mudpies's Blog

Mixed weather
May 8, 2009 | 8:39 PM PST
Tags: weather , thunder , tiller , peas , beets , Lily-of-the-Valley , wide rows , weeding
The past couple of days have been rainy off and on, so I haven’t got much done in the garden.  The up-side to this, of course, is that I have given my house some much needed attention.

This morning dawned sunny and warm.  My favourite weather forecaster, Frank Ferragine on Breakfast Television, warned of the possibility of pop-up thunder storms, but that seemed highly unlikely.   So after getting the morning’s chores out of the way and feeding my dear hubby, I grabbed my treasure trove of seeds and headed to the farm.

Ever since I acquired Dick Raymond’s book, ‘The Joy of Gardening’ several years ago, I’ve wanted to try his ‘wide row’ method of planting.  C has steadfastly resisted, preferring to stick to tried and true methods, but I finally convinced him to try it as an experiment.

The dreaded tiller has been in the repair shop since my last mention of it.  When the repairman called to say it was ready, I asked what was wrong with it.  “Water in the gas,” he responded, being a man of few words (unlike yours truly, who tends to ramble on.)  Who wudda thunk – just because it sat outside all winter?  C intended to put it into the shed, but never got around to doing it.

Now, C absolutely hates putting seed into the ground without going at the soil one more time.  That, and the fact I had virtually bullied him into trying the ‘wide row’ method, caused him to be a little grumpy.  Well, actually, a LOT grumpy, but he helped me prepare the 15’ row with a minimum of grumbling.  I planted half the row in peas and the other half in beets, scattering the seed randomly but fairly uniformly.  I’ll share photos when the plants emerge from the soil.  Hopefully, the block planting will be beneficial to the peas, making them better able to withstand the wind.

That was enough experimentation for C.  He prepared two conventional rows for me and I planted them with yellow beets.  We’ve neither grown nor eaten yellow beets, so I didn’t tell C about this new variety.  I’ll report on his reaction after we’ve eaten some.

By this time, his good humour restored, C went to weed the strawberry patch while I turned my attention to cleaning up my holding bed yet again.  Those darned weeds just keep a-comin’.  After I got that bed weeded, I decided to attack the weeds in my new lasagna shade bed.  They’re few and far between, but I’m a fanatic about getting my flower beds weed-free in the spring.  I firmly believe that it saves a lot of work later.  I planted some lily-of-the-valley (I hope I don’t end up regretting that.) and finished edging the first ‘link’ (the area between each of the spruce trees).   Yahoo!  Only five more to go!

C went to harvest some more asparagus.  I was leaning on my shovel, admiring my handiwork, when the skies darkened, the wind picked up considerably, and I felt the first large drops of rain on my shoulders.  “Oh, well,” thought I.  “I’m not made of sugar nor salt, so a little rain won’t hurt me.  I’ll just pull a few more weeds before heading home.”  The thought had barely passed through my brain when a tremendous thunder boomer sent me scurrying out from under those tall spruce trees.  (‘Scurrying’ is probably not the appropriate word to describe the way a chubby old lady runs for cover, but I really like that word.) 

C had considerably more foresight than I.  He hates to get wet, and had headed to our truck when he felt the first drop. He had the good sense not to laugh, although I noticed him struggling to suppress a grin at my hasty retreat.  I should have given more credence to Frank’s forecast.

So much for gardening for a while!  The soil will likely be too damp for a day or two.  Maybe I’ll actually get around to cleaning my stove and fridge.

Second time around typing this entry
May 4, 2009 | 6:58 PM PST
Tags: onions , Asparagus , tiller , daffodil , day lilies , iris , hydrangea , holding bed , bluebells , dianthus , stonecrop , forsythia , sprirea , heritage roses , peonies , tomato cages , foundation plantings , Berm , lasagna garden , lady's
Well, my friends, the soil was dry enough to plant onions this afternoon.  Hubby raked, set out the lines, and made the furrows while I tucked the sets into the earth, covered them and tamped the soil down.  It’s amazing how much satisfaction can be gained by seeing one small area (four 15’ rows smack dab in the middle of our garden) all smoothed out like a bed spread.  We plant the garden in three sections with paths between so that the harvest is easily accessible.

We didn’t get to eat asparagus, though.  Being the greedy person I am, I decided to wait one more day so we could have more of the delicious stuff.

After we got the onions in, my husband (hereinafter referred to as ‘C’ since he wishes to remain anonymous following yesterday’s rant) tried long and hard to start his tiller.  Didn't happen.  God is good!  No plants were harmed through C’s over-enthusiastic use of said machine.

Meanwhile, I went back to cleaning up my holding bed.  Virtually every plant over-wintered successfully:  daffodils, day lilies, irises, perennial geraniums, hydrangeas, bluebells, dianthus, stonecrop, chives, forsythia, spirea, and even some heritage rose bushes.  I’ve never been successful with roses.  The person who gave them to me said she had actually tried unsuccessfully to kill them off.  There has to be a lesson in that.

I was especially excited to see two peonies popping through the ground, discards from another friend’s bed.  I adore the outrageously gaudy appearance of peonies, but there’s no room to accommodate them in my flower beds here at home.  I once planted a pair of them on either side of a ‘telephone tower’ (those ugly brown aluminum things that are scattered throughout urban areas) at the edge of my lawn, but someone cut a cable and the linemen trampled all over them when they came to make repairs.  (No, that time it wasn’t my dear husband.)  I’ll have to protect them from the wind (and the tiller) with tomato cages later.

When we build our new home at the farm, I’ll have plenty of plant material to start my foundation plantings and the berm I’ve been designing (and revising) in my head for the past couple of years.

My attempt at making a ‘lasagna bed’ has met with mixed results.  The only shady area on our farm is a curved row of spruce trees that border the lane between the barn and our vegetable garden.  Winter before last I came across an article about creating a new bed using the ‘lasagna method’.  “Aha!” thought I, “the perfect solution to making a shade bed at the farm!”  I spent all summer long digging out the most persistent weeds – burdocks and dandelions – then section by section between the trees, laying down several thicknesses of newspaper that had been soaked thoroughly to prevent it from flying away and to accelerate its eventual decomposition.  I covered the newspapers with a generous layer of compost, then a layer of spoiled straw, then a layer of pony and goat manure (It’s a good thing I value their droppings, because neither creature is good for much else.), and finally another layer of straw.  Then, like Rumplestiltskin,  I waited for Mother Nature to work her magic, turning straw not into gold, but into soil.  Dreams of my beautiful shade bed made our long, dreary winter more bearable.

Well, Ma N did a fine job at the top end of the bed.  But as she worked her way towards the bottom, she was prevented from accomplishing the desired result by an over-enthusiastic top layer of straw.  I managed to circumvent the decomposition process by piling it on too deep.  So I spent much of the afternoon turning the stuff over, bringing the wonderful rotten stuff to the top in preparation for another application of compost and pony poop.  Hopefully, it’ll be ready to plant by fall, but if not, I’ll have another winter to design that end of the bed in my head.  I must remember to take my camera with me so I can display my new, if far from complete) shade bed to all and sundry.

I’ve been splitting the perennials in my shade bed at home and moving them down to the farm.  After years of struggling to grow in sticky clay, they’re luxuriating (along with a bumper crop of earthworms) in the new soil Ma N created at the top of my new bed.  Thus far, I’ve planted five hostas, some wild violets, a couple of astilbes, several small bleeding hearts, a couple of clumps of lady’s mantle, and four clumps of silver mound that miraculously made it through the winter virtually bare-rooted in a pot above the ground.  The silver mound nagged at my guilty conscience all winter long.  A friend gave it to me late in the fall and I just never got around to planting it.  How ungrateful!  Early this spring, I moved the broken old plastic pot to my garage door intending to throw it on the compost heap at the farm.  When I was about to put it into the back of my van, I noticed some new growth at the base.  Lo and behold, I split it up into four sections and planted it in my new bed where it has thrived ever since.

Well, my friends, I hope I haven’t bored you with this long entry.  Having typed it out twice, I’m definitely bored.  Happy gardening to all, and to all a good night.