BS: Gardening, 2009

Subject: RE: BS: Gardening, 2009
From: GUEST,Dani
Date: 15 Feb 09 - 12:36 PM

I second the invite, Bobert! Do be our guests.

If you don't have time to get booked at the Bayou, at least make sure you're in town long enough for us all to catch a show there!

http://bluebayouclub.com/index.htm



Dani

Subject: RE: BS: Gardening, 2009
From: pdq
Date: 15 Feb 09 - 11:24 AM

A few years back I was remodeling an small Victorian house.

The "claw foot" bathtub was cute, but too small for me. Anyway, I love showers.

The damn tub was so heavy, three of us got it ouside and just past the patio when we took a break. The tub stayed right there for years.

I put a screen over the drain hole, placed a few rocks to hold down the screen, then filled the tub a little over halfway with a quality mix of sifted dirt and "mushroom compost", available as a byproduct of the mushroom industry.

I took a bag of "red potatoes" that had started to developed "eyes" and cut them out, dipping fresh-cut edges with Rootone. Planted them about 3 days later, perhaps an inch deep.

Grew the best potatoes I have ever had. Secrets are: good choice of potato variety, good drainage, regular wattering, fertile soil and the ability to raise the soil level when the potatoes start showing above it.

Subject: RE: BS: Gardening, 2009
From: SINSULL
Date: 15 Feb 09 - 10:57 AM

Like Dani, I kill everything I plant usually with love. But I have a shamrock and a spider plant that have been resurrected numerous times. Poor shamrock died right back to the dirt when I forgot to water it. A liitle plane food and water and it is back - I have had it for about six years. A record.


Bobert,
Finances are tight and I would love to know how to grow azaleas from cuttings to fill out the bare spots. Any fairly simple advice?
Mary

Subject: RE: BS: Gardening, 2009
From: Janie
Date: 15 Feb 09 - 10:52 AM

Bobert, you will be driving right by Dani and I on your trip to three of the best nurseries ever was. Would love to offer a place to stay or to have you over for supper. PM if you are interested.

If you have time, you might think about contacting the Blue Bayou and to see if you might book yourself a gig there on the 6th. You would be a real hit.

The Hellebore is doing well and has several lovely, creamy white blooms that are nearly fully opened right now. I was very pleased and surprised to see it bloom so well. I dug it up last July to bring with me, and it is still in the pot. I potted up the azalea you brought me at the Getaway, and it is doing fine also.

Subject: RE: BS: Gardening, 2009
From: paula t
Date: 15 Feb 09 - 10:39 AM

My garden is still covered by snow. It makes it look much more tidy!
I garden organically, so try to encourage the natural predators of garden pests. I therefore leave as much of the leaf litter etc on the soil as I can.I also leave the herbaceous plants alone in the Autumn. By this time of year I am gritting my teeth because it all looks so unkempt.
Whenever I am tempted to cut everything back to ground level and clear away the leaves , I look back to February a few years ago.The garden was looking neglected so I began to cut back the herbaceous plants and tidy the soil. I had been working for about 10 minutes when I disturbed a huge number of ladybirds nestling in the "rubbish" around the plants. Suitably ashamed at my impatience, I covered them back up again and put the tools back in the shed.

Subject: RE: BS: Gardening, 2009
From: Liz the Squeak
Date: 15 Feb 09 - 09:47 AM

My primroses/polyanthus are in bloom, the violets are showing new green, the buddliea has been denuded of the broken branches and I filled the bird feeders up. The new fence is still up and the birds are liking it. It's confused the hell out of the cats because it has an arched trellis top and they can't walk along it.

It's looking good on the bulb front, I can identify snowdrop, crocus, daffodil and hyacinth/bluebell, with a couple of early tulips that might not survive. Some of them may even flower this year, due to the major pruning the shrubbery got in December and the extra light that is letting in.

LTS

Subject: RE: BS: Gardening, 2009
From: Bobert
Date: 15 Feb 09 - 09:03 AM

Well, the P-Vine and I are slammed... Our chapetr of the Azalea Society of America is holding the national convention in NoVa the first weekend in May so we are busy with those details... 17 of us met yesterday to iron out stuff...

Plus, the P-Vine will be managing the garden center at the Page Co. Coop...

Needless to say, the next couple months will occupied in getting plants purchased form the various wholesalers...

We will be in N.C. on March 6 & 7 picking up stuff in a trailer from Plant Delights (Raleigh), Big Bloomers Flower Farm (Sanford) and Niche Gardens (Chapel Hill) and catch Pine Knot Farms in Clarksville, Va. on the way home...

As for our own gardens... Weather permitting I'm going to try to get a load of chicken litter down on the veggie garden before the "tiller man" makes his appearance... He has a 6 foot tiller on the back of his Ford tractor and tills everyone up in the spring... Our veggie garden is 90 feet by 40 feet and he casn till it in about 15 minutes...

We also have about 600 azaleas we have grown from cuttings and hope to get about jhald of them in this season and leave the rest in beds for future plantings....

Janie,

Do you still have Lenten Rose hellebore??? That plant will grow well in yer new environemnt... Ferns will, too... Pulmanaria should do well... Remember strawberry begonia... There's something very similar that is hardy and will grow and spread in the shade... Heck, it might even be starwberry begonia... And moss will be very happy if you have a source for getting it... We grab a handfull now and then and have it growing here and there...

B~

Subject: RE: BS: Gardening, 2009
From: GUEST,Dani
Date: 15 Feb 09 - 08:49 AM

I pulled the dead leaves off the hyacinths nubbins the other day.

Does that count?

Also, I went to Home Depot and sentenced a palm tree to death. Once a houseplant comes to live with me, it doesn't have long on this earth, but I wanted it so much, and it might be happier here in its short life than it was at the store?

Dani

Subject: RE: BS: Gardening, 2009
From: maire-aine
Date: 15 Feb 09 - 08:38 AM

We had a few days when the snow was out of the yard, and it got me thinking about garden plans. Then it snowed again yesterday, so I put the plans to the back burner. But I took some pictures of the garden last fall, so I can make a list of what needs to be done. This is the first year that I've been retired, so I'll be able to (I hope) keep ahead of the weeds.

Maryanne

Subject: RE: BS: Gardening, 2009
From: bobad
Date: 15 Feb 09 - 06:49 AM

Ordered my seeds yesterday. Will be starting the plants indoors soon. Thus begins another cycle. "To everything there is a season."

Subject: RE: BS: Gardening, 2009
From: My guru always said
Date: 15 Feb 09 - 05:23 AM

I'm not much of a gardener (yet) but I do a lot of 'tidying up' possibly at the wrong time of year for all I know!

The last couple of days I've been cutting our Old Roses back to good buds which I'm sure is right. While stuff isn't in growth I'm also trying to reconstruct/straighten path & driveway edges that have expanded over the years of neglect here. We're now able to position our caravan along the small driveway which used to be too overgrown, thus giving us more space on our main driveway.

We've an avenue of Yew trees along the drive from the road and lost one of the large branches to the weight of snow recently. Richard happily got his chainsaw out to take it off properly behind the break & we had a bonfire of most of the branch the other day. I went through it and salvaged some smaller, straighter branches first though!

Also trying to reclaim some lawn areas (I need them so more people can put up tents at our Easter party) which Japanese Anemones & Primroses have overtaken. I'm potting the stuff I take out so that I can either replant them in other areas of the garden next year, or pass them on to friends. Last year Richard managed to clear a large area of garden that had overgrown & lawn-seeded it in October. It's looking good & there's space for 2 more medium tents or 4 people *grin*

I'm out there every day we're at home & it's not actually raining. Who knows, over time I may start to learn a bit about actual gardening *grin*

Subject: RE: BS: Gardening, 2009
From: Tangledwood
Date: 15 Feb 09 - 04:12 AM

Janie, I'm not much of a gardener, and from your reference to oaks, probably on the other side of the world. However, I do know that some gardeners here have success raising sub-tropical plants in temperate areas by planting them on the sunny side of sheltered brick walls. Similarly, if they are planted amongst large rocks, the rocks work as heat banks.

Mal

Subject: BS: Gardening, 2009
From: Janie
Date: 15 Feb 09 - 01:02 AM

Well, I'm still observing and thinking, and other than to find places to put the plants in the ground that I brought with me from my old place last July, I don't expect to do a lot of gardening this spring. Even those, I will probably not site permanently for the most part, but they will do better in the ground and require less maintenance than if I leave them in pots. I'm having a hard time accepting that I don't have the time, the energy, or the money for major landscaping at the present time.

I did fill some large pots today with potting soil and fertilizer and am going to plant them with assorted salad greens, kale, green onions and the like. I figure there will be sufficient sun before the oaks leaf out to do that, and I can start moving the pots around to sunnier spots a bit later as needed.   There is absolutely no where with enough sun for a summer garden, but I may try a tomato in a pot out by the road, where it probably gets 5 hours of summer sun. Should get at least a couple of tomatoes from that.

It's late to being doing this, but I broadcast some "bread" poppy seeds in a little existing bed that I added a little dirt and compost to last fall. Was gonna use that little space for my salad garden, but unless I raise the bed and put a cold frame over it, or a little fence, the rabbits would just eat the greens. They won't bother the poppy plants.

I'm eager to hear about your gardens, plans, ideas and experiences, especially since most of my own gardening pleasure will be vicarious this season.

Janie