gardening – Page 11 – The Salem Garden

My Lavender Is Loaded…

With bumble bees of course, and they are amazing! I’ve been kind of obsessed with these creatures this week. On Monday we discovered that our lavender plant at work was buzzing with them so the people that I work with and I have been enjoying them a lot. We’ve been watching them hard at work and talking about different types of insects and how important they are to our garden. We even took photos with our ipad and published our own blog post about them. When I got home I found myself doing the same thing here so I spent half an hour yesterday trying to get the perfect macro bee shot. Photographing bees is a lot like taking pictures of chickens, their always in motion so it’s tough to get it right. I think I’ll try using a tripod today and fiddle with the camera settings a bit more.

Unfortunately it’s becoming increasingly clear that bees are dying by the millions because of pesticide use. This article from the Boston Globe Magazine a few Sundays ago details one study and speaks to how difficult it is for the research to be taken seriously.

http://www.bostonglobe.com/magazine/2013/06/22/the-harvard-scientist-linking-pesticides-honeybee-colony-collapse-disorder/nXvIA5I6IcxFRxEOc8tpFI/story.html

Check out the links to other articles just below too, then slow down and take a few minutes to watch the bees at work today.

Enjoy everything!

Michele

The Last Stop for Bees (greenphonebooth.com)
How You Can Help Prevent Another Mass Bumble Bee Die-Off (fracturedparadigm.com)
Pesticide Causes Largest Mass Bumble Bee Death on Record (guardianlv.com)

What’s Happening in the Garden-June 30

Good Morning! Happy Sunday! The sun is out and I’m ready to rock and roll out in the garden this morning! We’ve had pretty crazy weather here in Salem, Massachusetts. It’s often been sunny out, but then it rains. Then it rains torrentially, then the sun comes out. Then we have a thunderstorm. Then it’s sunny. It’s been pretty weird.

Since we’ve had so much rain we have lots of fungi scattered everywhere. This grass was freshly cut yesterday afternoon and by this morning this guy (and several of his friends) had appeared.

Down in the garden, the staked tomatoes are staked. I’m going to do a bit more pruning today. I’m taking away the bottom branches in hopes of keeping the diseases off of the plants. I wish I’d done a ground cover. If I find salt marsh hay in my travels today I may still add some in around these plants.

Good morning girls!

Tomatillo, that I started from seed. They were spindly, sad seedlings and I thought that they were a lost cause but I plunked them in anyway and here we are. I think I’ll spread them out a bit and see what we get.

We have tomatoes! This is “mortgage lifter.” Their said to reach three pounds and taste wonderful. I’m very excited about these! Notice the little velcro ties? I’ve never seen these before so I thought I’d give them a try. So far so good.

The brussel sprouts look happy…

as do the shallots.

And another sweetie tomato seedling that I’d given up for lost. Plants are more resilient than we think sometimes!

Cabbage, with cosmos for color…. Someone thought the cosmos were a weed yesterday, lol. He put them back.

More fungi… at first glance I thought that this was one of my long, skinny friends with a stripe on it’s back. I was pretty happy when I realized that it wasn’t.

Cauliflower is flowering. I’ve never grown cauliflower before and we love to eat it! Bush beans are coming along nicely. The snapdragons self seeded to help light up the chicken coop steps. The peas did their thing… they climbed in spite of the wind and rain! Horseradish…Banana Pepper..
Bee Balm ready to flower… and a greeting by the shyest cat in the world when I came back inside. See, family and friends, Mittens does exist… just a few of us ever see her.

Time to get out there! There’s weeding to do!

Enjoy everything!

Love, Michele

Garden Blogger’s Bloom Day- June 15

Happy Bloom Day! The fifteenth seems to come so quickly every month. I enjoy writing these bloom day posts because they help me to focus and appreciate my garden. I also enjoy them because I always take a wonderful trip around the world to see what’s blooming in everyone else’s garden! Grab a cup of coffee or tea and visit May Dreams Gardens to see what other gardeners have posted. It’s really a nice treat and you deserve it!

We’ve had so so so much rain here that I went out to the garden wondering if there would be anything at all to share today. I was happy to find that the usual June blooms are there, if not a bit weather worn and soggy.

Somehow the iris have made it through the rain…

This is a bit of a mystery rose. I didn’t plant it but it’s quite happy hiding among the iris and it seems to be getting more prolific every year. I don’t think it’s a weed, and it’s not too aggressive so I’m just kind of enjoying it. Here’s what happens to rhubarb blossoms when I host large family events that require almost all of my time and attention. Comfrey…White iris, still hanging on too. I honestly don’t know how.
Sage… Salvia… Sweet Pea… Rose Campion… White Cottage Rose Heather… Dianthus (weather worn dianthus, actually)… and Rosa Ragosa, one of my favorites…

What’s blooming in your garden?

Enjoy everything!

Michele

Catching Up ~

Wow! The past eight days have flown by! I’m sorry that I’ve been so completely absent. My middle daughter was inducted into the Junior National Honor Society last week, then twenty-four hours later our oldest son graduated from Salem High School. It’s been a whirlwind of events, celebrations, family and fun! I’m “off” today and trying to catch up around here. A lot happens in a week in my cyber world, not to mention on my desk and in my fridge… time to clean out, freshen up and get moving again! It’s been raining a LOT for the past week. There’s a little glimmer of sun today so I got out for a few minutes this morning and snapped a few very quick photos. Garden Bloggers Bloom Day is on Saturday (where did a month go??) so I’ll share most of the blooms that haven’t been destroyed by torrential rain then.

Here we go:

Potatoes, spilling out of their pot… I keep adding soil and hoping that we have a nice harvest from this bucket. I’m starting other potato pots a little at a time in the hope that we can enjoy them over time. I wonder if I could grow potatoes year round if they were in a cool spot? I’m thinking about that, especially for my workplace. The first little Adirondack Blue potato sprout… I hope to see lots of these in a few days!
I planted and caged quite a few romas. Margaret Roach talked me into staking the rest of the tomatoes this year. Click on the link to read about that. I love Margaret, she is one of my very top gardening mentors… Someone is digging a hole, I don’t know who. I think a Have a Heart trap is in order here… Okay, one bloom… a very waterlogged white iris. I can’t help it. It’s beautiful, even in it’s frazzled state. Lots of lettuce… we need to keep eating it. I’ve had a tendency to forget lately!The bush beans sprouted. There’s just a few, I’ll probably start to add a few seeds where the lettuce is as we use it up.
Hi girls. Their wet too, poor things…Buff orphington chickens are quite friendly and tame. This lady may be doing some visiting around town soon.

I need to add some twine to help the poor peas reach the arbor… I’ll be there as soon as I can! My littlest girl grew the lettuce and carrots that are coming up in front of the peas. She’s really proud of “her garden”…

So, as you can see I have lots of work to do today! Now that I’ve gotten back to my blog and caught up a little I can move on to the outside stuff. I may even get the laundry under control!

Thank you, thank you for stopping by, and reading and commenting! You are all wonderful!

Enjoy everything!

Love, Michele

Early Morning Iris

Today’s their day! They won’t be here for long…

enjoy every minute!

Love, Michele

What’s Happening In the Garden-May 31

We’re rolling right along out there! The impending heat today was a great incentive to get things deeply planted and watered yesterday. It finally feels like summer is here in Salem!

The potatoes are coming right along. I’ve been adding soil to these as they grow. This pot is full (I hope) of early red potatoes. I’m a little worried about that Japanese Maple. There are tiny buds but no leaves at all yet. It seems a little late?

These are newly planted (last week) Adirondack Blue potatoes.I’ve been working on pots and containers in preparation for our high school graduation visitors next weekend. Hopefully this will fill in in the next few days.
Tomatoes are in! We went for a large variety this year. I’ll have to do a separate post on that sometime soon.Peppers, cabbage, brussel sprouts and shallots. Please notice the complete lack of perfection here. I just don’t allow myself to get bogged down by that. I would never get anything done.Lettuce, cauliflower and bush beans planted at the end.One lonely zucchini plant can grow into the space currently used by the lettuce. I had such horrible squash bugs last year that I swore “no zucchini”. Of course there is a tiny bit of zucchini.The chicken coop window box is in!
Sweet peas are creeping up beautifully.
And we have iris!!This is a German iris. And of course, siberian.

Maybe there is just a little bit of perfection out there, but not because of me!

Enjoy everything!

Love, Michele

For the Lady I Met In Walmart Yesterday…How To Start Your Garden

Hi there!

I heard you ask for help yesterday in Walmart and spoke with you a few minutes later and told you a little bit about my blog. Since then I’ve been thinking about how I can help people like you who are just starting out with their very first garden and I came up with a few simple ideas. These are my thoughts after talking with you for just a minute or two.

—You said that your garden will be next to your driveway and you want some things growing and some color. I didn’t say it, but I should have said that you would want to dig down 12-16 inches to loosen the soil really well. If you just scratch the surface it will be tough for the roots to grow and establish themselves.

—Then, see what kind of soil you have. It may be nice topsoil (black, brown and crumbly), or sandy (light colored and very fine) or clay like (sticks together in a clump when it’s a little wet). It may be very rocky (try to take out as many as you can), or not. Adding compost that you can buy in bags from garden centers will help improve most soil. If you have an extreme version of any of the above you may need to work at it a little bit more. Here’s a link that can help you with that.

—As you work on getting the soil ready watch the way sun shines on the space. How many hours of sun the garden gets is really important in choosing plants that will do well. It might be over 8 hours a day (full sun), 3-6 hours a day (part shade) or less than 3 (shade). Match the light requirement on the plant tag with the type of light you have. It’s really important to do this!

—Look for plants that will fit the light requirement and the type of garden that you have in mind. Read the labels again to get an idea of how tall the plants will be and when they’ll bloom. Some tags even tell you what to plant together which is really handy when your first starting out!

—Try to arrange the plants so that the tallest are in the back and shortest are in the front.

—Pull the weeds as you see them pop up. If you do this for a few minutes every day you’ll be able to keep up with them easier.

—Watch the weather and be sure to water if it doesn’t rain.

—Take off dead flowers and leaves so that new ones can grow.

—Leave me a message here if you have any questions. I’m happy to help if I can!

— Most importantly, enjoy it! Don’t worry too much if plants don’t make it, it happens to all of us! You can do it!!!

Michele

ps/ Other gardeners, feel free to chime in with your ideas and suggestions in the comments section.

Let’s help this lady have the best first garden ever!

English: Soil types by clay, silt and sand com... — English: Soil types by clay, silt and sand composition. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Check Out the Link to This Wonderful Post: Creating Your Own Special Retreat From the World by Linda Buzzell

Don’t we all need our own special retreat from the world? Here’s the link to a post by new-to-me author and blogger, Linda Buzzell. She writes about the healing benefits found in nature and the garden. She expresses my feelings so well that I had to share!

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/linda-buzzell/nature-health_b_3134900.html?utm_hp_ref=fb&src=sp&comm_ref=false

My Mother’s Day Gifts

We have a busy weekend here. Today’s the dance recital, which means lots of work and lots of fun! This is our ninth or tenth year of dancing, actually I should say this is “my daughter’s ninth or tenth year of dancing” but it doesn’t really work that way. As a dance mom, it’s my project too, and now my youngest child has joined in so we spend more time at dance then ever. I believe that dance is a wonderful way for my girls to develop skills in many areas. They love to dance and we love to cheer them on.

When I let Winnie out this morning I was greeted by this view. It was rainy and overcast but all I could see were the flowers.

Of course I was drawn right out there and I had to keep looking. Tomorrow will be garden day for me but I’ve been so busy with rehearsals and running people places that I haven’t been down to the garden in a couple of days. I’m always surprised by the changes when I’m absent for a little while.

The rhubarb is in flower already. Shallots are peeking out. My daughter decorated the fence for her birthday party. I think the lights are staying here, I love them! This perennial border is starting to come together this year. We need some more rain to fill up the pond so that the kids can use the canoe, and I need to make that fence with the dogwood twigs.

There’s always bleeding hearts and spirea for Mother’s Day, along with the flowering cherry in the background.

Dancing and flowers…what better gifts are there?

A perfect Mother’s Day weekend to me!

Happy Mother’s Day!

Michele

What’s Happening In the Garden- May 1

Happy May Day!

I hope that you had as nice a day where you are as we did in Salem. It was gorgeous out there!

I had to spend some time poking around outside and checking things out. Here’s what I saw in between dropping off and picking up children…

Lady’s mantle and siberian iris, with the bleeding heart in the background.

I pruned the beejeebes out of this poor butterfly bush the other day. I’m planning to move it way over to the left in the next few days. I ran out of time and steam when I started this project so I have to get back to it (or get Michael to help me, soon)…
The sweet peas are all in a row, ready for their climb up the fence and trellis…
Asparagus is peeking through! And we have this beautiful pile of red twigged dogwood branches. I have to decide what to do with them. I think that they would make a great little fence!The rhubarb is ready. I wish I liked rhubarb more. My mother-in-law makes the best rhubarb custard pie in the world! I should work at that.
The flowering pear tree that we planted last spring is turning out to be beautiful! The soloman’s seal is poking through. I need to clean up and get rid of the dead stuff around it, however that requires me to steel up my courage because it’s snake country over here, not across the yard, just over on this side ;)! There’s a pot of potatoes underway. This year I’m planning to add a little bit of soil at a time, as the plants grow. The radishes pushed through. Radishes are great to grow with kids because they germinate in 4-6 days and you can be harvesting them in just a few weeks. Here’s the view looking down through the dogwood tree. Dogwoods take several years to flower after transplanting. I think this is going to be the breakthrough year for this tree. I have a feeling that it will have been worth the wait. And finally, looking out at the juneberry tree. This is another example of patience paying off. I was very tempted to cut it down a year or two ago because it just looked so sad and sickly. We treated it with Treetone organic fertilizer last spring and fall and the comeback is dramatic. It looks quite healthy and happy this year!

Try to hang in there with your plants and trees. If your having difficulty with something in your yard go ahead and google for a solution, or ask me to help you find one.

My husband will tell you that I live for this stuff 🙂

Enjoy everything!

Michele

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