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Pssst! Over Here! In the trunk…

OSH Garden Center

I jumped out of my van in the Orchard Supply Hardware (OSH) parking lot and made a beeline for the garden center.  A friend recommended an EarthBox® for growing tomatoes and I was hoping to find one there (no luck).  Our local OSH relocated to the former Mervyn’s site where, coincidentally, I had my first “real” job working in gift wrap.  The new garden center has a recording of birds chirping in the background.  Corny as it sounds, it’s actually very nice.

As I headed for the double doors I heard my name.  I met Barbara through my son’s school, but didn’t know she was a gardener until I took my son to her home for a party in their back yard.  I was green with envy!  She has a beautiful garden on a double-sized lot and she has chickens.  They make the best fertilizer around.  Barbara also shares my fantasy of buying the neighbor’s house for the sole purpose of expanding her garden.

We chatted about our boys, but first she popped the trunk so I could ogle her flats of flowers and vegetables.  It makes me giggle when I think about two women with their heads bent over a trunk, admiring all those plants. Ah, the joys of bonding over eggplant and tomato starter plants. I’m still smiling.

Garden Center Greeting

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Weeds: Green Isn’t Always a Good Thing

Oxalis, pretending to be ground cover

If you garden, you weed.  The end.

Seriously, every garden has weeds; it’s only a matter of degrees.  I’m an expert weeder myself, probably because pulling weeds falls into the category of garden organization.  I  pull weeds and restore order.  It’s therapeutic clearing out the interlopers, those pervasive plants that sneak into the garden beds when you aren’t looking.  They pretend to be the real deal as they vie for water and nutrients, using clever camouflage and stealth tactics to avoid detection.  I know the regulars around town: oxalis, dandelions and spotted surge. Now and again I spot something new and unfamiliar.  I pause overhead, garden fork in hand, wondering if I should give the newcomer a chance.  I once let a glossy green plant grow in our side yard, only to learn from my friend Doug that it was invasive.  It’s still popping up!  I’ve also yanked out plants, only to realize it was an annual re-seeding from the previous year.  I was amused to discover this week that the plant I left growing next to the Chinese Pistache is a volunteer broccoli plant.  How fun that was!

When you garden you have an intimate knowledge of weeds and their habits; where they’ll grow and when. If you don’t pull them out by the roots early, they’ll flower and drop seeds.  Once they go to seed you’ve extended an open-ended invitation to return year after year.

To Weed, or Not to Weed?

I made my rounds today, fork in hand, with a strong wind kicking up pollen.  We have rain in the forecast, so I figured I would get this first round done before the rain helps plant a new batch.

Do you have a garden “chore” that you secretly love?

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Happy Earth Day

I found an interesting quiz on the site Act Earth Day.  It estimates your ecological footprint, based on a series of questions.  At the end of the quiz you can explore ways to improve your impact on our planet.

You can find the quiz here.

I thought I would score better than I did and I’m disappointed.  Clearly I have room for improvement!  On the plus side:

  • I’m a vegetarian (eating lower on the food chain)
  • I recycle, reuse and re-purpose
  • I plant a vegetable garden (small plot) each year
  • One of our two cars is a Prius
  • All of our appliances are Energy Star
  • We insulated our home and installed dual-pane windows throughout
  • Our heat is off during the day; set to 66 at night during the colder months.

The quiz suggested I travel locally (instead of flying) for my next vacation and consider using public transportation.  I should buy less packaged food and improve my local food consumption.

Please let me know if you take the quiz and if so, how you did. I pledge to do better this year.  I hope you have something wonderful planned to celebrate our beautiful planet.

Feathered Observer

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Next House: Voodoo and Tasmanian Tigers

Garden nurseries and animal shelters have the same effect on my psyche: I want to bring everything (and everyone!) I see home.  I chant my “all things in moderation” mantra, and tell myself I can visit those plum trees and flowering succulents any time I want.   When possible, I stay out of animal shelters all together, since a steady stream of stray cats and the occasional dog make it to my door on their own.  I value the necessary work that our shelters provide, but find it disheartening to see so many animals in need of a good home.  Nurseries, on the other hand are always great fun.

My husband and I have a saying between us when we pine for something we unattainable: next house, code for it’s not going to happen.  So…in my next house, I’ll plant the following:

Ruby Clusters: Jewels for the Common Gardener

Tasmanian Tiger: Where the Wild Things Are

Voodoo: For my Tim Burton Inspired Fairy House

If you had the space and place, the time and the money, what would you grow?

Plants available at Almaden Valley Nursery in Silicon Valley.

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Mystery Solved: It’s a Squirrel’s Nest

Peanut Tester

I photographed a nest last month, high up in the orange tree.  There was no sign of activity so I  assumed it belonged to a nocturnal mama, most likely an opossum.  This week, purely by chance, I looked up to see a squirrel enter the nest.  How I wished I had my camera!  I’m fascinated by what looks like a paper bag at the bottom of the nest.  I’ll have to dig out some binoculars so I can get a peek without getting any closer than I already have.  It’s such a compliment when nests appear in your garden.

According to A Squirrel Place, “Squirrels are usually born in the early spring. The average litter consists of four. This varies with climate and location.”

What have you seen nesting this spring?

Squirrel Nest: March 25, 2012

Squirrel Nest: April 19, 2012

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Blooming Thursday: Geranium Containerem

Geranium: Old Faithful

Geraniums are the garden work-horse. In our zone, they flower three seasons  of the year and remain hardy down to at least 30 degrees Fahrenheit. They enjoy full sun and a good soak during the summer months, but the rest of the year they just hang out in the pot, content. Our pretty-in-pink geranium asks for very little, yet produces these beautiful blooms. I don’t see geraniums in local gardens like I used to, so perhaps they’ve fallen out of favor.  When I envision geraniums, I imagine them tucked up along white picket fences or grazing the corners of a bucolic cottage porch.  Time and again, geraniums appear in greeting cards and calendars, imparting a sense of nostalgia and harmony.  I saw several varieties when I traveled through Europe in 1989, dreaming of recreating that essence when I returned home.

Do you have geraniums in your garden?

Geranium Pink

If I were a paint color:
Several shades of subtle pink

Geraniums: Cheerful Splendor at the Edge of our Deck

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Pumpkin Sprouts!

Quack-quack!!!

The pumpkin seeds are sprouting.  Yippee!  They look so hearty and healthy.  I prepared the beds last week with fresh amended soil.  We had success with bat guano fertilizer last year, so I’ll use that again this season.  One application did the trick.

We live close to Half Moon Bay, California, home of the World Championship Pumpkin Weigh-Off.  The event attracts growers from around the United States.  We fantasize each year about growing “a big one” but in reality we’re just happy when they grow into whole fruit without sacrificing too many to the rats and squirrels.

I love this time of year!

So then she said...

Twinsies!

Let me take a look under the hood...

Pumpkin Seed Convention

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Spider Catcher: Witness Relocation Program for Arachnids

Humane Bug Catcher
Available from PETA

Spiders used to freak me out.  Seriously, I considered sleeping on the couch if I knew a spider lurked above my bed.  I once read that people ingest about six spiders during an average lifetime.  Well.

Over time, I’ve faced those fears.  Though I’m not fond of the over-sized wolf spiders or the dark-legged lurker, I can deal.  Interestingly, unless they are really large, I don’t mind them so much in the garden.  They eat non-beneficial insects and, I recently learned, provide silk for hummingbird nests.

In my early renting days, one of my roommates set up a primitive version of a spider catcher: a plastic cup and a nice strong piece of cardboard.  He knew I couldn’t kill a spider so an at-the-ready bug catcher was the next best think.  Cup and cardboard in hand, unwanted arachnids  were unceremoniously evicted into nearby landscaping.

About a decade ago, I found a super-cool spider catcher at a local wildlife bird center.  It has a long handle (distance is good!) and a clever little chamber to safely cup over the intruder.  Once confined, you gently slide the bottom closed and the spider remains captive as you head for the shrubs in the far, far, far corner of the garden.

Humane Bug Catcher available from PETA’s catalog.

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Chocolate is the New Black

Not all is what it seems,
Not all seams are sewn,
A dress made of chocolate,
With flowers, adorned.
Like most high-end fashion,
Too pricey for me,
With ruffles more like truffles
the hat a delicacy.

Chocolate is the New Black

I love fashion, flowers and chocolate so was quite delighted with this concoction.

On display at Jean-Philippe Chocolates and Pastries at the Bellagio Hotel and Resort in Las Vegas, NV.

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Bellagio Botanical Gardens: Flowering Whimsy

Charming Display Markers: Children's Clogs

It’s Las Vegas after all, a larger than life playground for adults. I expected over the top everything on my first visit to sin city, but was pleasantly surprised to find delicate blooms, charming displays, and happy children working their way through the Bellagio Conservatory and Botanical Gardens.

The Conservatory transforms five times a year, once for each season and a special display to commemorate Chinese New Year. The 2012 Spring Garden display is on view through May. Potent hyacinth were in bed with tulips, while mums lined the walkways. Larger than life wooden clogs housed flowers, with their miniature counterpart used as display markers to describe the scenes. I loved the bicycles, propped up against the landscape and the stunning floral reproduction of a Monet.

Bicycles at the Ready

The over-sized and somewhat silly swans seemed out of scale to the rest of the garden, but the artificial flowers and bees were fun. Whimsical hanging parasols had me mentally redecorating my bedroom at home. The overused catch phrase, “what happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas,” needn’t apply to a beautiful set of floral parasols hanging from my bedroom ceiling at home. A gardener can dream, can’t she?

'Flapjack' Tulips

Chrysanthemum Ying and Yang

If only they were real

For My Room at Home?

Reminds me of me: I'm always the tall one in the bunch

I guess they meant "literally"

√ You can see some of the past Bellagio displays here.

√ For a time-lapse photo slide show of the garden installation click here.