Mmmmmm, slugs are tasty

*Sigh.* Meet my hero, the humble California Towhee that scratches under my leaf litter and eats slugs and other superfluous invertebrates. After that I get to hear him splashing in the birdbath and off he flies. Daily ritual, all day long. Towhee, on behalf of my dahlias and seedlings I thank you. Mind you, this is not the actual bird. My guy was too busy to pose.

(photo credit Stephen Lea, taken in Berkeley, CA)

'Margaret Long' falls off a log

That's about how easy it is to propagate. A couple of months ago I started off with one nasturtium 'Margaret Long' that I purchased from Annie's Annuals & Perennials in Richmond (I go to the nursery in person for the swoon factor) and now I have five baby plants, nicely rooted and one mama plant with the misshapen botanical equivalent of stretch marks. Wouldn't you sag like that if you'd given birth to quintuplets?

I did an online search first to see if the plant was under patent and could find nothing. 'Margaret Long' first appeared in an Irish garden as a sport of the double red nasturtium 'Hermine Grashof' back in the '70's, so the 20 year patent limit has come and gone. Neither of these nasturtiums set seed, so cuttings it is. I could not rationalize spending over sixty dollars for six easy-to-root plants. So Annie (who rocks the gardening world, by the way) got my first wad of dough and I am high on 'Margaret.'

My experience has been if you want to propagate nasturtiums from cuttings, just stick them into wet potting soil and you'll have roots enough to plant out in about two to three weeks.

Little Shop of Horrors - part 2

This is what the centaurea macrocephala shown in a previous post has turned into. It's big, it attracts aphids (which my jillions of ladybugs devour) and the brown bracts that form prior to the bloom look oddly like little dead artichokes. I'm curious to see if any of these buds will bloom simultaneously so that the plant looks less weird. I've already changed my mind about using it as a cut flower. If it doesn't evolve, off with its macrocephala. I'll post its progress.

Crop circles

So, I went trotting outside early morning a couple of days ago to admire the catmint and bask in the sound of buzzing bees (they're baaack) and found this, one of the plants completely flattened, with the stems radiating out from the crown: bizarre, symmetrical, very crop circle-ish. Initially there was no other evidence and I had not been abducted onto an alien medical spacecraft during the night. Maybe it was a defective catmint and could not hold the weight of its blooms? Nay. It was an alien, alright, who belongs to no-one and roams the neighborhood. Finally I saw the culprit slink away from under the 'Graham Thomas' rose (very thorny, he's safe there). He moved too fast for me to get a photo, therefore....

...I'll have to substitute a shot of Gino, so you can get an idea of the deceptive form these aliens take. They even sometimes ruthlessly send their young (not related to Gino)...
...which you see here on my niece Kanishia's shoulder making itself as appealing as possible to trick her into thinking he's a real cat. I see a future catmint flattener with some serious aaaahhhhh factor going on.
It's all OK, though, because the plant in question was Jeffy's favorite, so it must smell especially nice. There are many more catmints in the garden, standing tall and putting out bloom like there's no tomorrow.

(please spay and neuter pets)

Margaret's Rose

Rosa 'Tequila' - first of the the season, posted in memory of Margaret, who died yesterday.

Saved from the shovel

Lobelia laxifolia, offsets obtained before the gardener at a local business dug it out of their perennial border. I had no idea what it was at the time but it was a splendid affair, growing fountain-like, lush, over five feet tall and smothered in the blossoms you see here. My little guy in the photo is only about 10 inches tall but I have great hopes based on parent plant.

(How about that lovely exposed irrigation pipe? I'm working on it, really I am.)

Waking up

The garden is starting to stretch and yawn a little and wake up slowly. It was stinkin' hot today and a few things wilted so I was out there in shorts and work boots with the hose. I have drip irrigation but the clock isn't working so my plan is to flush the system and make periodic water settings like all good farmers should.

A little bit of color is starting to push. My soil is rich and loamy so I have big poppy plants with few flowers.

Little shop of horrors! The photo is a tad fuzzy but the thing was lunging and snarling at me so I couldn't get a clear shot (Centaurea macrocephala). This is its third spring in the ground and it's the first year I'll get bloom. If you live in a rural or boggy area avoid this plant as it can be invasive. I plan to use this one for cut flowers so it will get whacked back before going to seed. By the way, this photo shows only a small portion of the plant; it's at least 3 feet wide, and covered with buds. Creepy, scary buds

The catmint started blooming a couple of days ago, but sadly very few honey bees are visiting, numbers perhaps reduced by colony collapse. I am, however, seeing carpenter, bumble, and orchard mason bees.

"The road to hell..." by way of glyphosate

It's controversial in gardening circles but I did it. I finally let the neighbor (while my nasty seeds floated into his yard) spray my weed patch with Roundup. Why I was so cowardly and resistant about this, I don't know. Maybe it's because of that pesky -cide suffix. Maybe because glyphosate is alleged to form environmental xenoestrogens. A friend told me that Roundup causes breast cancer, about which there is no definitive scientific proof (Scientific American - 1997). I've had breast cancer, and my illusions that taking impeccable care of myself will give me immunity to most catastrophic illnesses have already been shattered. And now I know that life is too short to be a slave to weeds. So what's a little chemotherapy and radiation burn, ya know? I don't plan to use herbicides indiscriminately but I wanted to get control over a tenacious area where previous efforts had failed. I did slink back home guiltily to Dr. Earth and he forgave me my indiscretion - this time. You can beat me up now, if you want. Steal my lunch money, too.
p.s. I did use some clove oil organic herbicide on a patch of dichondra and I have some grieving earthworm widows now.

What's blooming in the North Bay

Narcissus

Abutilon

Freesia

Nasturtium "Margaret Long" & phalanges "homo sapien"

Narcissus (of course), abutilon, freesias, dianthus, anchusa, iceberg roses (no joke, they bloomed all winter), dutch iris, pacific coast iris, lavender, california poppies, nasturtium 'Margaret Long,' saponaria, white scabiosa and I picked and ate my first alpine strawberries of the season about two weeks ago.

Here are photos of just a few (some kinda fuzzy - all taken with my camera phone).

How did you grow that? & other "mysteries" of gardening revealed

Here's what sometimes happens when you take a home grown, bedraggled bouquet into an office of kind-hearted hospice co-workers (disclaimer, I'm making this up).

Q: How did you grow these flowers? You must have a green thumb.

A: I dig a hole, stick something into it and wait. While I wait I dig more holes, stick in more somethings and wait some more. Occasionally I water the somethings. Sometimes I throw the rotted fecal matter of four-legged herbivores or flightless fowl around my yard. When the somethings are unattractive or overly buggy I rip them out, or ignore them and let them die of natural causes (read: neglect).

Q: May I come see your garden? It must be beautiful.

A: Ha! No. It's homely as a mud fence and I could never endure the shame. I'll keep bringing in the flowers, though.

Q: What's your favorite flower, and why?

A: *gasp!* How can you ask me that with a clear conscience? Which of your children do you love the most? I love all my flowers! (pssst - it's sweet peas because they're pretty, they smell great and they are well-behaved.)

Q: I've always wanted to garden, but I kill everything. How do I get started?

A: Take one bit at a time. Start with the easy stuff. Put on old clothes and get yourself and your digging fork outside. Tell your family they'll have to fend for themselves until first frost.

That's all I know about gardening, period.

Hey, neighbors, it's not dead; it's resting

First two photos, taken in summer about 3 years ago.

My neighbors love lawns and I live on a street of small, tidy 1950's bungalows with manicured, pretty yards. I don't have a speck of lawn so right now the front garden looks twiggy, sparse and, well, kinda weedy (read: It badly needs weeding). We lovers of perennial borders know what lurks in our imaginations. The garden surprises me each season, even in winter when every year I get a new configuration of dormant twigs and stubs. What looks like weedy things now I see as various alcea, yarrow, penstmon, agastache, anagallis, centaurea; you get the picture. One winter morning a year or so ago I came home to an anonymous note posted to my front door which read, "Carolyn, would you mind terribly doing something about your front yard? PLEASE??" OK, anonymous writer, I recognize that handwriting.

Here are photos of the front garden in the blazing heat of July taken about three years ago and a recent photo (bottom) taken just a few days ago. It does look bad right now and I deserved the note, written by my truly dear neighbor. But there it is exposing all its unkempt truth: the perennial border of a novice and sometimes lazy gardener in late winter. It's been pouring down rain for way too long and I've worked several 16-hour shifts in a row, leaving me with my nose pressed solemnly against the window, staring out at soggy, too wet to dig earth (I like calling muddy garden soil earth - it sounds less muddy).

Promise of spring. It's like anticipating the arrival of a long-awaited lover, minus the disillusionment of inevitable flatulence. Chosen carefully, flowers smell better and will return.

A good cat enhances a garden

Jeff the cat, loved and missed