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Monday, August 30, 2010

The Birds Know

At times I feel I'm living in an old "Heckle and Jeckle" cartoon. Remember the talking magpies who would spy a fresh crop of corn and scheme to steal a free meal? Maybe that was a little before your time, but next time you're in your garden turn all around and look for the culprits, sitting in a tree or on a telephone line. They're looking at you and planning the theft of your treasure.

A few years ago I had a small crop of apricots ready for harvest, not a small accomplishment for the Colorado high country. I dutifully checked the progress of the six or seven apricots that were ripening well. I think my mistake was to say aloud, to no one but nature and me, "Tomorrow they'll be perfect for picking." That next day, with harvest bowl in hand, I set out in the morning to claim my reward. Imagine the horror when I encountered only three fruit remaining and all of those with wide holes pecked through, the rest on the ground in pieces. Through whatever subterfuge and espionage network they possessed, the birds attacked in the early hours of the day.

The victim before the attack
Since then I've tried to make it habit to pick vegetables a day or two before I think they're at their peak of ripeness. This year I became a little too daring and paid the ultimate price.

After the move to the new house last fall and because of an extra long winter, I had to create my garden beds from scratch and wasn't ready to plant until June, late even by high country standards. My wife was convinced the tomatoes wouldn't fruit before the first frost, but with careful watering and fertilizing the first fruit was fully ripe this last week. At mid-week I inspected the first red tomato and said to myself-- or so I thought-- "Tomorrow it'll be perfect for picking." You can guess the rest.

After the remnants of that catastrophe were placed to rest on the compost pile, it was time to water and weed the rest of the garden. In another section I had a single jalapeno pepper valiantly fighting for life on a plant that had been eviscerated by hail early in the season. I carefully moved to check on him because he too was approaching his prime. Alas, all that remained of that stalwart warrior was the helmet that once had connected him to his mother. His body was gone!

I love birds in the garden normally. We have hummingbird feeders and many flowers designed to attract those beautiful flitting birds. We have a couple hanging socks with miniscule seeds for the yellow-breasted finches. I even hang peanuts for the blue jays. Though the many magpies are at the very bottom of my list of favorites, we even put out a dish of seeds we know they'll attack. You'd think with all that charity, they'd leave my tomatoes and peppers alone.

Of course I know better than that. I have bird netting and plans for deploying it over my plants, but there always seems to be another gardening chore that seems a little more important. There's always tomorrow. But be warned... they're out there and they're watching and waiting and somehow they know when the time is perfect for an attack. If you want to be victorious you'll need to be smart... or at least smarter than a bird.
At times I feel I'm living in an old "Heckle and Jeckle" cartoon. Remember the talking magpies who would spy a fresh crop of corn and scheme to steal a free meal? Maybe that was a little before your time, but next time you're in your garden turn all around and look for the culprits, sitting in a tree or on a telephone line. They're looking at you and planning the theft of your treasure.

A few years ago I had a small crop of apricots ready for harvest, not a small accomplishment for the Colorado high country. I dutifully checked the progress of the six or seven apricots that were ripening well. I think my mistake was to say aloud, to no one but nature and me, "Tomorrow they'll be perfect for picking." That next day, with harvest bowl in hand, I set out in the morning to claim my reward. Imagine the horror when I encountered only three fruit remaining and all of those with wide holes pecked through, the rest on the ground in pieces. Through whatever subterfuge and espionage network they possessed, the birds attacked in the early hours of the day.

The victim before the attack
Since then I've tried to make it habit to pick vegetables a day or two before I think they're at their peak of ripeness. This year I became a little too daring and paid the ultimate price.

After the move to the new house last fall and because of an extra long winter, I had to create my garden beds from scratch and wasn't ready to plant until June, late even by high country standards. My wife was convinced the tomatoes wouldn't fruit before the first frost, but with careful watering and fertilizing the first fruit was fully ripe this last week. At mid-week I inspected the first red tomato and said to myself-- or so I thought-- "Tomorrow it'll be perfect for picking." You can guess the rest.

After the remnants of that catastrophe were placed to rest on the compost pile, it was time to water and weed the rest of the garden. In another section I had a single jalapeno pepper valiantly fighting for life on a plant that had been eviscerated by hail early in the season. I carefully moved to check on him because he too was approaching his prime. Alas, all that remained of that stalwart warrior was the helmet that once had connected him to his mother. His body was gone!

I love birds in the garden normally. We have hummingbird feeders and many flowers designed to attract those beautiful flitting birds. We have a couple hanging socks with miniscule seeds for the yellow-breasted finches. I even hang peanuts for the blue jays. Though the many magpies are at the very bottom of my list of favorites, we even put out a dish of seeds we know they'll attack. You'd think with all that charity, they'd leave my tomatoes and peppers alone.

Of course I know better than that. I have bird netting and plans for deploying it over my plants, but there always seems to be another gardening chore that seems a little more important. There's always tomorrow. But be warned... they're out there and they're watching and waiting and somehow they know when the time is perfect for an attack. If you want to be victorious you'll need to be smart... or at least smarter than a bird.

Friday, August 27, 2010

Deadheading Without Jerry Garcia

The geraniums are blooming... again. So are the coreopsis and roses. Many parts of my garden are showing a second season of color. The secret isn't much of a secret. It's all about deadheading.

Deadheading is simply pinching or cutting off a flower after it has bloomed. The magic comes in the plant's response to losing that flower. As pretty as they are, the primary purpose of a flower is to attract insects and birds for pollination so that the plant can produce seeds for propagation. It's the typical story in nature where the goal is to produce offspring. When the flower is lost, the plant typically responds by producing another flower to replace it. No flower means no seeds, and many plants get pretty serious about replacing lost flowers. Some times the flowers that bloom after deadheading can be more numerous than the first blooming.

You'll want to deadhead after the flower has reached its peak and is beginning to brown, shrivel, or dry out. On plants that flower at the end of long, slender stems, you can cut back the stem at the base. Flowers on shorter stems can be cut, pinched or pulled off. If the plant is bushy, you can trim off all of the flowers at once with a hedge clipper.

Plants that produce many flowers will respond by giving you many more. My geraniums, coreopsis, and roses flowered in June; with deadheading there are new flowers in August. I'm particularly pleased because I was able to buy most of these plants on a clearance sale at the home center. Their flowers were spent and brown so the store wanted to get rid of them. After all, who wants a flowering plant that isn't flowering. I took them home, pinched off the old flowers, gave them a new bed to lie in, and now they're blooming in glorious colors.

Many of my other, common flowers do the same. Marigolds, gaillardia, lavender, salvia, snapdragons, and daisies are all plants that I've received a second life from. Most annuals respond very well to deadheading and many perennials that offer a profusion of flowers will too.

For plants that devote most or all of their energy to producing a single flower or group of flowers, deadheading isn't effective. My irises, lilies, and tulips typically produce one burst of color and then fade. Deadheading won't change that, but it will help direct the plant's energy away from making seeds and back into the bulb. Clematis, wisteria, and jasmine will give you a defined number of flowers and deadheading won't affect that either, but it will help to clean up the plant and let the new flowers shine.

It can be a lot of work, a lot like weeding. Especially on a plant with many flowers, like my coreopsis, it takes awhile to pinch off the brown and dry flowers. The roses and geraniums were easier to cut off because there weren't as many flowers, but it still took time. I think it's worth the effort because it looks a little like spring at the end of the summer.

Some plants like yarrow, echinacea, and Jupiter's Beard will give you continuous color if you deadhead the first blooms, though subsequent growth may not be as large or abundant as the initial flowers. Plants like daylilies will offer many flowers in the season and removing the dried flower stalks keeps the plant looking fresh and clean.

If you haven't deadheaded before, go ahead and do it. Pinch off some of those blossoms. Experiment with the process to see how it works. Most of the time you don't have to worry about hurting the plant. On woody, flowering plants like lilacs you need to deadhead immediately after the blooms fade to avoid cutting off the developing buds that will produce the next year's flowers. But other than a few cases like that, cutting off the spent flowers won't adversely affect the plant. If it is programmed to produce more flowers, it will; if it isn't a second-bloom producer, it won't.

After a few tries you'll know what works well and your garden will respond with new color. Try it, you'll like it.
The geraniums are blooming... again. So are the coreopsis and roses. Many parts of my garden are showing a second season of color. The secret isn't much of a secret. It's all about deadheading.

Deadheading is simply pinching or cutting off a flower after it has bloomed. The magic comes in the plant's response to losing that flower. As pretty as they are, the primary purpose of a flower is to attract insects and birds for pollination so that the plant can produce seeds for propagation. It's the typical story in nature where the goal is to produce offspring. When the flower is lost, the plant typically responds by producing another flower to replace it. No flower means no seeds, and many plants get pretty serious about replacing lost flowers. Some times the flowers that bloom after deadheading can be more numerous than the first blooming.

You'll want to deadhead after the flower has reached its peak and is beginning to brown, shrivel, or dry out. On plants that flower at the end of long, slender stems, you can cut back the stem at the base. Flowers on shorter stems can be cut, pinched or pulled off. If the plant is bushy, you can trim off all of the flowers at once with a hedge clipper.

Plants that produce many flowers will respond by giving you many more. My geraniums, coreopsis, and roses flowered in June; with deadheading there are new flowers in August. I'm particularly pleased because I was able to buy most of these plants on a clearance sale at the home center. Their flowers were spent and brown so the store wanted to get rid of them. After all, who wants a flowering plant that isn't flowering. I took them home, pinched off the old flowers, gave them a new bed to lie in, and now they're blooming in glorious colors.

Many of my other, common flowers do the same. Marigolds, gaillardia, lavender, salvia, snapdragons, and daisies are all plants that I've received a second life from. Most annuals respond very well to deadheading and many perennials that offer a profusion of flowers will too.

For plants that devote most or all of their energy to producing a single flower or group of flowers, deadheading isn't effective. My irises, lilies, and tulips typically produce one burst of color and then fade. Deadheading won't change that, but it will help direct the plant's energy away from making seeds and back into the bulb. Clematis, wisteria, and jasmine will give you a defined number of flowers and deadheading won't affect that either, but it will help to clean up the plant and let the new flowers shine.

It can be a lot of work, a lot like weeding. Especially on a plant with many flowers, like my coreopsis, it takes awhile to pinch off the brown and dry flowers. The roses and geraniums were easier to cut off because there weren't as many flowers, but it still took time. I think it's worth the effort because it looks a little like spring at the end of the summer.

Some plants like yarrow, echinacea, and Jupiter's Beard will give you continuous color if you deadhead the first blooms, though subsequent growth may not be as large or abundant as the initial flowers. Plants like daylilies will offer many flowers in the season and removing the dried flower stalks keeps the plant looking fresh and clean.

If you haven't deadheaded before, go ahead and do it. Pinch off some of those blossoms. Experiment with the process to see how it works. Most of the time you don't have to worry about hurting the plant. On woody, flowering plants like lilacs you need to deadhead immediately after the blooms fade to avoid cutting off the developing buds that will produce the next year's flowers. But other than a few cases like that, cutting off the spent flowers won't adversely affect the plant. If it is programmed to produce more flowers, it will; if it isn't a second-bloom producer, it won't.

After a few tries you'll know what works well and your garden will respond with new color. Try it, you'll like it.

Thursday, August 26, 2010

A Weed by Any Other Name...

A weed by any other name... wouldn't be a weed. We all have plants that we like in places that we like and plants we don't like in places that we don't like. Plants can easily cross back and forth into our "like" category or our "dislike" category. Some plants are notorious for crossing that threshold. Mint and lambs ear can easily take over a garden from the single spot you planted it and once it does, it becomes a weed.
Weeds are simply plants growing where you don't want them to grow. Sure it's easy to target our disdain toward dandelions or crabgrass or spurge or, my least favorite, purslane. But hard as we try to rid our landscape of those plants, other gardeners may be cultivating them intentionally. Ever have dandelions or purslane in your salad? Many people have and love it.

How about tomatoes? Who would ever pluck a tomato plant from the ground as a weed? I would. By some twist of fate, I have a tomato plant growing right next to one of my blackberries. I didn't put it there and figure an errant seed from my compost pile rooted in the blackberry bed. Though I work hard to grow tomatoes, in this case the tomato plant is interfering with another plant and has to go. It has become a weed.

That isn't always the case. One year an errand plant popped up among the cucumbers and I decided to let it grow until I could identify it. Turns out it was a cantaloupe, also, I suspect, from an uncomposted seed. In that scenario I let it grow. The plant was doing better than any of the cantaloupes I intentionally planted in previous years and ultimately produced delicious fruit. By letting it grow, it started as a weed and became a treasured memory in gardening.

Seeds and seedlings often tag along in the soil with plants we buy from nurseries or swap with our gardener friends. I've had occasions where the tag-along plant became better liked than the original purchase. Right now I have a Virginia creeper growing out from soil that was just supposed to be Russian sage. Geographic lessons not withstanding, the creeper isn't desired in that spot, but I was planning on acquiring some for another section. A quick transplant and the weed is now part of the planned landscape.

Next time you're weeding your gardens, take a second to analyze the weeds you see. Before you pull or spray, identify the plant and think how you might be able to use it elsewhere. Some will be easy to kill, but others might deserve a second life in another plot. If the plant is able to grow in a place you didn't want it, think how well it will grow in a place you do. How easy is that?
A weed by any other name... wouldn't be a weed. We all have plants that we like in places that we like and plants we don't like in places that we don't like. Plants can easily cross back and forth into our "like" category or our "dislike" category. Some plants are notorious for crossing that threshold. Mint and lambs ear can easily take over a garden from the single spot you planted it and once it does, it becomes a weed.
Weeds are simply plants growing where you don't want them to grow. Sure it's easy to target our disdain toward dandelions or crabgrass or spurge or, my least favorite, purslane. But hard as we try to rid our landscape of those plants, other gardeners may be cultivating them intentionally. Ever have dandelions or purslane in your salad? Many people have and love it.

How about tomatoes? Who would ever pluck a tomato plant from the ground as a weed? I would. By some twist of fate, I have a tomato plant growing right next to one of my blackberries. I didn't put it there and figure an errant seed from my compost pile rooted in the blackberry bed. Though I work hard to grow tomatoes, in this case the tomato plant is interfering with another plant and has to go. It has become a weed.

That isn't always the case. One year an errand plant popped up among the cucumbers and I decided to let it grow until I could identify it. Turns out it was a cantaloupe, also, I suspect, from an uncomposted seed. In that scenario I let it grow. The plant was doing better than any of the cantaloupes I intentionally planted in previous years and ultimately produced delicious fruit. By letting it grow, it started as a weed and became a treasured memory in gardening.

Seeds and seedlings often tag along in the soil with plants we buy from nurseries or swap with our gardener friends. I've had occasions where the tag-along plant became better liked than the original purchase. Right now I have a Virginia creeper growing out from soil that was just supposed to be Russian sage. Geographic lessons not withstanding, the creeper isn't desired in that spot, but I was planning on acquiring some for another section. A quick transplant and the weed is now part of the planned landscape.

Next time you're weeding your gardens, take a second to analyze the weeds you see. Before you pull or spray, identify the plant and think how you might be able to use it elsewhere. Some will be easy to kill, but others might deserve a second life in another plot. If the plant is able to grow in a place you didn't want it, think how well it will grow in a place you do. How easy is that?

Wednesday, August 25, 2010

Hay, You Get Out of My Yard!


I love green in the garden, most of the time. With the construction of my raised beds this year, vegetable gardening has been easier than ever. It's a breeze to organize the plants, water and fertilize them, and take care of the inevitable weeding. And that's the green I don't care for...weeds. This season I decided to experiment with mulches and in the process created a nightmare.

Mulches are an important part of well-maintained gardens. Mulch does marvelous things: it moderates soil moisture and temperature; it can add an aesthetic value; it protects tender plants from frost and sun damage; it can add nutrients to the soil; and it can reduce the quantity of weeds. Of course it only reduces weeds if you use the correct mulch.

In a vegetable garden you should use an organic mulch. Inorganic mulches like rocks and plastic can work, but they're not ideal. The nice thing about using organic mulches is that you can till or turn them into the soil at the end of the growing season and you've added organic matter to help improve your soil. I advocate mulches like dried grass and straw; they protect your plants and break down easily over the winter.

My experiment was to use a different mulch in each of my beds. I'd saved bags of leaves from last fall, so had crushed, dried leaves; I saved grass clippings from mowing and let them dry out a little; I had bushels of hay from the barn; and I had some straw. I know straw works pretty well so left it out of the experiment.  In one bed I put leaves, another was hay, another was leaves topped with hay, another was hay topped with leaves, another was leaves topped with grass, another was grass, and for a control bed I didn't use any mulch.

It was very windy when I first started the process. Within two days most of the leaves in the leaves-only bed and the leaves-on-top bed had blown away; I replaced as much as I could. The hay and grass stayed pretty constant and the other combinations of grass and hay with leaves stayed in place best. Phase one showed that grass and hay does a pretty good job, but when you mix grass and leaves together it does very well at staying where you put it.

After watering and summer rains, phase two began. As expected, the grass and hay began to mat down and compress. It did a great job of keeping the soil moisture from evaporating, but it also hindered some of the water movement from above into the soil. The combination of grass and leaves seemed better, but also had some compacting in places.

Phase three was the most interesting and annoying aspect of the test. The grass and leaves bed had almost no weeds. The control bed had a few weeds, but nothing out of the ordinary. All of the beds with hay had weeds and the hay-only bed was the worst; it developed into very grassy growth. Multiple weedings helped, but the grass kept growing back. My conclusion is that typical ranch hay has millions of seeds and if you use it in your garden you'll introduce a new crop of hay.

Though relatively inexpensive as a mulch, hay has added hours of weeding to my normal gardening tasks. As the summer progressed, I occasionally added a new layer or two of lawn grass to a few beds and they're all doing great as far as weeds are concerned. The beds mulched with hay continue to produce green, grassy weeds.

Bottom line: don't use hay as a mulch unless you intentionally want to grow more hay. I've used newspapers and straw with great success. Though leaving grass clippings on your lawn is the best thing to do, occasionally bagging some for garden mulch can be very cost effective. Leaves are also cheap and make a great additive to grass.

I love green in the garden, most of the time. With the construction of my raised beds this year, vegetable gardening has been easier than ever. It's a breeze to organize the plants, water and fertilize them, and take care of the inevitable weeding. And that's the green I don't care for...weeds. This season I decided to experiment with mulches and in the process created a nightmare.

Mulches are an important part of well-maintained gardens. Mulch does marvelous things: it moderates soil moisture and temperature; it can add an aesthetic value; it protects tender plants from frost and sun damage; it can add nutrients to the soil; and it can reduce the quantity of weeds. Of course it only reduces weeds if you use the correct mulch.

In a vegetable garden you should use an organic mulch. Inorganic mulches like rocks and plastic can work, but they're not ideal. The nice thing about using organic mulches is that you can till or turn them into the soil at the end of the growing season and you've added organic matter to help improve your soil. I advocate mulches like dried grass and straw; they protect your plants and break down easily over the winter.

My experiment was to use a different mulch in each of my beds. I'd saved bags of leaves from last fall, so had crushed, dried leaves; I saved grass clippings from mowing and let them dry out a little; I had bushels of hay from the barn; and I had some straw. I know straw works pretty well so left it out of the experiment.  In one bed I put leaves, another was hay, another was leaves topped with hay, another was hay topped with leaves, another was leaves topped with grass, another was grass, and for a control bed I didn't use any mulch.

It was very windy when I first started the process. Within two days most of the leaves in the leaves-only bed and the leaves-on-top bed had blown away; I replaced as much as I could. The hay and grass stayed pretty constant and the other combinations of grass and hay with leaves stayed in place best. Phase one showed that grass and hay does a pretty good job, but when you mix grass and leaves together it does very well at staying where you put it.

After watering and summer rains, phase two began. As expected, the grass and hay began to mat down and compress. It did a great job of keeping the soil moisture from evaporating, but it also hindered some of the water movement from above into the soil. The combination of grass and leaves seemed better, but also had some compacting in places.

Phase three was the most interesting and annoying aspect of the test. The grass and leaves bed had almost no weeds. The control bed had a few weeds, but nothing out of the ordinary. All of the beds with hay had weeds and the hay-only bed was the worst; it developed into very grassy growth. Multiple weedings helped, but the grass kept growing back. My conclusion is that typical ranch hay has millions of seeds and if you use it in your garden you'll introduce a new crop of hay.

Though relatively inexpensive as a mulch, hay has added hours of weeding to my normal gardening tasks. As the summer progressed, I occasionally added a new layer or two of lawn grass to a few beds and they're all doing great as far as weeds are concerned. The beds mulched with hay continue to produce green, grassy weeds.

Bottom line: don't use hay as a mulch unless you intentionally want to grow more hay. I've used newspapers and straw with great success. Though leaving grass clippings on your lawn is the best thing to do, occasionally bagging some for garden mulch can be very cost effective. Leaves are also cheap and make a great additive to grass.

Tuesday, August 24, 2010

Bigfoot, Nessie, and Dung Beetles

They're out there! If you claim to spot one, your friends might think you should also wear a tinfoil hat to protect you from alien mind control. Most claim they're fictional, just something to talk about over one too many beers, or to scare children with around a campfire. But I have the evidence and this weekend I'm pretty sure I saw one. I recognized it because I've been visited before.

That's right. I've been visited by dung beetles. The evidence is all around me, or rather the evidence is what isn't all around me. We have four adult dogs, two of which are rather large Labrador Retrievers. To walk in our grass, the same grass the dogs walk and do their duty in, you'd think we might have goldfish or parakeets. There is no sign of the 60 pounds of monthly dog food we go through, or rather goes through the dogs.

I had a similar visitation when I lived in Oklahoma. During summer months the canine waste would disappear overnight. It was a mystery that seemed to defy logical deduction, until one evening when I actually saw the culprit at work. A small black beetle was pushing a large round ball of dog dung through the dried grass with its obviously-strong rear legs. It was exactly like a National Geographic film I had seen years before of the Scarabs in the desert pushing dung balls through the sand. Sure Asia would have dung beetles, but I was amazed to see one in Colorado.

Earthlife.net reports there are 7,000 species of dung beetles worldwide. They fall into three categories: rollers, tunnelers, and dwellers, depending on what they do with their dung. Based on my previous observation I suspect we play host to a species of roller. And there must be hundreds or more living nearby. In the winter, the evidence of our dogs leaves no doubt as to their diet. After the snow melted this spring, it took hours to clean up their winter waste. When we lived in the city, it was a year-round task. But after our move to the country and with the warming of the soil, this regular activity faded from my chore list.

A search through the internet finds many articles about African beetles, a few European beetles, South American beetles, and the famous importation of beetles to Australia to cleanup the millions of tons of cattle waste, but barely a word about what we have in the United States. Discoverlife.org says North America has about 75 species of Scarabaeinae. Wikipedia says that the American Institute of Biological Sciences reports that dung beetles save the US cattle industry $380 million annually by burying livestock feces (actually misspelled on the site, so who knows if it's true.)

All I know for sure is I've seen little black beetles hiding in my yard and I haven't had to clean up after the dogs for four months. It's possible that Bigfoot is doing the work for me after I go to bed, but I believe the answer is even more mysterious: little insects are rolling balls of poop into their subterranean homes to share with their mates and offspring. Believe it! It's true!
They're out there! If you claim to spot one, your friends might think you should also wear a tinfoil hat to protect you from alien mind control. Most claim they're fictional, just something to talk about over one too many beers, or to scare children with around a campfire. But I have the evidence and this weekend I'm pretty sure I saw one. I recognized it because I've been visited before.

That's right. I've been visited by dung beetles. The evidence is all around me, or rather the evidence is what isn't all around me. We have four adult dogs, two of which are rather large Labrador Retrievers. To walk in our grass, the same grass the dogs walk and do their duty in, you'd think we might have goldfish or parakeets. There is no sign of the 60 pounds of monthly dog food we go through, or rather goes through the dogs.

I had a similar visitation when I lived in Oklahoma. During summer months the canine waste would disappear overnight. It was a mystery that seemed to defy logical deduction, until one evening when I actually saw the culprit at work. A small black beetle was pushing a large round ball of dog dung through the dried grass with its obviously-strong rear legs. It was exactly like a National Geographic film I had seen years before of the Scarabs in the desert pushing dung balls through the sand. Sure Asia would have dung beetles, but I was amazed to see one in Colorado.

Earthlife.net reports there are 7,000 species of dung beetles worldwide. They fall into three categories: rollers, tunnelers, and dwellers, depending on what they do with their dung. Based on my previous observation I suspect we play host to a species of roller. And there must be hundreds or more living nearby. In the winter, the evidence of our dogs leaves no doubt as to their diet. After the snow melted this spring, it took hours to clean up their winter waste. When we lived in the city, it was a year-round task. But after our move to the country and with the warming of the soil, this regular activity faded from my chore list.

A search through the internet finds many articles about African beetles, a few European beetles, South American beetles, and the famous importation of beetles to Australia to cleanup the millions of tons of cattle waste, but barely a word about what we have in the United States. Discoverlife.org says North America has about 75 species of Scarabaeinae. Wikipedia says that the American Institute of Biological Sciences reports that dung beetles save the US cattle industry $380 million annually by burying livestock feces (actually misspelled on the site, so who knows if it's true.)

All I know for sure is I've seen little black beetles hiding in my yard and I haven't had to clean up after the dogs for four months. It's possible that Bigfoot is doing the work for me after I go to bed, but I believe the answer is even more mysterious: little insects are rolling balls of poop into their subterranean homes to share with their mates and offspring. Believe it! It's true!

Sunday, August 22, 2010

Ode to a Reptile

You steadily slithered upon the earth in your snakely town
Of bushes and rocks and logs and black plastic hoses.
From your den tucked inside a hole you roamed 'round
Your world, tongue-seeking friendly beasts and prey.
Smaller than your brightly-striped cousin, who sleeps far down
Under my porch, you feasted on the worms that I find dear,
And more hopefully slugs, those repulsively slimy brown
Creatures that chew my plants and squish on the walk.
A few years older and larger in size, you might seek the mound
Home of the voles, that scar my yard, for your supper of tasty rodents.
But you had years to go to mature to that size when I found
You lying still and stained upon the weathered patch of road.
You still startled my step, forced a leap aside, made my heart pound
As unwelcome thoughts in childhood dreams and fears appeared there at my feet.
In younger times I'd have relished the lifeless sight, but now only frowned
To see this unknown ally and citizen of treasured gardens left still
In the baking sun, as ants and birds feasted on this unhappy ground.
I could only leave you there in your silence and let natural forces reign,
So I turned to return to my world, walking a little slower as I wound
Back to my gardens, knowing one fewer friend would bask in their warmth.
You steadily slithered upon the earth in your snakely town
Of bushes and rocks and logs and black plastic hoses.
From your den tucked inside a hole you roamed 'round
Your world, tongue-seeking friendly beasts and prey.
Smaller than your brightly-striped cousin, who sleeps far down
Under my porch, you feasted on the worms that I find dear,
And more hopefully slugs, those repulsively slimy brown
Creatures that chew my plants and squish on the walk.
A few years older and larger in size, you might seek the mound
Home of the voles, that scar my yard, for your supper of tasty rodents.
But you had years to go to mature to that size when I found
You lying still and stained upon the weathered patch of road.
You still startled my step, forced a leap aside, made my heart pound
As unwelcome thoughts in childhood dreams and fears appeared there at my feet.
In younger times I'd have relished the lifeless sight, but now only frowned
To see this unknown ally and citizen of treasured gardens left still
In the baking sun, as ants and birds feasted on this unhappy ground.
I could only leave you there in your silence and let natural forces reign,
So I turned to return to my world, walking a little slower as I wound
Back to my gardens, knowing one fewer friend would bask in their warmth.

Friday, August 20, 2010

I Scream, You Scream, We All Scream for Rhubarb

Rhubarb in bloom.
There is one plant that seems to be foolproof for virtually any garden. As you've already guessed, it's rhubarb. For many of us it is a strange, red stalk that we see in the supermarket vegetable section. For others it's a plant that brings variety to our garden and thrives when other plants suffer.

I've grown rhubarb in wet years, dry years, hot years, and cold years. It keeps coming back like a loyal puppy. Last year I potted a few plants that popped up outside the confines of my designated rhubarb zone (If you let it flower and go to seed, you'll be rewarded by many new plants.) I had intended on transplanting them to a new bed, but never found the time to make it happen. They sat in their quart-size plastic pots through the winter -- unprotected, unwatered, and ignored. In the spring as prairie grass grew up around them, they were forgotten. Still in the pots, I literally stumbled upon them at the beginning of the summer and saw that all three of the plants were alive and thriving, better than could be expected.

They now have new home next to the three rhubarb "Victoria" that I actually paid for this spring. My six plants will now provide more stalks than I'll ever be able to use, but I figure any plant that survives after such abuse deserves a place in my garden.

Rhubarb is well adapted for survival. It prefers well-drained, amended soil, but just about any plot will do. Water and fertilize as you would normally, but don't dote over it. The long taproot dives deep into the soil and ensures moisture and nutrients when drought may be occurring on the surface. Even a neglected plant can thrive, as I've demonstrated.

A perennial plant, it's ready for harvest early in the year at about the same time you're beginning to think about sowing your vegetable garden in the spring. Treat it nicely and you'll be rewarded by a second harvest in late summer or early fall. The leaves are poisonous so discard them; they're great for your compost pile. The stalks that can range from green to mottled pink to crimson red are very edible. Most people would not recommend eating them raw, however. Rhubarb is quite tart and has an astringent effect on your mouth; you'll be puckering for days.

It tastes best when cooked and mixed with another fruit or vegetable. Sugar works miracles and you can find many recipes online for standards like strawberry-rhubarb pie, rhubarb candy, and many other desserts. I like to juice the stalks and make a rhubarb jelly. It has a unique taste that is very pleasant. Rhubarb ice cream is also pretty tasty.

Like the tomato, rhubarb had its day in court. Though technically a vegetable, legally it is a fruit for purposes of regulation and taxes. So it's easy to talk about. Call it a fruit or a vegetable and you'll be right.

It does require a little planning when you decide to plant it. The leaves grow quite large and take up a good amount of space. And because it comes back every year, you'll want to place it in a section of garden dedicated to rhubarb and rhubarb only; it doesn't do as well when crowded out by weeds or other plants. It's quite attractive and can also be used as a landscape plant outside your vegetable garden.

If you've ever struggled trying to grow something, try rhubarb. It will make any gardener a successful gardener.
Rhubarb in bloom.
There is one plant that seems to be foolproof for virtually any garden. As you've already guessed, it's rhubarb. For many of us it is a strange, red stalk that we see in the supermarket vegetable section. For others it's a plant that brings variety to our garden and thrives when other plants suffer.

I've grown rhubarb in wet years, dry years, hot years, and cold years. It keeps coming back like a loyal puppy. Last year I potted a few plants that popped up outside the confines of my designated rhubarb zone (If you let it flower and go to seed, you'll be rewarded by many new plants.) I had intended on transplanting them to a new bed, but never found the time to make it happen. They sat in their quart-size plastic pots through the winter -- unprotected, unwatered, and ignored. In the spring as prairie grass grew up around them, they were forgotten. Still in the pots, I literally stumbled upon them at the beginning of the summer and saw that all three of the plants were alive and thriving, better than could be expected.

They now have new home next to the three rhubarb "Victoria" that I actually paid for this spring. My six plants will now provide more stalks than I'll ever be able to use, but I figure any plant that survives after such abuse deserves a place in my garden.

Rhubarb is well adapted for survival. It prefers well-drained, amended soil, but just about any plot will do. Water and fertilize as you would normally, but don't dote over it. The long taproot dives deep into the soil and ensures moisture and nutrients when drought may be occurring on the surface. Even a neglected plant can thrive, as I've demonstrated.

A perennial plant, it's ready for harvest early in the year at about the same time you're beginning to think about sowing your vegetable garden in the spring. Treat it nicely and you'll be rewarded by a second harvest in late summer or early fall. The leaves are poisonous so discard them; they're great for your compost pile. The stalks that can range from green to mottled pink to crimson red are very edible. Most people would not recommend eating them raw, however. Rhubarb is quite tart and has an astringent effect on your mouth; you'll be puckering for days.

It tastes best when cooked and mixed with another fruit or vegetable. Sugar works miracles and you can find many recipes online for standards like strawberry-rhubarb pie, rhubarb candy, and many other desserts. I like to juice the stalks and make a rhubarb jelly. It has a unique taste that is very pleasant. Rhubarb ice cream is also pretty tasty.

Like the tomato, rhubarb had its day in court. Though technically a vegetable, legally it is a fruit for purposes of regulation and taxes. So it's easy to talk about. Call it a fruit or a vegetable and you'll be right.

It does require a little planning when you decide to plant it. The leaves grow quite large and take up a good amount of space. And because it comes back every year, you'll want to place it in a section of garden dedicated to rhubarb and rhubarb only; it doesn't do as well when crowded out by weeds or other plants. It's quite attractive and can also be used as a landscape plant outside your vegetable garden.

If you've ever struggled trying to grow something, try rhubarb. It will make any gardener a successful gardener.

Thursday, August 19, 2010

Where Have All the Coneflowers Gone?


I love coneflowers in my garden. Echinacea purpurea is the common purple coneflower that many of us see in public gardens or in our own. Today's photo is from one of my gardens in 2004. This year, after moving to the new house, the very first new gardening bed I prepared was devoted to coneflowers. There was already one large echinacea there, next to a larger Potentilla. I dug it up and divided it into three smaller plantings. Ten new plants from High Country Garden's catalog were purchased; I ventured away from the standard purple by selecting new varieties with colors ranging from yellow to salmon. After removing sod and weeds and amending the soil with compost and seasoned manure, the plants were placed in the ground and mulched with medium bark chunks.

Then they began to disappear. Today only one of the original plants remains.

Gardening is rife with failure. Even if you have found what works and continue to follow the same practices day after day, you can be met by failure when the unexpected happens. A wayward dog, a surprise hail storm, an eager child. The best laid plans of mice and men, and such. One of the things that makes gardeners special people is the desire to continue on even when things don't turn out as planned. My plan certainly didn't work out.

This is where the analysis begins. Gardeners try to figure out what happened so they can fix it for the next time. Because there is almost always a "next time". Who wants to be defeated by a plant or a bug?

That's a good place to start. Did a bug kill my plants? I don't think so. I've seen few signs of damaging insects, particularly this spring. I once had a newly-planted garden eaten to the ground overnight by pill bugs, or roly poly bugs as my kids liked to call them. Technically they're not insects, but crustaceans, and typically they are decomposers, but have been known to damage tender plants. When I found thousands of them holed up next to the damaged plot, I had to believe they were at fault. But as to the coneflowers, I could find no evidence of insects.

How about animals? I've found slugs in the area around this particular garden bed. As dry as our region is, slugs still abound. Like virtually every other intelligent gardener, I hate slugs. In the past they've destroyed my strawberries just as the ripe fruit is ready to pick. I suspect they're the culprits for some of the cucumber seedlings that disappeared overnight. I like having my garter snake in the garden because he is a major slug predator. Slugs will eat any plant, but prefer tender leaves. The echinacea looked pretty sturdy when I planted it and many other tender shoots of grass and weeds should have been more appealing to the squishy monsters. I don't think slugs were the criminals in this case.

What else does that leave? Soil and root-related issues account for more than 80% of  plant problems. And sadly, that's where I think the problem lies. As I cultivated the area I discovered I'm blessed with a pretty solid layer of clay soil that begins 12 to 18 inches below the surface. That's a primary reason why I amended with compost and manure in an effort to minimize the negative effects of the clay. The snapdragons and other annuals in the same bed are doing fine and the Shasta Daisies are gaining strength, but the coneflowers faded fast.

If you take the time to research a plant's needs before planting, and you should, you can foresee potential problems. Every gardening and plant guide says that coneflowers need well-drained soil. I knew the new bed had large amounts of clay, which is the opposite of well-drained, but that's where I wanted to plant them and besides, there was already one growing there. Sure the established echinacea was rooted in an area abounding with small river rocks, the definition of well-drained, but wouldn't it do better when divided and planted in "good", amended soil?

Be careful when your vision and desires overtake your reason and understanding. The new coneflowers did okay for a couple weeks. It was probably about the time their roots hit the clay layer that things took a downturn. Continued watering made a bad situation worse as the moisture stayed in the clay at the roots. Echinacea prefer "dry feet" or roots that aren't saturated by water. The plants died and I was the one who killed them.

I'll still have coneflowers in my garden, but not in that particular bed. I've started preparing a new bed, with new clayless soil, that will host a new generation of echinacea next spring. There will be new purchases and new plantings.

I've learned from this failure. It won't be my last; I'm a gardener, after all.

I love coneflowers in my garden. Echinacea purpurea is the common purple coneflower that many of us see in public gardens or in our own. Today's photo is from one of my gardens in 2004. This year, after moving to the new house, the very first new gardening bed I prepared was devoted to coneflowers. There was already one large echinacea there, next to a larger Potentilla. I dug it up and divided it into three smaller plantings. Ten new plants from High Country Garden's catalog were purchased; I ventured away from the standard purple by selecting new varieties with colors ranging from yellow to salmon. After removing sod and weeds and amending the soil with compost and seasoned manure, the plants were placed in the ground and mulched with medium bark chunks.

Then they began to disappear. Today only one of the original plants remains.

Gardening is rife with failure. Even if you have found what works and continue to follow the same practices day after day, you can be met by failure when the unexpected happens. A wayward dog, a surprise hail storm, an eager child. The best laid plans of mice and men, and such. One of the things that makes gardeners special people is the desire to continue on even when things don't turn out as planned. My plan certainly didn't work out.

This is where the analysis begins. Gardeners try to figure out what happened so they can fix it for the next time. Because there is almost always a "next time". Who wants to be defeated by a plant or a bug?

That's a good place to start. Did a bug kill my plants? I don't think so. I've seen few signs of damaging insects, particularly this spring. I once had a newly-planted garden eaten to the ground overnight by pill bugs, or roly poly bugs as my kids liked to call them. Technically they're not insects, but crustaceans, and typically they are decomposers, but have been known to damage tender plants. When I found thousands of them holed up next to the damaged plot, I had to believe they were at fault. But as to the coneflowers, I could find no evidence of insects.

How about animals? I've found slugs in the area around this particular garden bed. As dry as our region is, slugs still abound. Like virtually every other intelligent gardener, I hate slugs. In the past they've destroyed my strawberries just as the ripe fruit is ready to pick. I suspect they're the culprits for some of the cucumber seedlings that disappeared overnight. I like having my garter snake in the garden because he is a major slug predator. Slugs will eat any plant, but prefer tender leaves. The echinacea looked pretty sturdy when I planted it and many other tender shoots of grass and weeds should have been more appealing to the squishy monsters. I don't think slugs were the criminals in this case.

What else does that leave? Soil and root-related issues account for more than 80% of  plant problems. And sadly, that's where I think the problem lies. As I cultivated the area I discovered I'm blessed with a pretty solid layer of clay soil that begins 12 to 18 inches below the surface. That's a primary reason why I amended with compost and manure in an effort to minimize the negative effects of the clay. The snapdragons and other annuals in the same bed are doing fine and the Shasta Daisies are gaining strength, but the coneflowers faded fast.

If you take the time to research a plant's needs before planting, and you should, you can foresee potential problems. Every gardening and plant guide says that coneflowers need well-drained soil. I knew the new bed had large amounts of clay, which is the opposite of well-drained, but that's where I wanted to plant them and besides, there was already one growing there. Sure the established echinacea was rooted in an area abounding with small river rocks, the definition of well-drained, but wouldn't it do better when divided and planted in "good", amended soil?

Be careful when your vision and desires overtake your reason and understanding. The new coneflowers did okay for a couple weeks. It was probably about the time their roots hit the clay layer that things took a downturn. Continued watering made a bad situation worse as the moisture stayed in the clay at the roots. Echinacea prefer "dry feet" or roots that aren't saturated by water. The plants died and I was the one who killed them.

I'll still have coneflowers in my garden, but not in that particular bed. I've started preparing a new bed, with new clayless soil, that will host a new generation of echinacea next spring. There will be new purchases and new plantings.

I've learned from this failure. It won't be my last; I'm a gardener, after all.

Wednesday, August 18, 2010

Future Gardening

Believe it or not, most of our gardening is done for the future. We plant seeds and seedlings in the spring looking forward to the flowers or vegetables we'll enjoy in the fall. We plant fall bulbs for the flowers we'll enjoy the following spring. We pull weeds and fertilize today because we know if will benefit the plants tomorrow. While some activities reward us immediately, like picking a nice bouquet of lilies or plucking a tomato for tonight's dinner salad, the majority of our gardening activities are done for future results, near and far.

Many gardeners tend to garden with just one season in mind. Every year is pretty much the same: winter is used for planning and pruning, spring is for tilling and planting, summer is spent weeding and fertilizing, fall finally arrives for harvesting and cleanup. The next year follows a similar pattern, though the specific plants and where they're planted may vary slightly. There is nothing wrong with this schedule; it benefits gardeners with organization and consistency.

I recommend we look beyond this year's pattern toward a farther gardening future. Act today for results you might not see for years to come. Think about what garden you want in three years, or five, or ten. Rather than think about what you might plant next year, after you harvest this year's efforts, think about what you'll plant for the next decade.

Last week I planted a Canadice Seedless Grape plant. It will be at least three years before I see any fruit and at least five before I have quantity worth the effort. I've already started expanding the area in which I'll plant more grapes by removing the prairie sod and staking out borders. I plan to have multiple Concord grapes and a few other less-known varieties that should do well in my zone 5 garden. These plants will require watering and pruning and care like any other garden plant, but my efforts won't see any substantial results for many years.

Today, while watering, I bent one of my blackberries canes to the ground, pulled off a few leaves, scratched the underside of the cane, and buried it under a small pile of soil. I weighted it down with a small piece of a brick. This process is called layering; roots should develop where the cane is buried and a new plant will result. The new blackberry plant won't be strong enough to stand on its own for about a year and probably won't fruit until the year after that, but I started the process today.

All summer I've been preparing the area that I'll plant fruit trees next year. It's at the bottom of the sloped area where I planted my raised, vegetable beds. In an effort to level the ground, that's where I've spread soil and dried pieces of sod that I dug up from other areas of the yard as I created new beds. With more soil to come, and a winter to stabilize the ground, I'll plant some dwarf fruit trees in the spring. That project won't produce measurable fruit for about five years, but I'm working on it now.

I planted a Montmorency Cherry tree and a Gala Apple tree in my backyard as soon as I could remove some sod and work the soil. Right now they look a little odd, each standing alone, 30 feet apart, with no other plants near them. But in 10 years they'll each be 20 or 25 feet tall and wide with benches underneath, paths between, and companion plants surrounding them. To get the vision I have for a decade from now I began by planting them with plenty of space to grow.

Sure I have flower beds with annuals in them and I have my vegetable garden that will be tilled up and replanted next spring. I love that part of gardening. But as I walk through my garden each day and look at it through the window each morning and evening, I'm always envisioning what else it will be. I try to picture what my future grandkids will see when they visit. I imagine the new beds I'll create for the sole purpose of sharing my love of gardening with a new generation by giving them their own patch of soil.

How do you see your gardening? Do you look beyond this season or year? Do you look to a future garden that will take a long time to realize? It takes great patience to plan and act today for results you may not see for many years.

I suggest it's worth the wait. For when you're sitting under the shade of your apple tree, watching a child climb it's branches to pluck a ripe fruit, you'll smile and be glad for the moment. A moment that began years before.
Believe it or not, most of our gardening is done for the future. We plant seeds and seedlings in the spring looking forward to the flowers or vegetables we'll enjoy in the fall. We plant fall bulbs for the flowers we'll enjoy the following spring. We pull weeds and fertilize today because we know if will benefit the plants tomorrow. While some activities reward us immediately, like picking a nice bouquet of lilies or plucking a tomato for tonight's dinner salad, the majority of our gardening activities are done for future results, near and far.

Many gardeners tend to garden with just one season in mind. Every year is pretty much the same: winter is used for planning and pruning, spring is for tilling and planting, summer is spent weeding and fertilizing, fall finally arrives for harvesting and cleanup. The next year follows a similar pattern, though the specific plants and where they're planted may vary slightly. There is nothing wrong with this schedule; it benefits gardeners with organization and consistency.

I recommend we look beyond this year's pattern toward a farther gardening future. Act today for results you might not see for years to come. Think about what garden you want in three years, or five, or ten. Rather than think about what you might plant next year, after you harvest this year's efforts, think about what you'll plant for the next decade.

Last week I planted a Canadice Seedless Grape plant. It will be at least three years before I see any fruit and at least five before I have quantity worth the effort. I've already started expanding the area in which I'll plant more grapes by removing the prairie sod and staking out borders. I plan to have multiple Concord grapes and a few other less-known varieties that should do well in my zone 5 garden. These plants will require watering and pruning and care like any other garden plant, but my efforts won't see any substantial results for many years.

Today, while watering, I bent one of my blackberries canes to the ground, pulled off a few leaves, scratched the underside of the cane, and buried it under a small pile of soil. I weighted it down with a small piece of a brick. This process is called layering; roots should develop where the cane is buried and a new plant will result. The new blackberry plant won't be strong enough to stand on its own for about a year and probably won't fruit until the year after that, but I started the process today.

All summer I've been preparing the area that I'll plant fruit trees next year. It's at the bottom of the sloped area where I planted my raised, vegetable beds. In an effort to level the ground, that's where I've spread soil and dried pieces of sod that I dug up from other areas of the yard as I created new beds. With more soil to come, and a winter to stabilize the ground, I'll plant some dwarf fruit trees in the spring. That project won't produce measurable fruit for about five years, but I'm working on it now.

I planted a Montmorency Cherry tree and a Gala Apple tree in my backyard as soon as I could remove some sod and work the soil. Right now they look a little odd, each standing alone, 30 feet apart, with no other plants near them. But in 10 years they'll each be 20 or 25 feet tall and wide with benches underneath, paths between, and companion plants surrounding them. To get the vision I have for a decade from now I began by planting them with plenty of space to grow.

Sure I have flower beds with annuals in them and I have my vegetable garden that will be tilled up and replanted next spring. I love that part of gardening. But as I walk through my garden each day and look at it through the window each morning and evening, I'm always envisioning what else it will be. I try to picture what my future grandkids will see when they visit. I imagine the new beds I'll create for the sole purpose of sharing my love of gardening with a new generation by giving them their own patch of soil.

How do you see your gardening? Do you look beyond this season or year? Do you look to a future garden that will take a long time to realize? It takes great patience to plan and act today for results you may not see for many years.

I suggest it's worth the wait. For when you're sitting under the shade of your apple tree, watching a child climb it's branches to pluck a ripe fruit, you'll smile and be glad for the moment. A moment that began years before.

Tuesday, August 17, 2010

Stick a Finger in it

Watering the garden can be a wonderful thing for both you and the plants. Though I strongly advocate soaker hoses and drip irrigation systems as a way to provide the correct amount of water to your garden, there is something cathartic about holding a warm hose and connecting with each plant  as you offer nourishing H2O. Stress and worry seem to flow out of the body at the same rate as the flow from the hose.

During a hot summer or in an arid region like ours, a soothing rain can also provide that catharsis. The cooling and cleansing effect of an afternoon thunderstorm or evening shower revitalizes the air and rivatalizes your inner being. In the same way, a heat-stressed garden will perk up after the irrigation from the sky.

Though I love hand watering my garden, I look upon rain as a natural process to help keep plants alive. After a rain, the trees are green, the flowers are glistening and the birds are singing. It's easy to keep the hose coiled on the ground as you give thanks for nature's processes and for not having to add more to your water bill. For those of you who don't enjoy the watering as I do, it's a nice day off from another gardening chore. But do you stop to analyze whether the rain was enough to actually keep your garden alive?

Without thinking about whether a plant needs water or not, we have our watering schedule planned and often stick to it. We take part in our morning or evening habit. It's time to water, so we water. We know how long it takes to complete the activity and that's how long we take to do it. Each plant gets its regular water on a regular basis.

If it rains we likely cancel that day's chore. Then we wait until the next scheduled watering, unless it rains again. In our Colorado, monsoonal, late-summer weather pattern, it's possible to have rain for two weeks without a break. In that time the hose stays wound up, the weeds explode into life, and the garden is ignored more than usual. We wait until the scheduled watering time before we get back to irrigating our gardens.

Scheduled watering is one of the worst things you can do for a garden. If you maintain a watering schedule it's possible that you'll provide too much water and drown your plants. If rain intervenes, it's possible that you will under-water your plant and kill it by thirst. Unless you use a rain guage you won't know if the water from the sky is enough to nourish your plants; assuming it is can be deadly. I've made both mistakes.

Most gardens don't need watering every day, but some do. With proper soil preparation and mulching, many gardens can go three or four days between watering, and some only need it once a week. When it's particularly hot and dry or if the soil is very sandy, gardens may need daily irrigation. It varies based on your specific plant's water needs, on the heat and humidity, on the wind, and on the growth cycle of the plant. The most common problem plants have in a typical garden is receiving too much water. We want to baby our little green friends so we shower them with wet affection, often killing them in the process. Too much water can actually drown a plant by replacing the oxygen in the soil that roots need to absorb to prosper, especially in clay soils.


Use your finger to fix the problem. Before your scheduled watering or after a rain, stick your finger in the soil near a plant. Use that nifty, fleshy tool as a gauge for how moist the soil is. If it's dry, water. If it's wet, don't. Plants don't like too wet and they don't like too dry; they like moist.

Don't rely on the sign of wilting leaves to determine how much water is needed. In the heat of the day, it's normal for a plant's leaves to wilt. It's part of the cellular process a plant uses to minimize water loss by closing off the normal transpiration of water vapor; the result is what we call wilting. As soon as the day cools, leaves open their stomata, little openings in their leaves, and through the process of osmosis begin to absorb water through the roots. The leaves perk up again. Too much water in the soil can screw up the process.

In a similar way, assuming the rain has provided enough moisture can screw things up. While plants benefit from some water on their leaves by absorbing a little of it and easing the transpiration process, they receive primary moisture from the soil. If the rain doesn't reach the soil or if it isn't enough to saturate the soil, the roots will have nothing to absorb and the plant suffers. In this case wilting results because the transpiration process stops and it may be too late to reverse the process. This is when plants die.

The best way to determine if wilting is normal because of a hot day or deadly because of dry soil, is to stick your finger in. Moist finger is good, dry finger is bad. Use the results to decide whether watering is appropriate. Some experts suggest using a screwdriver to determine the dryness of soil; you stick the screwdriver in the soil then touch it after you pull it out to see if it's wet. As I blogged earlier, I like the feel of the soil. Sticking a finger in gives instant feedback and gives you contact with your garden.

You can buy a water sensor, which is a little probe that measures the water content in soil. You stick it in the ground and a little gauge tells you the degree to which your soil is dry or wet. Cheap sensors can be inaccurate and accurate sensors can be expensive. I'm frugal and don't see a need to spend unnecessarily.

For me, you can best benefit your plants and determine your correct watering schedule by just sticking a finger in it.
Watering the garden can be a wonderful thing for both you and the plants. Though I strongly advocate soaker hoses and drip irrigation systems as a way to provide the correct amount of water to your garden, there is something cathartic about holding a warm hose and connecting with each plant  as you offer nourishing H2O. Stress and worry seem to flow out of the body at the same rate as the flow from the hose.

During a hot summer or in an arid region like ours, a soothing rain can also provide that catharsis. The cooling and cleansing effect of an afternoon thunderstorm or evening shower revitalizes the air and rivatalizes your inner being. In the same way, a heat-stressed garden will perk up after the irrigation from the sky.

Though I love hand watering my garden, I look upon rain as a natural process to help keep plants alive. After a rain, the trees are green, the flowers are glistening and the birds are singing. It's easy to keep the hose coiled on the ground as you give thanks for nature's processes and for not having to add more to your water bill. For those of you who don't enjoy the watering as I do, it's a nice day off from another gardening chore. But do you stop to analyze whether the rain was enough to actually keep your garden alive?

Without thinking about whether a plant needs water or not, we have our watering schedule planned and often stick to it. We take part in our morning or evening habit. It's time to water, so we water. We know how long it takes to complete the activity and that's how long we take to do it. Each plant gets its regular water on a regular basis.

If it rains we likely cancel that day's chore. Then we wait until the next scheduled watering, unless it rains again. In our Colorado, monsoonal, late-summer weather pattern, it's possible to have rain for two weeks without a break. In that time the hose stays wound up, the weeds explode into life, and the garden is ignored more than usual. We wait until the scheduled watering time before we get back to irrigating our gardens.

Scheduled watering is one of the worst things you can do for a garden. If you maintain a watering schedule it's possible that you'll provide too much water and drown your plants. If rain intervenes, it's possible that you will under-water your plant and kill it by thirst. Unless you use a rain guage you won't know if the water from the sky is enough to nourish your plants; assuming it is can be deadly. I've made both mistakes.

Most gardens don't need watering every day, but some do. With proper soil preparation and mulching, many gardens can go three or four days between watering, and some only need it once a week. When it's particularly hot and dry or if the soil is very sandy, gardens may need daily irrigation. It varies based on your specific plant's water needs, on the heat and humidity, on the wind, and on the growth cycle of the plant. The most common problem plants have in a typical garden is receiving too much water. We want to baby our little green friends so we shower them with wet affection, often killing them in the process. Too much water can actually drown a plant by replacing the oxygen in the soil that roots need to absorb to prosper, especially in clay soils.


Use your finger to fix the problem. Before your scheduled watering or after a rain, stick your finger in the soil near a plant. Use that nifty, fleshy tool as a gauge for how moist the soil is. If it's dry, water. If it's wet, don't. Plants don't like too wet and they don't like too dry; they like moist.

Don't rely on the sign of wilting leaves to determine how much water is needed. In the heat of the day, it's normal for a plant's leaves to wilt. It's part of the cellular process a plant uses to minimize water loss by closing off the normal transpiration of water vapor; the result is what we call wilting. As soon as the day cools, leaves open their stomata, little openings in their leaves, and through the process of osmosis begin to absorb water through the roots. The leaves perk up again. Too much water in the soil can screw up the process.

In a similar way, assuming the rain has provided enough moisture can screw things up. While plants benefit from some water on their leaves by absorbing a little of it and easing the transpiration process, they receive primary moisture from the soil. If the rain doesn't reach the soil or if it isn't enough to saturate the soil, the roots will have nothing to absorb and the plant suffers. In this case wilting results because the transpiration process stops and it may be too late to reverse the process. This is when plants die.

The best way to determine if wilting is normal because of a hot day or deadly because of dry soil, is to stick your finger in. Moist finger is good, dry finger is bad. Use the results to decide whether watering is appropriate. Some experts suggest using a screwdriver to determine the dryness of soil; you stick the screwdriver in the soil then touch it after you pull it out to see if it's wet. As I blogged earlier, I like the feel of the soil. Sticking a finger in gives instant feedback and gives you contact with your garden.

You can buy a water sensor, which is a little probe that measures the water content in soil. You stick it in the ground and a little gauge tells you the degree to which your soil is dry or wet. Cheap sensors can be inaccurate and accurate sensors can be expensive. I'm frugal and don't see a need to spend unnecessarily.

For me, you can best benefit your plants and determine your correct watering schedule by just sticking a finger in it.

Monday, August 16, 2010

Sunflowers for Love

The sunflowers are blooming! Few plants so visibly display the vitality of a garden as sunflowers. Long, thick green stalks with bursting yellow flowers the size of dinner plates catch the eye immediately. Their beauty adds a punctuation mark to all other flowers and plants a gardener grows. I love sunflowers, but hadn't planned to grow them this year.

They now provide striking scenery in my garden beds because my wife asked me to plant them.

I think it's important to realize gardening is more than what you think it should be. Avid gardeners have a vision and toil long and hard to bring that vision to life, literally. Too often gardeners plant what they want, where they want, and how they want without realizing that their efforts impact the people around them. Though I'm the only one in my household who digs and plants and prunes and weeds and waters, my family and friends anxiously await the results of my labors. They enjoy the beauty of the flowers and songs of the birds and lazy fluttering of the butterflies that my garden creates. They enjoy the fresh summer salad with tomatoes, and cucumbers, and basil from my garden.

My family and friends influence my gardening. And when your family and friends influence your garden, it offers them a sense of partial ownership and their appreciation for you and your efforts grows. My wife asks often how the garden is doing, if the tomatoes are growing, if the hail destroyed anything new. But she asks most often about the sunflowers and journeys to that section of the yard, more than before, to see their progress. Though restrained, her enthusiasm in the last week was noticeable as they bloomed. In a sense, that's her section of the garden because she created the idea of sunflowers.

My daughter loves the pickled green beans that I make at the end of each season. My wife and I fostered our relationship because she loved the same pickled green beans I served at a Christmas party. Though I don't especially enjoy their taste, I grow dozens of plants so I can have a big harvest and make jars and jars of pickled green beans for my daughter and wife. I'm not just gardening for me, I'm gardening for them. They play a major role in how I garden.

People often enjoy viewing what they aren't capable of producing. Be it a painting by a Renaissance master or the tomatoes in their grandmother's backyard, people appreciate beauty in whatever form it takes. I believe they appreciate it more when they feel they had a role to play in its development. Think about the school projects from kids or grandkids that adorn the refrigerator door; familiarity with the "artist" improves the perceived quality of the work.


Gardeners are artists on many levels. Through your passion you create beauty on the canvas of your landscape. Use the people around you as muses for your canvas.

If your son-in-law likes snapdragons, grow a few snapdragons. Grow pumpkins for the sole reason of having your kids turn them into jack-o-lanterns at Halloween. When your grandmother stops bringing strawberry-rhubarb pie to Thanksgiving dinner, grow your own strawberries and rhubarb and make the pie yourself. After your friend casually mentions a new hobby of decorating gourds, surprise her next year with the dozens that you grew.

Take inspiration from everyone around you. In that way you're sharing your gardening in a way you didn't envision when you planted your first seed years ago. The people close to you will recognize it and appreciate it. You may even appreciate your own efforts more.
The sunflowers are blooming! Few plants so visibly display the vitality of a garden as sunflowers. Long, thick green stalks with bursting yellow flowers the size of dinner plates catch the eye immediately. Their beauty adds a punctuation mark to all other flowers and plants a gardener grows. I love sunflowers, but hadn't planned to grow them this year.

They now provide striking scenery in my garden beds because my wife asked me to plant them.

I think it's important to realize gardening is more than what you think it should be. Avid gardeners have a vision and toil long and hard to bring that vision to life, literally. Too often gardeners plant what they want, where they want, and how they want without realizing that their efforts impact the people around them. Though I'm the only one in my household who digs and plants and prunes and weeds and waters, my family and friends anxiously await the results of my labors. They enjoy the beauty of the flowers and songs of the birds and lazy fluttering of the butterflies that my garden creates. They enjoy the fresh summer salad with tomatoes, and cucumbers, and basil from my garden.

My family and friends influence my gardening. And when your family and friends influence your garden, it offers them a sense of partial ownership and their appreciation for you and your efforts grows. My wife asks often how the garden is doing, if the tomatoes are growing, if the hail destroyed anything new. But she asks most often about the sunflowers and journeys to that section of the yard, more than before, to see their progress. Though restrained, her enthusiasm in the last week was noticeable as they bloomed. In a sense, that's her section of the garden because she created the idea of sunflowers.

My daughter loves the pickled green beans that I make at the end of each season. My wife and I fostered our relationship because she loved the same pickled green beans I served at a Christmas party. Though I don't especially enjoy their taste, I grow dozens of plants so I can have a big harvest and make jars and jars of pickled green beans for my daughter and wife. I'm not just gardening for me, I'm gardening for them. They play a major role in how I garden.

People often enjoy viewing what they aren't capable of producing. Be it a painting by a Renaissance master or the tomatoes in their grandmother's backyard, people appreciate beauty in whatever form it takes. I believe they appreciate it more when they feel they had a role to play in its development. Think about the school projects from kids or grandkids that adorn the refrigerator door; familiarity with the "artist" improves the perceived quality of the work.


Gardeners are artists on many levels. Through your passion you create beauty on the canvas of your landscape. Use the people around you as muses for your canvas.

If your son-in-law likes snapdragons, grow a few snapdragons. Grow pumpkins for the sole reason of having your kids turn them into jack-o-lanterns at Halloween. When your grandmother stops bringing strawberry-rhubarb pie to Thanksgiving dinner, grow your own strawberries and rhubarb and make the pie yourself. After your friend casually mentions a new hobby of decorating gourds, surprise her next year with the dozens that you grew.

Take inspiration from everyone around you. In that way you're sharing your gardening in a way you didn't envision when you planted your first seed years ago. The people close to you will recognize it and appreciate it. You may even appreciate your own efforts more.

Friday, August 13, 2010

Tea in the Garden

I'm a creature of habit, though I try to add at least one thing new to my activities each day. For more than 40 years, I've started the day with a nice cup of hot tea, preferably Earl Grey. It's usually accompanied by a light breakfast of homemade banana bread, an apple fritter, or a bowl of oatmeal if it's a cold morning. Always frugal, I abandoned tea bags years ago and now make my cup with Indian looseleaf tea that I buy at a local Greek market.

As the water heats, I fill my tea ball half full with the tea leaves. It begins to steep as I head out to fetch the morning paper, always accompanied by my faithful Chocolate Lab, Shaca. When we return, my morning beverage is ready; of course on snowy mornings the brew is a little stronger, in accordance with the time it takes to put on my boots and jacket and trek to the end of the driveway. A few too many scoops of sugar, sans milk, and the brew is complete. The final step in the process is to remove the tea ball from the hot, tea-infused water and dump the saturated leaves.

This is where I tend to veer away from the habits of most people who start their days similarly. I don't dump my tea leaves in the trash, I dump them in my compost bucket sitting next to the sink. It's not one of those fancy, charcoal-impregnated buckets you can pay too much for from a catalog or website. It's an empty plastic bucket that used to hold a margarita concoction to which you just add tequila. It now holds wilting lettuce leaves, the skins of cucumbers, gnawed corn cobs, tea leaves, and any other organic kitchen waste we throw in it.

I believe in compost. I believe compost can make any garden better. In our Rocky Mountain region with terrible natural soil, compost is imperative in improving growing conditions. Gardeners can buy bagged compost at garden centers or home improvement stores and they can buy bulk compost at rock yards or sand companies; I've done both.

But I prefer to make my own compost. It's much cheaper, it's easy, and it gives me the opportunity to recycle my yard and kitchen waste, rather than sending it to some landfill that's already overloaded. When my margarita bucket is full, I dump it on my compost pile. When I have a handful or more of weeds I've plucked from my gardening beds, I throw them on my compost pile. When I clean up the spent plants in the fall, I throw it all on my compost pile. I even go around the neighborhood and collect bags of leaves from my neighbors to throw on my compost pile.

You can compost almost anything organic. Eggshells and egg cartons, overripe peaches and the cardboard box they came in, bird-pecked apples and pruned apple tree branches can all go into a compost pile. The black peels from the bananas in my bread are always visible in my bucket and on my pile.

The concept is quite simple: find a area near your garden and start dumping organic stuff. The science of composting is more complex and I'll cover that in another blog, but the basics make it easy for anyone to do. And I encourage you to do it, if you aren't already a composter. You don't need to buy expensive activators and you don't need to buy expensive plastic systems; you can, but a pile in a corner of your yard will work just fine for starters.

Mix "browns" and "greens" as you do it. The "browns" are organic pieces high in carbon, typically dried leaves or sticks or newspaper or brown grass. The "greens" are fresh organic pieces high in nitrogen, typically freshcut grass or rotting fruit or most kitchen waste. The mix of carbon and nitrogen creates a vacation themepark for microorganisms that naturally live in the soil and on the plants. The microrganisms begin the process of decomposing the organic matter and in time will produce a beautiful dark brown, almost black, product that works wonders for your garden.

Compost doesn't smell bad, in fact it has an earthy smell that reminds me of a meadow deep in a forest. The leaves and needles in a forest are decomposing naturally in the same basic way as a compost pile. You take this natural process and control what decomposes in the shelter of your yard. With a little effort, you're rewarded with a remarkable substance that improves soil quality, water retention, pH, biodiversity, nutrient values, plant growth, and much more.

I'm not completely fanatical in how I process my compost. For the most part I throw things on the pile, add water when it gets a little dry, mix it up every now and then to introduce oxygen to the microbes, and wait for it to turn dark and lovely. It's pretty simple.

By composting, I feel I'm doing my part in reducing neighborhood waste, I'm improving the conditions in my garden, and I'm giving a place for delinquent microorganisms to spent their summer.

Think about it and join me with tea in the garden.
I'm a creature of habit, though I try to add at least one thing new to my activities each day. For more than 40 years, I've started the day with a nice cup of hot tea, preferably Earl Grey. It's usually accompanied by a light breakfast of homemade banana bread, an apple fritter, or a bowl of oatmeal if it's a cold morning. Always frugal, I abandoned tea bags years ago and now make my cup with Indian looseleaf tea that I buy at a local Greek market.

As the water heats, I fill my tea ball half full with the tea leaves. It begins to steep as I head out to fetch the morning paper, always accompanied by my faithful Chocolate Lab, Shaca. When we return, my morning beverage is ready; of course on snowy mornings the brew is a little stronger, in accordance with the time it takes to put on my boots and jacket and trek to the end of the driveway. A few too many scoops of sugar, sans milk, and the brew is complete. The final step in the process is to remove the tea ball from the hot, tea-infused water and dump the saturated leaves.

This is where I tend to veer away from the habits of most people who start their days similarly. I don't dump my tea leaves in the trash, I dump them in my compost bucket sitting next to the sink. It's not one of those fancy, charcoal-impregnated buckets you can pay too much for from a catalog or website. It's an empty plastic bucket that used to hold a margarita concoction to which you just add tequila. It now holds wilting lettuce leaves, the skins of cucumbers, gnawed corn cobs, tea leaves, and any other organic kitchen waste we throw in it.

I believe in compost. I believe compost can make any garden better. In our Rocky Mountain region with terrible natural soil, compost is imperative in improving growing conditions. Gardeners can buy bagged compost at garden centers or home improvement stores and they can buy bulk compost at rock yards or sand companies; I've done both.

But I prefer to make my own compost. It's much cheaper, it's easy, and it gives me the opportunity to recycle my yard and kitchen waste, rather than sending it to some landfill that's already overloaded. When my margarita bucket is full, I dump it on my compost pile. When I have a handful or more of weeds I've plucked from my gardening beds, I throw them on my compost pile. When I clean up the spent plants in the fall, I throw it all on my compost pile. I even go around the neighborhood and collect bags of leaves from my neighbors to throw on my compost pile.

You can compost almost anything organic. Eggshells and egg cartons, overripe peaches and the cardboard box they came in, bird-pecked apples and pruned apple tree branches can all go into a compost pile. The black peels from the bananas in my bread are always visible in my bucket and on my pile.

The concept is quite simple: find a area near your garden and start dumping organic stuff. The science of composting is more complex and I'll cover that in another blog, but the basics make it easy for anyone to do. And I encourage you to do it, if you aren't already a composter. You don't need to buy expensive activators and you don't need to buy expensive plastic systems; you can, but a pile in a corner of your yard will work just fine for starters.

Mix "browns" and "greens" as you do it. The "browns" are organic pieces high in carbon, typically dried leaves or sticks or newspaper or brown grass. The "greens" are fresh organic pieces high in nitrogen, typically freshcut grass or rotting fruit or most kitchen waste. The mix of carbon and nitrogen creates a vacation themepark for microorganisms that naturally live in the soil and on the plants. The microrganisms begin the process of decomposing the organic matter and in time will produce a beautiful dark brown, almost black, product that works wonders for your garden.

Compost doesn't smell bad, in fact it has an earthy smell that reminds me of a meadow deep in a forest. The leaves and needles in a forest are decomposing naturally in the same basic way as a compost pile. You take this natural process and control what decomposes in the shelter of your yard. With a little effort, you're rewarded with a remarkable substance that improves soil quality, water retention, pH, biodiversity, nutrient values, plant growth, and much more.

I'm not completely fanatical in how I process my compost. For the most part I throw things on the pile, add water when it gets a little dry, mix it up every now and then to introduce oxygen to the microbes, and wait for it to turn dark and lovely. It's pretty simple.

By composting, I feel I'm doing my part in reducing neighborhood waste, I'm improving the conditions in my garden, and I'm giving a place for delinquent microorganisms to spent their summer.

Think about it and join me with tea in the garden.

Thursday, August 12, 2010

Success in a Dead Pepper

Many gardeners gauge gardening success by the beauty of their roses or the size of their tomatoes. We weigh our pumpkins, measure our crookneck squash, and count our chickens. The green of our leaves and yellow of our corn show us that our efforts were worth the sweat and toil. My buddy Jeff found success in a dead pepper plant and I am motivated by his enthusiasm over what most of us would see as a failed endeavor.

With the move to a new house, I started a new vegetable garden this year with seven raised beds, areas for raspberries, blackberries, and grapes, and a small area for rhubarb and sunflowers. I planted a cherry tree and an apple tree. Hours of digging, sawing, hammering, filling, planting, watering, fertilizing, and weeding have provided a fairly substantial garden with green beans, strawberries, tomatoes, peppers, onions, and potatoes growing very well. It's a beautiful garden, but I've been very disappointed by the progress of my cucumbers and asparagus. I planted 25 asparagus roots and 25 cucumber seeds and only have two plants of each to show for the effort.

My buddy Jeff grew one plant. After filling it with potting soil, he sowed dozens of hot pepper seeds in a single pot, enjoyed a high germination rate, and gradually plucked weak and spindly sprouts until he was left with a single, strong pepper plant. The generic packet of seeds was a variety mix so he didn't know which kind of pepper the plant would produce as he watered it and fertilized it and moved it around his small deck to gain the most of the sun's energy. His total gardening effort for this summer was focused on that single plant.

I can picture Jeff scanning darkening skies as thunderstorms built over the mountains. I can see him looking down at his solo pepper and looking back to worsening weather as he thought of hail and wind and rain. On numerous occasions, Jeff would pick up the pot and move it into the safety of his home, protecting the green shoot from harm. When danger passed he'd return it outside, carefully selecting a sunny spot for it. The stalwart pepper enjoyed the warmth inside his home when the nights were cold.

It was well-watered and coddled and rewarded Jeff with many small white flowers. A few of the blossoms were pollinated by passing flies or bees and small peppers began forming where the flowers once bloomed. I imagine Jeff checking on his pepper plant each morning before heading out to work, smiling on the inside and on the outside upon seeing the growth. It's a feeling I'm familiar with and suspect most gardeners are too: literally seeing the fruits of your labor.

The potential crop ceased to exist when a rogue wind gust sent the brave plant toppling. Jeff's solitary pepper plant died.

The fable from our childhood warns us about putting all of our eggs in one basket because a mishap will make us lose everything. I always thought the warning meant that losing all of our eggs was a bad thing, but Jeff helped me see a different moral. Putting your eggs in a single basket, or devoting all of your attention to a single pepper, can be a good thing when things come crashing down.

Jeff is not what many of us would call a gardener. But emboldened, I suspect, by some of my gardening stories around the office, he bought the pot, soil, and seeds and embarked on his first foray into the wonderful world of gardening. He saw success in each sprout, and his careful pruning, and his tender care of the triumphant pepper plant. In a harsh environment and limited living space, he was able to start with a seed and in a few months see fruits that had him envisioning the salsa he would make with his harvest.

The plant grew stronger and longer than he ever thought it would. He started the venture expecting a failed experiment, but was surprisingly rewarded by the feeling gardeners get when they make a connection with a green, growing organism. There is no doubt he was upset and disappointed upon finding the dead plant, but he turned lemons into lemonade, or maybe dead peppers into a phantom salsa, by realizing he accomplished much more than he expected. Jeff is enthusiastically looking forward to doing it all again next year.

In every perceived gardening failure, we actually have success. When the new heirloom tomato seeds fail to produce an abundant crop, we learn to use different seeds the next time or maybe try the same seeds again but with different growing methods. When the birds eat all of your apricots, you learn to harvest a few days earlier the next time or cover the tree in bird netting. We find out what's best for our gardens by observing; we fix what doesn't work and repeat what does.

Jeff's enthusiasm has me realizing that two asparagus plants are more than I started the season with and two cucumber plants can still give me something to put in my salad. It's easy to lose sight of why we garden when we don't get what we thought we wanted. The real success is in the journey and the venture and the love of gardening.

Thanks, Jeff. You're a true gardener.
Many gardeners gauge gardening success by the beauty of their roses or the size of their tomatoes. We weigh our pumpkins, measure our crookneck squash, and count our chickens. The green of our leaves and yellow of our corn show us that our efforts were worth the sweat and toil. My buddy Jeff found success in a dead pepper plant and I am motivated by his enthusiasm over what most of us would see as a failed endeavor.

With the move to a new house, I started a new vegetable garden this year with seven raised beds, areas for raspberries, blackberries, and grapes, and a small area for rhubarb and sunflowers. I planted a cherry tree and an apple tree. Hours of digging, sawing, hammering, filling, planting, watering, fertilizing, and weeding have provided a fairly substantial garden with green beans, strawberries, tomatoes, peppers, onions, and potatoes growing very well. It's a beautiful garden, but I've been very disappointed by the progress of my cucumbers and asparagus. I planted 25 asparagus roots and 25 cucumber seeds and only have two plants of each to show for the effort.

My buddy Jeff grew one plant. After filling it with potting soil, he sowed dozens of hot pepper seeds in a single pot, enjoyed a high germination rate, and gradually plucked weak and spindly sprouts until he was left with a single, strong pepper plant. The generic packet of seeds was a variety mix so he didn't know which kind of pepper the plant would produce as he watered it and fertilized it and moved it around his small deck to gain the most of the sun's energy. His total gardening effort for this summer was focused on that single plant.

I can picture Jeff scanning darkening skies as thunderstorms built over the mountains. I can see him looking down at his solo pepper and looking back to worsening weather as he thought of hail and wind and rain. On numerous occasions, Jeff would pick up the pot and move it into the safety of his home, protecting the green shoot from harm. When danger passed he'd return it outside, carefully selecting a sunny spot for it. The stalwart pepper enjoyed the warmth inside his home when the nights were cold.

It was well-watered and coddled and rewarded Jeff with many small white flowers. A few of the blossoms were pollinated by passing flies or bees and small peppers began forming where the flowers once bloomed. I imagine Jeff checking on his pepper plant each morning before heading out to work, smiling on the inside and on the outside upon seeing the growth. It's a feeling I'm familiar with and suspect most gardeners are too: literally seeing the fruits of your labor.

The potential crop ceased to exist when a rogue wind gust sent the brave plant toppling. Jeff's solitary pepper plant died.

The fable from our childhood warns us about putting all of our eggs in one basket because a mishap will make us lose everything. I always thought the warning meant that losing all of our eggs was a bad thing, but Jeff helped me see a different moral. Putting your eggs in a single basket, or devoting all of your attention to a single pepper, can be a good thing when things come crashing down.

Jeff is not what many of us would call a gardener. But emboldened, I suspect, by some of my gardening stories around the office, he bought the pot, soil, and seeds and embarked on his first foray into the wonderful world of gardening. He saw success in each sprout, and his careful pruning, and his tender care of the triumphant pepper plant. In a harsh environment and limited living space, he was able to start with a seed and in a few months see fruits that had him envisioning the salsa he would make with his harvest.

The plant grew stronger and longer than he ever thought it would. He started the venture expecting a failed experiment, but was surprisingly rewarded by the feeling gardeners get when they make a connection with a green, growing organism. There is no doubt he was upset and disappointed upon finding the dead plant, but he turned lemons into lemonade, or maybe dead peppers into a phantom salsa, by realizing he accomplished much more than he expected. Jeff is enthusiastically looking forward to doing it all again next year.

In every perceived gardening failure, we actually have success. When the new heirloom tomato seeds fail to produce an abundant crop, we learn to use different seeds the next time or maybe try the same seeds again but with different growing methods. When the birds eat all of your apricots, you learn to harvest a few days earlier the next time or cover the tree in bird netting. We find out what's best for our gardens by observing; we fix what doesn't work and repeat what does.

Jeff's enthusiasm has me realizing that two asparagus plants are more than I started the season with and two cucumber plants can still give me something to put in my salad. It's easy to lose sight of why we garden when we don't get what we thought we wanted. The real success is in the journey and the venture and the love of gardening.

Thanks, Jeff. You're a true gardener.

Wednesday, August 11, 2010

Dennis Is Almost Right

There is something juvenile, yet invigorating, about plunging your hands into warm garden soil. In today's "Dennis the Menace" comic by Hank Ketchum, Dennis is on his swing set watching Mr. Wilson plant some seedlings. Observing the plump retiree bent over a garden mound with trowel in hand, Dennis remarks, "Gardenin' is just an excuse for grownups to play in the dirt." Dennis is onto something, but only scratches the surface.

While kids play in the dirt for myriad reasons, adults tend to do it for just the one. Kids cover themselves with soil just to get dirty and see a mother's reaction, or for the gritty sensory experience, or because they're oblivious to the mess as they explore their imaginations. Adults have learned that society encourages cleanliness and usually avoid getting dirty, except when it comes to gardening.

As I watered my garden this morning, I couldn't help but reach down and pull a few weeds, and reset some plant markers, and realign some strawberry runners. In each case the feel of the warm soil warmed my blood. I'm not sure if that warmth was literal or figurative, but it felt good connecting with the most primal sensation of touching the earth.

Many studies have shown that gardening relieves stress. I think most gardeners know that's true without relying on a study to say it. It seems that in the instant you first feel the minerals and organic matter, you share a transfer with Mother Earth. Some of your stress, tension, and worries travel through your fingers into the ground to be overseen by a greater force. Some of the calm, energy, and strength from that larger power flows into you and surges into your being.

We say we interact with the earth with a goal in mind: to plant a plant, pull some weeds, or harvest our crop. We aren't doing it as a child would, for play. But when you're immersed in your efforts, with soil caking on your boots, or pants, or gloves, do you really see it as a chore? How often do visions of your childhood enter your thoughts as you set in a tender seedling? Do you think of your grandparents' garden when you plant your seeds? Do you encounter a vision of summer days, playing after dinner, as you water the garden at dusk? Does a youthful part of you emerge, if just briefly, when you smell the tomato plants or brush against the corn stalks? As your garden begins to fruit do you remember the first time you bit into a fresh, sun-warmed tomato?

I think gardening helps make us young again. Our blood flows more easily, our wrinkles smooth out, and our muscles ache a little less. We gain a few hours of life in exchange for the life we give our plants. The memories of happier days fill a garden and they're there for us to harvest.

So get your hands dirty. Become young again. Play in your garden.
There is something juvenile, yet invigorating, about plunging your hands into warm garden soil. In today's "Dennis the Menace" comic by Hank Ketchum, Dennis is on his swing set watching Mr. Wilson plant some seedlings. Observing the plump retiree bent over a garden mound with trowel in hand, Dennis remarks, "Gardenin' is just an excuse for grownups to play in the dirt." Dennis is onto something, but only scratches the surface.

While kids play in the dirt for myriad reasons, adults tend to do it for just the one. Kids cover themselves with soil just to get dirty and see a mother's reaction, or for the gritty sensory experience, or because they're oblivious to the mess as they explore their imaginations. Adults have learned that society encourages cleanliness and usually avoid getting dirty, except when it comes to gardening.

As I watered my garden this morning, I couldn't help but reach down and pull a few weeds, and reset some plant markers, and realign some strawberry runners. In each case the feel of the warm soil warmed my blood. I'm not sure if that warmth was literal or figurative, but it felt good connecting with the most primal sensation of touching the earth.

Many studies have shown that gardening relieves stress. I think most gardeners know that's true without relying on a study to say it. It seems that in the instant you first feel the minerals and organic matter, you share a transfer with Mother Earth. Some of your stress, tension, and worries travel through your fingers into the ground to be overseen by a greater force. Some of the calm, energy, and strength from that larger power flows into you and surges into your being.

We say we interact with the earth with a goal in mind: to plant a plant, pull some weeds, or harvest our crop. We aren't doing it as a child would, for play. But when you're immersed in your efforts, with soil caking on your boots, or pants, or gloves, do you really see it as a chore? How often do visions of your childhood enter your thoughts as you set in a tender seedling? Do you think of your grandparents' garden when you plant your seeds? Do you encounter a vision of summer days, playing after dinner, as you water the garden at dusk? Does a youthful part of you emerge, if just briefly, when you smell the tomato plants or brush against the corn stalks? As your garden begins to fruit do you remember the first time you bit into a fresh, sun-warmed tomato?

I think gardening helps make us young again. Our blood flows more easily, our wrinkles smooth out, and our muscles ache a little less. We gain a few hours of life in exchange for the life we give our plants. The memories of happier days fill a garden and they're there for us to harvest.

So get your hands dirty. Become young again. Play in your garden.

Tuesday, August 10, 2010

As the Worm Turns

Yesterday as I finished a few projects around the barn, I picked up a fallen stable door and was rewarded by a sight any gardener should be glad to see. At the top of the cool, moist soil were a dozen earthworms of varying sizes. Worms perform multiple duties in your garden. They help aerate the soil with their tunnels, they help organic matter decompose, and they leave nitrogen behind them in their castings (worm poo).

But more importantly, in my opinion, they show that the soil isn't as bad as it may appear. Worms are near the top of the food chain in a soil's biodiversity. In every inch of soil lives millions, if not billions, of microbes. Bacteria, fungi, and protozoa abound. They feed on each other and on the organic matter in the ground. Earthworms complete the circle of soil life by dragging down organic matter from the surface as they burrow down, consuming the microbes as they go.

The appearance of earthworms shows that a soil is alive. That's important because plants need a living soil to thrive. If you plant a garden in soil void of that biodiversity, your plants will die. Straight and simple. Fertilizer and water will do no good. It's the microbes that convert the components of fertilizer, and all soil nutrients, into an ionic form that plant roots can use. No microorganisms means no food for plants. No food means lingering death for your garden.

There are three basic types of earthworms: Anecic worms, like nightcrawlers, that grow big, burrow deep, and live a long time; Endogeic worms that have semi-permanent burrows and migrate across your soil; and Epigeic worms that live in shallow, organic-rich soil. The worms you see on the sidewalk after a rain are typically Endogeic worms that are trying to move quickly on the wet ground toward a new spot to find a mate and raise their young; they just can't gauge how wide and rough a sidewalk is and get stuck when the sun comes out. The worms you can buy online are typically Epigeic worms, like Red Wigglers, that are used to compost household waste; they work great in a controlled household environment, but won't survive outside in a location with cold winters.

Earthworms are not native to the U.S., but were brought over by European settlers. In their slow, but progressive manner, they have infiltrated the entire continent. I prefer to introduce them to my vegetable garden as legal aliens. When I find a trove, as I did yesterday, I pick them up gently and resettle them in one of my raised beds. I'll rough up a moist section of soil in the shade of a plant and set them down. Avoid digging a hole and burying them as it can do more harm than good. They naturally burrow so let them dig a hole and start the process of enriching your soil.

There is a lot of compost in my raised beds and that organic matter needs to break down further to feed plant roots. I find earthworms in the beds all the time. They'll naturally migrate to a nutrient-rich site like a garden, but encouraging their population growth by introducing a few more can help the process. I'll even rescue the unfortunate ones caught on the sidewalk and give them a safer home. They don't always survive, but it's better than ending life on the bottom of a shoe.

Contrary to movies on the Sci-Fi channel, worms don't have teeth. Yes, they're squishy and squirmy, but pick up stray worms anyway. The few seconds of uncomfortability in your hand can add vitality to your garden. A worm in the hand is worth a bloom on the bush. And smile when you see them in your garden.
Yesterday as I finished a few projects around the barn, I picked up a fallen stable door and was rewarded by a sight any gardener should be glad to see. At the top of the cool, moist soil were a dozen earthworms of varying sizes. Worms perform multiple duties in your garden. They help aerate the soil with their tunnels, they help organic matter decompose, and they leave nitrogen behind them in their castings (worm poo).

But more importantly, in my opinion, they show that the soil isn't as bad as it may appear. Worms are near the top of the food chain in a soil's biodiversity. In every inch of soil lives millions, if not billions, of microbes. Bacteria, fungi, and protozoa abound. They feed on each other and on the organic matter in the ground. Earthworms complete the circle of soil life by dragging down organic matter from the surface as they burrow down, consuming the microbes as they go.

The appearance of earthworms shows that a soil is alive. That's important because plants need a living soil to thrive. If you plant a garden in soil void of that biodiversity, your plants will die. Straight and simple. Fertilizer and water will do no good. It's the microbes that convert the components of fertilizer, and all soil nutrients, into an ionic form that plant roots can use. No microorganisms means no food for plants. No food means lingering death for your garden.

There are three basic types of earthworms: Anecic worms, like nightcrawlers, that grow big, burrow deep, and live a long time; Endogeic worms that have semi-permanent burrows and migrate across your soil; and Epigeic worms that live in shallow, organic-rich soil. The worms you see on the sidewalk after a rain are typically Endogeic worms that are trying to move quickly on the wet ground toward a new spot to find a mate and raise their young; they just can't gauge how wide and rough a sidewalk is and get stuck when the sun comes out. The worms you can buy online are typically Epigeic worms, like Red Wigglers, that are used to compost household waste; they work great in a controlled household environment, but won't survive outside in a location with cold winters.

Earthworms are not native to the U.S., but were brought over by European settlers. In their slow, but progressive manner, they have infiltrated the entire continent. I prefer to introduce them to my vegetable garden as legal aliens. When I find a trove, as I did yesterday, I pick them up gently and resettle them in one of my raised beds. I'll rough up a moist section of soil in the shade of a plant and set them down. Avoid digging a hole and burying them as it can do more harm than good. They naturally burrow so let them dig a hole and start the process of enriching your soil.

There is a lot of compost in my raised beds and that organic matter needs to break down further to feed plant roots. I find earthworms in the beds all the time. They'll naturally migrate to a nutrient-rich site like a garden, but encouraging their population growth by introducing a few more can help the process. I'll even rescue the unfortunate ones caught on the sidewalk and give them a safer home. They don't always survive, but it's better than ending life on the bottom of a shoe.

Contrary to movies on the Sci-Fi channel, worms don't have teeth. Yes, they're squishy and squirmy, but pick up stray worms anyway. The few seconds of uncomfortability in your hand can add vitality to your garden. A worm in the hand is worth a bloom on the bush. And smile when you see them in your garden.

Monday, August 9, 2010

A Snake in the Grass

Day one of tips for and experiences in gardening.


Today I saw my friend the garter snake at the bottom of the stairs outside. Though I know there are snakes in my yard, the sudden sight of him at my feet is always a bit frightening.

Aversion aside, I know he does a great job eating slugs and other large insects that might harm the gardens I've planted this year. Along with his son or daughter (the other, smaller snake that lives in the same hole), he helps keep the natural balance in my favor. Regretfully, he might also eat some of the small frogs in the grass that I've seen this week (they'll eat bad insects too), but I'm hoping they all can live in harmony as they help guard my plants against invasion. It's getting close to harvest time and after losing some plants to the hail in June, it would be nice to enjoy a nice bounty.

Many gardeners try hard to rid themselves of pests. Snakes and frogs may be seen as pests by some, but I say, "Bring them in!" I've yet to build many habitats in my garden to encourage their presence, but that time is coming. I did move a large rock closer to the snake's hole so he has a little more protection from predators and a little more warmth in the morning. For now the few reptiles are only there because the natural habitat encourages them.

We modify our environment by constructing a house and planting a garden and in that process we disrupt the nature that we often are seeking with our outdoor hobbies like gardening. The easiest thing to do to help restore balance is to not interfere too much. If you have to remove a habitat, try to restore one near by.

Pesticides may get rid of one pest, but may harm the beneficial presence of another. The concept of Integrated Pest Management (IPM) fosters an environmentally sensitive approach to managing pests in your garden. I'll highlight that and many other topics in days ahead. As this blog progresses, I'll discuss many things to make your garden better, for you and your plants.

For now, live and let live. If you have snakes, rejoice. It's okay to shiver when you see them, but just pause, maybe walk another way, and feel good that they're on the job. Your garden and our world would be worse without them.

(Modified in October 2010 from the original posting)
Day one of tips for and experiences in gardening.


Today I saw my friend the garter snake at the bottom of the stairs outside. Though I know there are snakes in my yard, the sudden sight of him at my feet is always a bit frightening.

Aversion aside, I know he does a great job eating slugs and other large insects that might harm the gardens I've planted this year. Along with his son or daughter (the other, smaller snake that lives in the same hole), he helps keep the natural balance in my favor. Regretfully, he might also eat some of the small frogs in the grass that I've seen this week (they'll eat bad insects too), but I'm hoping they all can live in harmony as they help guard my plants against invasion. It's getting close to harvest time and after losing some plants to the hail in June, it would be nice to enjoy a nice bounty.

Many gardeners try hard to rid themselves of pests. Snakes and frogs may be seen as pests by some, but I say, "Bring them in!" I've yet to build many habitats in my garden to encourage their presence, but that time is coming. I did move a large rock closer to the snake's hole so he has a little more protection from predators and a little more warmth in the morning. For now the few reptiles are only there because the natural habitat encourages them.

We modify our environment by constructing a house and planting a garden and in that process we disrupt the nature that we often are seeking with our outdoor hobbies like gardening. The easiest thing to do to help restore balance is to not interfere too much. If you have to remove a habitat, try to restore one near by.

Pesticides may get rid of one pest, but may harm the beneficial presence of another. The concept of Integrated Pest Management (IPM) fosters an environmentally sensitive approach to managing pests in your garden. I'll highlight that and many other topics in days ahead. As this blog progresses, I'll discuss many things to make your garden better, for you and your plants.

For now, live and let live. If you have snakes, rejoice. It's okay to shiver when you see them, but just pause, maybe walk another way, and feel good that they're on the job. Your garden and our world would be worse without them.

(Modified in October 2010 from the original posting)