

THE WEEKLY GARDENER

2019

WEEK ONE

December 31st - Welcome 2019!

San Francisco Streets

The cable car from Ghirardelli Square to Market Street is a little roller coaster ride. It makes a steep climb up the hill to the top of Lombard Street and then starts an even steeper descent which covers three quarters of the way down to Union Square.

Did you know there is a hill mapper app that color codes which streets go uphill or downhill in downtown San Francisco and how steep they are? It may come in handy if you don't want to be surprised by, say, the 31.7% incline of Filbert street, or better yet, by a street so steep it was deemed impracticable for pedestrians and had to be turned into stairs.

Before you get too excited about this useful piece of information, let me give you a general overview of which streets have a notable incline: all of them. At least all those that lead to objectives you will want to visit - Fisherman's Wharf, China town, Lombard street, Coit Tower, Nob Hill, Hyde Street, you get the idea.

Anyway, if you want to have fun and really see the city the way it deserves to be seen you will need either a good level of fitness or an incredibly stubborn personality, preferably both.

Sea Lions

I snapped a few pictures of the local celebrities at Fisherman's Wharf. The sea lions draw sizable crowds, especially during winter, when they congregate on the docks in large numbers.

They arrived in San Francisco after the earthquake of 1989 and by 1990 they completely took over the K-dock at the Pier 39 Marina, which is now their habitat. Here they are now, enjoying the sunshine, noisy, gregarious and irresistibly adorable.

A few facts about sea lions.

They are different from seals, which are much smaller, quieter, and less adapted to life on ground, for instance seals can't 'walk' like sea lions do, by putting one flipper in front of the other. Unlike seals, sea lions have external ears that protrude from their heads and use their front flippers for propulsion.

Their whiskers work as tactile sensors, like those of cats, but their distant ancestors are closer to bears and weasels.

Sea lions can dive to 600 feet and are able to stay under water for 40 minutes before they need to come out for air. They live around twenty years and you can tell their age by counting the growth layers on their teeth, which form rings, like trees.

Flowers in Winter

The flowers were in bloom on the Embarcadero in the middle of winter, so I stopped to photograph as many as I could. I got purple clematis, otherworldly sugar bushes, clumps of white roses, large variegated weigelas and stunning double camellias.

God I miss summer! On a happier note the plant catalogs are here, a month early, happy new year to me! Besides the hellebores should get started soon, winter was kind so far.

Chocolate, Cotton Candy and Sweets by the Bushel

On the last day of the year we took a pleasant stroll down the Embarcadero, all the way from the Farmer's Market to Pier 39. 2018 ended with sunshine, blue skies and happy holiday celebrations.

The warm weather drew a lot of people to the pier, to enjoy cotton candy, clam chowder and the antics of the seals. The place where sweets come in bushels. That's what New Year's resolutions are for.

WEEK TWO

January 7th – Tinseltown

Digital Flowers

I can't tell what makes this display so mesmerizing: four screens of colorful digital blooms sifting delicately from above. I guess you can take the gardener out of the garden but you can't prevent them from noticing pretty flowers should they happen to be around. Even in electronic form.

Of course there is no shortage of real blooms in Hollywood, where the temperatures rarely drop below fifty degrees, but they are all brought from somewhere else and carefully tended to in order to keep them thriving. The local flora is thorny and rogue, clinging to the bare sides of the hills with stubborn defiance.

You can't miss the fact that you are experiencing an arid climate, especially in winter. Seen from above the valley glistens in the sunshine, an uninterrupted sea of roofs dotted only by rare places by small patches of greenery.

There is one thing that made me very jealous however: the roses! It seems to be the perfect climate for them and they are all thriving and blooming abundantly. Must be nice not having to worry about blackspot, mold and shade. Ah, the white roses at UCLA...

Public Art

More HeART art, publicly displayed in a restaurant downtown.

Healing gardens have long been accepted as an important component of the recovery process. Having a quiet place to connect with nature and relieve the stress of a physical ailment can be almost as important to the patient outcomes as the treatment itself. There is something hopeful and reassuring about a garden, especially one designed to address all the senses, not just sight alone.

Maybe creative expression will become an integral part of the healing arts too, to the betterment of both body and soul, although watching all these artifacts sneak up on you when you least expect them and in the strangest of places has a slightly different emotional impact.

They are everywhere: the subway station walls, the parks, the sides of the buildings, on giant billboards, there are even little poems etched in glass and embedded in the sidewalk.

I didn't know what they were when I first saw them but they do command attention, you can't pass them by without taking notice, especially since most of them are rendered in the official Wear Red color.

Heart in LA

Right on the corner of Pershing Square is one of the numerous art displays sprinkled all around LA, created as a part of the Heal My HeART campaign. It is an art therapy program fostered by UCLA in concert with Marymoutn High School that aims to give a creative outlet to patients being treated for heart failure at the Ronald Reagan Medical Center.

It has been proven that providing artistic means of expression can relieve the mental strain associated with heart disease. Creating art speeds recovery, promotes healing and improves transplantation outcomes.

Dress Emporium

A display worthy of "Gone With the Wind", right in the heart of the fashion district in historic downtown Los Angeles. The old city is an eclectic mix of old Hollywood elegance, complete with gilded decorative patterns of acanthus leaves and a rather sober and subdued contemporary architecture.

As we turned the corner to Pershing Square I glimpsed a miniature garden of Semiramis on top of one of the tall buildings that surround it. Mostly palm trees, of course.

WEEK THREE

January 14th - Disney Magic

Color Me Enchanted

There is something magical about Disney, something that is specifically designed to spellbind you and make you happy. I remember watching the midnight fireworks on New Year's a few years back. I was sitting on the front lawn of Cinderella's Castle at Magic Kingdom and they burst out suddenly, completely surrounding me and filling the whole sky. Such delightful excess, everywhere, for everything - the sights, the smells, the music, but most of all, luxury of luxuries, snow on Main Street in the middle of summer, just because.

Nothing is done half measure at Disney, the parades go back to back all day long, the shows are displayed on screens five stories tall and there is enough candy around to build a small village. Everything is joy, music, light and delicious cotton candy in pastel hues. A child's paradise.

Sometimes an unexpected detail is enough to remind one that happiness is easy.

Christmas Decor

It is always a little weird to see Christmas decor surrounded by lush tropical foliage, especially at the height of noon and in bright sunshine.

Disney is the place of perpetual celebration and they really take their task very seriously here, with endless spectacular and over the top parades, daily fireworks shows that will blow your mind and fantastic productions of light and sound that will humble the most hardened cynic.

You definitely remember your child like wonder, whether you want to or not. This magical land of fairytale fantasy will find it and let it out for you, don't worry about that.

Some say that this retreat into pure fantasy and suspension of disbelief, this desire to exist into a hand made utopia that is purposefully shunning every hardship of reality is turning us into passive consumers and feeding us an idealized utopia, innocent of evil and imperfection, it turns us all into dwellers of never-never land.

Aah...sure! Wasn't that the whole point? Giant Mickey chocolate chip cookie? Don't mind if I do!

The Village of Hogsmeade

Butterbeer? Chocolate frogs? Wizard wear? A new broomstick perhaps? Find them all here, in the village of Hogsmeade, which is as cozy and cheerful after dark as it is during the day and which is swarming with people at all times.

I couldn't help but notice that the Gryffindor cloaks were everywhere. The class of 2019 at Hogwarts must be very large.

Disney at Night

Disney is a festival of lights at night, especially during the holidays, when it thrives on excess. Due to the season we had the opportunity to experience a few extra hours of this lighting extravaganza.

As always, once you get past the park gates you are in a different world that smells like sugar and looks like a dream and which quickly shaves a few decades off your emotional age. I don't think one can get too old to enjoy Disneyland.

WEEK FOUR

January 21st \- And Back to Winter

Seasonal Ramblings

The garden emerges suddenly from its dormancy sometimes at the end of April, almost over night, as if it arrived from somewhere else while you were sleeping. The rare shoots poking through the dirt turn up clumps of leaves so thick you can't reach through them to get to their roots. The faint green mist that highlights the tops of violet tubers blooms into a carpet of delicate flowers almost overnight.

Right now most of the perennials are resting, with the exception of a precious few who have decided to brave the deep freeze with their leaves on. During mild winters the hellebores sprout a fresh set of leaves and a full assortment of flowers sometimes at the end of January, usually under the snow, but with the subzero temperatures we had lately they decided to wait.

What is there to do in a chill that rivals that of the Siberian tundra? Plan for spring, of course.

A few plant catalogs have arrived, but they are early, the bulk of them will not be here until mid-February.

This year I decided to skip the seed starting and get fully developed seedlings later in spring. The seed started veggies haven't been up to snuff lately.

Garden New Year's Resolutions

Every January green thumbs like to make garden related resolutions: what to move, where to plant, what new varieties to try.

My beautiful garden grew into a little verdant paradise filled with mature perennials that thrive in each other's company as they have for many years. The purple clematis counterpoints the rosy blooms of the hellebores in shady flower beds accented here and there by cheerful daffodils and sweet smelling hyacinths. The lush peonies buckle under the weight of their giant flowers. The roses put up displays worthy of a flower show. The garden is so beautiful in spring.

I don't have any resolutions this year about getting new plants, starting new borders or trying varieties I haven't tried before. This year I'm going to appreciate and take better care of what's already there.

I resolve to weed the garden religiously so that the new plants don't get crowded while they're trying to get established in their spaces. I plan to feed and water on a schedule and deadhead promptly.

I am going to keep the sunny border neat and tidy at all times, so it doesn't turn into an uncontrollable jungle by the end of the summer and I promise not to let the wild honeysuckle bushes get the better of me again.

I will refrain from overcrowding the flower beds, despite the constant temptation to add new plants in spring, when they always look sparse.

I will make peace with the fact that shade means shade and dry shade is not the gardener's friend and develop said locations accordingly.

On second thought, maybe I'll try a couple of new plants.

It's January, It's Supposed to Be Cold

Let's just say that our furry friend Phil's predictions are right about fifty percent of the time. That should be a lesson to all of us regarding the wisdom of planning one's life around the whims of a groundhog.

Not that he's not endearing, and the celebration is kind of fun, ok, I'll stop being a wet blanket. Let's wait for the famous rodent's insight and keep our fingers crossed for an early spring.

Waiting for the Groundhog

January ended with a bone chilling freeze, with temperatures so cold they made the water vapors sublimate into eerie clouds of powdery ice instead of water droplets. It's dreary god awful winter, it's supposed to be cold.

Inside the house the plants struggle with the dry air, absorbing water like thirsty sponges. They never like being cooped up indoors, especially the rosemary, which tends to get mites. Where on earth do those come from, I could never figure it out.

WEEK FIVE

January 28th - Early Spring

Thank you Punxsutawney Phil

After a blast of polar air shrouded the entire landscape in silent frozen stillness our friend, Phil the groundhog, decided to cheer us up and announced an early spring. Way to go, my friend! We're going to pretend you are right.

I guess I can safely assume there aren't going to be any flowers on the great southern magnolia this year; it is gracious enough to stay put in a climate that's several zones north of what it adapted to as it is. Subzero temperatures and subtropical vegetation don't mix.

Just in case Phil is correct I need to start researching vegetable varieties that will yield consistently throughout the growing season, and find some summer and fall bulbs to plant after the world thaws.

Even the indoor plants got the message that deep freeze is not their friend and therefore this is not a good time for them to bloom. They are scrunched up morosely in their pots instead, waiting for more seasonable weather.

This is why gardening books were invented. If one had an actual garden to enjoy why would one look at pictures, right?

Sweet bunches of roses gracefully clinging to their pergolas and arbors, lush borders of mixed daisies, delphiniums and coreopsis, peonies and lilies, carpets of tulips. Just don't look out the window until April.

Hibernating

Despite the bone chilling weather I'm eagerly awaiting the first flowers of the year - hepaticas and hellebores. These plucky blooms brave the vagaries of February long before the earliest spring bulbs decide to grace us with their presence.

I planted a lot of bulbs last fall, a lot! There better be some left, the squirrels don't have a sense of humor, even though I waited until the beginning of December to put them in the ground and the dirt froze very soon after. I'm sure the rascals found a way to get to their choice winter delicacies regardless.

For those who like to follow the yearly gardening calendar, let me save you some time: there are no gardening chores for February. Not even made up ones, like cleaning your tools and alphabetizing your seed box. Seriously, who goes into a freezing shed in the middle of winter to oil their trowels?

The wildlife had it right: they sleep off this god awful month and only come out when there is something to see that's actually worth their effort.

The only sign that gardening exists during this month is that the plant catalogs are starting to arrive, but it's way too early for them too.

In the Dead of Winter

During some years the house plants that originated in the Southern Hemisphere spoil me with blooms in February, to make up for the drab landscape outside. This is not that kind of year.

I don't mind, I will be satisfied if they make it through the winter without mites or powdery mildew. They are never happy inside.

Let's Talk About Blossoms

Come to think of it, there is something that blooms indoors in February: potted bulbs. I already got a hyacinth which opened dutifully and shed its flowers as soon as it could manage.

Half of the hyacinths in the garden started out as potted plants. They seem to stick around, unlike the fall planted bulbs. I don't know whether that is because they already have leaves or because the squirrels find better things to eat in March.

WEEK SIX

February 4th - Home Pampering

Happy Skin

What does the skin need to look radiant? Good food, plenty of water, regular removal of the superficial layer of dead cells and an adequate amount of rest. The third one in particular will leave you wondering why the complexion still looks dull and sallow despite the scrupulous amount of care you've been doling upon it. A good skin scrub stimulates cellular growth for a youthful, dewy look, and prevents pore clogging by allowing the skin to breathe.

Although skin deep beauty usually starts from the inside and relies on a healthy diet rich in antioxidants, a good face mask you can whip up in the kitchen in a couple of minutes will give it the extra oomph that makes it glow.

Keep it simple, to one or two ingredients, for the best results. Those ingredients vary based on skin type, but here are a few that will work for any complexion: honey for a gentle peel and natural moisturizing, oats and egg yolk for a B vitamin boost, rose water for revitalizing mature skin, chamomile and lavenderto soothe irritation.

Hydration is essential, especially during the winter months: eight glasses of water a day and a good moisturizer will keep the skin elastic and prevent irritation and breakouts.

Pure honey or sugar scrubs work best for cleansing the skin because they dissolve dead cells but don't disturb the pH balance of the thin layer of fatty acids and beneficial bacteria that protects the skin surface. Mix equal quantities of sugar and coconut butter to gently exfoliate and nourish the skin at the same time. Blend in your favorite essential oil for extra pampering.

The last component, well, how can I put this? There is no way to rest just the skin in order to look radiant while running at a hundred miles per hour, one actually has to sleep every night.

Essential Oils

A scented oil massage is always a good way to reduce tension and improve general well being, but it doesn't have to get as involved as that: enough of the essential oils' active ingredients that pass through the skin get absorbed through the palms of the hands and the soles of the feet. You can simply mix the right blend of essential oils into your hand and foot cream depending on your needs.

Here are a few basics and their uses.

Lavender and chamomile calm both the skin and the nerves and are perfect to use right before bed if you have trouble sleeping.

Rosemary improves circulation and its scent stimulates memory and improves focus when you have to learn new information. Works best when rubbed on the temples.

Frankincense promotes calm and inner peace and it is an excellent meditation aid. Frankincense and myrrh oils speed up healing and promote cellular regeneration, especially that of the mucous membranes.

Citrus lifts the spirits and acts as an immune system booster. The smell of grapefruit in particular is said to control appetite, thus aiding in weight loss.

A blend of peppermint and cayenne (careful with the dilution, they can irritate skin) yields a natural hot and cold therapy for achy muscles and joints.

Balsam fir is excellent for reducing anxiety and it provides relief from chest colds. Works best when inhaled, put a few drops in a diffuser.

Speaking of dilution, a little goes a long way. Don't underestimate the potency of essential oils or the amount of stuff that can get absorbed through the skin. Never blend essential oils with carrier oils in proportions larger than 3%.

Bath Teas

Have you been wondering what to do with all those herbs you collected and dried over the summer? Here is a suggestion: make your own bath tea blends.

You will need a thick muslin bag with drawstrings filled with your favorite mix of aromatic herbs. Run the water through it while you fill the tub and throw the bag in to steep into the bath water afterward.

Dried Rose Petals

I recently used dried rose petals that I collected more than two years ago and noticed that their fragrance had kept incredibly well. If you'd like to preserve rose petals, here are a few tips.

Pick the petals mid-morning on a sunny day after the dew has evaporated. Store them in a cool dark place and make sure the container is airtight. They have to be bone dry, any amount of moisture left in them will mold the whole batch.

WEEK SEVEN

February 11th - A View from Above

Field Patterns

I assume the last thing on farmers' minds as they toil and labor to cultivate the land is how beautiful their field patterns look as seen from above, so I am including photographic evidence of that.

Our mind loves patterns, especially those that occur naturally; it always perceives them as beautiful because they are the seeds of matter organizing itself, and as such they are the enemy entropy, the very opposite of things falling apart.

People like to keep things simple and prefer to stick to linear motifs when designing large structures, but nature loves curves and has no limit on the levels of complexity it is able to achieve by using them, at any scale. I can't take my eyes off this example of the two types of patterns crossing. The curvilinear motif is a river bank, I think.

The black and white makes the image even more mesmerizing, during the summer the components would be color coded and that would make it easier to tell what's what. Right now it looks like an abstract painting.

The Beautiful World

A view so beautiful it can almost make one forget that the outside temperature at the time registered -63F. Maybe it takes a little trip outside our natural bubble of 'life support' to realize how precise its settings are, how strict its tolerances.

A hundred degree range of temperature, a very fine tuned balance of atmospheric gases, just the right amount of liquid water: we're all living in an incubator, obliviously sheltered from harm.

Ability to hold an atmosphere? Check. Magnetic shield to protect us from radiation? Check. Endless recycling of drinkable water? Check. New lands sprouting life with minimal input? Check.

Of course everybody takes all of this for granted, and why wouldn't we? For the longest part of our history we couldn't even imagine there was anything outside this fertile womb that seems specifically designed to help us thrive.

It feels so small in the larger scale of the universe, a tiny eggshell that sustains our lives during this epic journey we're all engaged in, mostly unaware. It displays an unexpected resilience and a seemingly endless supply of resources that, under the circumstances, defy the limitations of logic. Nothing short of a miracle.

Winter Sunrise

Winter has the most beautiful skies, fiery sunrises and sunsets glowing in bright orange, purple, ruby and golden yellow and deep blue skies dotted by pure white puffy clouds.

These spectacular sky shows have one thing in common: they always happen on the coldest days of the year like some sort of consolation prize.

Over Newfound Land

I have to confess I'm not a fan of arctic landscapes, still, there is something awe inspiring about these rugged cliffs which stand guard at the outer limits of human habitation.

Beyond them lays a realm of frozen wilderness - fields of perpetual snow and giant mountains of ice floating on dark and frigid waters. A place so inhospitable to life it might as well be on a different planet. The world without us.

WEEK EIGHT

February 18th - Peonies and Roses

Caring for Peonies

The most important thing to know about peonies is the three year rule: first year sleep, second year creep, third year leap. Don't expect them to bloom before their third year.

This goes for new plantings and for dividing existing clumps: once you disturb the roots, you're back to square one.

Peonies like rich soils with plenty of humus and neutral pH, but don't mind heavy clay around their roots and once established they are care free. The clumps require full sun to be at their best and need a lot of elbow room: they will crowd out any plant within their reach and not many can withstand the stifling presence of their mighty foliage.

Dead head the spent flowers to encourage the plant to bloom more and don't plant them too close to the entrance, they are an ant magnet.

In humid climates the foliage is prone to powdery mildew, an irritatingly stubborn problem that affects the plants in late summer and is not easy to get rid of. Keep the proper spacing and trim the foliage to allow good air movement in order to prevent it.

Plant the roots at the end of fall, with the spring bulbs, in a location that is sheltered from strong winds. Provide support for their heavy blooms in spring to keep them from drooping.

Give a lot of thought to their location before you plant them: once established, peonies will live and bloom for many decades. They grow larger every year and they dislike being disturbed.

How to Prune Roses

There is something I'm looking forward to this spring: I can't wait to find out if the two roses I started from cuttings last fall took root.

It's almost time to start caring for roses, now that the threat of killing freezes is over and before they come out of their dormancy. If you are starting them bare root, they need to be planted sometimes mid-March, depending on your location.

For the existing ones wait until forsythia blooms and prune them as follows.

The roses that bloom all summer long need to be hard pruned. Remove all but three or four healthy canes, thick but still green, and cut them down to one third of their height. This applies to hybrid teas, floribundas, landscaping varieties and miniature roses.

The once blooming roses grow their flower buds on old wood and hard pruning them guarantees you won't see any blooms that year. Only do so to rejuvenate the plant if is absolutely necessary, otherwise trim just to remove crossing or damaged canes or to shape the shrub.

For climbing roses remove winter damage and tie fresh growth to the supports. Trim back side shoots to two thirds of their length. If the rose is really overgrown, thin it to ensure good air movement.

Good luck with the ramblers, they won't let you get close enough to prune them. I for one took the hint. If you manage to get close, prune them like you would a climber.

If you don't know what kind of rose you have, check out its growth: if its canes are tall and arching it's probably blooming on old wood.

Spring Perennials

A short list of spring perennials no cottage garden should be without: peonies, clematis, lily of the valley, lady's mantle, bleeding hearts, hellebores, coral bells, wild geraniums and dianthus.

These long lived plants will keep good company to the spring bulbs and provide a graceful transition into the summer season. Their foliage fills up quickly at the end of the season to hide their unattractive faded foliage.

Fragrant Damasks

The Damasks are the most fragrant rose variety, a quality which makes them the go to flower for perfumers, chefs and florists alike. Their fragrance is heady and sweet, almost too strong at times, but perfect for making rose water, fragrant potpourri and delightfully scented preserves.

Any Damask, pink or white, will do for this purpose, but the Kazanlakvariety has the most intense perfume.

WEEK NINE

February 25th - March Garden

Waiting for Spring Flowers

You know you have a bad case of cabin fever when you start thinking fondly about spring cleaning and start making up reasons to visit the plant nursery even though you know full well it is too early for any garden related purchase.

After I checked out the indoor plant section, the only green oasis in a bleak February landscape, and studied at length every packet of seeds on the rack I returned home empty handed but very motivated to start planning the gardening tasks for the upcoming season. Any moment now...

The garden calendar for March is actually very busy. Between the spring cleaning, the pruning, the tying and the planting, by the time you're all caught up with your tasks it's already June.

The end of March used to gift us a few unseasonably warm and sunny days, perfect for sprucing up the flower beds before the perennials had had a chance to leaf out, but that didn't happen in the last few years.

No matter how scrupulous I am about fall cleaning, at the end of winter the garden is always a hot mess and I hate to see the beautiful spring perennials struggle to dig themselves out from under debris. The good news is that once their borders are cleaned they spring back to life with a vengeance. I can't wait!

Gardening Calendar

Want a list of gardening tasks for March? Here goes:

-clean the flower and vegetable borders, prepare them for planting by working the soil and mixing in compost or natural fertilizer.

-start annuals from seed indoors.

-fertilize trees and shrubs, prune roses.

-plant grass seed, fertilize and treat the lawn.

-divide and replant the summer and fall blooming perennials as soon as the soil is workable.

-start wood cuttings under glass cloches.

-prune and tie back climbers and vines.

-plant bare root trees and shrubs before they come out of dormancy.

-start cold weather plants like strawberries, blueberries, spinach, artichokes, peas, radishes, onions and potatoes as soon as the soil is no longer frozen.

-spray fruit trees against pests and diseases.

-plant summer and fall bulbs.

Renewal

The blades of daffodils and hyacinths are already poking through the dirt in an attempt to defy winter. The temperatures have been ten degrees below freezing lately and it snowed every day this week.

I thought the groundhog said early spring, early, as in mid-March. So far we're enjoying solid winter weather with no signs it's going to change anytime soon. This morning I got out of the house, saw snow and ice and didn't even question it. There is something wrong with that.

WEEK TEN

March 4th - Blooming Indoors

High Drama

It took its time and I thought it would skip this winter altogether, after all there is a reason why amaryllis is called the Christmas lily. The extra months certainly paid off because when it finally bloomed it produced four flowers instead of three, like it usually does. Time for some reliably impressive pictures.

Some plants are show stoppers and amaryllis is one of them. Like its double, the lily, to whom it is in no way related, an amaryllis in bloom will draw all the attention to itself like the perfect drama queen. To be fair, no other plant can compete with these stunning flowers whose exotic white petals look even more striking against a dark backdrop.

Amaryllis is a bulb, and therefore it's care free. Water it regularly and give it some fertilizer to encourage it to bloom. It doesn't go dormant in summer, like many dwellers of the southern hemisphere do, it replaces its foliage gradually but never loses all of it.

The plant is much happier outdoors where it will produce flowers at the weirdest times throughout the warm season too. I saw it bloom in April, July, October, there is no telling, really.

Amaryllis bulbs "bloom" like those of lilies. You can lift them, scale them and replant the babies to get more plants, which will be genetically identical to the parent, but don't expect the young specimens to perform sooner than five years, the bulbs need time to grow to maturity.

Flowering Herbs

I haven't had much luck herb gardening during the last few years, the summers have been way too rainy for their taste, and because of that I used up almost all of my inventory of dried kitchen herbs, basil, thyme, marjoram and lovage, something that rarely happens.

I have two patches of herbs, of course, one in full sun, one in part shade. The one in full sun is for lavender, sage, rosemary, thyme, chives, tarragon, yarrow, calendula and bee balms.

The one in part shade is for mint, dill, fennel, parsley and lovage.

Basil and marjoram love full sun, but not dry soil, and have to be watered around the clock if you want them to thrive, they're better off grown in a pot.

An herb garden in bloom is rich with color; not only do the herbs have pretty flowers, but many of them either bloom all summer or have very long blooming seasons - indigo blue sage, cool lavender buds and light purple chives for spring, light pink rosemary, ruby or peach yarrows and tiny white thyme for summer, cheery yellow-orange pot marigolds until the first frost. I had years during which the sage outperformed the cone flowers.

Of course this requires cooperation from the weather, there is not a lot the gardener can do to make up for the lack of sunshine.

Color and Fragrance

Here is an annual I wish I could grow in the garden every summer, but I can't find it at the plant nursery very often and it's not easy to start from seed: stock.

Its beautiful white, pink or purple flowers are intensely fragrant and its growth is compact and very well behaved, perfect for planting in drifts. As a bonus, it blooms during the end of summer lull and its fragrance is very strong in the evening. Grow it around the patio where you can enjoy its scent.

Growing in a Pot

Container gardening often requires added care and attention, but some plants are perfectly happy growing in a pot, where they can cozy up away from competition and have all the room and the nutrients to themselves. Some, like spider plants and asparagus fern don't even start blooming until they are pot bound.

Don't rush to help out just because the potting soil looks rock hard or the foliage seems to have grown beyond its means. Look at the plant: if it's green, healthy and blooming, don't fix it.

WEEK ELEVEN

March 11th - Almost There

Early Flowers

A few perennials have adapted to thrive on the edges of the growing season for the privilege to have the whole garden to themselves. Some, like the hellebores, bloom in the middle of winter, often under the snow, undeterred by single digit temperatures or biting winds. Others, like the toad lily, wait until every perennial in the garden has retired for winter in order to delight us with their orchid-like flowers.

Winter aconites are the first flowers of spring or the last flowers of winter, depending on your perspective. They bloom really early, from the end of February to mid-March, when their cheerful yellow flowers are the first signs of life in a landscape that is still dormant. The plants are actually related to the buttercups, not the aconites, but are just as poisonous as the latter, which is probably how they got their name. All the plant parts are poisonous, including the pollen, it seems. So, I guess, don't smell them?

They are not the only flowers in the garden, I noticed with glee during my quick stroll through the back yard. There are hellebores of every color, an enthusiastic hepatica, even an early orange crocus. Everything else is still in dry stick mode, full blown spring is still a couple of weeks out.

Have you ever noticed how, after hesitating for what it seems like forever, vegetation comes to life suddenly, almost overnight? It makes you feel like you went to sleep in February and woke up in June.

Spring Care for Roses

Both of the rose cuttings I started last fall have rooted, judging by the new growth, but I'm not taking the jars off of them until the weather turns really warm.

The roses are usually the first to get attention in my garden, before the spring cleaning or tending to the grass, so let's talk a little about spring rose care.

This is the time when nurseries start shipping them bare root, with instructions to plant as soon as possible, which means immediately unless the ground is still frozen. Make the hole at least twice as big as the root ball and water generously to help the dirt pack up close to their roots. It helps them get better access to nutrients while they settle in their new home. Growers usually recommended to prune the bare root roses immediately after planting.

If you want to start your own from cuttings you can still do it now before the shrubs get out of dormancy, even though hard cuttings are much slower to root. The rooting method is the same: take a six inch cutting with at least four buds, bruise the end, dip it in rooting hormone, stick it in the dirt, water the soil if it's dry (which hardly ever happens at this time of year), put a glass jar over it and hope for the best.

For roses that need pruning, the goal is to remove old and damaged canes, open up the middle, get them into a shape as symmetrical as possible and give them plenty of room to develop new growth. Leave no more than four canes, sturdy but still green, evenly distributed around an open center and remove two thirds of their height.

Wait to fertilize roses until they have four to six inches of new growth and wait to prune them until the risk of a killing frost has past, which, by established gardening practice is when the forsythia blooms.

Long Blooming Perennials

Some perennials are ubiquitous in cottage gardens and this privilege is rightfully earned: they are long blooming, low maintenance and adapt well to a broad range of growing conditions.

Low maintenance doesn't mean care free. One thing about perennials, they need to be pruned and deadheaded regularly in order to look neat and healthy and keep blooming. A perennial border is never done.

Daffodils

Every winter the squirrels polish off the daffodils, which are supposed to be too bitter for the rodents' delicate palates, so last fall I got mad and planted a hundred of them.

I'm anxiously awaiting results. I mean, a hundred of them, right? All bitter... There must be a few left.

WEEK TWELVE

March 18th – Equinox

The First Day of Spring

The plants got the message that winter is over. Every year this message comes in secret, in subtle ways that only plants seem to understand, but they all get it simultaneously and come back to life with a speed and enthusiasm that always humbles me, even after so many years of gardening.

This moment sometimes coincides with the spring equinox, but oftentimes it doesn't, and you are left scratching your head in disbelief and going back and forth between the calendar date and the trees that refuse to acknowledge it.

Spring always comes suddenly around here, you go to bed in a gray dormant landscape, and wake up in a lush green paradise.

I have been dreaming of daffodils for over ten years now and it looks like finally this year my dream came true. In all fairness, the potato sized bag of bulbs I planted last fall had to yield some result. They're everywhere, beautiful and fragrant, the color of egg yolk and sporting bright coral middles. I'm pinching myself constantly and this is just the beginning, most of the later blooming varieties have just now started to emerge from the ground.

The forsythia bloomed and I proceeded to prune the roses according to good gardening practice, only to notice this winter was not kind to them at all. There was a lot of damage, even on the floribundas, which usually weather anything that comes their way effortlessly.

Since this year I didn't start veggies from seed I get the consolation prize of getting bigger plants from the nursery. I know it's still too early to plant any of them outside, but I can hardly wait!

Strange Hybrids

Nature is the absolute master when it comes to creating hybrids. I have every shade of hellebore between deep maroon and mint green (the rose colored ones are so romantic!) and they all started with just three plants. The Painted Lady is prolific, it populated several flower beds with its eager descendants, fathered by the Ivory Prince and Burgundy varieties, and every year I make a game out of trying to guess what color they are going to be when they finally bloom.

The plant in the picture is a spotted dead nettle which had been lingering in bright sunshine in the back yard and produced modest but abundant purple flowers, the regular kind. I separated a runner and replanted it in the shade, where it took its sweet time to adjust. Now it covers an entire slope where it blooms at odd times throughout the year (it's supposed to bloom in spring and these pictures were taken in August), but that's not the oddest thing about it.

Divisions are supposed to be clones, right? They should look exactly like the mother plant? I have never seen flowers like these on their progenitor, I can only surmise the plants got cross pollinated by the Yellow Archangel variety, or more likely by the common dead nettle weed before they propagated from seed. The leaves are different too.

Shrug.

Climbers

Growing plants vertically can yield wonderful outcomes, especially in a tiny garden, where being completely surrounded by vegetation enhances privacy and closeness to nature.

Climbers are often planted as decoys, to direct attention away from less than appealing details of the garden. They serve as privacy shields, camouflage for unsightly utilities, natural rain screens to keep the walls cool. Planting them for their own sake requires you to put in some extra work and build supports for their wayward shoots, so they can reach out to the sun. By all means do the work. They are worth it.

Bulbs for Naturalizing

Grape hyacinths are perfect candidates for naturalizing because they spread aggressively when conditions favor them. I still remember with great fondness the springs when their delightful little bunches seemed to be everywhere.

Growers have developed a lot of hybrids in the recent years and they now come in white, lavender, baby blue, even pink, but I still love the original color best, an intense, almost phosphorescent cobalt blue that looks even brighter in the sunshine.

WEEK THIRTEEN

March 25th - Sweet Daffodils

Fragrance

The air is filled with the indescribable fragrance of spring, a blend of tree blossoms, heady hyacinths and fresh grass. It grows stronger in the sunshine and calls to every living creature, it entices the birds to sing louder and the little critters to come out of their burrows.

I too can't escape the pull of its call, I have to be out in the garden, I have to, because I need to bear witness to something that I feel more than I know, but that is very important: life is renewed again.

It might sound silly to people, after all aren't we busy enough without all this nonsense? The garden smiles contented under the sunshine, following its bliss and forgiving scornful sneers. It radiates peace.

Carpets of cheerful daffodils sway gracefully in the morning breeze, undeterred by the slight chill in the air, grateful for the bright light of spring. They look like a garden full of smiles as they flaunt their ruffled attire the color of baby chicks and egg yolks and sunshine.

I went through the garden flower bed by flower bed, searching with endless patience and love for signs of perennials coming back to life; some, like the peonies and the hostas, have already broken ground, others, like the bleeding hearts, the daisies and the cone flowers, are still enjoying their beauty sleep. The grass turned from tan to bright green over night, like somebody flipped a switch and turned it on.

I already bask in visions of fragrant blossoms and take in the spicy scent of herbs I haven't planted yet. The essence of miracles.

Spring Cleaning

After a full week of hard labor I'm finally getting closer to finishing the spring cleaning. It's not for the faint of heart, that's for sure.

The flower borders look so alive without the bulk of dried up debris that piled up on top of them during winter. It's almost time for planting and many of the spring bulbs are already in bloom.

I'm planning a bigger herb garden this year, filled with the usual - mint,rosemary, thyme, marjoram \- and some plants I haven't tried before - tarragon, coriander, hyssop, licorice mint, heliotrope. Definitely calendulasif I can find seedlings, it's too late to start them from seed now, they won't have time to bloom before the first frost.

I can't tell how the perennials I planted last summer are faring, most of them haven't emerged from the ground yet. I guess there is still some time to put together a plan for the annual plantings, both flowers and vegetables. I'll give the micro farm experiment another try, although in the recent years the results have been underwhelming.

Of course the garden planning depends on what plants are available at the nursery this summer, every year is different. So far there is nothing but pansies but it's way too early still.

Sunny Borders

The perennials took off promptly after the spring cleaning but the sunny border still looks like a cluster of tiny islands in a sea of barren dirt.

Sometimes in mid June the same flower border gets so crowded it looks like it's going to burst. Where are all those plants now? It seems unreal that all of this growth happens in only two months. Nature is quietly performing miracles every day, under our very eyes, and we have become so accustomed to them we don't even notice.

Garden Poetry

There is a quote from one of Dorothy Frances Gurney's poems that every gardener knows: you can find it etched on decorative stepping stones in every plant nursery and gardening supply store.

"One is nearer God's heart in a garden Than anywhere else on earth."

As I watched the spring daffodils glow in the light of the sunset I got a pretty good idea what inspired this thought.

WEEK FOURTEEN

April 1nd - The Makings of a Garden

The Land of Pretty Flowers

What makes a beautiful perennial garden? There is no recipe or guarantee, but I can list a few things I noticed over the years that all thriving gardens have in common.

Work with the land you have

I know this ingredient can be supplanted by a simply unreasonable amount of work and earth moving, but growing a garden is a love story, not a conquest war. Your garden will tell you what it wants to grow if you take a moment to pay attention to it. Test your soil, notice which plants are thriving, plan according to its natural levels of moisture and remember: if your plantings can't survive without your constant intervention for even a season, you don't have a garden, you have a hostage situation.

Cultivate harmony

Companion planting is very important and there are so many sources of information about how to find successful combinations. You may be surprised to learn that some plants really hate each other and they won't stop until they take each other out, not exactly a desirable long term result. Harmonious plant combinations work on all levels: underground, where their roots have to negotiate the common resources, at ground level, where they need to parcel out their living space, and in their aerial parts where the plants compete for the sunshine. Once the plant combination reaches balance and all the denizens' needs are met the garden can thrive for decades with very little input from the gardener. Humbling, I know.

Use scale and variety

A beautiful garden has a little bit of everything from the tiny moss between the stepping stones to the tallest trees. It has drifts of color and specimen plantings, different textures, climbers and groundcovers, changes through the seasons.

Diligent maintenance

Sadly, there is no way around this, not if you want to maintain any semblance of the original design. Perennials are messy living things and they need cleaning, pruning, pinching and dead heading to look their best and if you don't tend to the weeds on a regular schedule, they will take over because they are relentless and highly motivated to stand their ground.

Last, but not least, if you should be so lucky to have a particular plant thrive beyond your wildest imagination, that's a plant you plan the garden around. Don't move thriving rose bushes, flowering lilacs, established peonies that bloom every year, climbers that have gotten settled on their supports. No amount of gardening expertise will reestablish the balance the plant had reached naturally with its environment in order to flourish like that, basically if it ain't broke...

Sweet Violets

Speaking of affinities and natural balance, the violets started blooming. It feels like they're sprouting right under my nose, I took a couple of pictures of their cheerful little clumps, took a walk around the garden and five minutes later when I returned I swear there were twice as many. If you're looking for plants that thrive in clay soil they are the perfect candidate.

The garden is full of daffodils, they're everywhere, my patient bulb plantings over many falls finally paid off.

That's another thing about thriving gardens, they don't happen gradually. They take many years of patience, labor and love to mature and when they finally get established they emerge from the ground fully grown one spring without any tentativeness or fragility.

Since I mentioned clay soil, here are a few candidates that will never disappoint:

\- hostas. Yes, I know they're common but they really like clay and they will never fail you.

\- hellebores. No sunshine, no hummus, no water? No problem.

\- sedums. They'll grow where you plant them, but they really shine if they have reasonable sun exposure.

\- brunera. It likes clay so much it will become invasive. Don't plant it in full sunshine, it gets scorched in July and looks really unattractive.

\- sage and asters. Just add sunshine.

\- bugleweed and plumbago. Very pretty and reliable long flowering groundcovers. Colorful fall foliage too.

\- goldenrod. Will spread aggressively.

\- cone flowers, black eyed susans and daisies. For full sun areas that get very hot in the summer.

Bragging Rights

I couldn't help myself. This is one of the two roses I started last fall, Lily Pons I think. They both rooted and they are still under a jar, I don't want to take any chances with an unexpected frost.

Starting roses is really simple, you take a stem cutting at least six inches long with at least five leaves and preferably a spent flower, bruise the end, dip it in rooting hormone, stick it in the ground and cover it with a glass jar. Whether the miracle happens is up to the rose.

Transfers

Every winter I get potted hyacinths for two reasons: cabin fever and improved outcomes. I found that planting the potted hyacinths in the garden in spring, when they already have foliage, makes them more likely to stick around for a few years.

I planted this beauty last spring. Hey, there used to be three bulbs in this clump, where's the rest of it? Oh, never mind! A squirrel's gotta eat.

WEEK FIFTEEN

April 8th – Violets

April Garden

April came and brought with it capricious weather, one day it's the middle of summer, the next you're drenched in cold drizzle.

The plants blossomed after the spring cleaning and the flower beds look lush and healthy, the abundant rain made them double in size. I'm waiting for this last chill to dissipate before I move the potted plants outside and start planting the annuals. A good dose of fertilizer wouldn't hurt the perennial borders either.

I took a trip to the plant nursery and the basics were already there, just waiting to be brought home.

All the seeds from last year's American bell flower germinated and now the garden is full of their offspring, I need to thin them a little, they started to spread into the lawn. I weeded the borders twice last week, the weeds are relentless, even more now, encouraged by the plentiful moisture.

I'm looking forward to next week, filling the planters and starting the vegetable border marks the official start of the warm season and the anticipation of a lot of time spent in the garden. It looks like the peony in the back yard is going to bloom for the first time this year, it looks very happy in its new home. The roses are thriving, both the old ones and the new, all in all things are looking up.

Cycles

Sometimes mid-April the violets bloom all at the same time: I come out in the garden one morning and the ground is covered with them.

These beautiful flowers bear deep connections to the underworld, legend has it that Persephone was picking violets when she was lured by Hades to spend half of her life in his realm.

Greek mythology aside violets symbolize the eternal cycles of nature, the knowledge that all that dies down to the ground in the fall will come back to life, fresh and renewed the following spring.

There are no pessimistic gardeners, the green world teaches us that life is triumphant and that it boasts an unbridled vitality. Nature is permanence through change. The hardest thing us humans have to do, which is to constantly adjust to the shifting currents of life, gardens do effortlessly and they look beautiful in the process.

Wise men said that that is real which never changes. I dare to adapt this saying a bit: that is real whose substance never changes. Is this the same garden as last year? Yes. More or less. Define the same.

Of course it is!

Hardliners

Another plant for harsh conditions \- pachysandra \- the evergreen ground cover whose foliage can brave the harshest winters. It spreads by runners and its roots are shallow, barely underground. When transplanted to a new location it can take a while to settle in, mostly because it can be so easily uprooted, but once established it spreads quickly, covering entire borders with a carpet of textured leaves.

What can be perceived as invasive under favorable growing conditions becomes a godsend for those dark and awkward corners where nothing else seems to grow but pachysandra will.

When Only the Tough Succeed

Some plants can thrive anywhere and periwinkle is such a plant. It grows in dry shade, north foundation plantings or around the base of walnut trees where it neither needs nor appreciates maintenance and once established it will survive anything.

If it gets some sunshine it will bloom, delighting the gardener with its characteristic lavender blue flowers sprinkled like little stars over the thick and lustrous foliage. There is a reason why they named a color after this plant, you know.

WEEK SIXTEEN

April 15th - Any Moment Now...

A Garden in Bloom

May is the month when the garden is most beautiful. Everything is perfect in May, the foliage is fresh and bursting with health, the weather is perfect and the bloom, oh, the bloom!

The most beautiful flowers bloom at this time and they do so with decadent excess: garlands of roses and heavy bunches of peonies, so heavy they need supports, thick clouds of lilac fragrance, cheerful clematis extravagance. You can't take a single step inside your garden without getting drunk on life itself.

Every year I wait for the peonies, they only bloom for a month, but what a month that is!

Long living perennials like to pace themselves and peonies are no exception. They take three years or more to get established and close to ten to reach full maturity. The next time you walk by the random peony clump keep in mind that their lifespan and the time they need for growing up is comparable to that of humans. A peony lives sixty to eighty years.

I miss the flowers, the fragrance, it's been such a long winter, it's always such a long winter! Any moment now...

Roses

Once the rose enchants you you become a life time devotee. In all fairness who can deny this blossom anything, I mean anything, really? For what other flower would you suffer through the scratches and the winter protection and the constant fending off of beetles and blackspot and the capricious blooming schedule, if any? I would like to take this opportunity to remind fellow gardeners that tree roses have to be buried and dug up every fall and spring.

There are two types of roses: the easy ones and the difficult ones.

The easy ones are not hard to spot because they are usually in bloom at the time: they are the landscaping types, the species, the floribundas. The ones covered in flowers all summer long regardless of the circumstances, the ones who grow by the side of the freeway with not a soul to tend to their care. They are the wild varieties from which the noble blooms evolved. These troopers usually have a downside: the ever blooming ones are not fragrant, the species only bloom in spring and the wild roses are so prickly you can't get within five feet of them without bleeding.

And then there are the difficult ones - the old garden varieties, the bourbons, the gallicas, the musks. The flowers from which they make essence of romance. Those are exacting and discriminating. No, don't you give me the speech about that one time, I mean in general.

If you want them you will have to work around the clock. They don't tolerate harsh winters, hot and humid summers, any pests, crowding, a less than ideal balance of nutrients, overcast skies or heavy alkaline soil. This basically rules out your average mid-western garden.

I'm a sucker for punishment though and I will try them anyway, again and again. I will grow you, you demanding Reine des Violettes, you will not lick me!

Fragrant Veil

The French lilacs are very particular about their growing conditions: they only bloom when they feel satisfied and I haven't figured out exactly what that entails. When they do they are a treat fit for kings with their pure white blossoms, heavy with perfume.

These aristocratic shrubs believe in quality over quantity, so they will only produce one or two flower clusters, large, immaculate and heavenly fragrant. I rush to immortalize them as soon as they open so I have something to tide me over during their many sabbatical springs.

Tree Blossoms

The trees are running very late this year. It is true that the cherry blossoms obliged, but the rest of them... It's still magnolias for now, with the occasional redbud joining in.

In previous years when the crabapple tree went this late into the year without flowers it skipped blooming altogether, which means no little red berries in the fall. I hope that's not the case. Spring is coming later and later lately, I don't know what's going on. Almost May and the branches are still bare.

WEEK SEVENTEEN

April 22nd - On Schedule

Thriving

Spring finally arrived. Soaking wet and begrudgingly, but it did. There is a pervasive scent of flowers in the humid air, a scent that seems to come from everywhere in the coolness of the morning.

After another weeding marathon, as of yet unfinished, I managed to uncover a few wonderful surprises and got some reassurance on the fact that the perennial border I started last year is thriving beyond my expectations. There is always the problem of filling the gaps in bloom during the transition periods, and now that the daffodils, which have been resplendent, have faded, the garden reverted to dark green. Everything is bursting with health and enthusiasm, at least as far as the foliage is concerned.

I patiently waited for the last day of frost and then rushed to the nursery to gather material for the plantings: tomatoes, peppers, eggplant, beans, cucumbers, squash, herbs, both medicinal and culinary, and of course, my new found favorite - heliotrope.

The seedlings benefited from the cool humid weather, which put no stress on them while they were adjusting, and their deep green turned a shade darker, if that's even possible. Everything is exploding with growth.

The little back garden which was a sad barren landscape only a month ago looks like it's going to come undone and spill all over the world, I really ignored all good gardening practice about spacing and stuffed the perennials together like a can of sardines, but, on the bright side, I never have to weed that border - no weed dares attempt to sprout. Somewhere in the middle of the thick jumble one of the new irises started blooming.

In Between

Now I know what was missing from the spring garden - tulips. This is their time, right after the spring bulbs fade and just before the late spring perennials start blooming.

I see I haven't planted enough of them, note to self for October, but what is there is providing color in an otherwise all green garden.

Every year I notice the same problem and every year I fail to resolve it, it seems: continuous bloom.

Perennials bloom in bursts, or flushes, it's an all or nothing endeavor, at least until mid June when the all season die-hards, like phlox, delphiniums, daylilies, yarrow and hostas, take over. The second flush of bloom for this year is getting ready, I saw flower buds - giant alliums, peonies, clematis, lilacs, wild geraniums, but I'm looking, puzzled, at a still empty flower bed in full sun where crowded plants used to be. Where is everything?

They passed away, I guess, plants have lifespans like every living thing and I kind of planted that border all at the same time. Time to go back to the nursery for some sun loving perennials and a whole lot of colorful annuals to fill the spaces in between.

There is one silver lining. In the middle of said rarefied flower border grows a lily that is simply gigantic. I've never seen them like this, it's almost like a tree trunk. I forgot what lily varieties I planted, but I don't think this one is a Casablanca, those are loose and delicate. I'll just have to wait for it to bloom to find out.

Spring Border

Not for nothing the dead nettle and the violets rule the garden at this time. The result is a heart melting carpet of little flowers in every shade of purple. My garden has a tendency to shift to purple no matter what I plant, I noticed over the years. Maybe it's the soil composition, maybe it's in the water, I don't know.

When I planted the new flower border I decided to respect nature's wishes and stick to this color, for balance and harmony if no other reason. It seemed to work.

Newcomers

It's been a while since I planted tulips, I didn't have much luck with them in the early years but times they are achanging, and so are gardens.

They look pretty happy to be here now, also donning the garden spirit, purple and magenta, a little lonely in a sea of fast growing foliage. Pretty soon the huge pompons of peonies and the splendor of bearded irises will keep them company. I can't wait!

WEEK EIGHTEEN

April 29th - Planting Time!

Starting the Vegetable Garden

The veggies find their way into my backyard as soon as the weather warms up. The tomatoes, peppers, cayenne, eggplants, cucumbers and yellow squashes are now planted, staked and fed, waiting for a few consecutive days of warm and sunny weather for their next growth spurt.

You must be wondering where do I have the room for this impressive production and the answer is I really don't. I crowd the long suffering vegetables and they usually don't like it. Maybe I should start sneaking tomato plants into the front yard again, although last time I did that they grew out of control and took over the entire flower bed. Did you know that if you allow a tomato plant to trail on the ground instead of growing it vertically on supports it can cover up to twenty five square feet? That's pretty much my entire vegetable garden.

This year I picked a colorful array of tomato colors, instead of the classic red: yellow, striped, black and purple, they're going to make for beautiful pictures when they ripen.

I think the shrubbery grew, or the magnolia tree expanded branches around the house corner, and I can't figure out whether the veggies are still receiving enough sun exposure, a task made more difficult by the recent overabundance of rainy days.

I would have loved to grow purple pole beans again this year but they seemed to have disappeared from existence, I can't find them anywhere, not in the garden stores, not on line, I wonder what's up with that. There are purple beans, but only the bush variety, which is not suitable for the growing conditions I have available.

Herbs

The herb patch received all the attention this year: the first to be tilled, planted and sown it is a week ahead of the rest of the garden. Why grow herbs you ask? They enchanted me. There is no other explanation, really.

Yes, some of them, like lovage, parsley, chives and dill make their way into the soup pot, and others, like the sage, the rosemary and the lavender have beautiful flowers and enticing scented foliage, but some I grew out of simple curiosity.

Hyssop, the actual hyssop this time, not the licorice variety. I still haven't figured out a use for it, but I couldn't help myself.

Cotton candy mint, whatever that means, despite the fact that I still have enough mint to last me through the rest of this decade (plus three jars of dried leaves left over from last year)

Dark purple basil, just for the color - it matches the almost black leaves of the rhizomatous begonia and the dramatic black flowers of the ghost petunias.

Mexican lavender - one has to see the flowers to understand why I simply couldn't pass it up.

St. John's Wort and yarrow for Midsummer bloom

Wormwood - don't even ask.

Lemon verbena and lemon balm for the lovely scent

Calendulas, better latter than never, although I don't know if they'll have enough time to bloom until the frost. They sprouted very quickly, so here's hoping.

Last but not least not one but two varieties of thyme.

You may be wondering with all this abundance of foliage where am I going to have room for flowers? I am too.

Herb Mythology

After I add oregano to the herb patch all the classical herbs around the Mediterranean basin will be represented. What's so cool about these herbs is that all of them are old enough to have a legend written about them.

For instance did you know that Aphrodite was said to emerge from the sea foam draped in rosemary? That's why some cultures add sprigs of the herb to wedding bouquets, as a symbol of fidelity and remembrance.

Mint

There are so many varieties of mint I lost count. You've got chocolate mint, spearmint, grapefruit mint, apple mint, cotton candy mint, pineapple mint, peppermint and catmint and I'm growing almost all of them.

A little excessive perhaps, but a very welcome source of cool flavor during the hot months of summer. Plant mint in the shade, it can't tolerate heat and draught.

WEEK NINETEEN

May 6th - Happy Planters

Complementary Colors

The complementary color scheme is the go to design for professional landscapers because it is easy to maintain and affords great flexibility for what plants to use. It keeps the planting very simple, while still delivering lots of color and interest to the garden.

The most common complementary combination, and one that is ubiquitous, is the mix of daylilies and Russian sage. These plants were chosen because they are heat and draught resistant and very long lived, but there are many more ideas for complementary color combinations: blue delphiniums and tickseed, purple phlox and goldenrod, any red flowers all by themselves (I saw a simple bed of red geraniums once, it looked stunning), cone flowers and green zinnias or Bells of Ireland, daffodils and purple clematis, marigolds and plumbago, German irises and tiger lilies.

If you are planning a perennial complementary scheme for your garden it has to include plants in both colors that will bloom at the same time during all the seasons and rule out all the lovelies that come in colors other than, for instance roses.

I'm not that much of a purist, my garden comes in all the colors, especially this year when I took the courageous step to sprinkle State Fair zinnias in each and every flower bed. There will be lots of color, gosh darn it, but also much irreverent noise.

Starry Night

I am always in awe at the endlessly creative art of plant hybridization. I picked these flowers out of the sea of annual flats that embellished the tables at the garden center: they are called Starry Night for obvious reasons.

Every year brings waves of petunias in arrays of colors and variations of patterns that can make even the most jaded person throw their hands up in the air and admit that the world is made of beauty and wonder. One can spend a whole day just skipping from one unusual variety to the next, and at the end of it it is impossible to leave without taking at least one of them home.

Here is a quick list of hybrid petunias that made my day.

Pirouette \- a double variety that comes in hot pink and purple; the flowers look like large carnations with a white trim

Ghost \- they are black. Not some deep variety of purple, a deep black with ruddy brown reflexes and Jack-o'-lantern bright yellow peekaboo slits through the middle of their petals.

Sky blue \- yes, there is such a thing as a blue petunia. Sky blue, specifically.

Latte \- not only are they the most refined gradient of white and deep chocolate brown, but they are also fragrant.

Spellbound \- the center holds a profusion of delicate purple filaments that fade out like openwork into the white of the petals.

My absolute favorite was still Starry Night, which now fills the planters and keeps beautiful company to the purple basil and the blonde lavender. I think we're not in Kansas anymore.

Scents

The garden is filled with fragrance because the lilacs, the lily of the valley and the woodruff are all in bloom. A perennial garden can never have too many scented flowers, and they must cover all the seasons.

Many of the staple cottage flowers are fragrant: garden phlox, candytuft, hostas, catmints, peonies, and of course the roses. To this list I would like to add two plants I have become very fond of recently: snakeroot, a stately plant with dark, lacy foliage and tall fuzzy wands that smell like grape soda, and heliotrope, with its sweet cherry vanilla bunches dressed in royal purple.

Sunny Yellow

Lemon yellow marigolds to keep company to the black, yellow and purple tomatoes. Gardeners plant nasturtiums and marigolds around the vegetable patch to discourage nematodes and aphids, but this year I have to confess I planted them because they were pretty.

They are going to look lovely in the company of the squash and cucumber flowers when the latter decide to bloom. It's still cold and the squashes aren't even out of the ground yet.

WEEK TWENTY

May 13th – Rain

Backyard Wilderness

It rained all week, on and off. The air is moist and warm, and it filters light like green glass, in a way that turns my garden into a rain forest of sorts. The vegetation's luxuriant growth has a hint of untamed ruggedness about it that is enticing wilder and wilder creatures to venture into my back yard and make it their home: rabbits, possums, hawks, ravens, a stork, and my last surprise, a baby fox.

The perennial clumps, encouraged by the abundant rain, have grown to the point where they are engulfing the walkway and I have to push them off the path on my way to the tomato towers.

I can't keep up with my garden but it doesn't look like it needs my help anyway, the plants are too busy focusing on the race they are engaged in, where each of them is trying to outgrow the plants around it and claim the whole flower bed for itself.

The branches, the thickets, the shrubs, the grass, everything is teaming with life, in a constant whirlwind of activity. There is a cottontail permanently stationed in the lush grass of the front yard, whose blades are so tall now that they hide its little body completely, allowing only a pair of nervous ears to poke through. Every now and then a natural event, the kind that people usually ignore, creates a ruckus, enticing every living creature to add its voice to the disorganized choir of croaks, barks and trills.

I practically live in the woods now. Next time I get out into the back yard I'll have to remember to thank the wildlife for allowing me to trespass into their territory.

Giant Alliums

I didn't anticipate, when I planted those, that they will dominate the flower border to such a degree. My whole garden has turned into a sea of fuzzy globes swaying gently in the wind like giant purple popcorn balls on long sticks.

They must be at least fifty inches tall, challenging the bear's breeches for height, and they are sprouting everywhere, a testament to my mindless planting from last fall.

You may call them whatever you like, but they are onions, even though the ornamental kind, and they inherit the humble care free nature of their plebeian cousins. Flowering onions thrive on neglect and hold their giant heads high in the face of rain, wind and occasional drops in temperature, to beautify the garden for over a month. Mine have been in bloom for over a week now and I think they are going to outlast the roses, which wrap up their blooming season by the end of June.

The flowers are followed by decorative seed heads, and after those are also gone, the slender foliage dies back to the ground, allowing the plant to rest and recharge until the following spring.

Alliums are long lived bulbs. Unlike the tulips and the hyacinths, which deplete their energy stores over a couple of seasons, alliums come back to the garden for six or seven years, without losing their luster.

Aah, fragrance!

For one month in May the whole garden is filled of divine perfume. I can see that the lilacs are in bloom, but their fragrance doesn't linger around them, it's everywhere, carried by the humid breeze.

No garden is complete without scents, and some flowers provide reliable fragrance. Lilacs, lilies, stock, nicotiana, garden phlox, heliotrope, pinks, sweet alyssum, lily of the valley, peonies, pinks, viburnum, honeysuckle, they are nature's perfumer's lab.

Archangel

Here is a good looking plant to brighten up a shady spot - Archangel, the only variety of dead nettle that bears yellow flowers. It doesn't have the trailing habits of its more popular purple relative, its growth is compact and erect and it will not spread, which makes it easier to fit into a design scheme.

Yellow dead nettle does have one shortcoming. Unlike the purple variety it is once blooming and its flowers don't last very long.

WEEK TWENTY ONE

May 20th - Life Thriving

The Scent of Heliotrope

There is something very sweet and nostalgic about this plant, with which I got acquainted in literary works before we met in real life.

What is it that I find so fascinating about heliotrope? I don't know. Maybe it's its deep purple flowers that glow like gems wrapped in dark foliage, maybe it's its cherry vanilla scent, which doesn't seem to match the flowers at all, maybe it's the way it always looks like it's brooding, like a creature of the night caught in bright sunshine, a bright sunshine it actually loves and can't do without, by the way. As its name indicates, heliotrope flowers always turn their faces towards the sun, just like sunflowers.

The heavy rains that visited us lately prompted the young clumps to develop an assortment of thick and broad leaves, deep green, a good support system for the hot summer months.

The plant does just as well when grown in containers as it does when planted directly in the garden. Pinch the new growth in spring; this will delay its blooming, but it will encourage the plant to grow bushier and produce more flowers later in the season. Fertilize lightly and water regularly, it doesn't tolerate drought.

Heliotrope is grown as an annual and it blooms all summer if conditions agree with it. The plant is actually perennial and can be moved indoors during winter, but it doesn't thrive there, you are better off getting new plants in spring.

It is a great addition to butterfly gardens, especially in mixed borders alongside sedum, butterfly weed, coneflowers, lantanas,salvias and asters.

In Full Glory

I have to confess that I'm jealous every time I see irises basking in full glory, sometimes in carefully manicured gardens, but most often than not, on the side of the road where they are obviously fending for themselves, and where they burn bright, in an abandon of blooms for which mine never seemed to garner enough enthusiasm.

This year, though, after a long pause, the blue German iris decided to grace me with its beauty.

Irises, much like peonies, take their sweet time to mature, a couple of years at least, you have to keep that in mind when planting the rhizomes. Just like peonies, they are definitely worth the wait, because they will bloom reliably and abundantly every year after that. Well, maybe not mine, but in general.

Irises like well drained soil, slightly acidic, and full sun. Do deadhead the spent flower stalks but don't trim the foliage, which it needs to build energy stores for the following spring.

Plant irises in very shallow beds, where the dirt barely covers them, or else they will never bloom, and don't insist on covering their unruly roots when they breach through the soil, which they will, eventually. Irises spread aggressively when they find favorable conditions, and if you're so blessed, they will provide you with plenty of material to start new flower borders. Just separate pieces of rhizome from the very loose root clump and plant them somewhere else.

Almost June

The June roses are already in bloom. It's summer, no doubt about that, a wild summer with punishing thunderstorms and drenching rain. The plants don't seem to mind it so far, at least they don't look like they do.

Everything is overgrown, of course, and the weeds are having a ball. I would very much like to clean up, but every time I even think it, it starts raining.

Purple Veil

No matter what the year looks like, clematis is consistent in providing this beautiful purple veil of blooms. The plant is slow to start, you have to be patient with it. This one didn't bloom for five years after I planted it, and then switched to this, with no transition.

Clematis needs very little care, and that care is geared mostly to maintenance, light pruning when the branches look like they are getting out of control and a handful of fertilizer in spring.

WEEK TWENTY TWO

May 27th - Plants in Motion

Phototropism

All plants reach out for the light, as we notice every winter when the dwellers of the window sill have to be turned regularly so they don't grow lopsided. Plants don't have the ability to pick up and move to a more favorable location, so they do the next best thing, they grow up, sideways and around corners. They extend long stems to grasp for the sunshine and don't even bother to leaf them up, except for the portions exposed to the light.

Sunshine can be too much of a good thing too; sensitive shade lovers hide their flowers altogether, burying them under a glut of leaves and stems to protect them from the sun.

Some plants, like morning glories and four o'clocks, love sunshine, but only a specific amount of it, and they don't open their sensitive corollas around high noon, when its intensity is too much to bear. This is the plants' way of keeping time, a task they must be really good at, judging by one of the names mentioned above.

Other plants go a step further to track the sun's movements across the sky for the entire day, or over the length of a season, through a mechanism called heliotropism. There are two types of heliotropism. The first one is mediated by motor cells, which pump potassium ions into nearby tissues and change their turgor pressure. The second one is generated by permanent cellular expansion that alters the plants' growth patterns. Yes, they really do go to these lengths.

Heliotropism can involve the flowers, which use solar energy to help with germination, or the leaves, which orient themselves perpendicular to the sun's rays to conserve precious water, and these mechanisms act independently of each other.

Examples of heliotropic plants include asters, daisies, poppies, buttercups and of course, heliotrope.

You may notice I didn't mention the classic sun lover, the sunflower. It turns out that mature sunflowers don't turn their heads towards the sun, they always face east. Only their young buds do, until they develop flower heads.

Geotropism

Geotropism is an incredibly sophisticated method through which a plant manages to use the same process to make its stems grow up and its roots reach down.

If a plant is growing horizontally, instead of vertically, a plant hormone called auxin, which serves to inhibit cellular growth, sinks to the underside of the roots and stems in response to the gravity pull.

This is where the magic happens. In the aerial parts the auxin inhibits the growth on the bottom side of the stem, encouraging their top sides to curl upward. This is called negative geotropism. But in the underground parts the auxin inhibits the growth on the bottom side of the roots, encouraging their top sides to turn downward. This is called positive geotropism.

How does the plant decide when to do which? I would love to find that out myself.

But wait, there is more. This magical action happens only in plants that grow at angles up to fifty degrees as measured from the horizontal axis. As the slant approaches fifty degrees, the plant reaches a tipping point, where it switches back to an even distribution of auxin throughout its stems, so it can engage in phototropism again. This even distribution of auxin happens in the stems, but not in the roots, which keep growing straight down, something the plant can apparently do at will; so much for the gravity pull.

Here is a lovely example of geotropism in action, sweet alyssum sticking out the side holes of a strawberry pot.

I can't help my curiosity: how does one grow upside-down tomatoes?

Thigmotropism

If you want to see something great, check out a time lapse of morning gloriesreaching for supports. You will never think of plants the same way again. Their long flexible stems whip around in circles, in a motion that reminds me of a person throwing a lasso, and the motions get broader and more dynamic as the stems grow in length, until they reach a support, grab hold of it and start clambering to the top.

If you think this is a slow process, think again. There is a reason why somebody cooked up a story about magic beans which sprout overnight and reach for the sky.

Gender Changes

Every year I wait with great excitement to see if my Jack in the Pulpit has turned female yet. The plant adapts to its growing conditions by deciding whether to be male or female every year, since the female plants require more nutrients in order to bear fruit.

Beside the fruit itself, whose bands of color are said to predict the yearly harvest for a variety of crops, you can tell whether the plant is male or female by the number of leaf stems. Females have two. I went to the garden and checked mine. It's a girl!

WEEK TWENTY THREE

June 3rd - Peonies and Roses

Raspberry Sorbet

Legend has it that peonies got their name from a nymph who was bashful, and for this reason they symbolize this quality in the language of flowers. There is nothing bashful about this here flower, in my humble opinion.

In fact, every year I wait for peony season because they really put up a show. Their flowers are numerous, gigantic and fragrant, they overshadow every other plant in the garden and attract every ant within a ten mile radius for about a month.

The cultivar in the picture, called Raspberry Sorbet, was supposed to be a bicolor peony, but I'll be glad to take this variation on the theme. I have two varieties of peonies in my garden, this one and Sarah Bernhardt. They are both supposed to be fragrant, but I can barely distinguish their scent this spring. It must be the rain. They haven't performed as well as they did in other years and everything is wet all the time.

This morning when I got out into the garden I noticed, bewildered, that there was water on the leaves, after a bright night with full moon and no clouds, no clouds at all. How? When? Who? Never mind!

I'm sure I'll remember saying this the next time a drought comes around, but there is such a concept as 'too much of a good thing'.

The Queen of Flowers

Just a reminder why roses are the crowning glory of the plant kingdom. Not all of them are delicate and demanding either, this rugosa is as tough as they come. It requires no pruning, no fertilizing, no blackspot treatment, no winter protection, and it performs spectacularly in June when it displays masses of fragrant magenta flowers.

It is once blooming, unfortunately, although it does repeat sporadically in the fall and produces large bright orange hips for winter interest.

Rugosa roses are beautiful, but they are also wild and thorny, and they spread aggressively through suckers if their conditions allow. They can become invasive if not kept under control.

We had a lot of rain this spring and their petals scattered very quickly. Roses usually don't like humid weather, but this one doesn't seem to care, the rain did not affect its reliable bloom or its perfect foliage.

The only rose more reliable than this wild Hansa is Dr. Huey, which is still boasting glorious blossoms as we speak, in spite of the rain. Its clusters of deep red flowers with yellow stamens last for over a month.

Cute as a Button

The tiny rosettes of the Leda damask are so cute they almost make me cry. The rose's red buds open to gorgeous painted flowers, too many to count. The flowers fade to a delicate blush and then they simply fall apart, scattering their petals everywhere all at once.

I didn't realize it during the first year, but this rose is also fragrant, as it is fitting to a Damask. I didn't get to collect any of its petals this spring, unfortunately, the rain scattered them all before I got the chance.

Hedges and Borders

If you are looking for the perfect rose for hedges and borders, try landscaping roses, rugosas and hybrid musks.

Here is a short list of varieties that will be suitable for hedges: Ballerina,Bonica, Knock Out, Simplicity, Iceberg,Maiden's Blush and dog roses.

These varieties provide interest in the garden all year long, especially the rugosas and the species roses, which are the proud parents of plump red and orange rose hips.

WEEK TWENTY FOUR

June 10th – Summertime

Sunny Border

Sunny days have been so few and far between lately I figured I'd better take a picture.

The zinnias never disappoint, I don't know why I don't plant them more often. When you become a perennial garden devotee you have a tendency to look down on annuals and start underestimating their impact in the flower border.

Despite an exasperating stretch of rain the garden is resplendent. And overgrown. And in terrible need of weeding.

The flowers shrugged off the lack of sunshine and went with their internal schedule, which tells them it's time to bloom. Giant clumps of fragrant garden phlox dot the flower beds with splotches of purple and the countless stems on the daylilies already promise a sea of orange flowers.

The hostas are blooming ahead of schedule and the hellebores way past their quitting time, I have tomatoes growing in the front yard and volunteer larkspur everywhere. Everything is crazy happy and ignoring me.

I had two full minutes of sunshine to go around the yard and ascertain these facts before it started storming. At this rate by the time I get out of the house again I'll have to chop my way out the door with a machette.

Maltese Cross

Legend has it that the Knights of Malta where so impressed with this plant, whose four petaled bright red flowers reminded them of their crest, that they brought it home when they returned from the crusades; it has been a cottage garden staple ever since.

The plant has many names, some of which sound aristocratic, Jerusalem Cross, Maltese cross, burning love, dusky salmon, flower of Bristol, scarlet lighting, fireball, meadow campion, nonesuch, and if you're partial to red flowers, they don't get any redder than that.

It glows like a little fire in the flower bed, no matter how thick the foliage that surrounds it.

The patrician moniker is misleading, the plant is actually very modest, so much so that it naturalizes in abandoned fields, on top of landfills and on the side of the road. Some say it's invasive, but I had it in my garden for many years and haven't noticed it growing out of control. It prefers full sun but grows well in part shade too, it just doesn't bloom as much.

Don't overfeed it, it's one of those plants that thrive on neglect. It can take pretty good care of itself, it doesn't mind too much or too little rain, it doesn't get damaged by winds and cold temperatures (did I mention it's a native of Russia?) and it has a pleasing, compact growth that makes it a lovely neighbor in a mixed border.

First, I thought there was something wrong with my plant, whose blooms have five petals, not four, but then I found out that the Maltese cross bears both types of flowers. To clarify, when I brought this here beauty home, its flowers had four petals, not five.

Red Roses

I was talking about Dr. Huey and how unappreciated it is in and of itself. Objectively speaking a rose variety that boasts this level of vitality and which blooms this abundantly should be able to hold its own with its grafted counterparts, it's not their fault that their resilience makes them the optimal choice for rootstock.

They bloomed for a month and a half this year, in part shade, no less.

Turk's Cap Lily

I planted the turk's cap lilies last fall and hope they enjoy their new home for many years. They are a smaller than I thought and look dainty compared to the stately bearing of their Oriental cousins.

I hope they naturalize and grow into a large clump over the years. Apparently these flowers became almost extinct because their bulbs are a culinary delicacy. Please don't try this at home!

WEEK TWENTY FIVE

June 17th - Perennial Gardens

Early Summer Bloom

It is officially summer and the temperatures instantly adjusted to match the page in the calendar. While a little taken aback by the abundance of sunshine and heat after so many weeks of rain, I am grateful to have finally managed to weed the flower beds. It was not a task for the faint of heart, but I can afford to be cheerful about it after the fact.

I'm staring straight into the heart of summer as I admire its favorite flowers. The garden is bursting with daisies, coneflowers, daylilies, garden phlox, delphiniums, larkspur, veronicas and lilies. Tall cleomes, the loud echoes of plantings past, have volunteered again this year and are towering over the sunny border with their enormous purple and lavender flower balls.

The Mexican lavender hasn't stopped blooming since I planted it a couple of months ago, the heliotrope sprouted dark purple flower heads the size of cauliflowers, and the cornflowers just won't quit.

Even though the early summer perennials have already faded, I will mention them here, since no June garden would be complete without them: roses, peonies, clematis, lily of the valley, alliums, bear's breeches, cranesbills, lavender, lilies, dianthus, lilac, speedwell, irises.

I'm still waiting for my St. John's Wort, which, according to plant lore, was supposed to bloom around the summer solstice.

Late Summer Bloom

This is a problem I seem to have every year, so I put in a lot of research with rather underwhelming results: come August the garden gives up on blooming, just because, and I have to wade through the end-summer doldrums with only the determined goldenrods to keep me company.

I will make a list of late blooming perennials I tried and failed to acclimate to my garden, as a proof that I did apply myself, but sometimes things are just not meant to be.

Aconite. I know it's poisonous, but seriously, people! Who eats plants from the flower border? It has lovely purple-blue flowers and it blooms at just the right time. Didn't happen.

Asters. These are the plants to swear by for the late summer garden and they did reasonably well in mine until they died of old age and I couldn't find them anymore. I would like to see Glory of Staffa again, whatever happened to that cultivar?

Obedient plant. I finally got it in my garden, with great excitement, only to notice it blooms in June. I hope it's a June and August, not a June or August sort of thing.

Russian Sage. Not on my life!

Japanese Anemones. Didn't even come out of the ground.

Mums. They behave like I'm pouring salt water on their roots, they won't even cooperate for a month! I'm not talking hardy mums here, I can't keep the annual ones alive. Clara Curtis? Yes, please!

Snakeroot. Oh, how I love this plant! Oh, how many years I've tried to make it happy, to no avail! For the last three it lived but passed out from the heat mid-summer. It's supposed to bloom in August, so that didn't help. This year I finally saw flowers. At the end of May.

Balloon Flower really blooms mid-summer.

Lilies? In the fall? Hilarious!

Because I managed to sprout calendulas this year, I'm holding up hope for late bloom from them, but that's not going to happen in August, I don't think. I'll just stick to the sedums.

Easy Going

Daisies are easy-peasy, plant them and forget them plants. I have to say I'm impressed, they even bloom in part shade. Move them, divide them, forget to water them, they don't care! Here are my beautiful new additions to the sunny border - crazy daisies. This is their real name, and one well deserved, judging by these pictures.

The old variety, the one with dignified smooth petals, is right behind them, but it hasn't started blooming yet. Any moment now!

All Summer Bloom

Every year a plant surprises me, and this year is the larkspur. Now I understand why some people treat this plant as a perennial. Just like hollyhocks, they volunteer seeds every year, so you do get to keep them from one year to the next.

They are particularly enthusiastic this year, dominating the front of the border and looking very purposeful. I have to confess I didn't plant them.

WEEK TWENTY SIX

June 24th - Summer Light

Of Life and Love

I saw this photograph once in a book, of a woman standing in her vegetable garden, amongst giant stalks of celery, seven foot tall tomatoes and cabbages that reached up to her knees. The woman had this expression on her face, I can't find words to describe it, of a person who is at home, that garden was her home.

One thing you won't find in gardening books, because it is implied, what green thumb would even think otherwise, is that tending to all things green and leafy is not a hobby, or a profession, it's a relationship with the land and with the plant realm.

Gardens are living things with long lifespans, which often match, if not exceed, ours. To give you an idea, peonies live to be eighty years, red oaks can make it to four hundred, and a healthy rose bush will last for three and a half decades. I couldn't find out how long garden phlox lives, but I can tell you mine is forty-five.

Behind the peaceful imagery of an established perennial garden, behind its fragrant veil of stems swaying gently in the breeze, there is a constant, fierce battle for survival and dominance, for shares of light, water and nutrients.

A silent, but very dynamic kingdom.

We are usually oblivious to its epic struggle, which happens at speeds too slow for us to perceive, but sometimes the garden lets us in, like it did the woman in the photograph, it invites us to witness and share in its story, and that is a declaration of love and a rare privilege.

The Rainy Season

It is the middle of the summer and I have yet to water the garden. There was never a need for it, with the constant rain that made all the foliage go into overdrive. I didn't even have to water the containers, and that says something.

Now I know why the daylilies haven't been performing well in previous years: they need water, lots of it and constantly. Now I'm staring at a sea of stalks, covered with buds ready to burst open just in time for the mid-summer flush of bloom, which promises to be glorious this summer.

When it finally stopped raining for a few hours and I managed to tend to the weeding, I found five foot tall tomato plants growing in the herb patch; I guess their seeds must have been mixed into the soil that came with the lemon thyme. The thyme is already gone, for some reason I can never keep it alive till the end of the season, but the tomatoes are very healthy and already bearing fruit.

I couldn't bring myself to pull them, (they are growing in the front yard after all, even if hidden behind shrubbery), so I brought supports and trained the plants on them instead. Now they're visible :)

The fickle weather looks broody again, I guess we'll have more rain this afternoon. You know where else it gets exceedingly hot, rains every day and the plants grow gigantic? The equator.

The Wild Things

Fleabane took a liking to my garden, and it reseeds reliably now. I know it is a weed, but who can despise these heart-melting little wonders?

The new perennial border has a color scheme, which is white, bright orange and lavender (yes, I actually planned it for a change), and the tiny rosettes of the fleabane blend in it beautifully. They are asters, right? Sort of...

Afternoon, Late

Yesterday I just had to get out of the house to figure out why light was the wrong color and walked into a world with a pink sky. It was pink in its entirety, edge to edge. Behind this surreal surface, as if through a pierced veil, I could see the real color of the sky in places, and it wasn't pure blue either, it was an intense shade of turquoise.

I felt I was walking through a painting the whole time.

WEEK TWENTY SEVEN

July 1st - Midsummer Bloom

Flower Meadows

Flower meadows are a prerogative of the wilderness, not easily accomplished in the average suburban garden, whose soil composition, sun exposure and growth dynamics are significantly different.

You can't get a flower meadow just by sprinkling a wildflower seed mix over a forgotten corner of the garden, it needs to be constructed and maintained and usually requires more than three years to mature. Here is why.

A flower meadow is composed mainly of annuals and biennials, with a few perennials in between.

Perennials mature in three years. Most biennials bloom the second year and by that time previous year's annuals need to be reseeded. In a couple of years the annuals and the biennials start to reseed consistently and produce enough plants in the right stage of development to bloom every year after that, but they will not be all the ones you started with. Plants are very territorial and will fight over their turf with a vengeance, so you'll be left with the winners.

If you ever noticed a flower meadow in the wild, you couldn't have missed the fact that one or two plants seem to dominate the landscape. That is one of the appeals of a wild meadow, large blocks of color in wide open spaces. If you don't want a monoculture, you'll have to thin the plants regularly, to allow different species room to grow.

Meadow flowers adapted to the conditions of the northern grasslands, whose soils are naturally rich in nutrients and rather dense. You will need to amend the soil heavily to approximate those conditions. Full sun is a must.

Plants native to the area will provide better outcomes. Also, remember that meadow means grass, right? Tall grass going to seed in the middle of the flower border. Mh...

Solstice

Nature welcomed the summer solstice with lots of flowers and fragrance, as if to remind me what a beautiful place our world is, so filled with scent, sound and color and so vibrantly alive. I'm humbled by its intensity, by its care free excess; every bloom, every leaf is a piece of art. We walk in beauty every moment and don't even notice it, busy as we are with our daily lives.

Midsummer flowers are challenging each other to glorious bloom - the daisies, the cone flowers, the phlox, the daylilies, the delphiniums, the yarrow, the lilies, the veronicas, the sages, the verbenas, the tickseed, the pot marigolds.

The vegetable garden just now started bearing fruit, a consequence of the excessive spring rain which delayed flower formation for about a month. Still, the plants have a long growing season ahead of them, and with any luck they'll make up for lost time later in the summer.

July brings with it glorious beauty, but also a lot of work. The early blooming perennials have faded and badly need dead heading, the borders demand weeding around the clock and there is no shortage of yard debris in the aftermath of the strong thunderstorms. Still, I'd trade winter for this amount of work in a heartbeat.

Every summer I take plenty of pictures, so that, in the dead of winter, I have something to remind me how beautiful my garden is. Those pictures look kind of surreal on a dreary February afternoon, when there is no color in the world other than ghostly shades of gray.

Hostas

The hostas are very prolific, on account of the abundant rain. They started blooming early, it's strange, though lovely, to see them blend in with the daylilies and the daisies, in full sunshine.

The early hosta varieties are not fragrant, but the late ones do justice to their name,August lily, with a delightful scent of honeysuckle and citrus.

In the Garden

After weeks of rain the sun finally came out, filling the garden with bright light and enticing everything into bloom.

If you want a guaranteed splash of color in the garden, annuals are the quickest and easiest way to get it, but if you want design, structure, texture, scent and consistency you can only accomplish that with perennials. The midsummer flush of bloom is a real treat this year.

WEEK TWENTY EIGHT

July 8th – July!

Where Did the Herbs Go?

I don't know what has gotten into the herb patch this year, but I can tell you that much, my herbs are not happy! Even the dill and parsley decided to quit on me. Who can't grow parsley and dill?

St. John's Wort died down to the ground and I can only hope that is what it does when the summer is too hot. I like to think that it is going to come back eventually.

Thyme checked out early, but that's not a surprise because it does that every year, but the lavender did too, even though it was growing in an enviable spot, complete with sunshine and good soil.

Basil seems to have a good year, provided it is watered religiously, and the rosemary looks very healthy, but not interested in blooming.

Calendulas are the consolation prize, I didn't think the old seeds would sprout, and even if they did, I didn't think they'd bloom, but they already are.

I think the herb patch requires some design and some TLC.

Oh. I have chives. For now. And there is no stopping the lemon balm. I should cultivate the plant professionally, it can't be killed.

Jewel Tones

The midsummer flowers are in full bloom, filling the borders with jewel tones - the deep pinks of lantanas, the bright burgundies of daylilies, the intense magenta of cleomes, the strong blue of delphiniums and plumbago.

The rest of the garden is mostly white, by design of course, because white looks best in the shade.

Now that the dayliles are almost done blooming (mine is a rare once blooming triploid variety), the garden reverted to cooler shades.

Purple dominates the landscape, as always, in every shade and hue, from the almost white tiny flowers of catmint, through the delicate lavenders of hostas and the bright magentas of phlox to the dark clusters of heliotrope, a favorite of mine which hasn't stopped blooming since I planted it.

We're fast approaching the season of fragrant hostas, whose scent of honeysuckle and citrus competes with that of the lilies.

Since we're on the subject, the giant lily bloomed, with clusters of huge flowers so heavy I had to stake it.

Here and there, in the wild shrubbery, volunteer American bell flowers are standing tall with their blue-violet spikes that counterpoint the ageratum and the larkspur.

This year a good part of the summer borders is populated by volunteer plants. Larkspur has been especially prolific and I think after all these years together I should probably consider the giant cleomes perennial.

The garden is a pastel dream in blue, rose, lavender and white. My beautiful!

Summer Joy

'Tis the season of daisies and cone flowers. Long blooming perennials are very important in the summer garden, they bridge over the lull times between big flushes of bloom.

The garden phlox has been particularly fragrant this year. Its lingering scent of linden flowers and white tea fills the air, especially during late afternoons, when the fireflies perform their sparkly little dances.

Garden Maintenance

After the flush of bloom at the beginning of July there is a lot of cleaning to be done. The delphiniums, the daylilies and the veronicas need dead-heading to keep them from looking unkempt, and so do the early blooming hostas.

This is the time when the plants tend to grow out of control, when the tomatoes best their supports and when the shrubbery tries to take over the world. Control and contain!

WEEK TWENTY NINE

July 15th - The Colors of the Sun

Enchanted Sunshine

In July the exuberant summer garden takes on the colors of the sun. Bright oranges, fiery reds and intense yellows dominate the landscape, counterpointed by the bright whites of daisies.

White flowers look great in the shade, but they look simply surreal in strong sunshine, when the sun reflected off their petals glows with a light so intense it takes on a violet hue. It makes you squint to protect your eyes.

A summer meadow in the sunshine is the glory of creation. There no flower spares any effort to outshine their neighbors. The bright sunlight turns the garden into an enchanted realm with its own inner source of power that glows vibrant and alive.

In the middle of the summer there is no difference between annuals and perennials, between once bloomers and perpetuals, they all blend in a splendid tapestry embroidered with a thousand flowers. The picture shows zinnias and daisies, but one can imagine endless combinations: verbenas, obedient plant and veronicas, phlox, larkspur and cosmos, snapdragons and dahlias, bearded tongue and lantanas.

The warmth of the sun has started to ripen fruit, revealing the tomatoes and peppers hidden in the foliage. It's summer, blessed summer, and all the plant kingdom is filled with joy.

About Lilies

I had lilies in my garden for many years and they never disappoint. Whether it's because of their exquisite fragrance, like Easter lily, Casablanca and Stargazer, or for their spectacular corollas, like Giant Orienpet or Big Brother, once in bloom lilies become the center of attention.

Some of the recent hybrids are growing so tall it's hard to decide whether to call their stately stalks stems or trunks, when you walk under the giant trumpets that hang high overhead. Giant lilies grow up to eight foot tall and their sultry flowers are larger than a child's head.

A few things about growing lilies.

Plant them in the fall, with the other bulbs, keeping in mind that they need to be buried much deeper than the other bulbs, about eight to twelve inches. That allows them to develop a good root system that will strengthen and stabilize the stem, thus eliminating the need for stalking, keep their bulbs cool during scorching summers and, frankly, give the squirrels additional digging to do in order to find them.

Most lilies like neutral to slightly acidic soil, but they'll thrive anywhere as long as they have plenty of sunshine. For instance Madona lilies prefer alkaline soil. The plants look best in groups of three or five bulbs, spaced eight inches apart.

After that, just water and enjoy. Sure they could use a bit of fertilizer every now and then, but like most bulbs, they are happily self-sufficient. If planted in mixed borders the amount of food and water you administer by default is more than enough for them. They shrug off scorching droughts, poor soils, excessive rain or punishing winters with the vitality of perennial weeds.

Basking in the Light

These are the care free days of summer that everybody likes to wax nostalgic about. The little sun garden outdid itself this year, in an explosion of flowers \- daylilies, hostas, phlox, coral bells and sedums all jumbled together defying their blooming season.

Who said crowded plants don't bloom? Frankly I gave up trying to figure out optimal growing conditions a long time ago. If the plants perform well, I just assume they like what they have.

Garden Royalty

A picture that does justice to these frequently overlooked summer perennials. Daylilies dominate the summer landscape with their warm palette of yellows and oranges and I learned, to my delight, that some of them have fragrance, a light floral-citrusy scent.

I had to take a picture to immortalize this ephemeral masterpiece of colorful sophistication; daylilies bloom abundantly but their flowers only last a day.

WEEK THIRTY

July 22nd - The Painted Veil

Flowery Excess

Nothing outshines the lilies, not this variety, which, if I remember correctly, is Casablanca. I had them in my garden before and they came back for many years, with great vitality and consistent bloom, until they died of old age. The new ones I planted in their stead grew tall and sturdy, strong enough to bear this glut of huge fragrant flowers.

Not only are lilies gorgeous in real life, but they are also among the most photogenic flowers. On bright days filled with sunshine they glow as if they are made of a luminescent, slightly translucent substance that is magnificent and not of this world.

Lily bloom covers the entire season, starting in early summer with Easter, Asiatic and species lilies, continuing with the trumpet, large flowered varieties and ending with Oriental hybrids and tiger lilies.

As a bonus, trumpet, Orienpet and Oriental varieties are intensely fragrant, sometimes to the point where people find their scent overwhelming.

There is a Baroque sensibility to the July garden, where no amount of profusion and detail is deemed too extreme.

This excess of vegetative growth slows down a little after the daylilies finish their bloom and their foliage starts to thin and die down to the ground. I have to confess this comes as a relief after having to fight their mighty foliage for over two months. Their leaves overflowed the garden path, completely blocking it, and I have to wade through them to get to the vegetable patch.

Speaking of vegetables, the tomatoes kept their composure so far, reluctant to engage in profligate growth, but finally succumbed to the general attitude of the garden and started churning out flowers and fruit, eager to catch up with the rest of the plants.

White Flower Gardens

White flower gardens have a special allure, there is an aura of simplicity and purity about them, a quiet grace. They look beautiful in the sun and in the shade, and can be enjoyed on bright nights with a full moon too, especially if they include fragrance.

A good mix of annuals and perennials will achieve the desired effect, a mix that must always include fragrant nicotiana and white petunias, white phlox, daisies and fragrant lilies.

Honeysuckle, wisteria, clematis, scented jasmine and climbing rosesprovide elegance and fragrance for the vertical surfaces.

Large clumps of peonies, with their huge flowers, make a statement in the middle of the flower border at the beginning of summer, while free blooming lilacs and lily of the valley fill the garden with their enticing scent.

Later in the season the large flower heads of hydrangeas and phlox take first stage, accented by the tall spires of snakeroot and the lacy texture of astilbes.

All through the summer white verbena, candytuft and cheerful catmint spill rambling stems, flowing around their taller neighbors to advance to the front of the border. Flowering thyme fills the cracks and crevices between stepping stones.

Hosta plantaginea dominates the late summer, with pure white and fragrant flowers that dangle gracefully above a mass of splendid foliage, and anemones and asters provide abundant bloom early in the fall.

Hostas

It's hosta time. The early bloomers are fading and the mid to late summer varieties, the scented ones, are getting ready for their season. The August lily, an exquisitely fragrant cultivar with a imposing countenance, should start blooming soon. Later in the summer, during the slow times at the end of August, the miniature hostas dominate the landscape with their compact vase shaped clumps topped by abundant purple flowers.

Late Summer Perennials

Here is a short list of cute, carefree perennials that shouldn't miss from the late summer garden: daisies, coreopsis, yarrow, veronicas (in the picture), obedient plant, blanket flower, sedums,asters, rudbeckia, salvia, coneflowersand lilies.

That's a full garden right there, and I have most of these plants in mine. I'm looking forward to the late summer bloom.

WEEK THIRTY ONE

July 29th - Fast Growing Favorites

Produce

This year the tomatoes decided to show up of their own accord, I found them fully grown, trailing between the sage and the wormwood. By the time I picked them off the ground and trained them on supports their wandering stems were five foot long, and already bearing fruit.

I don't know what variety they are, since they sprouted from volunteer seeds that hitched a ride in the thyme container, but they look like Supersweet100 if I were to venture a guess. Since they have full sun exposure (at the front of the flower border, I might add), they are doing splendidly, and after I lifted them off the ground they started growing even faster.

The tomato varieties I actually planted are a different story. You are looking at their entire production, yes, that one tomato. One fruit at a time, no hurry or anything. Maybe I should naturalize them and let them reseed in the front yard, they seem to do better that way.

Otherwise we're looking at a modest harvest, there are some hot peppers and a tentative cucumber, but that's about it. Too much shade.

The beans didn't even come out of the ground this spring, I guess the seeds were too old and I should try again with fresh ones. Beans need to be seeded every six weeks anyway, to keep the production going. I'm still puzzled by the disappearance of the purple pole variety, I couldn't find it anywhere, not even online.

All the herbs quit last month. Is it me?

I'm not going to complain, though, because the abundance of flowers makes up for what's lacking in vegetable production. Gardening is an exercise in patience. There is always next year.

Gardening with Children

Children are very enthusiastic about growing their own gardens, and with a little help they can get the satisfaction of doing so successfully.

Prepare a tiny area by raking the soil and amending it to ensure the balance of nutrients and minimize the amount of weeds. Pick fast growing low-maintenance flowers like zinnias, marigolds, nasturtiums, runner beans, snapdragons and morning glories, these are classic plants for a child's garden because they germinate reliably, grow quickly, need very little care and bloom freely.

Sunflowers are the children's all time favorites for some reason, so there should be a few of them sprinkled at the back of the border.

Stick with fast growing annuals, the little ones don't have the patience to wait for biennials to bloom during their second year. Also, planting seeds is more exciting and educational than transplanting potted plants; even seasoned gardeners can't escape the magic of seeing a seedling's first set of leaves emerge from the ground.

Don't expect the apprentice gardeners to stick to a maintenance schedule, but ask them to help out with cleaning, feeding and watering, even if you have to do most of the work yourself.

As far as vegetables are concerned, there is no better way to convince a child that veggies are yummy than having them watch the fruit ripen under their very eyes. Tomatoes are great and require very little care. Squashes are also impressive, since they turn a handful of seeds into a little jungle filled with huge orange flowers and colorful fast growing fruit. Just make sure the growing area gets plenty of sunshine, you don't want to disappoint the little green thumbs:)

Colorful Kitchen Gardens

Don't forget the pretty flowers of the kitchen garden: the marigolds and the nasturtiums. Gardeners plant these among tomatoes and peppers to fend off aphids and nematodes, or so they say.

Any reason to plant free blooming annuals is a good reason. During favorable years marigolds bloom non-stop, unfortunately this year is not one of them. The nasturtiums on the other hand are doing reasonably well.

Container Plants

Just a reminder that containers need to be watered frequently in the middle of summer, even twice a day during dry spells. This is also the time when the plants start challenging each other for turf and winners start to emerge.

Some plants, like lantanas and petunias, always win the battle and end up taking over the entire container. As long as they bloom, that's what I say.

WEEK THIRTY TWO

August 5th - A Moment of Respite

Natural Cathedrals

Nature started to slow down, quietly, in anticipation of the cold season. It is a very subtle shift, an almost imperceptible change in the light quality, a hint of bronze on the lush foliage, a scent of ripe fruit and barren leaves in the air.

Charming as fall is around here - the leaf season yields colors simply out of this world - I'm not looking forward to it, since, lately, it is followed by four unholy months of bleak weather, colorless days and overall dreary.

I tried to keep that out of my mind as I admired this natural cathedral of trees.

The bright green light filtered through the leaves suffused the afternoon with a weird softness and wiped away all earthly cares. It illuminated a whole other side of life, one that can't be seen while rushing at a hundred miles an hour, destination bound.

That being said, these are rare moments, precious gems that existence allows us to keep. Fall is still coming, life still generates its share of hassles and oh, did I mention leaf season? Truckloads of leaves to clean up. Woe.

Fair Fare

Last, but not least, the little children's fair, complete with merry-go-round, rail carts, cotton candy, spun sugar, pastries wafting aromas of cinnamon and vanilla and excited sharp giggles.

I confess I got turned around after walking through the park for a few hours, so I had to stop here for a while, to orient myself. One can't orient oneself without coffee, of course. They have that too :)

By the Lake

This is a natural lake, formed by underground streams in the quarry of an old brickyard, and it's teaming with wildlife: ducks, cranes, fish, turtles, swans.

The finned and feathered friends don't mind the large groups of people that hang around the edge of the water or the little swan shaped gondolas that float on top of their little kingdom.

I lingered a while to watch the turtle habitat and then went on to admire the swans that like to congregate by the merry-go-round. I guess they enjoy all the attention the little ones generously dole on them.

As I was making my way back home, flocks of wild geese flew over the animated landscape, a little early, perhaps, I wonder if that portends an early winter.

Where did those long summers go, the ones that lasted until the middle of November, and during which the end of August was only a beginning for a whole other season of bloom and harvest?

Weather got stingy. It only springs for two months of real life now, May and June, and then coasts for the rest of the year, dressed in shades of meh. That is if it doesn't rain the whole time.

I'm pretty sure nature is mad at us and likes to express it in this passive aggressive way.

Green Station

A cozy place to rest for a while as you wait for your next ride. Little train stations are sprinkled through the park, donning the popular names of European capitals. Is there a choo-choo to go with them? But of course!

It's a big park, too much ground to cover on foot.

WEEK THIRTY THREE

August 12th \- The Garden in August

Late Season Bloom

Seeing the sedum in bloom always makes me a little sad, because that means fall is not far behind. Some years this reliable perennial starts early, but most of the time the seed heads appear in mid-August and turn pink when September begins.

I shouldn't begrudge their bloom, which brings the best to the fall landscape and fills in the gaps after the staple summer perennials, the plantain lilies, the daisies, the garden phlox, the Oriental lilies and the tickseed, have stopped blooming.

Their ruby flower bunches will soon be joined by cheerful asters, hardy mums, bright blue plumbago, slender Japanese anemones and airy clumps of Russian sage, a delicate background for the intense yellow splotches of goldenrod.

I'm waiting for my all-time favorites, the tuberoses, which should start blooming any moment now, and challenge the plantain lilies for their scent.

The garden is winding down gracefully, wrapped in color and fragrance, and will continue to delight me until the leaf season begins and garners all the attention. The streets in our neighborhood are lined with sugar maples and black locust trees and every other large shrub is a burning bush. Just trying to paint an image of what the landscape will soon look like.

Fall Landscaping with Annuals

After the late summer lull the garden is enticed into bloom once again during the month of September, which tends to be sunny and warm.

There are lots of beautiful choices for annual bloom for the fall garden, and I'll go quickly over a few of them.

Morning Glory, the joy of the September landscape. Once summer heat dies down, it starts growing rapidly to cover trellises, posts and arbors with a veil of heart-shaped leaves embroidered with white, pink, deep red, purple or sky-blue flowers.

Pot marigolds like cooler weather and are at their peak during this month. They accelerate their blooming schedule once September rolls in and don't stop producing flowers until after the first frost.

The cleomes are in season. Be careful, they reseed themselves with a vengeance. Make sure you want them because you're going to have them forever. Annuals, you say? Ha!

Snapdragons enjoy the fall and will bloom well into the end of October, after the rest of the annuals have wrapped up their growing season.

Don't miss out on the marigolds, the quintessential autumn flowers. They are all dressed up and ready for Halloween, and they will still be in bloom at that time.

If you are going for a dramatic effect, try a mass planting of celosia, whose colors are simply wild.

For those who love scent, the fragrance of evening stock is unmatched, and it just happens to bloom at the end of summer.

Prolific Hostas

Miniature hostas dominate the garden from the middle of August till the end of September. Their compact, vase shaped clumps with deep green leaves are very attractive all season long, but especially at the end of summer, when they are topped by a profusion of purple flowers.

Their low maintenance needs and exceptional resilience makes them a staple of the fall garden. Sadly, they're not fragrant.

Purple Basil

Every year I plant the purple basil variety because it looks so dramatic in the middle of the herb border, among the dill fringes and the slender blades of the chives. Basil blooms a lot and its flowers are lovely, one more reason why this plant shouldn't miss from any garden.

Remove the spent flowers before they go to seed (the plant dies after ensuring its propagation) and pinch the tips regularly to encourage bushy growth.

WEEK THIRTY FOUR

August 19th - Rosy Peach

Produce

After a whole summer of doting and loving dedication it is finally time for harvest. The best part of growing your own produce is that you get to pick and use it at the peak of its flavor. Here are the best times for harvest.

Eggplants \- should be four to six inches in diameter, with deep purple and shiny skin; once the color starts looking dull, they are past their prime.

Tomatoes \- pick them as soon as they turn red and always harvest before the rain to keep them from cracking

Squash \- harvest when it gets to six to eight inches and when you can pierce the skin with your fingernails. Leaving squash on the vine too long will turn the rind hard and the flesh dry, seedy and stringy.

Herbs \- always pick them on a bright morning, after the dew has dried up but before the midday heat kicks in. Harvest the fresh growth, the large bottom leaves are the plant's energy reserves and they're also tough and not as flavorful. Pinch the tips of the clump to encourage bushy growth.

Cucumbers \- harvest them while they are still bright green and firm; once they start yellowing they're only good for seed. Water them a lot, they grow stunted and bitter during draughts.

Beans \- the pods should be large enough to feel the beans inside, but still tender enough to snap when bent.

Keep picking the produce as soon as it ripens, the plants slow down production otherwise.

Fall Planting

It is too early for fall planting yet, but a great time for planning and preparation.

Many perennials fare better when started from seed in the fall, because they benefit from the cooling period to which they are naturally adapted and have plenty of time to develop a healthy root system. They are also much sooner out of the ground compared to their counterparts planted in spring. Good examples - larkspur, cone flowers, columbines, Black-Eyed Susans.

Some hardy annuals, like calendulas, love-in-a-mist, poppies, cornflowers, and borage need to be sown in the fall if you want a good display of color the following season.

The spring bulbs, of course, are the main planting of the season, but are not due for another couple of months. Plenty of time for selecting and purchasing, especially if you have them mailed to you.

The beginning of fall is the best time to plant and/or divide spring and early summer blooming perennials - peonies, bleeding hearts, foam flowers, coral bells, daylilies, cranesbills.

It's not too late for cool weather crops - radishes, cabbage, kale, carrots and spinach.

Don't forget to reseed the lawn.

And finally, yes, mums. They are everywhere, you can't miss them.

Clean-up and Maintenance

There is a lot of dead-heading to do at the end of August, when the bulk of the summer plants have finished blooming. Some of the foliage dies down to the ground at this time, and all that dead foliage is a breeding ground for molds and fungi. The weeds are slowing down, but not enough to stop being a problem.

A good weeding and perennial maintenance will keep the flower borders looking their best during the fall season, support the plants' health and make life easier for the gardener during the fall cleaning.

Lawn Care

Keep mowing the lawn as needed, aerate it and, if the weather is dry and your grass goes dormant, allow it to rest. I know it goes against every gardening instinct to sit and watch it look dead, but it will spring back up with a vengeance after the first rain, and it will be better for it. Late August is also the time to apply the last batch of fertilizer in the annual maintenance program.

Stop watering once weather cools down to allow the grass to prepare itself for winter.

WEEK THIRTY FIVE

August 26th - The End of Summer

Just Zinnias

A wave of sweltering heat is sweeping the landscape at the beginning of September; the temperatures are in the nineties and the air has taken on that muggy quality we usually associate with smog.

Technically, it's still summer, at least for three more weeks.

I'm waiting for the weather to temper a bit before I take a fall trip to the plant nursery to find interesting spring perennials and, of course, mums.

I can already picture what the greenhouse tables must look like right now: a sea of rounded pincushions in every earth tone imaginable. Come fall the mums take over the world.

Meanwhile, the zinnias are still going strong, tireless after an entire season of blooming and proud of their flashy mix of colors whose bright hues frequently clash in garish combinations.

The end of summer depends on resilient annuals for continued color.

The marigolds, calendulas, zinnias, snapdragons, cosmos, salvias and verbenas keep blooming long into the fall, right until it's time for pumpkins, filling the gaps between perennial bloom.

My Pride and Joy

There's a good crop of tomatoes this year, something I haven't seen in almost a decade.

They are the tiniest cherry variety imaginable, perfect for creating the beautiful canning jars one sprinkles around the kitchen in the fall, for effect, to brag tastefully.

Their long chords have grown completely out of control, but it's too late to reign in their disarray so late in the season. I'll just let them trail on the ground and weave themselves through the fall borders until the end of the year.

The official planting is reasonably productive too, now at the end of the season, but has not reached harvest yet. Tomatoes have the obnoxious habit of coasting through the warm months, when they can't be bothered to bloom, and snapping to attention at the end of the season, with not enough time left to ripen.

Blushing Beauty

I can't remember a single year when the stonecrops have not performed, that's probably why they're never absent from professional plantings, but don't take that as a guarantee that they will accept any growing conditions.

They need alkaline soil that drains well, a fair amount of sunlight and shelter from hail and wind. Their foliage is tender and damage prone and their shallow tubers are easy to uproot. Don't worry if that happens, just stick them back in the ground, they won't even notice.

August Queen

High season for the plantain lilies, which are glorious this fall. The new plantings have filled up beautifully last year, enough to give them plenty of energy to bloom this summer.

Hosta fragrance is classically floral and quite intense up close, a mix of honeysuckle, magnolia, cloves and citrus. Plant the clumps close to the patio or around the front door where you can enjoy their beautiful flowers and their delightful scent.

WEEK THIRTY SIX

September 2nd \- The Fall Garden

September

It's still hot at the beginning of September, it doesn't feel like fall at all. The only sign that the warm season is winding down is the trademark early fall sky - clear blue and visited by cumulus clouds. There is no moisture left in the air, none of the humid breath of summer.

The quiet end of the season chaos started to set in, amplified this year by the steady rhythm of plant growth, which shows no signs of slowing down. The garden is ignoring winter preparation, it's like there's never been and there will never be a cold season again. It's near impossible under the circumstances to remember the still and frozen landscape of early January, when even the breath slows down, to save precious warmth.

The tomatoes keep sprouting clusters of fruit, which for some reason refuse to ripen, why, it's everybody's guess! Goodness knows it's hot enough.

The landscape is feeling the effects of the long stretch of dry weather and I'm not sure whether I should water the plants or allow them to follow their natural vegetative cycle and begin storing food for winter.

I keep putting off the clean-up, the weeding and the dead-heading. The garden is such a mess just looking at it makes me tired.

What to Plant When

Here's a quick planting calendar for the fall.

As soon as the weather cools down, usually after the equinox, divide and propagate spring blooming perennials like peonies, bleeding hearts, geraniums and irises. This is also a good time to start fast rooting shrubs from softwood cuttings. For best results, keep the cuttings covered with a glass cloche until spring. See glass jar propagation method here.

Mid-October used to be bulb planting time, but with the recent changes in the weather this planting time keeps getting pushed later and later in the year. Last year I started the spring bulbs in December. Avoid planting them too early, they will produce foliage before the winter and consume precious resources in the process, so you're likely to see fewer flowers in spring.

Leaf season is also the time to sow seeds for cool season annuals like calendulas, nigella, larkspur and poppies. They need a stretch of cold weather to germinate too.

Plant new rose bushes up to six weeks before the first frost, but not bare root roses, which should be planted in spring.

Add bare root shrubs and trees to the garden after the all the leaves have fallen but before the ground freezes.

There is still time for a quick crop of radishes, snow peas, beets, spinach or chards. These veggies' seed to harvest time is very short and they prefer cold weather, anyway.

Before the first snow don't forget to sow grass seeds for a lush lawn come spring.

Perennial Herbs

Don't forget to protect perennial herbs during winter. Winter tender perennials, like rosemary, need to be brought indoors during winter. Trim down the winter hardy perennial herbs four to six inches above ground after a couple of frosts and mound up dirt and mulch around their roots to protect them from freezing if winter gets exceedingly cold.

Also, woody herbs can be started indoors from cuttings during the winter, you know, just in case.

Autumn Crazies

Some annuals simply go nuts at the approach of fall, as observed in this picture.

The French mallows, four o'clocks, calendulas, celosia, cleomes, marigolds, morning glories and verbenas redouble their efforts right before the winter, to produce a splendid display of color. The most rugged of these, the mallows and the marigolds, last in the garden long after the first frost.

WEEK THIRTY SEVEN

September 9th \- Field Patterns

Dark Flowers

In recent years I developed a fondness for the dark flowers, whose stunning and unusual corollas bring welcome drama to the landscape, and lots of it, so I decided to make a list.  
The selection might be a little goth for the classic gardening design sensibility, but these plants' visual impact is so striking they're almost impossible to resist.

Most of them are black, or at least as close to black as the pigments of the plant world will allow.

Before the Storm irises boast stunning deep violet-black petals accented by fuzzy purple beards.

Queen of the Night tulips, black, with a simple upright growth habit that looks spectacular in mass plantings.

Black petunias. I simply can't resist these flowers, which take on a metallic sheen in bright sunlight, and I end up getting them every year. Many are fragrant.

Dark and Handsome hellebores, whose velvety deep maroon petals provide a contrasting background for their bright yellow middles.

Night Rider lilies. Yes, that is right. Black lilies. Sadly, not fragrant.

Molly Sanderson black pansies with just a dash of yellow at the center.

Black dahlias, the quintessential dark flowers. They are not actually black, more of a blend of dark chocolate and maroon.

Hollyhock Nigra, whose somber color is an unexpected play on the old-fashioned cottage garden design.

Last, but not least, the stunning and simply unreal Black Panther Calla lilies, which look like they were brought straight from Morticia Addams' garden, just in time for Halloween.

I couldn't leave out the black Baccara roses, which are called black, but are really more of a deep burgundy, and of course, the endless array of dark foliage - chocolate snakeroot, black beauty elderberry, black begonias, purple leaved bearded tongue.

The list can go on and on, but I have to stop somewhere. I couldn't help myself, as I was watching these pouty blue-black salvias I couldn't resist at the plant nursery last spring. They were just sitting there all dark and brooding, looking so posh in their subtle discontent.

Who plants black flowers?

Groundcover

If you haven't had the chance to try plumbago before, by all means, don't miss out.

This resilient ground cover is a gift to the garden. It is perennial and long lived and only requires a quick trim in spring, to clear out the way for fresh growth.

It grows close to the ground, which makes it a perfect candidate for the front of the border where it delights the eye from the middle of August until the end of November with a carpet of cobalt blue flowers, followed by elegant maroon seed heads.

Come October its foliage turns bright red, with just a hint of copper around the edges.

Drawbacks? Like all ground covers it is very territorial and can become invasive. Use it in draught prone areas with poor soil but full sun exposure, where it will perform like a champ with no maintenance at all.

Don't feed it, it will grow a foot tall, produce way too much foliage and look rather unkempt.

It can be grown in the shade, but it's not happy there, it needs full sun to provide this enchanting display of flowers.

Deep Purple

Speaking of dark flowers, I don't know what is more attractive, the heliotrope's deep purple color, its old-fashioned charm or its sweet cherry pie aroma, which gave the plant its nickname.

All in all a must have plant. Did I mention it hasn't stopped blooming since I planted it? I spent a good half hour last spring combing every single table at the plant nursery until I found it. I couldn't have a garden without it, could I?

Care Free Annuals

Verbena is a great plant for the busy gardener: very reliable, ever-blooming and great for mass plantings. This variety, called Superbena, bears clusters of pure white flowers, so bright that they glow from afar, especially in the shade.

I was surprised to discover that it is reasonably shade tolerant, but don't get too excited about that. Verbena is a sun loving plant and needs at least eight hours of full sun to perform at its best.

WEEK THIRTY EIGHT

September 16th - Fall Activities

Sunshine

I don't care what fall lovers say, there is a melancholy quality to the bright but already oblique September sunshine. Everything is bathed in golden light, as if to portend the color show yet to come, sadly followed by the end of the season.

Normally at this time I bury my nose in plant catalogs, trying to ignore the gradual shift to low lighting conditions and skipping over the months of winter in my head in order to keep my mind strongly anchored in April happiness and bliss, but this year for some reason I couldn't gather the enthusiasm necessary for planning, moving, dividing and planting next year's perennials.

It's the heat, I think. It looks like fall but it sure doesn't feel like it.

Regardless, the gardening schedule doesn't wait for the temperatures to catch up with it, so I guess a trip to the plant nursery is in order, to look for spring perennials and bulbs and get the last step for lawn care on time.

I'm sad that the beautiful toad lilies, whose bloom I eagerly anticipate each fall, have all succumbed to the excessive late season temperatures and will not do anything at all this season. I hope they recover next year, but I'll get more bulbs anyway, you know, just to be on the safe side.

Way too hot, way too dry!

Brown Tomatoes

I didn't use to pay much attention to tomato cultivars, a tomato is a tomato, right?

It turns out there are over ten thousand varieties, and the list keeps growing right under the gardener's bewildered gaze.

They come in a broad array of shapes and sizes and in almost every color except blue, so after I perused the catalog wondering at such a plethora of choices I decided to try my luck with the more unusual breeds, and got a brown variety, a yellow and a green one.

This is a purely aesthetic exercise because a tomato will taste the same regardless of the color, but for what's worth, here's the brown variety, which finally deigned to ripen.

Meanwhile, the tiniest cherry tomatoes I've ever seen in my life, born on plants that sprouted in the front yard from sources unknown, smack dab in the middle of the herb border, spring out cluster after cluster of fruit, most of which matures and falls to the ground through the jumbled foliage faster than I have time to pick it.

I guess I won't have to worry about starting tomato seedlings next spring, I'll have a whole nursery of them coming out of the ground as soon as the weather allows.

Fall? What Fall?

Even though the summer heat lingers on (September has been unseasonably warm so far), the landscape shifted into fall mode. It's a subtle, but very noticeable difference in the tonus of the plants, in the sheen of bronze on the foliage, in the slowed down growth.

The fall bloomers performed as expected, defying the scorching temperatures to show up right on schedule. The tomatoes keep producing more fruit than I can use, I never thought I'd say this again.

Blushing Sedum

Because of the hot and sunny weather the sedums ripened really early this year. Their seed heads are already brown, I blinked through the change of hue from pink to ruby and I missed it.

They now tower over the fall garden mess two months ahead of schedule, looking like it's the end of November, an imagery made even more bizarre by the late summer heat.

WEEK THIRTY NINE

September 23rd - The Fall Equinox

Warm Gold

No matter how old one gets there is still a place deep inside one's heart that resonates to wonder. Nature keeps yielding these open mysteries and they are always beyond human grasp, even as we gape incredulous at their details, unveiled and illuminated for all to see.

These quiet miracles always take me by surprise, in my dull moments, in my jaded and distracted moments, and I can never get enough of them.

Sedums are the most mundane plants, you'll say. They're found in every garden, every outdoor public space, every professional landscape, they're meant to fade into the background. Come to think of it, they are the background. They inhabit the places where nobody's looking.

I spent some time with this plant after I took its picture, wondering how does the light seem to emanate from it almost, with a subdued and hard to grasp yet very persistent signature - the pulse of life.

I like to catch my garden unaware sometimes too. I wait until it forgets I'm there to snap these pictures of its golden moments, its triumphant radiance, its high intensity excess.

An elusive portrait of being, stripped from the frame of expectation, innocent and true.

Hope Springs Eternal

Did I mention the toad lilies were a total loss? Guess again. I was giddy when I found them, hidden under an embarrassing mess of leaves and stems. I must confess the flower borders got the better of me again at the end of the season. Oh, what's the point, right?

Not only are the toad lilies not dead, but they are early this year, and judging by the number of buds waiting to open, they will put up quite a show in a couple of weeks. Never underestimate the resilience of life, especially the green and leafy variety.

Sometimes this works to the gardener's advantage and sometimes not so much. Give a mulberry or a wild honeysuckle sprout two months and they will grow into a tree right in the middle of your flower border, encouraged and revitalized by your tireless efforts to cut it down to the ground.

Going on a somewhat unrelated tangent, there is a vicious gardening practice called hosta stomping, which, if you hope is some sort of metaphor, consists exactly of stomping the barely out of the ground shoots into oblivion.

Apparently this encourages the plant to double, even triple its fresh growth. It sounds barbaric, if you ask me, but I suspect the same thing happened to the mighty honeysuckle bush that is now challenging my crab apple tree for living space.

Never fight nature. Nature always wins. Truer words were never spoken.

Deep Purple

Yes, the heliotrope is still in bloom, I think I'm in love with this plant. Some people say it smells like cherry pie; it reminds me more of licorice, vanilla or grape soda, I guess it depends on the variety.

The plant's flowers also come in white, but I wouldn't want to miss the trademark deep purple clusters, which stare you back, all broody and antisocial, from a lush clump of dark green leaves.

Care Free Annuals

This year I wanted to create a blue flower scheme with annuals, which turned a little closer to periwinkle and indigo than pure blue. True blue flowers are not very common, especially among non-perennial plants.

If you've got your heart set on a blue summer, lobelias, Canterbury bells, forget-me-nots and morning glory will never disappoint. Love-in-a-mist and larkspur often come in intense blue hues and likes to make itself at home in the garden by producing lots of seeds for the following year.

WEEK FORTY

September 30th - Fall Garden, Late Afternoon

Season's End

One of the perks of keeping a garden is stumbling upon these little joyful moments when time stands still and life flows softly through, peaceful and unhurried.

Time slows down so we have enough of it to notice how bright the sunlight looks, reflected in the gold and orange leaves of the maple trees, how the long clouds cross each other in the periwinkle sky, how contours lose their sharpness and how a bronze hue underlies the colors; subtle changes, slow changes, not tethered to our speed at all.

Plants follow their schedule, mostly unnoticed by us humans, too busy with our daily hassles to marvel at something that springs from the ground and feeds on sunshine.

Sometimes towards the beginning of the winter a thin layer of soft wood right under the tree bark turns to ice, creating a makeshift greenhouse to protect the sap inside from freezing, to keep the pith alive and prevent damage to the trunk.

Every year this transformation occurs under our very eyes and goes unnoticed.

Every winter we live among trees of glass, pushing their defiant roots deeper into the frozen earth, waiting like real life Sleeping Beauties to be awakened by the first kiss of spring.

After all, the end of the season is just a station in an endless cycle, nothing more. The time when nature gets to rest.

Illuminations

Fall arrived suddenly, with temperatures dropping thirty degrees and a quick change of scenery. It's not leaf season yet, but after a couple of rains and a few cold nights when temperatures approached freezing there should be glorious color on the trees this year.

For some weird reason I almost look forward to cozying up with a gardening book by the fire and ignoring the fact that the days keep getting shorter and darker and colder. Very fast too, it seems. How is it already dark at six?

The last crop of tomatoes is still on the vine, I should pick them clean and process the fruit before the frost sets in.

The flower beds badly need weeding, I can't tell which is what anymore and the roses have been engulfed by overenthusiastic shrubbery.

In the meantime nature renders beautiful light around its charges, surrounding them with auras and liquid rainbow strands.

It's only a flower, isn't it?

Just a Little Sparkle

It's not fall until leadwort's sky-blue flowers ripen into maroon seed heads and its healthy foliage turns ruby red. A handsome perennial ground cover, very low maintenance, it tolerates poor dry soils and heavy clay as long as it has sunshine.

It grows in the shade too, but it doesn't bloom much.

Jewels in the Light

There is something about the light at the end of September, it is cool and bright, almost incandescent, and makes all the flowers sparkle like gems late in the afternoon.

Even though the weather cooled and the flower borders turned into a jumbled mess at the end of the season, lantana still shines. Jewel tones only, none of the warm hues of fall.

WEEK FORTY ONE

October 7th - Crisp and Clear

Autumn Sunset

The days are getting shorter but the walks are getting longer, now that the temperatures are pleasantly cool and the weather blessed us with crisp, clear air, blue skies and delightful shades of bronze and gold on the branches.

I took this picture during my stroll through the park. The fiery glow is not caused by the turning leaves, as one would assume at first glance, but by the light of the sunset, which reflected off the foliage and swirled in the branches, mixing light and shadow into living fire.

The geese are already flying south in noisy flocks that disturb the usually quiet landscape, accustomed only to the sounds of the wind.

There are pumpkins everywhere, colorful gourds and baskets of apples, this year's harvest.

We already had two overnight freeze warnings which are even more surprising considering the record high temperatures of September.

I don't want to move the plants indoors just yet, if recent years' weather is any reference they are not going to enjoy being cooped up for six whole months.

Panaches and Plumes

Come October the lush plumes of the pampas grasses cover the universe in undulating chenille fuzz. To be honest, I tend to think of them as filler and background, as opposed to specimen planting, although some varieties are quite attractive and grow to be seven feet tall.

Contrary to popular belief, pampas grasses are not maintenance free. The clumps grow large with the passing of time and start to hollow out at the center, a dead giveaway that they need to be divided. Keep the plants youthful and healthy by dividing them every three or four years, before they start their active growth.

Sometimes the clumps get so big they have to be pulled apart with forks or cut with a shovel. Don't worry about damaging the plants, as long as they have roots attached they'll pick up where they left off as soon as you plant them.

Grasses need watering just like any other perennial, even though they weather droughts better than their neighbors in the flower border. Don't overfeed them, they will produce excess foliage to the detriment of ears and plumes.

When to trim back the clumps? I usually leave mine until spring for winter interest, although I have to say that those graceful September plumes don't look so hot in February, after they've dried up and gotten soggy. The foliage provides some winter protection for the roots during the coldest days of the year.

Golden

The trees are slowly starting to change color, beginning with the maples. The leaf season goes through stages, which get wilder and brighter as the weather cools, but which always begin in the golden spectrum to make nature look like a delicious ripe fruit.

There is a scent in the air that accompanies this golden color: fallen leaves, crisp air and damp earth. The scent of fall.

Little Trumpets

Tall nicotiana is relentless; if you use it in your garden, make sure it's at the back of the border or against a foundation wall, in a location that will undoubtedly become permanent.

If you ever saw their little pepper shakers that spill countless seeds as fine as powder at the lightest touch you know those plants will perpetuate in that place forever. The one in the picture is the descendant of a plant I grew five years ago.

WEEK FORTY TWO

October 14th - Home Apothecary

Bath Salts, Creams and Oils

Bath salts.

The base of a bath salt is an equal mix of sea salt and baking soda. To this one adds other ingredients as one wishes: dried and powdered herbs, powdered resins, powdered milk, clays and muds, food coloring for effects, and of course essential oils. Go easy on peppermint and cinnamon, they irritate the skin, and citrus oils, which can induce a phototoxic reaction. Store in a pretty jar and replenish as needed.

Creams.

There are so many recipes for home-made creams online that I'm not going to present one here, but I will make one comment: home made creams are basically soap without lye, so the manufacturing process is very similar.

Warm up the fat-based ingredients until they turn into a homogeneous blend, warm up the water-based ingredients until they reach the same temperature as the fat and whip the two together into a cream, a task made much easier by the use of a hand blender.

Add the essential oils after the contents have turned into a stable emulsion and expect the product to curdle occasionally. If that happens, add hot water, not oil, drop by drop, to thicken the cream.

Oils.

I swear by this therapy in a bottle, which is as simple as mixing 2 oz of cooking oil with 10 drops of your favorite essential oils.

Shake the mix vigorously for two minutes and let the blend rest for a day in a cool dry place to allow its components to achieve synergy.

The end product is good for everything: removing make-up, cleansing the dirt and grime of a long day off your face, moisturizing dry skin, discouraging breakouts.

Contrary to popular belief, using fat based ingredients to clean your face does not make your complexion oilier.

You can use any cooking oil you wish, each of them has a different quality. Some, like grape seed, almond and apricot oils, are rich in vitamin E and barely there on the skin. Others, like avocado and olive oils, are a lot richer and heavier, but they are loaded with vitamins and antioxidants and are just the nourishment dry winter skin needs.

A Cure for the Common Cold

Just in time for the cold season, a few herbal remedies for the occasional sniffle. They may not really cure the common cold, but at least they will make you feel better.

Teas.

Almost all herbal teas served hot help with coughs and colds, because they provide you the much-needed hydration, but some are better than others.

Elderberry and linden flower teas tame fevers and facilitate restful sleep; they are especially good when you are fighting a chest cold.

Chamomile is the go to remedy for pretty much anything that has to do with fever, headache and congestion; it soothes and comforts.

There is nothing like peppermint to open up the airways and help you breathe better.

Brew lemon and ginger for their antiseptic and mood enhancing properties; just add honey.

Lemon balm makes for a delightful tea with a very pleasant flavor and has the rare attribute of being a natural antiviral.

Green tea is antioxidant and boosts the immune system to help you get back on your feet.

Hibiscus tea loosens up the mucus to break stubborn coughs.

Food.

Let food be thy medicine and load up on garlic, ginger, cayenne pepper and spices of every variety. Add thyme and basil to everything and go for the soup. Hot.

Hydration.

Since you have to drink your water anyway, why not enhance it a little with balsam fir syrup or pineapple juice for coughs, slices of lemon and ginger for chasing away pesky germs, or just a few leaves of fresh mint to relieve congestion? And, of course, don't forget the orange juice.

Aromatherapy.

Add a few drops of the following essential oils to a humidifier or a hot steam bath or blend them into a hot oil for massage, but be careful with the quantities, because they can irritate your airways or your skin when used in excess: peppermint, nutmeg, cinnamon, lavender, cypress, bergamot and eucalyptus.

Skin Deep

The cold weather brings with it another inconvenience: dry skin. The cupboard and the pantry contain wholesome remedies for this ailment, which can be whipped up into a face and hand mask or added to the bath: milk, honey, avocados, oatmeal, yogurt, pumpkin and papaya.

If you have to trust me on just one of these go for plain honey for a simple exfoliating and hydrating mask. Just try not to touch anything, it's sticky:)

Aromatherapy

I discovered essential oil diffusers some time ago and became very fond of them. I know they are glorified humidifiers with fragrance, but they look pretty, smell nice and provide a way to enjoy essential oils that doesn't require getting all slathered up.

Some oils, like the heavy florals and spicy herbs, are too intense for a room diffuser, but chamomile, citrus and rosemary are very pleasant for everyday use. Rosemary helps when you need to focus on a task.

WEEK FORTY THREE

October 21st - Custom Gardens

The Herb Wheel

The herb wheel is a very old garden pattern and a very special one, which is why green thumbs who fall for its lure approach it with the same affection and reverence they would a beloved family heirloom. It is supposed to look traditional and old-fashioned.

Herbs are usually an acquired taste for the new gardener: they don't bloom much, they take up too much space in full sun and they're kind of self-effacing. The herb wheel raises the status of these modest plants by formally displaying them in a way that both enhances their commonality of purpose and brings out each plant's individuality.

An herb wheel requires symmetry and perfect grooming, once the herbs are allowed to grow out of control the magic is gone. The comprising plants must be displayed in perfect slices, like the spokes on a wheel, in alternating colors and textures, and always neatly manicured to maintain the look and feel of velvet tapestry - no bald spots, no leggy sprawls, no staggering of growth.

Not all herbs are suitable for this kind of design, which requires its components to be small, lush and compact. Kitchen herbs are the best choices for it \- basil, marjoram, thyme, oregano, parsley, lavender, baby dill and sage.

Choose purple, golden, textured and variegated foliage when available, it will highlight the differences between the slices, and be meticulous in maintaining sharp edges between them. An herb wheel is meant to be laid out with a ruler.

Trim the herbs regularly, this will encourage them to develop thicker foliage.

It sounds like a lot of work because it is.

Bulb Gardens

While providing the easiest way to abundant bloom, a bulb garden presents a very specific challenge: finding a way to hide the fading foliage after the flowers have gone. This requires a careful selection of plants, which takes into account their foliage almost as much as their flowers.

You can create a bulb garden anywhere, even in an average size pot.

Lay out bulbs in layers, at different depths, and choose plants that bloom throughout the season. Sadly, bulbs get spent quickly, so you may have to replant your garden every other year to keep it looking its best.

A mix of crocuses, tulips, hyacinths, alliums, lilies, Persian buttercups, gladioli, Cala lilies, dahlias, crocosmia, liatris, anemones and toad lilies will keep something in bloom all season long. Some bulbs, lilies for example, come in varieties which bloom at different times during the summer for several flushes of color.

I intentionally left out the daffodils. A daffodil garden is complete in and of itself, as it should be; it is near impossible to conceal those awkward strands of browning foliage once the flowers fade, especially since daffodils need to be planted in mass to look their best.

If you really love them, use them in mixed plantings with broad-leaved summer perennials or allocate a portion of the garden just for them and accept it will stay barren once their flowers are spent.

Woodland Landscapes

It is surprisingly difficult to create this design in the average suburban garden, task made even more frustrating by its inhabitants' eagerness to naturalize in abandoned lots, wilderness shade and the side of the road.

There is a very good reason why that happens. Those plants need woodland conditions to thrive and those locations provide them in droves: moist rich humus, slightly acidic, sunshine and warmth, but only until the trees leaf out, and undisturbed soil.

The Potager

Sooner or later every gardener succumbs to the temptation of planting vegetables, it must be an instinctive drive or something. It is hard to describe the joy of walking out into the garden on a bright summer day and being welcomed by the giant squash flowers, which greet every morning in sunny egg yolk hues.

Vegetable gardens are too pretty to resist, it's as simple as that, with their neatly planted rows and their trellises overflowing with fruit, and their produce that peeks from underneath broad foliage.

WEEK FORTY FOUR

October 28th \- The Glory of Fall

Soft Fog in the Morning

The morning fog welcomed me to a world of muted sounds and melting colors. Its soft breath spilled on the ground and skimmed the dark contours of the houses, casting halos around dimming lampposts and fiery maple trees.

There was nothing sad or nostalgic about its spirited essence, which looked keenly alive in the beams of the headlights.

It felt light, playful and unruffled by the coming of winter, a far cry from the forlorn quality people usually associate with it.

Like an artistic blur it sifted out the irrelevant details to allow the colors and the patterns to come through: the coppery orange of the maples, the cement gray of the sky, the texture of the lawn under the fresh cover of golden leaves, the bright red honeysuckle berries, the strident yellow of the hosta leaves.

I spent some time in its company, listening to the sound of car wheels on wet pavement, muffled through its veil. I watched it hide in the barren leaves until the sun came out and claimed its thin dusting of mist from their damp surfaces.

Earth Tones

Even if you don't like fall its extravagant display of color is impossible to resist.

The end of the season renders me grouchy and jaded. I can't even look at the beautiful cover of leaves without contemplating the fact that it keeps growing thicker with each passing day and somebody (that would be me) will have to clean it up eventually.

That being said, the enchanted late October stopped me in my tracks today, asking me to forget about my chores for a moment and just enjoy the splendor of the art show that accompanies the end of fall.

The leaf season is unusually long and warm around here, as if nature wanted to make sure everybody saw its glory, glowing bright in earth and fire tones against the contrasting background of a leaden sky.

The little dwellers of the wilderness started gathering provisions for winter, the perennials slowed down their vegetative growth to prepare themselves for winter; the world grew quieter with the expectation of winter. Another cycle that ends just so it can begin again. Nature doesn't age.

Brown Plush

Their seed heads are a lot softer than I thought, I always assumed sedum flowers to be stiff and scratchy. The picture doesn't do justice to their delicate pincushions, which felt like plush under my fingers.

They make me a little sad, by the time they reach this deep shade of brown winter is clearly in sight, but hey, it's November. There will be another spring.

November Blooms

I am in awe of these plants' resilience. I thought they were gone after their stalks got scorched by draught last summer.

Toad lilies are tough plants and they will perform reasonably well in most growing conditions, but if you really want to see them shine, plant them in a sunny location where they get plenty of water: they will reward you with a profusion of blooms.

WEEK FORTY FIVE

November 4th - After Halloween

The Garden in Winter

The winter garden is a haven for the little creatures of the land; it provides them with shelter, food and cozy nooks to hibernate.

The gardener can lend a hand, goodness knows the wildlife can use all the help it can get during the coldest days of the year.

Add bird feeders to your backyard and you'll be greatly rewarded by the flock of colorful birds that gather near them on snowy days: finches, cardinals, chickadees, blue jays, titmice and sparrows. Hang up a few suet cakes too, your backyard visitors need the fat calories to keep warm.

Plant late blooming flowers, like asters and sedums, and don't forget the berry shrubs and trees - rowans, hollies, hawthorns and wild roses.

Don't trim down the perennial seed heads, not only they provide winter interest to an otherwise sparse landscape, but they are a good source of nourishment for birds and little animals. The best plants for this purpose are ornamental grasses, cone flowers, bergamots, black-eyed Susans, daisies and asters.

Leave a little portion of the garden untidy, to give hedgehogs, chipmunks, rabbits and squirrels a place to hide. The dried up chords, leaves and stalks are excellent insulators and make good locations for their burrows.

Last, but not least, put up nesting boxes and bird houses for your winged visitors. Bonus, they're colorful.

Things to Do Before the Snow

Green thumbs may not want to be reminded of the fact that the cold season is here, thus putting an end to all garden enjoyment until next year, and would rather not gaze upon the garden as it prepares itself for its long sleep, but there are still a few tasks that need done before the first snow.

Store the garden hoses, empty the clay pots and store them indoors, upside down, to keep them from shattering during deep freezes.

Bring the tender perennials inside and cluster them together, they will be less likely to suffer from the dry air in the house during winter. Cover your pond if you have one.

Rake the leaves, trim the hardy perennials' faded stalks, clean and mulch the flower beds. Give the lawn one last mow, fertilize and weed it and sow grass seed for next spring.

Amend the soil where needed to save yourself the extra work come spring.

Plant spring bulbs. This task used to have a mid-October deadline, but lately it can be put off until the beginning of December. It's much easier and more enjoyable to plant bulbs after the fall cleaning than before.

Clean the gardening tools with alcohol to kill plant pathogens which tend to overwinter and give the tools a good rub with vegetable oil, to keep them in top shape. Pay special attention to disinfecting your pruning shears; the worst pests, the plant viruses, which usually end up destroying the plant, spread easiest through cuts.

The First Frost

This is how long the warm weather held out; the first frost officially threw us into the dark half of the year. This is not a metaphor, we're only halfway to the winter solstice and the days are already too short: we're down to ten hours of daylight and we're going to gradually lose another hour until December 21st.

It's dark in the morning, it's dark in the afternoon. Don't you just love winter

Protecting Perennials

Perennials need winter protection too. Mound dirt around the bud grafts of roses to keep them from freezing and mulch the flower beds with pine needles or straw.

Some gardening guides advise to prune the roses in the fall, to reduce the risk of winter damage. In my experience, if the winter is too cold, whatever is left above ground would be damaged, anyway. Putting off the pruning until spring leaves you more undamaged canes to pick from.

WEEK FORTY SIX

November 11th - Winterizing the Garden

Fall Cleaning

Worst. Garden. Chore. Ever!

I'm finally done with fall cleaning, after three full days of hard labor, and not a moment too soon. It already snowed, and we had temperatures more suitable for January last week, so when mother nature graced us with a few days of mild weather I ran around in a panicked frenzy trying to clean and store everything before the deep freeze came back for good.

It's easy to get carried away and lop off all the dead foliage from your perennial border, so you have less work to do during the spring cleaning. I'm not even going to comment on the bitter irony of having to clean the garden both before and after winter. There are a few reasons to keep a little mess around during the cold season.

The dried up leaves, stalks and seed heads provide shelter and food for the wildlife during the freezing months ahead.

Plants enjoy the extra protection of the fallen foliage which covers their roots like a self-recycling blanket and slowly turns into food until spring.

A leaf cover keeps moisture trapped underneath and prevents ice sublimation, which happens on freezing days. It also acts as a natural mulch, to prevent weeds from germinating.

Last, but not least, the fabled winter garden interest. I'll say there is nothing endearing about a landscape filled with dried grasses and blackened seed heads, but at least there is something there to break the monotony of the monochrome winter palette.

Planning for Next Spring

I'm barely done putting the garden to bed for winter and I already started missing it, so I escaped into nursery catalogs and garden encyclopedias in search of attractive new plants for spring.

Every year I set the goal to acclimate more fall blooming flowers to my garden, and every year the effect is less than stellar. This season was no exception, I had to rely on sedums and goldenrod again for fall color.

Fourteenth time's a charm, so here we go.

Asters. Whatever happened to mine, I'll never know. They love the alkaline soil and performed very well for a few years, and then they disappeared. Not only from my garden, but also from the plant nursery. It's a mystery.

Toad lilies. I love them dearly and they put up quite a show in the fall provided the season gives them plenty of rain. This year the late summer and early fall were dry, so they aren't doing so well.

Russian Sage doesn't like my garden, for reasons unknown. I tried it in three different places and it refuses to cooperate.

Japanese Anemones, on the list every year, haven't happened yet.

Monkshood, a beautiful plant, but one which gives me pause, because it is very poisonous.

Maybe I should try pansies. Last year in Denver I saw some in bloom in single digit temperatures.

Moving Plants Indoors

Truth be told, none of the outdoor plant refugees are happy spending several months indoors, in an environment with indirect winter light, and warm, still, desiccated air.

Give them some extra care, water them regularly, from the bottom, if possible, make sure they are as close to real sunshine as feasible and clean up any signs of pests and diseases as soon as they appear. Some plants shed when moved to a different environment. Have patience with them and they will leaf out again, eventually. Or not.

Winter Lawn Care

Surprisingly, the one part of the garden that needs extra care during winter, right up there with the fancy roses, is the lawn. Rake the leaves, mow it one last time before the winter if needed, apply fertilizer and weed control, and reseed the bald patches (as you know, many popular grass varieties thrive in cool weather and will take advantage of the cold season to grow under the snow).

If you have a cool weather lawn, choose a potassium rich fertilizer to encourage a strong root system and apply late November, early December. For varieties that go dormant in winter, apply a nitrogen fertilizer early in September.

WEEK FORTY SEVEN

November 18th - Winter Garden

November Weather

Winter came in full force after the fall cleanup. In fact, it's not even winter, I don't know what it is, some unholy combination of winter temperatures and summer strength winds. The cloud cover must be a mile thick judging by how dark it gets during the day, even though I can't fathom how it stays put through the violent wind gusts, and the days keep getting shorter.

I have to fill the bird feeders, it's getting too cold and gloomy for the little ones, they could use the extra calories.

I went to the plant nursery in search of bulbs, but they were all gone, except for amaryllis and paperwhites, which are meant for indoor use. That's fine, it already got too cold to plant anything outside, anyway.

That wraps up this year, no more puttering around the garden until spring.

The back yard looks kind of pretty, ready to fall asleep, with all the trellises put away and all the pots cleaned out, I just wish there was a little more color in the landscape, ah, the mythical winter interest again.

Since I have nothing better to do, I'll immerse myself in gardening encyclopedias and try to find plants that look pretty in winter (red twig dogwood immediately comes to mind).

Cold

Yesterday I saw the first winter sky of the year, you know the ones, with hot pink, purple and orange splashes. It's not cold enough for snow yet, although it sure feels like it. The low cloud cover trapped enough warm air underneath to last another week.

The winter forecast looks dreary: harsh winter with lots of precipitation, freezing in February, snow in March, the works. Why?

I'm looking at the sky right now and it has no color at all, a whitish gray background that makes everything that projects on it look devoid of color too.

On a happier note the amaryllis is blooming early, joined in its efforts by the Christmas cactus, a delightful variety with white petals and bright fuchsia stamens.

I guess it really is time to bring out the gardening books and start planning for next spring. The sunny border gets completely out of control after the spring and early summer flowers finish blooming, when it gets overtaken by messy perennials and weeds that grow faster than I can pull them.

The focus this year is finding beautiful plants for fall and winter interest.

Caring for Roses

Don't forget to protect the roses by mounding up soil around their graft buds, otherwise you'll be left with the rootstock come spring, most likely Dr. Huey.

Tie up the climbers, so they don't get whipped by the wind and bury the tree roses, if you committed to the unreasonable amount of maintenance they require.

Indoor garden

The indoor garden frequently imports its residents from the southern hemisphere which means it should start its active season soon.

Winter blooming plants, which are coming out of their dormancy, require a good amount of fertilizer and regular watering to be at their best. Don't overfeed, a few drops of liquid fertilizer are more than enough, and keep them out of direct sunlight to avoid scorched foliage.

WEEK FORTY EIGHT

November 25th – Flowers

Planters

I love planters, they are like landscaping Legos. You can mix and match them in infinite configurations to get instant gardens in places where there is no dirt to plant - balconies, patios, urban spaces, shopping malls.

Caring for container gardens does not differ from tending a classic flower border, except for the fact that you have complete control over the sun exposure, the nutrients and the level of moisture in the soil. This can be both a blessing and a curse.

A few things about planters.

They need frequent watering, even twice a day during hot summers.

When in doubt always select a larger container, plants need room and plenty of nutrients to develop a strong root system. For the planting medium choose classic garden soil over peat moss, which can't hold enough moisture in full sun to keep them alive.

Most nursery plants have been conditioned to need high levels of fertilizer and won't perform unless those are sustained. You need to feed the containers regularly.

Place pots in groups, the plants like each other's company and the proximity will help them preserve their precious water and keep their roots cool on hot summer afternoons.

Containers are easy to move around, to chase the sun exposure or offer needed shade during scorching days, but don't overdo it. The plants have to adapt every time their conditions change, which is not something that happens naturally, and that puts a lot of stress on their system. If you can, place the container in the ideal location and never move it from its spot.

Sunny Borders

Sunny borders are the Holy Grail of gardening, the place where everything thrives, well, almost everything, but they are not without their host of specific problems.

First, the obvious. A sunny spot will get dry as a bone and harder than cement during droughts, especially if yours is an area with clay soil, often to the point where you can't push a shovel through it, or pull weeds out of it. This problem is more frequent for perennial borders, because their inhabitants don't like their roots disturbed.

Mulching helps somewhat, but the lighter medium washes out in strong summer rains, leaving the heavy clay exposed.

The perennial plants that thrive in these spots don't mind the heaviness around their roots, but they will suffer from lack of water.

Sunny borders always end up overcrowded, no matter how disciplined you are about maintaining the spacing requirements, simply because the plants grow much larger much faster there.

They bloom more and produce a lot of seed, which is always eager to germinate, given the ideal conditions.

These plants require cleaning, weeding and dead heading around the clock. Sunny borders are messy and work intensive.

As far as weeds are concerned, a sunny spot is the best place to call home for them too and they will have a ball; they also grow a lot faster than the other plants.

Petunias

What survives any weather, comes in colors and shapes that boggle the mind and blooms all summer long with nary a care? Petunias. Many of them are fragrant too, they are nature's gift to the gardener, to make up for all those hybrid roses that didn't make it despite heroic efforts.

Petunias only demand one thing: full sun exposure. Don't bother planting them in the shade, even part shade, where they waste away pitifully. I know this because I tried.

The Wild Ones

Ok, fleabane is basically a weed, but I can't get myself to pull it, not when it looks like this, its white petals almost incandescent in the summer morning sun.

It grows tall and looks right at home in the middle of the perennial border, in the company of the even taller goldenrod, also a weed. Deadhead the flower heads as soon as they fade, the plant self-seeds aggressively.

WEEK FORTY NINE

December 2nd – Winter

The First Snow

The first snow of the year surprised us and showed up very early, but now the weather is biding its time, waiting for Christmas. I went out into the garden this morning to enjoy the morning sunshine and the clear blue sky, which both look more like April than December.

Stretches of warm weather in winter come with lots of moisture, barely contained by the air trapped under the thick blanket of clouds, and sunshine only shows up in the company of frigid temperatures. Since I also saw frost on the grass this morning, so I assume last night was pretty cold.

Just as I thought, early snow or not, there is still time to plant spring bulbs, if only I could find them anywhere anymore. The nursery went full blast winter holiday and stashed all the warm season items until spring.

The pots and trellises are clean, the garden is tidy and the bird feeders are full. There is nothing left for me to do but sit and twiddle my thumbs until March. Well, maybe start some seed in February. And study books on gardening.

Gardening Indoors

While I was at the plant nursery, I passed the wreaths and the trees and the glitzy decorations to make my way into the greenhouse which, as it does every winter, looked like a little paradise out of time, filled with bromeliads, orchids, violets, blooming cacti and herbs, so many potted herbs!

I resisted the urge to bring yet another plant home, because the kitchen windowsill is packed and the living room is filled with the patio plants I brought indoors last month, but it wasn't easy. Even the light is different in that place, I suspect they have some growing lights hidden in the rafters to supplement the natural light that shines through the glazed enclosure. It doesn't feel like winter at all, not with that level of brightness, warm humid air and so many colorful blossoms.

My indoor plants started blooming too. I'm looking forward to the potted tuberoses, which did nothing this year, and are bound to produce some flower stalks in winter.

The old and twisted aloe got so heavy it uprooted itself from its pot and I replanted it without holding much hope for results. It just sprouted a thicket of new growth and I hope this one stays vertical. The old plant was very heavy, I couldn't find any supports sturdy enough to train it on.

New Year's Flowers

At the end of December tropical house plants are just the sight to cure a frustrated gardener's cabin fever. They start their active season around this time, with Christmas cactus and Amaryllis leading the way, and continue through January and February with the bulk of winter bloomers - begonias, cyclamens, anthuriums, African violets and kalanchoe.

Also, February brings the potted bulbs - papewhites, hyacinths, daffodils and tulips, which can be planted outdoors once their bloom fades and weather turns nice.

Good Cheer

Some annuals add color, texture, fragrance and cheerfulness to the garden with no effort at all. Just sprinkle a few seeds on the ground in spring, the plants will take care of themselves.

Here is a quick list, starting with cosmos, seen in the picture: zinnias, four o'clocks, calendulas, moss roses, morning glories, nasturtiums, love in a mist, sunflowers, nicotiana, larkspur and marigolds.

WEEK FIFTY

December 9th - Spring Bulbs

Early Flowers

Every spring I try to guess which flowers will show up first: sometimes it's the delicate crocuses, still shivering in the biting winds, other times the miniature daffodils brave winter with their cheery yellow thimbles, but most of the time hepaticas or winter aconites bring the first blooms, left untouched by squirrels and rabbits because they're toxic.

Hepatica is a modest woodland clump with white or purple flowers. The leaves of some varieties look like liver, and for this reason it was considered a medicinal plant back in the day, based on the tenet that like heals like, but it's not and can be dangerous if ingested.

The tiny winter aconites have frayed dark green foliage and bright yellow flowers that look like buttercups. Make sure to handle them with gloves, or wash your hands well, their milky sap irritates the skin. Poison notwithstanding, they are a sight for sore eyes for the restless gardener at the end of winter.

By the time it gets warm enough to attempt the spring cleaning, their flowers have long faded, still hidden under a blanket of dead leaves.

Mid Spring Garden

The spring garden grows in leaps and bursts and one fine morning you wake up to find it fully grown, with no warning or preparation. Plants acknowledge subtle changes in the weather and when they get the signal winter is over they bulk up as quickly as they can, to secure their turf and discourage the competition.

By mid-spring the early bulbs have to share their territory with their summer counterparts and the broad-leaved perennials, and for this reason they like to start early, throwing up tender shoots as soon as the soil allows.

Don't worry if a freeze shows up late to test them, they are well adapted to withstand it, but they won't bloom until they feel all danger of frost is gone. Since weather patterns have been shifting in recent years, pushing winter into the warm season, that is more likely to happen in May than in March.

Mid-spring is the best time for the daffodil garden. Both the early and late varieties are in bloom now, displayed on a bright green background of fresh foliage and surrounded by thickets of periwinkles and sweet violets.

Speaking of subtle cues, spring bulbs are conditioned to go through their entire growth cycle before the trees come out of dormancy, so even if they have plenty of sunshine where they're planted they will quickly wrap up their bloom once leaves start covering the branches.

Staggered Bloom

With so many daffodil cultivars being developed each year, gardeners who have a passion for this flower can stretch out its growing season by picking varieties with staggered bloom times and planting the bulbs in batches over a couple of months.

Don't miss out on Erlicheer, a delicate white petaled tazetta narcissus which boasts a lovely fragrance and blooms in the summer.

Fragrant Bulbs

It would be a pity not to add fragrance to the bulb garden.

Hyacinths are a given, but also try daffodils like Thalia, Sir Winston Churchill and Double Cheerfulness, or crocuses like Cream Beauty and Snow Bunting. Grape hyacinths are supposed to have a lovely scent, although I never noticed it with mine, and even some tulip varieties are lightly scented.

WEEK FIFTY ONE

December 16th \- Winter Solstice

The Longest Night

In many cultures the winter solstice marks the time when nature, until now hidden deep underground in a frozen slumber, prepares to be reborn. Strangely enough, the longest night of the year, the time when the sun stands still, is a celebration of light.

That's what solstice means, the time when the sun stands still; for three whole days its declination appears to stop moving south, closer the horizon, after which it reverts course and goes back up, higher in the sky.

Like all cyclical occurrences of nature, the winter solstice has traditions and superstitions associated with it, some derived from keen empirical observations of real phenomena.

For instance, the ancient Greek sailors noticed halcyons liked to nest around the time of the winter solstice because seven days before it and seven days after the Mediterranean Sea was perfectly calm, providing an excellent time to set sail.

This is the origin of the expression the halcyon days, the metaphor for idyllic periods of the past, happy and peaceful.

Given the symbolic meaning of the winter solstice as a marker of death and rebirth, it felt like the best time to honor the dead with offerings of food, a custom that continues to this day in some cultures.

In Celtic traditions, keeping a yule log burning for twelve hours on winter solstice was said to protect the household and bring forth a bountiful harvest.

Winter Spices

It's not all gloom and doom as the days get shorter and colder. Resourceful humans have always found ways to brighten their lives, especially during the dark half of the year.

That's how we ended up with mulled wine, peppercorn brandy and hard eggnog: one has to have something strong and aromatic to enjoy while one curls up by the fire, wrapped snuggly in a blanket, immersed in a story or gazing at beautiful images from a different place and time and ignoring the frightful weather outside.

The spices of winter are strong and woodsy, with none of the subtle flavor of summer herbs. They fill the room with heady scents, fit more for a bake shop than a perfumer's lab.

Cinnamon sticks, nutmeg, orange and clove pomander balls, fiery peppercorns, cardamom and cumin, wintergreen, allspice.

For a second you're transported to exotic lands where bushels of these precious spices cover tables and crates and their heavy sacks crowd up the walkways in decadent overabundance.

Time stops. Happy memories and daring adventures of the mind are given free rain. Complete success.

What's wrong with hot tea, you ask? Aah...Nothing?

The Sun

The sun is stingy in anticipation of the longest night of the year. Even on its shortened schedule it hesitates to come out of the clouds; it lingers on its low ecliptic, barely above the horizon, like it's nursing a hangover.

I still find it difficult to believe it gets dark at four thirty. Of course it's kind of dark before four thirty also. It's just a matter of degree.

And the Moon

A full moon coinciding with the winter solstice is a rare phenomenon. The last time it happened it was 2010 and we won't see it again until 2094.

The Cold Moon, as the December full moon is called, is said to bring with it the full power of winter and turn the landscape frozen and still. Not anymore, I guess.

WEEK FIFTY TWO

December 23rd - Year's End

In Review

I always feel weird summing up the gardening activities at the end of the calendar year. The garden keeps its own time, measured from planting to harvest with slumber in between.

Try as I might, I never seem to get the perennial borders to perform well at the end of summer, and the vegetable patch experienced too much shade this year to do well.

As luck would have it, a corner of the backyard which was home to dense evergreen shrubbery got cleared out for some utility work and it seems I've got myself a better location for the vegetable garden.

The little plot has terrible soil, dry, shallow and acidic, all rocks and tree roots, so I'll have to build raised beds if I want anything to grow, but it receives a lot of sunshine and that makes all the difference.

Other than that, it's a perennial garden, they're not supposed to change much. The new peony still hasn't bloomed. Maybe next year.

Growing Hope

A stroll through the garden brought up the fact that the weather is way too warm for December, even compared to recent years. I sighed at the sight of fallen branches, leaves blanketing the lawn and bare patches covered in grass seed that didn't have time to germinate.

The flower borders are a planned mess, I don't clean them until spring to provide some cover for the perennial roots and to give shelter to the wildlife, but that means they look unkempt all winter long.

I'm the eternal optimist, but I have to say, the winter landscape is testing my gardening enthusiasm. Naked trees with cement gray trunks, dead stems strewn about, dessicate lifeless dirt, leaden sky, gets dark at five, need I say more?

Planning for new perennials in the new year, and as unlikely as it looks in the middle of winter, I know the garden will be beautiful again come spring, it's just going to make me put a lot of work into it.

I'm already waiting for the daffodils, there are so many of them now, the whole backyard looks like a blanket of sunshine. But that's months away.

Nature's Art

There is something very compelling about this image, even though the monochrome effect of the bare branches against a colorless sky can drain the life out of a gardener's heart.

Nothing but brown and gray for three more months. What joy! Meanwhile my garden produced the regular amount of debris, so I don't get it into my head that I can go light on the spring cleaning.

Winter Sun

I just learned there is a word for the glow of the winter sun, and I'm glad someone thought to call it apricity and not warmth, which it definitely is not.

What the sun lacks in warmth in winter, it makes up with color: the most spectacular sunrises and sunsets occur during the cold months. The colder the weather, the more colorful the sky.

