Winter is a great time to sit back and enjoy the emptiness in the garden. Our garden is not quite empty since I left a lot of seed heads intact for the birds and insects. Some brush piles for them to take refuge in from the cold, situate here and there. Still, it’s much emptier than during the growing season. Winter is also a time … Continue reading Winter: Planning Time
Enhanced Beauty I want our garden to resemble a natural environment as much as possible but the roses don’t seem to quite fit. I try to incorporate roses in the garden anyway. I love roses and I think any garden without roses is not a complete garden. Any readers who don’t like roses and think that they are a pain to take care of, please … Continue reading Rose Companions
Spring Already? Tomorrow, December 22 will be the official first day of winter but Mother Nature didn’t get the memo. Day time temperature will be over 50° F for the next few days and night time will not be much lower than that. In fact, in this area Christmas Eve is predicted to be 70° F during the day. The sad part of this unseasonably warm … Continue reading Fooled By Nature
Welcomed With Heavy Rain Today is the official first day of summer but the weather doesn’t seem to want to cooperate. Morning started much cooler than summer should start with, then the rain arrived, pouring down and accompanied by strong winds. Over all, it’s pretty wet and cool with sunshine peeking out here and there. Tomatoes looked very unhappy being blown left and right and soaking … Continue reading First Day of Summer
Best Time Of The Season I love spring time. There is a lot of work to do in the garden in spring in order to keep up with the fast growing plants but it’s the best time of year, in my opinion anyway. When the weather gets gradually warmer, plants follow accordingly and they are much easier to keep up with. This year the weather … Continue reading Late Spring Garden
Still Blooming Heading toward the end of summer when not many things are blooming whether because of high temperature, humidity, pouring rain or drought, there are still some diehard flowers that never disappoint me. Garden Phlox, Black-eyed Susan, Echinacea and Alyssum just to name a few. There are also some low growing shrubs and lovely weeds, yes weeds – that is what they are categorized. … Continue reading Dependable Summer Plants (continued)
Dependable For Late Season It can grow more than 30 feet in a single season, climb and entwine on everything within its reach. The UPS, FedEx and USPS people no longer drop shipments off on our patio since they are not sure they can go under the thick overhanging vine covering the walkway. My fault! I draped the young vine over the walkway without thinking … Continue reading Sweet Autumn Clematis
Companion Plants Growing roses without growing clematis is almost a crime. They are supposed to be great companions for one another. It’s not the term I normally use but this is what I read in gardening books and websites. I can confirm this information as accurate having now grown a few kinds of clematis with roses. Lucky that I didn’t try to grow the Clematis … Continue reading Clematis
An End And A Beginning Spring has come and gone and somewhat unevenly too. The gap between day and night temperatures was very wide for some time, then a continuously pouring rain for several days. During the 70 to 85 degrees days, the plants shot up, leaves peeking out and flowers budding only to be knocked back by very cold nights. Vegetables, except for the tomatoes and … Continue reading Spring Recap
Blooms But Once A Year And It’s Worth It It’s that time of year again: A time of colors and scents. The unintended Clematis Montana (Clematis Montana var Rubens) proves itself of worthy for any garden again even though it blooms only once a year. I can hardly see it’s leaves this spring. The pool fence is covered with the beautiful pink flowers and it … Continue reading Clematis Montana
Petals and Wings 