Saturday, August 30, 2014

Rain Gauges

Lady's mantle, nature's rain gauge?

I can feel the season shift when the late summer rains begin.  Not just a dusting, or enough to settle the dust, but rain for hours, that even our sandy soils here in central Wisconsin cannot drain away.  Pools form in low spots around poorly graded garages, in the dips and the hollows.

My mother has a rain gauge, which she fairly regularly empties.  She tells me we had 3/4" of an inch a couple days ago, but she didn't empty it and then last night's rain brought it up to 2 1/2".  Why wouldn't she have emptied it when she checked it before?  Suffice to say we got some rain.

Luckily, given my electric plug-in lawn mower (which I really like, except for the cord!), I finished mowing the back lawn on Thursday.  It was a new personal best since my injury, just under an hour.  That is down from over an hour and a half.  I did mention I have a tiny amount of lawn out back? It is measurable progress; I'll take it!

My typical rain gauge is a pot, can, pail, etc. left outdoors.

You can get all cutesy...
(Photo: www.doorknockersandbells.com)

...or so high tech, your rain gauge looks like something NASA would use on Mars.

(Photo: www.hydrolynx.com)
But there are a lot of subtle ways to tell how much rain you received.  Those are the tools of the observant gardener, but don't give you any bragging rights.

So do you use a rain gauge?  Is it decorative, scientific, or does it simply get the job done?

Friday, August 22, 2014

Web Collaborative Flower Arrranging

Includes: turtlehead, coneflower, Pinky Winky hydrangea, Annabelle hydrangea, mountain mint, filipendula, beebalm, weigela, and sedum, and oh!  The rose is "Belinda's Dream'.

You cut buckets of flowers and send them off into the big wide world with Handsome Son and his girlfriend (to arrange for a party for her parents) and this is what you get...

...along with others.

Wait and see.

More pictures forthcoming, I'm sure.

Thursday, August 21, 2014

August Garden Bouquet

No, the beebalm seed heads on the nice native I have in my garden are not that pink.  I dry brushed them with a chipping brush and pink paint.  Notice the fennel flower heads and the broccoli leaves?  Also included seedheads of rudbeckia nitidia, statice, and ornamental oregano.

This coleus looks like a flower basket all on its own.  The strappy foliage of the variegated airplane plane really makes the other colors pop.  It is hanging in my dutchman's pipe.  I'm probably going to regret that location choice.

Rudbeckia triloba; yes, there is quite a bit of that in my garden.  Maybe, can you say weed...

It does combine well.

Got to be my almost favorite sedum, 'Matrona'



This Sheffield mum is nice.  It blooms early compared to others.
Overall, lots of bloom, a tad too much yellow.

Tuesday, August 19, 2014

Shoe Capture!

That garden faerie escaped, but I did manage to wrangle all the shoes into one herd.  This built-in shoe cabinet I finally completed holds between 10 and 16 pairs of shoes, depending on how many of Handsome Son's are included.  This summer some 15-odd pairs of shoes would be scattered about my entry doing their best to lessen my sanity, loosely wound as it is some days.
I know.  It's not about gardening.

It is something I did do myself, though, and I can't sit and weed all the time.  Well, actually I could...

Sunday, August 17, 2014

County Fair 2014

Grand Champion garden box at the Waushara County Fair, 2014
Well, it is end of the summer signaled here in Waushara County by the county fair.  It is also the 100th anniversary of 4-H in Wisconsin.  Although the motto is "100 years and going strong,"  I feel that may be wishful thinking on the part of the state organization.  To my eyes, it appeared there were a lot fewer entries this year over last in junior and open classes.  It may be the 4-Hers' priorities are more appropriately set on service projects of which I do not hear across the county, but I do not know if that is truly the case.

Zinnias on display backed by a pink geranium, the colors of summer on display.

Wednesday, August 13, 2014

Apple-less Apple Tree, an Herb-infused Dipping Oil and Other Summer Foods

The apple 'Honeycrisp' has just four apples hanging in a clump on the east side. The buds all froze in our repeated hard freezes right up into May.  Notice I was finally physically able to scoot around in this shrub border and weed.  No small task was this!
Not only will there be virtually no apple, but no cherries either.  The freezes and the brutal winter killed the apricot.  The pear with the help of the neighborhood bees is loaded.  I also am picking quite a few raspberries from my small stand.  The strawberries did well, scary sink hole opening up in the bed, non-withstanding.


I am also getting enough yellow summer squash to satisfy the urge for something crunchy, although I wish I had some cucumbers sited as well as I sited the squash.  My cukes have yet to deliver.  This cool summer is delaying tomatoes and pepper, although the cherry tomatoes have put out enough for salads.  I hope to be able to freeze quite a few Romas for use on fajitas through the winter.  Having my freezer loaded down with Romas hurriedly washed and froze last fall just after my injury was great when I eventually returned home.

I have been cutting a few florets of broccoli here and there along with some cabbage and parsley.  This year I used parsley as a filler in hanging baskets and pots.  There is always some near at hand.  Incorporating summer produce into the landscape plan is a way to grow more of my food here versus at the family garden which I find harder and harder to maintain.  Gardening there is a growing experience for more than the food, the Gardening Twins and Baby Gardener help, but it has much in common with attempts at the herding of cats.

I sited my cabbage in a poor spot.  Early on it seemed sunny enough.  As summer progressed though it seems to be receiving more and more shade.  I get leaves, but no heads have formed.

Usually I have enough basil to do with whatever I like.  This year it is at a premium, with the majority of it dropping into space and time in the form of a sink hole and the remainder growing slowly because of cool temperatures.  I also diversified my basil a bit going with some 'Thai Queen' ornamentally-prized for its dark purple flowers and stems.  I, and Handsome Son's Girlfriend, found the smell off-putting and not like basil at all; certainly not usable in a culinary fashion.

For an herb to take up space here, I have to be able to use it as a seasoning.  I won't be growing that particular form of basil again.  I will stick to 'Genovesee' in the future.

Instead, because of the lack of basil, I have used my perennial oregano a lot more.  Handsome Son's Girlfriend (The Girlfriend?  HSG?) came up with this recipe for a dipping oil for crusty bread, which we have all agreed is a winner and much preferable over the expensive dipping oils you can purchase in distant gourmet markets.

Here it is:

Dipping Oil for Crusty Bread

Combine:
3 Tablespoons butter, melted (microwaving 45 seconds on high in my 1100 w microwave did the trick)
2 Tablespoons olive oil
6 sprigs of oregano (the leaves stripped off and finely chopped, toss the stems; the sprigs were about 8" long and starting to form flower buds, which were also finely chopped as they were still tender)
a pinch of black pepper.

Once this was combined we held it on my stove over the standing pilot.  This spot on my stove is fairly hot to the touch, maintaining a temp around 110 degree in a circle about the size of a coffee cup.  Standing pilots are seldom the "rage" due to their energy inefficiency, but with my tiny house and tiny stove, that's the way it is.  If you do not have some sort of warming feature on your stove you might try holding it on the warming plate for your coffee maker or something similar until you are ready to use it.

Monday, August 11, 2014

Pruning

This is the rejuvenated hedge mid-August.n  The dappled willow is not visible in this picture.


No pictures of gorgeous flowers in this post.  This post is more about the hard decisions needed by the gardener in his or her space.

By the middle of June my privet hedge had still not leafed out.  I decided to give it another week before I would take it out if need be.  The end of that week brought signs that indeed it was still alive, but a drastic pruning would be in order and no way would it be approaching it 2012 or 2013 beauty.

Since then I took it within ten inches of the ground and cut some growth all the way to the ground.  I have since given it a light pruning.  I can now say it is on the road to recovery.

This is my hedge about a week into June.  The good bones and pruning apparent, but little sign of life.  You can see why I wanted to give it every benefit of time as it is major structural component between my garden and the alley way.
I also trimmed out the dead limbs in the dappled willow.  Actually, I had Handsome Son do that.  On further inspection we could see some sort of borer was at work.  I treated both it and the privet hedge, here and in front, along with a lilac and a climbing rose.  I used a broad spectrum systemic spray.  I haven't used any pesticides for over four years.  I didn't spray any plants near anything which was in bloom in an attempt to go easy on the many pollinators using my garden as their primary food source.  I have a feeling this damage may be the result of some sort of larvae of a sawfly or adelgid.    I have allowed the willow to sent up new shoots, but have also taken the old wood, some ten years old, to the ground this year as well, completely rejuvenating this plant.

In many ways this year has been one of rejuvenation and stream-lining my garden space.  That which does not kill us makes us stronger and proves we are alive.

Saturday, August 9, 2014

Yellow in the August Garden

Echinecea nitidia

Daylily 'Happy Days Are Here Again' PPAF (Apps)

Unnamed

Double heliopsis

Variegated weigelia

Naturtium, saved seed
Sunflower, saved seed

Smoke bush 'Golden Spirit'

Wednesday, August 6, 2014

Days of the Constant Gardener

Growing sedums and succulents in pots is also a frequent search.  This was how this particularly pot looked yesterday.  Notice the lumber behind the pot?  Hopefully, Handsome Son has finished my small building project whenever someone sees this in the future.
Like the Jimmy Buffet song, "It's Five o'Clock Somewhere," blogging has that at once ephemeral and everlasting quality.  No matter what the day, temperature, season, or weather, there is a blog entry about just that thing.  A couple of my blog entries and pictures seem to have gone almost viral.  Someone, somewhere is constantly accessing them.  It comes down to everyone wanting a blue bottle tree and more information on the dappled pink dwarf leaved willow, particularly how to prune them.
Daylily 'Arthur Kroll' is looking fabulous.  Don't bother searching for this patented plant; it has yet to be introduced (at least on this day).
But that's not how gardens really are.  They need constant attention.  They grow.  They change.  Sometimes for the better, often in my area, it seems, for the worse.

We have been plagued by some very harsh growing conditions.  Our very planet is changing.