Friday's Profile

I have been gardening for years and I like to not have to follow too many rules. This is my creative outlet! Right now I have a perennial garden filled with deer resistant plants, no fence, and the deer walk right through it. Also, I have many pots and planters on my decks which is on the north, slightly west, side of the house filled with butterfly bushes, sages, herbs, and begonias, both fibrous and tuberous. I've also started planting more succulents with the idea to have more of those than the herbs eventually. I have a greenhouse that is made of fiberglass and the fiberglass is darkening as time goes by. In there I have 6 patio tomatoes in pots and lots of dish gardens made up of begonias, coleus and spotted plant which I enter into the county fair in early September. The darkening is becoming a challenge, especially for the dish gardens which are sitting in the darker area. I have to pinch them back so they don't get too leggy. Then I bring them out in August to brighten them up. I put them on my front deck which is only two steps off the ground and the deer games begin! I have plant and object baffles and some years it works, other years the deer are more obnoxious. During those times I have to get up at night and scold and scare them off! Full moon is the worst . . . ! During the day I do graphics at the local Auburn Journal newspaper.

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hard clay
I have a perennial plot that is ten years old. Up until this year it was doing really well, even with the clay soil. This year I cut back the watering a little because of the extreme drought conditions here in Northern California and I'm on a well. M...