are some of the flowers in our yard that are actively producing seeds.

peonies have some of the prettiest seed pods. we have always let the seeds drop since we were under the impression that propagating them was difficult. this year, we noticed several new plants sprouting so perhaps it is not as hard as we thought.

some of the heads had 2 pods, some 3 or 4 and a few like this one, had 5 pods.

crape myrtle seed heads are also pretty. we always leave them on the branches and so far, we have yet to find a seedling.

cosmos look a bit punky or other worldly. however you look at it, they are as interesting as the flowers.

morning glory seed heads look like little tomatoes

coneflowers; goldfinches love the seeds so we never remove the heads.

liatris on the left and black eyed susans on the right. the black eyed susans are another favorite of goldfinches and we leave them for a while but since they propagate so easily, we remove them eventually.

liriope will sprout from seeds and rhiozomes. if you leave the seeds you can count on many more plants. that may be a good thing or a bad thing if you do not want it to spread.

we had an interesting visitor in the crape myrtle. some sort of fuzzy caterpillar eating the seed buds.

skippers like the butterfly weed.

our pretty little flower box at the end of the driveway. "proven winner" plants really do well in planters and beds. we picked up the petunias and coleus late in the season when tants plants was having a clearance sale and we only paid a dollar per pot. they have filled in nicely.

a garden fit for a king...or queen

2009-08-18T20:27:00.001-05:00

a monarch in my butterfly weed!

the same butterfly went all over the plant drinking nectar from many flowers.

what's coming up in the garden this month

2009-08-14T15:55:00.005-05:00

i realize that i have been slacking in the update department-sue me...it's been a busy summer and i must have blinked and missed it because school started again today. where has the time gone? at least we have been getting rain this year and have had to do little watering.

some of what we are growing this year:

japanese trifele tomatoes

ananas noire tomatoes

chocolate cherries

lemon cucumbers, they are getting ready to give up and i will miss them. come on spring...

patty pan squash

golden zucchini, we do better with this than the green ones-they just do not grow in our garden

hubbard squash

habaneros-who wants some pain???

the temporary herb bed is overgrown-see what a little rain can do to a garden

lasagna garden-it's so easy to do, i urge everyone to try it!

one of my new favorite plants, native butterfly weed. see the seed pods in the background, they look kind of like okra pods, we will be able to save the seeds and grow more next year!

my garden success story, our patio. i dug up small plugs of moss all over the yard and planted them in between the stones, hoping they would spread and expecting it to take a long time. well i have been very pleased to see that the rain fall has encouraged rapid growth (rapid for moss) and it is already spreading out and helping to anchor the stones. come on out and visit the garden and see it for yourself, we'd love to have some visitors!

mid summer update

2009-07-15T16:07:00.003-05:00

it's so hard to believe how fast summer is flying by. it's back to school sale time already and we are just getting used to the hot weather! can anybody tell me how to slow the time a bit, i am not ready for summer to be done yet.

cucumbers, marketmore hybrid, in the garden. they are doing well and i am making lots of cucumber salad as well as sharing them with co-workers.

i am beginning to think that squash plants could take over the world...

tall tomato vines and lots of green tomatoes-ripen, ripen, ripen...

the herbs have filled out the bed nicely and we have enjoyed making pesto and using the dill in cucumber salad as well as potato salad.

my first bloom for the great sunflower project

the bronze fennel is ready; bring on the caterpillars, we want swallowtails!

our new addition to the landscape and it's first visitor

2009-06-29T13:27:00.005-05:00

ever since we moved into our house 6 years ago, i have wanted a patio in the back yard. some place where we could put a table and chairs and have dinner outside or a place where we could sit outside and have our morning coffee and read the paper. the costs of building one can be high, having someone else do it are even higher so we put the idea on the back burner until we could afford it or figure out how to do it ourselves in an affordable manner.

last summer, my friend patti mentioned a place where she was getting stone for free to build a patio and i knew we had found our solution. luckily for us, she was willing to share the source and we made at least half a dozen trips to pick up large slabs of stone to build our patio. we had originally tried to make the stones with a mold and cement but the stones were cracking into pieces because the mold was too shallow. if you ever try to use those molds for stepping stones, be forewarned-they are not meant to be stepped on, just for decorative purposes only. we learned this the hard way since none of the packaging tells you not to actually step on them.

the stones we gathered are actually manufactured from cement by a stone company that then cuts them into various shapes for builders to use in many different applications. they also have broken pieces in addition to the scraps from cutting the stones and all of these are available to the public for free-you just have to haul them off yourself. we selected a large variety of broken and cut pieces to make a mosaic. we also gathered a bunch of cinder blocks that were being removed from a building during a renovation and used these for a sort of retaining wall along the most uphill section of the patio.

a closeup of the stones before we filled in the gaps with dirt

starting along one corner, we filled in the gaps with dirt, packing it in as tightly as we could

another view of our progress

the patio all filled in and awaiting its next layer of "mortar"-moss, our yard has lots of it and we decided to patch it in to the dirt to help hold the stones in place. when we started gathering the stones, we decided to do this as cheaply as possible. since we hadn't paid for any of the stones, except the gas to drive there, i decided to use the moss in the yard rather than paying for it at the garden center. it will take time to fill in but that is okay with me.

while we were working on filling the gaps, i noticed the dog had something. she was circling something on the lawn so i set off to investigate since she will make an effort to kill what ever little critters she can catch.

when i got up close, i was shocked to see a snapping turtle. we don't even have a creek along our property-this fellow had to travel across multiple yards and at least one street to end up in our yard. this was not a small turtle either, it was at least a foot in length and could have easily snapped off a finger tip!

we immediately knew that we had to take the little guy over to the 7 mile creek and let him/her go. when we took him out of the bucket that we carried him in and placed him on the rock by the stream, he made a dash to the water.

immediately, he was in the water and swimming away. there are lots of little fish in that creek so we know he shouldn't have any trouble finding a meal!

a view down stream from where we let the little guy go. it is pretty down there and he should be happy there. let's hope he stays in the water and doesn't go wandering around the neighborhood again!

what a month it's been...

2009-06-07T20:23:00.003-05:00

with all of the rainfall and the cooler temperatures during may, our garden is lagging behind a bit. this week we are finally picking lettuce and peas and our other plants are just beginning to fill out.

we decided to have the house treated for termites-strictly preventative and this forced us to move the herb garden to the other side of the walkway. darry built a bed quickly using cinder blocks and we filled it using the lasagna method. now we have all of the herbs we want to cook with in this temporary bed. it is my goal to fill all of the holes as well. right now a few of them have thyme, flowers, mint and rosemary in them but i think it would look nicer if enough plants droop over the sides to cover the blocks.

some of the lettuce plants in the garden

bell peppers and habaneros, the hot ones are the small plants on the right.

this years peaches

hollyhocks

asian lillies

the planter boxes at the end of the driveway are bursting with nasturtiums

coneflowers

the big bed we are creating along the property line. if the jerk next door isn't going to mow, we will just come up with a combination of plants to hide the ugly mess!!!

it's been a while...

2009-05-18T13:28:00.011-05:00

as of today, we have had over 8 inches of rain for the month. that may not seem like much to some but for us, that is more than triple the monthly average. if you know anything about gardening then you know that you simply cannot work the soil under such soggy conditions. you also know that fungus excels in moisture and that plants tend to wither and rot away with the moisture and fungus that it produces. needless to say, with all of the rainy soggy days and the up down up down of the temperature, our garden is lagging behind!

we have a few different lettuces, some peppers and peas out there as well as a few cucumbers and some artichokes but so far, nothing to brag about or to pick for that matter.

there was evidence of an old (very old, as in previous owners, many years ago) termite infestation in our house so we have decided to have the house treated, after all this is the south and termites are like opinions, everybody has at least one (colony) somewhere!

in the mean time, this lovely new bed will serve as my herb garden since nothing edible can be near the house for at least a year.

this years plants in the lasagna bed at the front walk. it had to be planted a second time-sometimes, i really don't care for dogs...

we have rather shady conditions along the front of the house and i have decided to make that the theme for these beds. we added ferns, columbines, huecheras, native phlox, caladium and more.

our sunny bed out front. linda sent me seeds for california wild flowers and i spread them over the bed. they are sprouting like wild fire and so are the weeds from all of the rain. now the dilemma-is it a weed or a wild flower???

do you remember the previous post about shiitake? here is darry out back checking the logs for moisture=they cannot be allowed to dry out or there will not be any shiitake!

more adventures with bees

since we are new members, we attend the monthly meetings for the nashville area bee keepers as often as possible. after many of the meetings, there is a field exercise that demonstrates vital procedures and methods of maintaining a hive. walt is explaining an ongoing experiment he tried to hopefully prevent swarming. the experiment failed but we were able to see the inside of the hive and listen to an experienced bee keeper impart valuable information.

the hive looks healthy but it is obvious to walt that a swarm took place.

a close up of one of the frames.

we also had the chance to listen to jim talk about a top bar hive. they are common in places like africa and the two main types of top bar hives are the kenyan and the tanzanian. these are easy to set up but are not very practical for honey production, just for pollination purposes.

the name top bar comes from the fact that the box contains a set of bars that rest on the top of the box-no frames are used. here jim is holding a bar that the bees have not yet begun to build comb on.

a shot of some of the bees in the hive, hard at work

jim took out a bar to show us the natural comb formations that the bees make.

here is a closeup of the comb. the yellow lumps-or bullet shaped cells in the middle are actually drone cells (male bees), the darker yellow parts at the top are honey and at the bottom, they are probably brood cells for workers (female bees)

we were lucky to have three bee keepers speak to us! here is trevor opening up the new hives-these were set up last month and in my last post about bees, jim was installing the packages of bees to these hives. trevor was looking to see how the bees are doing. he was able to find the queen easily and so far, it appears to be going well.

trevor holding up one of the frames to inspect it for varroa mites. have you noticed that these guys are obviously fearless when handling the bees? all three of them did so with out protective gear, just a little smoke.

here is a close up of a frame from one of the new hives. there are drone cells in the center area-they look like yellow bullet shaped mounds. the darker cells are worker cells and the light ones at the top are capped cells of honey.

bee happy

2009-04-27T14:21:00.005-05:00

as new members of the nashville beekeepers association, we are encouraged to attend as many official functions as possible. last week, we had the opportunity to attend a field exercise and a package installation.

in this photo, member walt is removing frames from his brood box to check for mites and signs of superceding (when the bees replace the queen, can have many reasons for happening)

walt and jim are trying to locate the queen, by the time we were finished, they had not located her but had located several queen cells. this indicated the possibility of a swarm or that they were replacing the queen. this hive is in the ellington apiary and is walt's personal colony.

in this photo, jim has opened up one of naba's two colonies in the ellington apiary. he is very confidant around the bees and doesn't always wear protective gear. he went through all of the boxes in the colony in the hope of locating the queen and for general purposes of checking on the hive. he was able to find a queen but it was not the one from last year, she was marked with a red dot. this indicates that she was superceded (replaced). there was some speculation that the hive may have swarmed-the old queen could have left with some of the bees but that was all subject to opinion and when you have two experienced bee keepers give you an opinion, expect at least three!

here jim is preparing to install a package into a new hive. when you order bees by mail, yes that is a very common practice, they come in a box like this. you must first pop out the lid on top so the bees will come out.

jim isn't the only one who was without gear, there were several people just as brave-not me or darry!
jim demonstrates the method of dumping them out of the box and into the brood chamber by banging on the bottom of the box.

here he installed a hood small hive beetle trap. it will catch those pesky small hive beetles and prevent them from making a mess in the hive.

now it is time to add the queen. first you must remove the cork from the candy end of the little box.

this little box gets placed on top of the frames and by the time the bees eat the candy to release the queen, they will be accustomed to her scent and they will recognize her as their queen. if we are lucky, that is. sometimes they don't and they can kill her.

next, jim placed an inner cover that has a hole in the center on top of the brood chamber. this will allow him to feed the bees without bees from other colonies taking advantage of the sugar water-called robbing.

he then placed an empty super over the inner cover.
and then a second empty super so it would be tall enough to house the bottle of syrup-1:1 sugar and water. the lid has very small holes in it and it will allow the bees to slowly drink it since they do not have any honey stored to feed from. this was then covered with a lid and a weight.

if all goes well, the girls (as jim likes to call them-the workers are all females!) will begin to build out the comb and the queen (who is already mated) will begin to lay eggs. before we know it, the hive will be storing nectar and pollen and producing honey. if all goes well, they will make enough honey to overwinter successfully. only time will tell!

back in the swing of things

2009-04-19T11:24:00.003-05:00

so here it is, a month into spring and i haven't done much to update the garden blog. please forgive me, it has been a busy month and we have been sorely lagging behind in our gardening duties at home. the demo garden looks wonderful though. luckily, for us, the weather has been cooperating. it hasn't warmed up as quickly as it does some springs and this is working to our favor since we were late in starting seeds. one thing we have done is start our lasagna beds along the front walkway of the house. they had completely compacted over the winter and we added new layers and plants.

the view of the walkway with the lasagna bed at the corner in the foreground and all the way at the end of the walk in the top left corner of the photo. the spaces inbetween have been filled in with iris, hostas, ajuga, trifolium (fancy clover) and other shade tolerant plants. the beds along the house on this side of the steps also have seen new additions of hostas, heucheras, convullaria (lily of the valley) and more. the beds on the other side of the steps, which are not shown in the picture have many new plants including, native phlox, dicentra (bleeding hearts), hostas, heuchera, may apples, convullaria, autumn ferns and more. the lasagna bed is pictured with it's first new layer-fresh cut grass.

a close-up of the grass layer

the second layer is pine needles. this is the small bed at the end of the walkway. it recieves more sun than the large bed so it will feature slightly different plants.

after adding a layer of leaves to both beds, i topped it off with a layer of peat moss.

a variety of shade loving coleus and begonias were planted in the bed and the surface was sprinkled with lime to help lower the acid level in the bed.

this bed has some verbena along with the begonias and coleus and it also was limed.

out in the front of the yard is a raised bed that forms a circle around our little silver maple tree. the bed is planted with tulips and daffodils as well as some creeping phlox, hyacinths and a bunch of snapdragons that self sow each year.

the lilac bush was beautiful this year, we had many blooms to cut and enjoy in vases in the house.

bee keepers or bee havers, that is the question

2009-03-29T13:02:00.002-05:00

this past week, darry and i attended the 2009 nashville area beekeepers association beginning beekeepers workshop. what was once a one day workshop is now a 4 day event with classes given for three weeknights and an all day workshop on saturday. talk about information overload! there are so many things to consider with bees that just thinking about it is intimidating. we hope to add bees to our yard and have joined the association and the mentor program. look for future posts on our adventures in beekeeping.

urban bluebirds

2009-03-25T05:37:00.002-05:00

yesterday afternoon i was looking out the dining room window into the garden when i spied these two going in and out of the old birdhouse that hangs near the vegetable garden. for the last two years, a persistent little wren has staked out the house and spent hours calling out for a perspective spouse to join him. guess he's out of luck this year and in more ways than one-no house, no spouse!

the male spent most of his time keeping guard while the female went about the business of setting up the house. at least this is what i am assuming, we could not get close to the garden to watch and i had to carefully circle around the house and watch from the back steps.

mr. met, as darry has named him since he is wearing the right colors, does a fine job of watching over his mrs.

this is a branch of one of the many hackberry trees in our yard, they seem to favor the hackberries. if you look carefully, you can see that mr. met is on the left and mrs. met is on the right.

we have been seeing bluebirds in the neighborhood for quite some time now. this year we noticed that they were flying through our yard and stopping to hang out in some of the trees, specifically the hackberries close to the house and our persimmon tree in the back. it is wonderful to see them up close in the garden, hopefully they will hang out with us and eat lots of bugs for us!!!

for more info on bluebirds, check out this very informative website from cornell university. it even has a recording of their songs and chatter to help you identify them.

http://www.birds.cornell.edu/AllAboutBirds/BirdGuide/Eastern_Bluebird_dtl.html#coolfacts

shiitake in the garden

2009-03-16T15:56:00.011-05:00

at last weekend's lawn and garden show, darry found himself to be the only person in the audience for a log innoculation demonstration. a man from "the farm", a middle tennessee mushroom business, was going to show people how to cultivate shiitake mushrooms using pre-innoculated pegs and hardwood limbs in order to grow the tasty little mushrooms in your own back yard. since darry was the only one who actually showed up, he got the advanced course as well as one on one instruction.

for those of you who happen to know my husband, you know that this was the equivalent of a superbowl trip to didneyland. but don't be fooled by his enthusiasm, if you take a few minutes to actually talk to him about his beloved fungi friends, you will find that he is actually quite knowledgeable on the subject, right down to the latin names for many of the species both poisonous and edible. after all, he gave a short lecture on mushrooms at the same show on sunday and it is up on my demo garden blog.

after saturday's private lesson, darry began gathering wood from a neighbor who had cut down a tree with the intention of cultivating a shiitake garden in the back yard. the wood was free but came with a promise to share some of the shrooms with our neighbor. we're keeping our fingers crossed that this will be successful, it will take about 9 months for the first flush.

here is darry drilling holes in the logs for the innoculated pegs.

these are what the pegs look like

darry tapping the pegs in with a hammer

sealing the pegs in with wax

our new garden, shiitake logs out back in the shade near the leaf corral

spring break

2009-03-10T13:26:00.002-05:00

can you believe it? spring is not only on the horizon, it is all around us! so many plants are breaking out and they are growing rapidly. it won't be long before we are whining about the heat of summer. we are waiting for the ground to warm up and for the danger of frost to pass before we put anything out in the garden. the only thing to look at right now are all of the flowers that are preparing to put on a show.

our little clematis is growing by leaps and bounds. it nearly doubled in size in just a few days.

this peony plant is much taller than the others and it is also as tall as the frame support around it.

so many daffodils

in this little bed at the end of the driveway, there are many hyacinths preparing to bloom and even more black eye susans sprouts.

our little peach tree is covered in blooms.

a close up of one of the peach blossoms, they are so pretty.

patiently waiting for spring

2009-02-09T13:01:00.004-06:00

this winter has been very cold for us. before you laugh, we haven't had this many cold, below freezing days in a long time. last year we overwintered lettuces and greens because it never got that cold for very long. this year has been a different story. now that spring is on the horizon, we have had a few warm days and we have taken advantage of them to do some much needed work in the yard.

out back in the yard, we have a leaf corral and 3 compost piles. we still haven't raked up all of the leaves in the yard, think back to what i said about it being too cold to work outside. we never did have that wonderful indian summer that makes raking leaves tolerable. darry uses the leaves as the "brown" material in our compost pile.

a close up of the piles. the one in the foreground is a finished pile that is ready for use in the garden. the one in the middle is ready to age, no new material will be added. the farthest one in the back, which is obscured by the middle one, is the collection pile. we are still adding to this one. darry is checking out the leaf corral, making sure the fence is secure.

the view from the front, left is finished, center is aging and right is the new pile.

signs of spring are evident in our little round bed located in the front yard around our little maple tree. the buddha is watching over the sprouting daffodils, tulips and hyacinths.

a close up of some of the daffodils

also sprouting are the peonies. they are one of my favorite flowers and their season is just too short for me. they are gone before i have a chance to get tired of them and then i spend the rest of the year waiting for them to bloom again.

here darry is prepping the vegetable garden for spring planting. he is turning the beds and this year, he added some lime to the beds since we suspect that the soil is just too high in acid.

winter gardening

2009-01-19T11:19:00.003-06:00

winter gardening is not for everyone. it is cold and damp and the soil is often too hard to work

with. that gives living in nashville a definite advantage. we very rarely have long stretches of cold weather that allow the soil to freeze solid. never the less, we do experience enough cold weather hours to produce some fruits like cherries and apples and to promote the germination wild flower seeds outdoors. this fall, i selected a number of wildflower seeds from a website and added those to seeds we collected and we began to plant a wildflower garden. The main purpose of this garden is to attract butterflies, bees and birds to our yard but the best part, the plants will be tall and will hide the unruly yard next door (for more on this, read the previous entry on privet). we also planted a california wild flower garden in the front yard in our little lasagna bed. linda sent us a bag of seeds that were simply labeled, california wild flowers and we added new layers to the bed as well as some of the seeds. everybody keep their fingers crossed and let's see if we get some pretty flowers to show off out front.

here is the first new layer going on, leaves. we always collect the leaves in the yard and place them in a large pen out back. during the year, darry uses them as the brown component in our compost. as the year progresses, they begin to break down and form leaf mold.

the next layer was finished compost from the pile out back. we always have at least 3 piles. one that is complete, one that is aging and one that is in the beginning stages with new products being added to it regularly. we do not have a lot of sunshine out on our piles so they take longer and aren't quite as hot as some but they are still good for the garden.

we sprinkled the seeds generously over the compost and finished it off with a layer of grass clippings. in the bed is our cardoon plant. we decided to move it from the side of the house to the front where it will be a centerpiece in the bed. only time will tell if this was a good idea.

here we are in the back yard where we have begun to build the wild flower bed.

we began by staking out two large rectangular areas. darry dug random holes through out the areas.

i followed behind him placing random selections of seeds that i mixed. some we bought and some we collected.

we then covered the seeds lightly and added some compost. now we wait for spring.

the string should help us keep track of the area and ensure that it doesn't get mowed until we can identify the plants. if we are lucky, we will have big tall flowers that hide the mess next door and attracts many butterflies and bees.

killer view

2009-01-10T16:47:00.005-06:00

we have a large yard-2/3 of an acre that is mostly sloped and has a nice population of old trees. we also have three neighbors bordering our corner lot. our neighbors uphill keep their yard closely clipped and neat. our neighbor behind us likes to garden and has a nice deck and landscaping. unfortunately, our neighbor downhill does not have any interest in aesthetics-he won't even mow his yard. at this point, only a bush hog would cut through the shrubs that have taken over the yard.

when we stand in our back yard, this is the view we have of our neighbors yard.

the property line between the yards is obvious; we mow regularly, he does not.

the entire yard looks like this, front and back. this is the view down the line to the street.

in one section of the yard, there are hundreds if not thousands of chinese privet plants growing.

it might not be so bad if they weren't such an invasive non-native plant. they quickly spread and can easily choke out the native plants. we have them coming up in our lawn as well as in a flower bed in front of the house-all unwelcome volunteers!

a view of the privet forest. behind the tree is the ever expanding bamboo/river cane forest, another unwelcome and invasive species that will eventually work it's way into our yard.

chinese privet usually have an abundant crop of small black berries. these berries sprout easily and new plants come up everywhere. unfortunately, birds love to eat them and they tend to spread the seeds in their droppings. this allows the plants to spread even more. we will never be able to get rid of the shrubs but we hope to at least control it's invasion.

persimmons in the yard

2008-11-30T14:20:00.008-06:00

when we bought our home, we had no idea what was growing in the yard. there was so much overgrowth and neglect that it was a bit overwhelming. slowly but surely over the 5 years we have been here, we have removed, relocated and replaced many things and trimmed back others as well. gone are the monstrous forsythia and all of the nandina as well as the lovely plastic pointsettias that were placed in various beds in the yard. missing is most of the pea gravel that served as mulch in some of the beds. one of the surprises in the yard besides the little grape hyacinths that popped up in the lawn is a pair of persimmon trees. we are both fans of the familiar japanese fuyu persimmons that you find in produce and grocery stores and we were excited. that is until we had the opportunity to taste one. we have american persimmon trees and the fruit must be eaten when it is soft and mushy, unlike the firm ones we sometimes purchase. if you do not know the meaning of astringent, try eating one of those fruits before it has been hit with frost and is still firm. you will be lucky to peel the insides of your cheeks off of your teeth since they are the most astringent thing you can imagine.

lately, i have been doing a little research and a little reading on native foods of the south and i read an article by a local food writer. this got me to thinking about our little trees out back. it was a warm sunny day and i headed out into the back yard with a bucket to try and gather some to see if they were worth the effort.

as you can see, this little

tree has quite a few

still on the branches.

as they ripen and soften,

they fall to the ground

where they can be

gathered.

if you walk through the neighborhood,

you will find persimmon trees growing

wild. they have most likely sprouted from

seeds dropped by the various animals

eating the fruits.

one of the ripe fruits on the ground just

waiting to be picked up. darry likes to

eat them and he is not much help if i am

trying to gather a bunch. the fruits can be

put into a food mill where it is a little work to

press them through, separating the pulp from

the skins and seeds.

another tree in the neighborhood

where i can easily gather the ripe

fruit. ours are so high up that we

have to wait for them to fall or tap

the trunk with a mallet to make

them fall and then gather them.

crazy cactus

2008-11-16T11:02:00.004-06:00

over the years, i have been given several "christmas" cactus plants. you've seen them in the stores covered in their colorful blooms. the blooms last for a few weeks and then all you have is a funky looking plant. for the truly ambitious house plant gardener, you can attempt forcing the blooms every holiday season or you can do what i did. put the plant outside in a sunny location for the summer and just let it grow. then wait for the days to shorten and the night time temperatures hit about 50. when the forecasts start calling for these cool nights and the overnight temps are dropping in to the 40's, you should see the plant start to set flower buds.

once the plant has developed buds, move it inside to a bright location, no direct sunlight, where the temperature is a constant of about 70 and wait for the show to begin.

when i moved my plant inside in mid-october, it had many more blooms than last year.

it had so many blooms that were growing rapidly that we thought it would be

in full flower for halloween.

this is a closeup of some of the blooms. this is actually the second time this year

that the plant has flowered. when we first put it outside in the spring, we had

a cold snap that forced me to bring it back inside. this was around easter and the

warm weather outside followed by sudden cold weather with shorter days forced a few

blooms, but nothing like the number you see in this photo.

the plant is now in full bloom as you can see. (thanks for the photo tanner!)

even though the plant had a rough summer, it lost a large section to some sort

of ailment, the number of blooms is impressive. some of these plants bloom at

christmas and others bloom for thanksgiving, like this one. hopefully, it

will still have some blooms for the holiday.

lubie and patches

2008-11-06T07:52:00.001-06:00

it's hard not to like these two, it's also obvious how much they

like each other. i can't believe that someone would just

move away and not find a way to take them!

varmints in the garden!!!

2008-11-02T12:49:00.005-06:00

along the side of our carport is a small bed of perennials. last year darry added a few cannas to the bed and they did very well here, too well in fact. they multiplied enormously and took over the bed crowding and shading many other plants this summer. they weren't affected much by the drought either. when we had our first frost this week, they were damaged and it signaled the time to cut them back for the winter. many times over the summer, i mentioned to darry that they needed to be relocated since they were too aggressive for this bed and he decided to do it when he cut them back. sugar bear beat him to the punch. we were unaware of the invasion of moles in the bed until i found her in the bed digging. boy did she dig, grape hyacinths bulbs, dahlias tubers and other plants lay on top of the soil baking in the sun. i had visions of her hanging from the tree by her tail i was so mad! that was when darry made the discovery. he gathered up all of the bulbs, tubers and plants and then he dug up all of the cannas making sure that he pulled up every single tuber. in reality, it wasn't moles it was voles. they are vegetarians and bulbs and tubers are their favorite meal which makes them the enemy of many gardeners!!!

what my poor little bed looks like now.

the frost also killed of many of the plants out in the front lasagna bed.

we plan to fill it with perennials next spring

more damage in the yard by either moles or voles

they seem to like this area by the north side of the house

some of the damage by the perennial bed

freeze warning

2008-10-27T19:39:00.004-05:00

it looks as if the wonderful warm weather is coming to an end. we have our first freeze warning of the season tonight. darry and i had to bring in the plants that have been outside for the season. now the cats will have something to do-shred my plants. lucy is quite fond of lemon grass and the plant was looking beautiful and full if you recall earlier posts, she will have plenty of it to chew on.

we harvested some of the pak choi and asparagus. last winter the pak choi did fine in the garden during the cold months and we are hoping it survives the frost.

knowing that the old tomato vines wouldn't make it through the freeze, darry took them out and he picked all of the tomatoes on them. we now have a large basket of tomatoes wrapped in paper in the basement. we are hoping that they will ripen slowly and not all at once so that we can enjoy them.

we also had to pull some of the pepper plants. they were loaded with fruit. as you can see here, we have some produce to eat.

over in the lettuce patch we have a nice variety of greens to pick from. here in the sink is a mix of mizuna, lolla rosa, garden cress, oaky red splash, italienischer and lau's pointed leaf.

weathering the change

2008-10-20T13:49:00.004-05:00

since fall has finally arrived, things are looking a little different in the garden. seeds are ready for harvest and plants are shutting down for the coming of winter. the mums are in full bloom and the trees are shedding their leaves. soon, it will be time to rake them all up and place them in the bin for next years compost piles. even so, there is still plenty of things to look at and enjoy.

in the herb garden, the salvia is still blooming, not bad for a cheap 6pack of annuals!

the thai basil and thyme are still going strong as well

when the girls went to italy with linda last year, they brought back tomato seeds.

we were late in planting them and they did not do well in a bucket. planting them in the garden among the other plants has given them the chance to take off. we hope to keep them going long enough to try the tomatoes that the plant has set.

this has been a good year for our little miniature roses

when the cardoon was done blooming, i cut it back to the ground. it is coming back nicely along with the catnip that we thought was long dead. the two plants look nice with the grosso lavender.

the pineapple sage and the nasturtiums are doing a wonderful job of covering up the

air conditioner. next year i will plant more nasturtiums to do it again.

the asparagus plants had been allowed to grow up into large ferns and when they began to

yellow, we cut them back. much to our surprise, they immediately began to send up shoots.

for the first time in 4 years, we will actually be able to harvest them and cook them for dinner!

up until this week, we have had such warm days and nights that i never thought to bring in

my christmas cactus. it wasn't doing well, it lost several large branches and others look awful.

but the lousy condition of some of the plant has not stopped it from setting flower buds.

looks like i will have a halloween cactus this year!

oktoberfest

2008-10-13T15:38:00.007-05:00

according to the calendar, it is officially fall. but out in the garden, it is still late summer. the ground is still warm enough that it is making it difficult to get lettuce and greens to germinate.

we are also still picking plenty of peppers. these are bells that if left long enough, they will be yellow.

our little artichoke did absolutely nothing all summer and is finally growing.

the only thing that is flourishing right now are the cooking greens. from the left, turnips, two types of pak choi and red mustard.

the year's herb garden was huge, despite the drought. we had so many plants get too large and next year we will have to plant them in different areas. the flamingoes have been residing in the herb garden this fall.

hard to believe but today i was out picking tomatoes, these are big beef

the chocolate cherry is still in production

this weeks pick

2008-10-07T16:37:00.004-05:00

it is october and the heat is finally subsiding although you wouldn't know it this week. we had temps up in the mid-high 80's. we also got some rain today, we have gone about 4 weeks without a drop so this is a much needed change. despite the fact that it is october, our garden is still producing, small amounts, but we are still picking peppers and tomatoes.

if you leave banana peppers on the bush long enough, they get a nice red color

mizuna on top, italienischer in the middle and garden cress on the bottom

we are once again attempting to over winter greens

this will probably be the end of the tomatoes, even so, the big beef is hanging on

not bad for october

the tomatoes are cherokee purple, ananas noire, mortgage lifter and big beef

red banana peppers and yellow ones too

pak choi and assorted greens

fall into step...

2008-09-24T14:36:00.005-05:00

the arrival of fall means it is time to plant winter gardens. last year we were lucky and had greens for the entire winter. these are various cooking greens, mostly pak choi and mustard as well as chard.
hopefully, our beans will make it through the first frost. we have never tried planting them at this time of the year. we also have one little roma tomato that never did much this summer, we planted it in a bucket late in the season and if we are lucky, it will set some fruit.
personally, i can't wait for the various lettuces and salad greens to grow large enough to pick. fresh picked salad greens can't be beat. the heat of summer kills them off fairly early here in the summer and i really miss them!
our new tenant, she has taken up residence on a garden post next to the bird house. she is a black and yellow argiope, argiope aurantia. that fancy zig zag pattern was made by the male who is much smaller and was not visible on any of my trips to photograph her.
this is her from the other side, she didn't make taking her picture easy! it seems she prefers to show her belly and not her back!

traveling gardener

2008-09-21T14:59:00.008-05:00

the truth is, time tends to fly even when we aren't thinking about it. this month was a special one for me because it marks two milestones in my life. darry and i were married 23 years ago on the 14th of september and on the 12th, i celebrated the 25 year anniversary of my graduation from the culinary institute of america. a small group of my classmates were on hand for the reunion festivities and we had a wonderful time.

traveling north to attend the reunion also meant a chance to see family members. my travel plans brought me first to pennsylvania, then on to new york, new jersey and back to pennsylvania. the scenery was lush and green with a hint of fall colors

mom and steve picked me up in scranton and we drove back to bushkill, after having a late lunch with with my uncle peter and aunt katherine. on our drive to the house, we made a quick stop to see the scenery of smithfield beach on the delaware river. it was a gorgeous day and the river was as smooth as glass.

mom's house is in a wooded area and due to the large amount of deer, everything is shrouded in wire fences. this is the little pond in her yard that is home to many frogs.

a close up shot reveals all of the non edible garden art. the large amount of trees on the lot prevent plants from growing and the deer eat just about anything that does grow.

mom and i went to lambertville, nj to wander in the shops and have lunch. we ate in an old train station that has been converted to a restaurant. it is along side a canal near the delaware river. they had a small series of container gardens that held herbs along the old train tracks.

when i arrived in hyde park, ny on the campus of the CIA, i hardly recognized it. so much has been added and the landscaping added has changed things dramatically. this is the new herb garden outside the colavita center which is where the caterina di medici restaurant is located.

this rhubarb was so impressive that i could not resist taking a photo of it. hopefully mine will look like that some day...

the entrance to the garden features a rose garden with many varieties to admire.

this is a new waterfall and landscaping added to the old pond that sits in front of the dorms we lived in. what an improvement!!!

while walking around the campus, i spied espaliered apple trees among the landscaping in front of Roth hall, the main building on campus.

finding myself with a little time to explore, i drove down to beacon, ny to do a little shopping. this is the back of a building located next to the public parking lot. it just goes to show that you do not need a huge yard to create your own garden oasis. on the ground level there is a group of comfy seats and a water fountain on the wall as well as potted plants.

the folks in beacon obviously take beautification seriously. the trees along main street were surrounded by colorful flowers. it also made me miss the area, the hudson valley truly is a beautiful place.

they'rrrre baaack!!!!

2008-09-05T16:36:00.003-05:00

today, while wandering past the herb garden, I spotted catepillars! we have been eagerly awaiting the return of the swallowtail catepillars and today we finally spotted them!

I'm not sure exactly which type of swallowtail they are but they sure are big and fat!

only two so far, but we are hoping for lots more!

welcome to fall

2008-09-01T08:56:00.004-05:00

in the south, july and august can be very hot and humid. the threat of afternoon thunderstorms generally means a short burst of rain followed by more humidity. lately though, we have found ourselves in a pattern of hot dry heat and a lack of those summer thunderstorms. the latest stretch, which lasted about 3 weeks, took it's toll on our garden.

many of the plants were so stressed that they stopped producing and the bugs were having a field day with them. this year has also been a great year for the woolly aphid. if you are familiar with them then you know that they make a huge mess in the garden. they continuously excrete honeydew (poop) and it coats the plants. It is sticky and the worst part is that it causes a sooty mold to take over and all of the plants end up looking black. yesterday, darry and I began removing plants and adding compost so we can get ready for the fall planting of greens, lettuces, beans and peas.

the garden with it's new layer of compost in the beds

the yellow bell pepper in full production. luckily, the pepper plants are not under or near the hackberry trees, the woolly aphids preferred host.

out front, one of our little lasagna gardens. this one has done very well and we will definitely do this again next year. they are fast to assemble, easy to plant in and they take off quickly!

oh fay, what wonderful rain you brought us

2008-08-26T16:29:00.004-05:00

we had little rain over the last 3 weeks, that is until fay arrived today. a sprinkle or two but mostly, nothing. even so, the perilla, on the left and the lemon grass, on the right did well. if you have ever eaten at a korean restaurant and had the barbeque cooked at the table, perilla is often served as a whole leaf used as a wrap for the meats and little dishes that come with it. we found the seeds in one of our favorite stores, K&S World Market and planted a few in the garden. it makes frequent appearances on our table, darry loves to make little lettuce wraps.

the last time we went down to gulf shores, alabama, we stopped in a flea market and found this little fig tree. it hasn't grown much and we think it needed more sun. when our beautiful rosemary bush died, we relocated the fig to it's spot since it gets much more sun here. maybe we will get some figs next year.

when our wonderful neighbor moved out and left Lubie behind, she also left Patches. they are staying in our yard until we can make arrangements for them. they are the sweetest cats and they really are attached to each other, they frequently rub their heads together.

hummers in the garden

2008-08-20T16:01:00.004-05:00

we have a small group of ruby throated hummingbirds that visit the feeders in our gardens.

if we sit very quietly on the bench near the asparagus bed, they will fly around us and stop for a quick drink. they love to chase each other and will occasionally stop to check us out too.

dog days of summer

2008-08-17T17:22:00.005-05:00

it's mid august and it's hot, big surprise in the south. the only thing in the garden that is thriving despite the heat and lack of rain is the vining okra. we have never grown it before and were given some seeds this spring and we decided to try it and see what would happen.
our little red pepper plant has been very successful as this photo shows. the peppers were large and sweet and we enjoyed them!
our new favorite tomato, ananas noire. believe it or not, this is actually a ripe tomato. they are also a bit green inside but are the sweetest tomatoes we have ever eaten.
some of the old german tomatoes. they are late season and we have yet to try them.
zucchini blossoms are always so pretty, and the zucchini is one of my favorite vegetables to cook on the grill.

this week in the garden

2008-08-12T20:55:00.003-05:00

the intense heat of last week combined with a lack of rain has made this a slow week in the garden. a lot of the plants shut down and began to die off. we are seeing a slowdown with the tomatoes and the cucumbers. the peppers and eggplants are enjoying the heat. we will most likely begin to remove plants, this week we took out some of the beans.

this hummingbird feeder, located between the herb garden and the peonies, is a busy spot. we have watched several hummingbirds come to drink from it.

the cardinal climbers in the front lasagna bed have taken off. the heat does not seem to affect them at all.

the peonies are dropping seeds now. some of last year's seeds actually sprouted.

our new friend Lubie likes to guard the herb bed. either that or she is stalking hummingbirds. can you believe a neighbor moved out and left two cats behind? it makes me so mad! hopefully we can find her a permanent home before winter.

today's pick

2008-08-04T08:20:00.004-05:00

with a quick trip through the garden this morning and i have a basket full of tomatoes, peppers and cucumbers. sounds like a good salad to me, just need to make a stop in the herb garden and maybe the grocery store for some cheese and bread. what more could any one person possibly need? starting on the left are banana peppers and going clockwise, two ananas noire, a pile of big beef, lemon cucumbers, 4 cherokee purple, chocolate cherries and gold nugget and finally, a small mortgage lifter that needs to ripen a little more.

on this plate, a close up of mortgage lifter-the two at the top, going clock wise, a cut cherokee purple which is also in the center,

tiny bonito ojo, and finally, big beef cut and whole. I apologize for the lousy colors in the photos, i really need to get a better camera.

in this photo, my new favorite tomato, ananas noire. they are a little prone to cracking but that does not stop me from eating them. they are so sweet that they can be eaten like fruit! not a very pretty tomato color wise. it is easy to see why they are called noire-black. they are green inside when ripe.

next year, i will definitely plant the chocolate cherry again, they have great flavor and a good yield. the gold nugget, on the right is also a good little tomato but the yield is not as high. if i do those again next year, i may plant two.

these banana peppers are sweet and the little bush is producing a lot of peppers. i would love to try stuffing some, a chile rellenos dish would be great. next year i may plant two so that i can make that dish. if they are left on the plant long enough, they turn red. maybe we will plant some hot ones too!

the last two years, cucumbers have been a challenge. during last years drought, we watched our vines shrivel up and the few cucumbers we picked were bitter.

in the fall we tried again with a third variety only to have the same results. we assumed it was both the drought and a poor choice of seed variety. this year we went with store bought plants and a few seeds for the lemon cucumbers that were a free gift with our order to rareseeds.com.

those little lemon cucumbers are the best we have ever grown. although we have had good results with store bought cuke plants in years past, this years are often more bitter than sweet and they look a lot like the asian cukes we grew from seed last fall. from now on, it's lemon cukes for us!

points of interest

2008-08-03T12:47:00.005-05:00

last year, i saved many of the annuals that i had in pots to overwinter them in the house. this spring i put them outside, some went into beds and others went into pots. these are some of the purple queen plants from last years flower box. they did not like the conditions in the house, not enough light for them and they turned green. after a short period on the front porch in a new pot, they were once again a nice shade of purple.

when we started our new lasagna bed out front, we transplanted

cardinal climber seedlings to cover the metal bed frame. as

you can see, they are very hardy and are doingwell. they do not

need much encouragement and will probably cover up the frame

quickly.

one of our other lasagna beds, pictured here is also filling in nicely. the coleus plants have grown substantially and are already in need of a trim. all over the yard, in all of the beds and pots are little pieces of garden art. in this bed is a mushroom and in the pot is a tiny gnome. the gnome collection is growing and we are always in search of gnomes in need of a garden home. keep in mind, like the photo to the left says, all of our gnomes live free of garden oppression. they are never expected to work the gardens, however, we won't stop them if they choose to do so on their own...

in the garden this week...

2008-08-02T21:19:00.003-05:00

the melons are getting big! this is one of the watermelons, we ran the vines outside the garden fence and are letting them takeover this section of the lawn.

we also have some green flesh melons. these are also taking over a section of the lawn. we are waiting very patiently for them to mature so we can eat them!

every time we have planted peppers, we have planted too many. we find ourselves with more than we can eat. this year we only planted 3, two bell peppers and one sweet banana pepper. this is the red bell pepper plant and as you can see, the peppers are just beginning to show some color. now that the weather is really hot, they will take off, peppers love hot weather.

this is one of our heirloom tomatoes, cherokee purple. they are a dark tomato, almost a brown color. we are eager to taste them.

one of the things we try to do in the garden is to provide beneficial plants for the various critters that may be in the garden. a few years back, we planted bronze fennel for the swallowtails and this year the plant is huge. all we need now are the swallowtail caterpillars.

what's happening

2008-07-27T13:46:00.007-05:00

our garden features several unusual varieties of vegetable such as vining okra and loofah. we also have an artichoke, various colors of eggplants and tomatoes and two of my favorites are the lemon cucumber (on the left) and cardoon (on the right). the lemon cucumbers are small and about the size of a lemon with a pale yellow rind, hence the name. they also have the best cucumber flavor of any we have ever grown. the cardoon was chosen specifically for it's display, large artichoke-like flowers that are surprisingly fragrant, and it's height.

along the front walk of the house, we added two lasagna beds as you may recall from earlier posts. in between the beds was a scraggly collection of hostas. we have decided to officially turn this space into a hosta garden. we moved around some existing hostas and added some chocolate chip ajuga, also called bugleweed, and in the future we will add more so keep checking back for more updates.

some of the most successful plants in the garden are the cannas. last year was the first year we had them in the garden. we were given some rhizomes by chris, one of the cousins in Kentucky, when we visited them during the holiday season of 2006. darry placed the cannas in the ground in the spring of 2007 and we watched them take off last summer in spite of the drought. last fall, darry cut the amount in this bed by removing half of them and placing them in an empty space by the end of the driveway and in another bed out front. they have once again doubled in this bed, if not tripled and are well over 6 feet tall. we will be removing almost all of them in this bed come the first frost, they are simply too big and invasive for all of the other plants here. as a result, we will have rhizomes to share!

more info on cannas

welcome visitors

2008-07-22T16:19:00.004-05:00

spending time outside means encountering critters. in the garden, that means encountering nasty critters. from mosquitoes to wasps to ants that bite, i run into them all.

this is a photo of a leaf footed bug, they don't bite people but they are big and ugly and they fly.

they are sap suckers, meaning that they pierce the fruit and suck out the juice doing damage that causes the fruit to be stunted.

when i am outside in the garden, i love to listen to the birds. often, i can identify the frequent visitors when i hear them. these black eyed susans are a favorite of the goldfinches. so far, when i have been able to hear them and have attempted to photograph them, they have flown away. any kind of movement near them will scare them off. they spend time up in the trees and they are very vocal. i have also encountered bluebirds in the yard, a male specifically, but no opportunity to photograph him has occurred yet.

tomatoes have begun to ripen! if you came to dinner this past weekend, you could have tasted this tomato salad. it has chocolate cherry, gold nugget and bonito ojo tomatoes in it. i also added some banana peppers and lime basil from the garden and tossed it with balsamic vinegar and olive oil.

our first crop green and yellow beans are finishing up, it will be time to pull them out soon. in this salad, i blanched the beans, added chick peas and kidney beans as well as onions and banana peppers and tossed it with vinaigrette.

being in the south, you become accustomed to having a bowl of cucumber salad on the table. we had a bunch of cukes to use so i sliced them up, added more banana peppers (pepper plants tend to produce lots of peppers when it is hot, and it is hot here!) and dill from the garden and i tossed it with some cider vinegar and a little sugar. i could easily live on this salad!

more to see in the veggie patch...

2008-07-17T13:52:00.007-05:00

this year we planted two kinds of melons, these are rocky ford and they are a green flesh melon.

for the first time, we planted a brown tomato and these are chocolate cherries.

above left is casper, a white eggplant and on the right are sweet banana peppers.

the little peach tree is trying hard to stay upright but the dozen or so peaches on it are bending it over. if it ever gets large, the branches will be on the ground!

garden update for 7/14

2008-07-14T14:36:00.005-05:00

this year, we are happy to report that we have tomatoes! the top left shows the collection of plants in this years garden. the two buckets are some bradleys that were given to us by our neighbor and as you can see, if you want to do them in buckets, go with the 5 gallon buckets and they will do a lot better. on the bottom left is gold nugget, a yellow cherry and on the bottom right is bonito ojo, a small red tomato.

we planted watermelons this year, and have been threading the vines through the fence. so far we have about 6 on the vines.

these are the zucchini plants grown from the seeds that the girls brought back from their mediterranean cruise last summer.

honeybee sighting

2008-07-14T14:21:00.003-05:00

i am marking 7/13 on my calendar as the day i saw the first honeybee in the garden.

although they are probably out there, i haven't seen any before this one. we have picked some cucumbers and zucchini and the various vines have melons and watermelons, so they are obviously visiting the garden, however, there aren't many to watch. i followed this one as it went from flower to flower on the cucumber vines.

two new lasagna beds

2008-07-10T17:48:00.003-05:00

anyone who has been following the progress of our gardens by reading this blog should remember the lasagna garden that we built this spring. it sits along side our front walkway in the long bed that runs the length of the sidewalk. we decided to build another one at the opposite end, it is smaller and features slightly different plants since the same varieties of coleus and begonias were not available. we eliminated the fresh grass cuttings in favor of old grass cuttings and built the bed with compost, leaves and old grass layers and the results were better. the lack of green material was a plus, it did not get "hot"

and the plants did much better from the start.

Recycling at its finest!

with this in mind, we set out to build a new bed out front. i have always wanted one with a sign that has the house numbers displayed so anyone looking for the house can find it easily. another of my goals for this bed was to do it cheaply, imagine that-a cheap garden. well, we did it and we spent less that $50 dollars. while that may not seem cheap, keep in mind that gardening is not cheap if you are building a bed from scratch unless you do as we did and rely completely on the lasagna method of building layers with found materials. first, the ugly green bed came from a neighbors yard, it had a sign stating take me-free on it and darry did just that. the silver scroll piece is actually from the original screen door that was on the house when we bought it and linda and the girls brought the house numbers back from their trip to spain two years ago. we assembled them and mounted them to some scrap pieces that we found in the basement. to erect the bed and the number sign, we spent less than $3 to buy screws, nuts and wire to assemble them. we put it all in place and began to build the bed by layering wet newspapers on the ground-better than tossing them in the bin! next we built layers from compost, grass, leaves, peat/potting soil, coffee grinds and pine needles. Since we didn't have enough soil, we bought 4 bags for $9 dollars. most of the materials came from the yard with the exception of the pine needles, we had to gather them at the demo garden and of course, the coffee grinds. luckily for me, working in a restaurant means an endless supply of vegetable and fruit material for composting and we had a large pile to use. most people do not realize that Starbucks gives away the used coffee and espresso grinds for gardening. you can ask them for the grinds, sometimes they bag them and set them in a basket in the front of the store or they place them in large bags and store them in a bin outdoors with the recyclables which is how the store we visit does it. we also have a lot of trees and a lot of leaves so we were able to build a nice deep bed. the real splurge came with the plants, $35. now this may seem like a lot for plants but, we purchased 13@$.99 each and 7 @$2.49 each, a total of 20 plants which will fill out the bed nicely. as for the ugly green bed, we brought home some seedlings for cardinal climbers and dropped in a few morning glories and before long, that thing should be covered! the other great thing about this bed, it didn't take long to build, less than 4 hours from start to finish!

california vacation

2008-07-09T11:10:00.005-05:00

as you all know by now, we went to california for a 10 day vacation. we joined the girls at linda's and packed in a lot of sight seeing and visiting. the weather was great and the time went fast. linda's vegetable garden was wonderful, 6 foot tall tomatoes and lots of lettuce, strawberries and green beans and even tomatillos and a pomegranate tree. the thought of photographing it must have slipped my mind because i do not have one photo to share! however, i did take a few photos of some of her flowers.

on the left is the bird of paradise plant that sits by the driveway entrance and on the right are two hydrangea bushes, the top one is a variagated lace cap that was so much prettier in person!

our travels took us to the napa valley where we spent a day in st helena. one winery that we always stop to visit is the franciscan winery. they have beautiful gardens and a giant bench that we have photos of the girls sitting on from when we lived out there.

on the upper left, the walkway that leads to the giant bench just barely visible in this photo.
upper right, some of the grapes growing along the walkway and on the lower left, some of the flowers in the garden.

playing catch up

2008-07-07T09:04:00.002-05:00

darry and i have been home for a week now, playing catch up! the garden was in desparate need of attention as was the entire yard! now that we are some what there, look for posts to begin again! we have a new bed to show off. unfortunately, we did not take many "garden" photos on our trip, only a few in napa and most of you may have already seen them. linda's garden was beautiful, but we were never there-we were on the go every day.

2008-06-15T18:25:00.002-05:00

it was just slightly misty/foggy this morning after yesterday's rain. the garden was thoroughly watered and we didn't have to man the hose this time! as you can see, the tomatoes have grown considerably and many of the plants have begun to set fruit, i can't wait to try them! my new favorite green, chard, is one of the best things to plant in the garden. the seeds sprout easily, the plants grow quickly and do not bolt in the southern summer heat. pictured is bright lights which comes in many colors from yellow to orange to red and many shades in between including hot pinks. this plant looks like a candy cane to me, red and white stripes. a new plant in our garden this year is the asparagus long bean, they have the prettiest flowers. the vines are growing up the tee pee and we have the beginnings of many beans, we will be trying them out soon. when the girls went to italy last summer with linda and mike, they brought me some packets of seeds. one of those packets is a zucchini variety that we planted. the plants have begun to bloom and i am sure the zucchini are coming soon. the banana peppers are the first of the peppers to set fruit and we should be experiencing a crop soon. we will be traveling to california this week so look for pictures from linda's garden to posted next!

garden update

2008-06-10T15:32:00.003-05:00

take a look and see what's happening in the garden. a bumper crop of yellow wax beans, cukes galore, asparagus bean stalks climbing the teepee and big beef has the first tomato of the season. we have been eating lots of fresh lettuce and greens and we are patiently waiting to pick cucumbers and tomatoes. the beans have been delicious, both yellow and green and we can't wait to try the asparagus long beans, the get about 18" long and should be fun to see. this year, we are hopeful that the tomatoes will succeed and that we will actually get to eat some.

josie helps out

2008-06-06T18:35:00.003-05:00

josie has embraced gardening, she loves to help weed-especially grass. however, the birds do not enjoy her company in the garden. here she is weeding the new asparagus bed.

where are the bees?

2008-06-01T21:20:00.003-05:00

there has been a lot in the news, gardening news that is, about honey bees. specifically about colony collapse disorder and other ailments bees are experiencing and the problems they cause. i have always thought it would be interesting to have a bee box or two out in the yard in the hopes of trading the space for some honey with a local bee keeper. in my search for information, i visited the nashville area beekeepers association website and found about the great sunflower project. it is a project being run by an associate professor at san francisco state university and i signed up to participate. they will send me seeds and i will plant them in my garden and when they bloom, i will count the bees that visit. this information will help them decide which parts of the country are experiencing the most trouble. it is free to join and you get the seeds for free as well, and maybe we can help save the honey bees! check it out and join the program, but you better hurry because they will only send out seeds to people that sign up through 6/15, after that you will be signed up for next year. (the photo is of a bumble bee, i didn't see any honeybees!)

great sunflower program

rhubarb

2008-05-28T15:54:00.003-05:00

while digging out the old asparagus bed in preparation for adding the 20 new crowns, we found one of the two rhubarb plants that we put in last year. the other obviously was a drought victim. because of the amount of crowns to go in, we had to relocate it. we had purchased two new crowns thinking that all of last years had perished. now, all three are nestled in together and the flamingoes are keeping a vigilant watch over them.

garden update

2008-05-28T15:34:00.003-05:00

this year's garden is moving right along. we have had plenty of rain and cooler night time temperatures and this is wonderful. we haven't had to do much watering, after last year, that's great! the greens are already picking size and some of the pak choy has already begun to bolt! next year, we will not plant it in the spring because it bolts so quickly, it does much better in fall and over winter. we are enjoying salads with arugala, spinach and many different lettuces such as lolla rosa, green deer tongue, tom thumb, red oak leaf and more. the green beans and wax beans are threatening to take over and they have many blossoms so it shouldn't be too much longer for picking. the new asparagus crowns have begun to send up spears, although they are too small to eat, we should be able to pick them next year. the tomatoes, eggplants and peppers are all adjusting to life outdoors. a lot of the seeds and plants we have came from two wonderful catalogs that i highly recommend territorial seeds and baker creek heirloom seeds. both carry wonderful selections of heirloom varieties and hard to find seeds, and territorial seeds has a great selection of plants for the spring only.

walking don

2008-05-25T11:41:00.004-05:00

darry's mother linda is lucky to live in an area where wildlife abounds. her stable is located in the golden gate national recreation area, just north of san francisco. there is a photographer who frequents the park and he sends linda many photos of the wildlife and she always forwards them on to me. this is an example of someone who is acutely aware of the wildlife around him!

these are a few photos from a series of 10 that show a pair of osprey caring for their young.

photos by Don Moseman, email him at walkindon@mac.com

good sense

2008-05-25T11:09:00.005-05:00

the sense of smell can trigger lots of things both pleasant and unpleasant. sometimes, just a quick sight of something can do the same and when we finally get a good look at it, we may also get a good laugh at ourselves for the misperception. sounds can do many things to the senses, especially if you really aren't listening. spending time in the garden, and being completely focused on a task, i often fine that my sense of hearing is acutely tuned to the wild life around me. part of that is the result of living in such close proximity to the zoo. it is entirely normal to hear the siamangs and gibbons during the day. the other main factor is that we live in an old and established neighborhood where there really is no room for new construction and the houses are spread out with plenty of old growth to provide room for the wildlife. we also have lots of wild life to keep it interesting.

a few nights ago, we were woken from a deep sleep to the sounds of what must have been two possums battling over a find in the compost heap. the dog heard it too and she only added to the noise level. quite often, while sitting in the dining room or working in the kitchen, i am seranaded by the hopeful little wren as he advertises for his future mate. the little bird house is chock full of sticks and he flits around from the birdhouse to the fence to any number of places in and around the vegetable garden and all the while he is calling out repeatedly and waiting for a response. cardinals, blue jays and goldfinches all stop by and make their presence known. every so often, we spy a blue bird but we generally don't hear them. we have hawks nesting in the old growth that forms boundary lines between various houses and i hear them frequently as they fly over head. since we live at the bottom of the hill, it is not uncommon for them to fly low up the driveway and thru the trees as they head uphill to their nest. surely they are hoping to find the chipmunks that are suddenly no longer present, we suspect the snake skins we have recently found have something to do with that. darry and i have also caught glimpses of a fox. it has been in and around our yard and in other parts of the neighborhood. i am thinking that it is a vixen, it is not very pretty, rather bland in color and markings and the tail is not especially fluffy. whether these are signs of gender, immaturity or inbreeding, i am not educated enough to say but i hope this means that there are more to keep her company.

one thing i haven't experienced so far this year, cicadas. we are supposedly expecting a bumper crop, a mass hatching if you will. it has been all over the tv and newspapers. so far, we have found a few shells on trees and in various plants, and with this neighborhood being so old, we should see or hear many soon if the predictions hold true. look for photos to be posted if they are!

bumper crop of berries

2008-05-21T15:19:00.003-05:00

last years late frost did a lot of damage. we had to replace vegetable plants that were damaged only to have them suffer from the drought that followed. one of the other casualties was a complete loss of all of the flowers on both of our holly bushes. as you know, without flowers there will not be any berries. needless to say, we had a bunch of hungry birds this past winter. when we saw the first signs of flowers, we were worried that we could lose them again and we had several cold nights that could have frosted them. luckily for the birds, the berries have survived the few false starts of spring and will be ripe and ready come fall!

the littlest herb garden in nashville

2008-05-15T15:10:00.000-05:00

this years herb garden has filled out nicely. the lemon balm and the sage (on the right) are attempting to take over! the spanish lavender and monarda are also on their way as well as the rosemary and oregano. on the left, you can see almost all of the 6 kinds of basil as well as the big beautiful bronze fennel that we planted specifically for the butterflies! the thyme and marjoram have filled in nicely after the damage of last years drought. this year i added flowers to the herb garden, violas and nasturtiums that are edible and some salvia that isn't and it should be nice and colorful. so fare, the skinks are doing a good job keeping watch, we have seen a large male broad head and a small blue tail of unknown sex. hopefully they will stay outside this year, a few snuck into the house last year and josie was all over them!

broad headed skink

blue tail skink

what's new in the garden

2008-05-13T18:14:00.000-05:00

the garden is showing signs of growth. the greens are filling out and the new asparagus crowns are shooting up all over. the tomatoes, peppers and eggplants are adjusting to life outside.

progress report-lasagna garden

2008-05-13T17:49:00.001-05:00

it has been slow going due to cooler temperatures.

but it is beginning to look as if it is taking root. the plants are slowly filling out and hopefully, once the tempurature goes up a little, the plants will take off. if this bed is successful, we will be adding more to this area of the yard.

monkey business

2008-05-12T16:21:00.000-05:00

life is short so you might as well as have a little fun while you are working. it was a beautiful sunny day today and with this in mind, i dressed accordingly before going out to weed the vegetable garden. baggy light weight pants that are definitely a little too short, long sleeve shirt, a bandana around my neck to keep it covered and a big floppy hat and sunglasses. the girls would have been sufficiently horrified by my appearance. but i was determined not to get a sun burn. it was so nice out that i truly did not mind being out there digging up weeds. as i settled into a rhythm and my mind began to wander, i found myself listening to the siamangs at the zoo. they make a loud whooping call that we can hear in our yard. it reminded me that earlier in the day, i found myself listening to the white handed gibbons. being so close to the zoo is nice, we can watch elephants and giraffes when we walk the dog near the zoo property some times.

siamang information: www.honoluluzoo.org/siamang.htm

white handed gibbon information: www.honoluluzoo.org/whitehanded_gibbon.htm

www.nashvillezoo.org

send me photos!

2008-05-08T08:01:00.000-05:00

we just put all of our vegetable plants out in the garden. seeds are beginning to sprout and soon, i will have photos of our garden to share. in the mean time, share some of your photos with me and i will put them up. be sure to keep checking up on us and see what we have going on in the garden. garden4groceries@bellsouth.net

the irises have it!

2008-05-08T07:54:00.000-05:00

the iris is the tennessee state flower. i have never been a huge fan of them because they just don't last that long. this was until i really started looking at all of the irises out there. we have an official state iris garden close by in the ellington agricultural center. there are so many that are old varieties and a lot of new varieties as well. it is a beautiful setting, raised beds surround a gazebo and there is a small stream with a bridge, a popular wedding site in the spring. my mother in law, linda, is also an iris fan. she has several varieties in her garden and she sent me these photos of her black iris.

linda's garden

2008-05-05T15:24:00.001-05:00

one of the things i love about gardening is the chance to share it with other people. there is nothing better than walking out to the garden and picking a bowl of greens or a bouquet of flowers or herbs that will be given to someone. so when i opened my email and found all of the photos that linda sent me, i had to post a few. the raised beds are being guarded by the dogs and the irises are beautiful. i can't wait to see the garden when we arrive in june. linda recently added a new foal to the stable when her mare molly gave birth, zara princess of hearts, check out the livery website for photos and information. miwokstables.com

darry to the rescue...

2008-05-03T19:03:00.000-05:00

while at work one day, darry saw a large plant being hauled out to the trash. he thought it looked nice and that it was a shame to see it going into the dumpster so he brought it home to me. it was obvious that the plant had been neglected so we gave it a fresh pot of dirt and some water then we placed it near a window for some sunlight. after a few weeks, we noticed that it had grown, all over were leaves and at the top, what we suspected were flowers. then the other night, i could not get over the perfume that i was sure that the girls had been using. it was so strong it was beginning to give me headache, the scent of lilies and jasmine and it was all over the upstairs of the house. then i went over to the plant and discovered that the little flowers packed the most scent i have ever experienced in a plant. it is a dracaena fragrans or a corn palm, and they are night bloomers, during the day the scent is not evident, but at night, watch out!

floridagardener.com/pom/Dracaenafragrans.htm

home again

2008-04-29T17:57:00.000-05:00

today while prepping dinner, i heard a familiar call. when i looked outside, i could see that the wren who called our birdhhouse home last summer had returned. he was busy filling it with sticks from the garden and every now and then, he would sit on top and call out to a perspective mate. this year, i hope he has better luck, the nest was unused last year. the funny thing is, we never cleaned out the house, but it was empty. we did see other birds scoping it out so maybe they cleaned it for the wren. in the background, you can see the beginnings of all of our cooking and salad greens. there are 14 different kinds, i can't wait to pick some!

oh so fruity

2008-04-27T20:58:00.000-05:00

elberta peach with a bumper crop

last years late frost caused our little tree to drop all of it's fruit. we were so disappointed, we had visions of eating them, even if there weren't very many we had plans! the year before, the little tree had a single peach that a squirrel stole before we could enjoy it. this year's crop will be well guarded, the squirrels are hereby put on notice, watch out! a lack of fruit last summer gave the little tree time to nearly double in size and as a result, the crop is larger and we hope it will be successful.

arkansas black apple with blossoms

this is the first year that the apple trees had blossoms, and only the granny smith and the arkansas black bloomed. hopefully, they were able to cross pollinate each other and we will see some apples this fall. we are having a problem with catapillars munching on the leaves but we are treating them with neem oil and hoping for some relief, otherwise, we may be seeking help. keep your fingers crossed, we hope to be picking fruit this year!

rain dance

2008-04-27T17:38:00.000-05:00

on april 17, i attended a rain barrel workshop sponsored by cool moms care and the cumberland river compact. it was $25 which seems like a lot for a 45 minute mini class but the price of the class included a rain barrel. now if you have ever tried to buy one, you will understand completely why i couldn't sign up fast enough for that class!!! i have seen them priced for $100 and up. the added bonus here, these are used soda barrels from coca cola so not only did i get a cheap rain barrel, i also helped keep a large amount of plastic from going to a land fill or a recycling center. the woman who gave the class explained to us that it is really harmful to streams and rivers if they get run off from our yards. many people use chemicals in their landscapes that are poisonous. then there all of the harmful chemicals that autos require such as oil, gasoline and anti-freeze that can also end up in the waterways. to make a long story short, it is best for rain to stay close to where it falls, it allows the local water tables to refill and it eliminates some pollution from entering the waterways. after the class, i managed to cram the barrel in the car and bring it home, then once again i had to be patient and wait for rain. it was amazing how fast it filled up, literally in minutes during the first real down pour. so now, we have it attached to a soaker hose and one flower bed is set. we need more barrels!!!

check out the website, all of you nashvillians, the readymade barrels are available for delivery.

cumberlandrivercompact.org