Weekly journal of a Midwest gardener, which includes mowing, weeding, buying plants, harvesting strawberries, and reading.
How shall I account for the day? (Must I account for the day?) In the morning, I met an arborist at the neighborhood common area to assess the health of the trees planted in that area. I also worked on a presentation I’m doing later this week.1 Then after a late lunch, the rain began, off and on, until late in the evening when it was FULL ON with winds, multiple warning sirens, and heavy rainfall. My garden got a good soaking, which was needed!2 My favorite flower today was a dianthus, variety unknown, but it is in full bloom now and if memory serves, it will flower off and on until late summer. I’m keeping an eye on it!
While the garden was drying out from the overnight storms, I went in the morning to the greenhouse to take some pictures for my presentation on Thursday. After lunch I weeded the rest of the flower border in The Vegetable Garden Cathedral. I love how easy it was to pull out those evening primroses and other weeds after the rain. And how nice to see that the bronze fennel is self-sowing, and many of the hollyhocks I planted last year have returned. Elsewhere in the garden, I was pleased to see columbines of various colors popping up all over the place, even in the patio. They are self-sowing nicely. May they ever do so!3
I had to switch up my morning plan—mow the lawn bright and early—when I realized it was raining. I hadn’t expected rain! At first, I thought it was just light sprinkles, but when I checked the rain gauge, I was surprised to find almost half an inch had fallen on the garden. By late afternoon, I deemed the lawn dry enough to mow, so that’s what I did.4 In other garden news, I noticed that the ‘Bartzella’ peonies look better every day as more blooms open. At least the two in front do. The one in the back is still all buds, but it is a bit less sheltered than those in front.
I got up early and headed out to the garden and mostly pulled weeds. They grow so fast! And yes, I did dump an extra bag of weeds in the trash bin before the trash was collected. You know I love to do that on Thursdays! I also sighed when I saw that sawfly larvae had been feasting on some of the Columbine in the back.5 The good news is I can incorporate that topic/problem into my presentation later today.6 Anyway, just as I was going in to get cleaned up, FedEx dropped off a shipment of new trial plants from Pan American seeds.7 I unboxed those… and that was my day in the garden. Oh, one more thing… the flower that caught my eye this morning was a Geum called ‘Totally Tangerine.’ It is a totally unfussy little orange flowering wonder.8
More early morning rain, but not a lot. Could have, should have, weeded a bit more out there. Instead, I stayed inside and tended to the houseplants because it was in the chilly 40s outside.9 In the afternoon, I went to see Animal Farm at the theater, then came home and picked the first strawberries of the season.10 Yum! Today’s flower was ‘Bath’s Pink’ Dianthus, which I have cascading over a low retaining wall on the east side of my house. It only blooms once in the spring, but it is glorious for those few weeks when it is covered in pink fragrant flowers.11
We didn’t get frost, but it was a chilly morning. No matter! My plans didn’t involve doing any actual gardening. I headed out early to go to the Johnson County Garden Fair and spent a blissful few hours there shopping and gawking.12 Then I headed over to Wild Geese Bookstore, since it’s in the same town,13 before winding my way home past one of my sister’s friends to check on the health of a redbud tree.14 The day ended with church and dinner out.15 What else?16 Oh, a flower! Today’s flower of note was the ox-eye daisies which have been blooming for a while now. I’ll let a few self-sow and welcome them back again next spring.
Another “we didn’t get frost but it was a chilly morning” start to a sunny day.17 What were my accomplishments of the day? I potted up four cute little succulents in a concrete trough planter that had sat empty on my patio for too long. I also potted up a a tiny rose that is supposed to stay tiny and is perfect for fairy gardens. It’s labeled merely as “Rosa sp.” We shall see how big it really gets, or rather how small it really stays. And while out in the garden, I admired today’s flower, some purple Baptisia.
Everyone wants it to be warmer than it is, but not hot, definitely not hot. Just warm enough at night, especially, so we don’t have to wonder if it will be frosty when we wake up in the morning. My tomatoes, which were outside, were inside for the past two nights, no doubt wondering why they can’t go back out “for good.” Not for a while! Ditto the peppers. And the same for some herbs I bought on Saturday. Such is spring. Cold, warm, cold, warm, cold, until it’s mostly warm. Through it all the grass grows, trees leaf out, and new flowers appear almost daily. Soon enough, we’ll all be enjoying high summer, unlike our ancestors who lived in 1816, which is known as The Year Without A Summer. I’m going to assume that if we were going to have such a summer, the meteorologists would have told us about it already. Never fear. Carry on.
“The peonies were out now—great balls of splendid crimson-and the white balls of the gueldre rose, sheaves of violet and purple flags, the wide graceful arches of Solomon’s seal, armfuls of lilac sweet as Spring herself, tall tulips rosy and white and gold, the yellow stars of the leopard’s bane—oxslips, cowslips, and always forget-me-nots;” - The Lark by E. Nesbit18
Until next week,
With a shared love of gardening and reading,
Carol
Don’t know what to comment? Tell about a flower you saw this week or about something you did in your own garden?
My presentation is titled “Tips and Tricks for Spring Gardening.” That’s pretty much what it’s about!
Rainfall total for Monday as measured on Tuesday morning was 1.76 inches. Top wind speed in my garden was 17 mph. I had one decently sized branch fall from the honeylocust tree; otherwise the garden made it through the storms in good shape.
Another task of the day was to spend time on the Libby app looking for audiobooks to listen to while gardening. I had none checked out! Oh no! Will I be forced to listen to the lawn mower while mowing? Nope, I now have five checked out, which should be enough for a while.
While mowing on Wednesday, I started listening to Raising Hare: A Memoir by Chloe Dalton. I continued to listen to it while weeding the following morning and finished it while cleaning up salad fixin’s for lunches. Highly recommend!
I won’t do anything about the Columbine sawfly larvae. The damage is done. Truth be told, I see this damage every year, but yet I get more Columbine self-sowing every year. The plants should recover, and we’ll all go on without poisoning everything in the garden.
My presentation went well, if I do say so myself. Lots of good questions and good information shared.
PanAmerican Seed sent me nine new annuals to trial in my garden. I’ll plant most of them in containers, but not for a bit as the early morning temperatures for Friday and Saturday are predicted to be in the 30s!
I know you want to know how we did at Trivia Night! We came in fifth. Got caught on a couple of questions where we changed from the right answer to the wrong answer. A good reminder of that old test taking strategy—your first answer is usually right. Dang. For the record, Atlas might look like he’s holding up the world, but he’s actually holding up the sky. Remember that if you are asked, “What Greek titan is condemned to hold up the sky forever?” (Did I mention we were fifth out of five teams?)
All that “we might be frost-free” talk of last week is null and void for this week. We have frost warnings for our first weekend of May. How about that?!
At the movie theater on Friday, something happened that has never happened before, at least when I was watching a movie in a theater. The projector failed half-way through the movie and couldn’t be fixed. They apologized and gave us tickets to use on a future movie of our choice. So, if someone asks, “Have you seen the new Animal Farm movie?” how should I answer? I tried to see it!
At the Johnson County Garden Fair, I bought several types of herbs, some cute little succulents, a tiny rose, a pot of crested irises, a plant stand, something to keep mosquitoes away from my patio, and one ‘Mini Skirt’ hosta. Plus I picked up some free seeds. I saw all kinds of people I knew including a friend from my garden club, an old neighbor who grew up next door in the 60s before moving away in the early 70s, another friend from high school who was selling plants there, a podcast listener from the next county over, plus several other vendors who are there every year. I left when I had spent the cash I brought. I think next year I’ll plan to stay longer—maybe the entire day!— and take more money.
At the bookstore, I bought Shakespeare: The Man Who Pays the Rent by Judi Dench, with Brendan O’Hea. Why? I like Judi Dench, because she loves trees, and I thought it might be fun to read her reminisces and stories of being a Shakespearian actor and in the process, learn more about Shakespeare’s plays, which I haven’t thought much about since high school, when I took a class on Shakespeare.
My sister’s friend’s redbud tree is indeed declining and most likely has some kind of borers or something rotting the base of the trunk at ground level. It has also not leafed out well this spring. I think the prudent thing to do is to chop it down. I once had a redbud that got attacked by borers, and one day when I was gone on vacation, it fell down all on its own.
We watched the exciting Kentucky Derby race in the bar where we ate dinner. Funny thing, I never think about horse racing until the first Saturday in May when the K.D. race is on in the bar, then I’m glued to the television, picking out a favorite horse purely based on its name. I did like the name Golden Tempo, the name of the horse that won. Also, this year’s race was historic because Cherie DeVaux became the first female horse trainer to win the Kentucky Derby. There are lots of videos of her on the Internet being very excited, for obvious reasons, and suddenly the Instagram algorithm thinks I’m wildly interested in horses and horse racing.
Between Friday and Saturday, I listened to Matilda by Roald Dahl, a classic children’s book first published in 1988 well after my childhood. Thankfully, I’m now old enough to read children’s books again.
I finished reading The Lark by E. Nesbit on my Kindle on Sunday and started reading Five for Sorrow, Ten for Joy by Rumer Godden. I’m still slowly reading the paperback edition of Mrs. Lorimer’s Quiet Summer by Molly Claverling. The four paperbacks I ordered last week arrived on Saturday, so I have a nice TBR pile going for the summer.
When reading novels with long passages describing gardens, the horticulturist in me wonders if such a garden could really exist. Could all those flowers be blooming at the same time? The gardener in me wants to see such a garden in person! And what, exactly, is a “gueldre rose’? (It’s a viburnum, not a rose!)
Comments
Nothing yet. Say the first thing.
Sign in to join the conversation.