The month of May, per Edith Holden’s “Country Diary of an Edwardian Lady” …
The name of this month is of doubtful origin. Ancient writers suggest it to be derived from Maia, the mother of Mercury; to whom the Romans were accustomed to sacrifice to on the first day of the month.
And from the collection of poetry Ms. Holden has been kind enough to share with us …
Among the many buds proclaiming May
Decking the fields in holiday array,
Striving who shall surpass in braverie,
Marke the faire flowering of the hawthorne tree
Who finely clothed in a robe of white,
Fills full the wanton eye with May’s delight.
Author: Chauncer
Whereforth cometh the inspiration to wax poetic? Garden Bloggers’ Muse Day, where Carolyn Choi invites bloggers to share our favorite poems, songs, verses and quotes about gardening on the first of the month.
We’ve run out of places to put plants, so Mike is considering the microwave and refrigerator.
Perhaps I’ve exaggerated a little. Just a little. Mike has potted up about 500 plants this spring. Some for us, and some for sales. There are about 350 dahlias, 60 calla lilies, 20 cannas, and some morning glories and coleus. They’ve all got to go somewhere until its warm enough for them to be outside. Many are still in the basement. Each day he brings more up, and yet our basement still looks like this.
The garage is full too. They need to all come up to the garage where we can open the door during the day. There are just too many to bring in and out, so they will have to settle for that. Getting the plants hardened off is a step by step process. An hour the first day, a few hours the next, until they are acclimated.
Mike looks happy here, bringing up a load of calla lilies. But I’ll let in on a secret.
He is really concerned about his plants going to good homes. Don’t tell him I told you. Guys are supposed to be tough. I don’t think caring about his 500 babies counts as tough. It does make him loveable though!
It is never too late for creativity, though it is too late to go to see it personally at the Chicago Botanic Garden Antiques & Garden Fair. The fair was last weekend, and I’m sooo glad I went. I’ve never been to the antique fair before, as I knew the prices would be out of my range. What I didn’t realize is that the great ideas are free (after you pay your $10-$15 admission). Free is well within my price range. My friend Addiz and I had a great time, and I came home with ideas to share with you.
Creativity spurs creativity. When I see great ideas like repurposing bird baths to be planters, I just love it. For example, take the stone birdbath in the picture to our left. Actually, you can’t just take it. You’d have to talk to the folks at Praiseworthy Antiques in NY to settle on a price. Isn’t it beautiful!
Or if you are the kind of person who just happens to have a cracked birdbath that you can’t part with (hmmm … sounds like me). Maybe a few years ago you would have filled it with dragon’s blood sedum (hmmm … again sounds like me.) The one you see on the right gets turned on its side for the winter. It is angled enough so that water doesn’t freeze in it, yet not so much that the sedum falls out
More creativity, this time from Al Linder. That would be albinlinder@yahoo.com in Minnesota. These silo pipes could be planters in your yard. I have no idea what a silo pipe even is, but that’s the fun it of. You look at something, and see something else. A couple of plants at the top and you’re a genius.
A majority of the items were high-end antiques that were not garden related. Or were they? We looked at several tables that weathered the test of time. Could a non-conventional table weather the weather? I can’t say that I’d put a $7000 antique table like Al’s in my yard, but Mike & I have been known to make an inexpensive item into something it wasn’t meant to be. Maybe we can find something to use as a base at the Kane County Antique Fair, and something else entirely to be the tabletop. So much more fun than buying a table and chairs at a big box store.
So what did I buy? Gardening gloves! Hard to imagine that these beauties from Foxgloves are going to survive my serious gardening. I’ll be able to find them in the garden since they are such a bright color, they are extra long, and the palms have grips.
Look at this live stream of baby eagles on USTREAM. I’m watching Mom and Dad eagle and the little babies right now. I even hear them peeping. Soooo cute!
Total views: 48,400,160 The Raptor Resource Project brings you the Decorah Eagles from atop their tree at the fish hatchery in Decorah, Iowa.
The live video feed is streamed online 24/7. At night an infrared light provides night vision. Infrared light is not visible to eagles, they do not see it or know it is there.
How perfect. I had often stared at my refrigerator (yes my refrigerator) over the last few weeks. In morning’s first light, a nearby plant cast an intriguing shadow. Thanks to GardeningGoneWild, I knew what to do about it … use it as inspiration for entering this month’s photo contest. The topic was ‘light’, and the vignette’s most important aspect was just that. Wish me luck as I enter my first ever photo contest!
It was so hard to choose! Here are some of favorites that Mike, Lynn, Kevin, and I selected from:
I couldn’t help but make this scilla picture into my screensaver. It’s ideal with the vivid colors, and yet has room at the top and bottom for all those icons.
Scilla is so lovely this time of year. Ours is planted with periwinkle, winter aconite, and grape hyacinths under a big maple tree. Grass refused to grow there so we chose ground cover instead. The winter aconite and scilla are both blooming now. Soon the periwinkle blooms will join the party, as well as the purple hyacinths. Stop back in a week or two to see them pop next to my red swing. And to learn how we got most of it for free.
Looking for more inspiration? To see what other bloggers have blooming on the 15th of every month, visit May Dreams Gardens.
Bits and pieces. Bits and pieces. I’ve toyed with you for months now talking about various parts of the garden, always giving you bits and pieces. Its time to see the garden as a whole, or at least as much of it as Kevin can get in his fisheye lens in this shot. He certainly made a worthy attempt, climbing on the roof with his camera equipment late last summer.
We started out 10 years ago with nothing but grass-filled weeds and the pines you see in the middle of the yard. Fast forward and you have major garden instead. Yes, the pines are in the middle even though it doesn’t look like it. That’s the magic of a fish-eye lens. More content, but the proportions are gone.
We have a half acre, which is roughly 100′ x 200′. We did have to give up some of the garden because it had a house on the property, but the house is small. To give you some idea of how much garden that can be, let’s talk about the fence project Mike took on a few years ago. As he redid the fence, he moved it back 10 feet. That gained a new yard area that was 10 feet deep by 100 feet across. That is 1000 square feet – a new area larger than many entire yards.
We tell ourselves we aren’t trying to get rid of the grass. We say we are not going to build any new garden areas. We say those things all the time. It’s not true. I’d have to say we are really heading towards more garden, less maintenance. For example, the berm area you can barely see to the right is mostly shrubs and groundcover. Further out of sight are 3 river birch that replaced annual beds. Minimal maintenance.
Here is another picture without the fish-eye lens. It shows less garden, but is more to scale. You certainly aren’t seeing it all, especially since we have a corner lot so we not only garden here and in the front, we garden on the side as well.
More pictures will be coming soon as I take photos of each area. I’d better get out there and do some more spring cleanup before my camera and I give you the grand tour.
You might not have noticed, but my blog is not alone out there. As I did my research for today’s presentation to the Central State Dahlia Society meeting, I found some really good articles. I’ve attached the links so you can go exploring as well.
Have you ever heard of the phrase “canary in a coalmine?” Coal miners used to take canaries into coal mines where they acted as early-warning signals for toxic gases or fumes. If the birds became sick, or died, miners would have quality of the air they were breathing. You can do something similar to test the quality of your garden’s soil by growing radishes. While growing radishes to test your garden soil will not give you any insight into toxins located in soil, this experiment can give you insight into what is lacking in your garden’s soil … Read more at Mr. Brown Thumb’s site.
I have clay soil and several kinds of rodents in my garden, and I’d pretty much given up on growing tulips, but Gardening with Tulips by Michael King is making me reconsider. Not just because of the gorgeous color photos on every page, but because …. Read more at Cold Climate Gardening.
Dear gardening friends,
While the swallows may return to Capistrano, the excitement around here is the great egrets and great blue herons returning to the pond behind the garden. A great egret visited and snacked on fish on Wednesday. Then the mercury plummeted and snow fell. The egret looked most … Read more at Mr. McGregor’s Daughter’s site.
As I start moving around and washing my containers for spring planting I am immediately reminded of my age and all of its aches and pains. …There are many herbal therapies that have been tried through ages and have proven … Read more at Backyard Patch Herbal.
Gardener’s Attention Distraction Syndrome (GADS). This is the condition that causes gardeners to start out intent on completing one activity in the garden, but then they see something else that needs to be done, say to themselves, “gads, I need to do that now”, then they stop and do that, which leads to yet something else to do. They repeat this cycle until they have completely forgotten what they were originally going to do. This constant shifting of focus, of doing one task and then another without really ever finishing anything, is quite … Read more at May Dreams Gardens.
I’m sure I had a point to make by writing this particular blog. Hopefully my own case of GADS did not deter me from reaching it, as I’m done now.
You can have dahlias blooming in your garden in August, even here in zone 5. Choose option #1 (do it yourself), or option #2 (don’t do it yourself).
Mike’s do-it-yourself option
If you followed the instructions in You Want Me to Plant My Dahlias NOW?, you are prepared for the task. You’ve got your dahlia tuber. You’ve got a pot. You’ve got soilless potting mix. You’ve got light.
For those of you who have grown seeds indoors, the challenge is minor. The results are what is huge … dahlias from August to October! Dahlias like Spike, who you see pictured here. If you are not so ambitious, see Carol’s not so-do-it-yourself option further below.
Mike says
Pick a pot that is large enough to accommodate the tuber. Use a soilless potting mix rather than actual garden soil. Garden soil has the possibility of harboring insect pests that might be detrimental to the early growth of your tuber’s roots. Plant the tuber, allowing just the top of the tuber above the soil line. This will allow you to watch the sprout development. It is not necessary to do this; you can plant it about 4 inches deeper, but why not enjoy the show. I find it really enjoyable witnessing this touch of Spring.
Once sprouted, young plants require significant amounts of light. My flourescent lights are just inches from the top of the plant. A minimum 2000 lumens is a good choice. A timer is set to keep the lights on 14 hours a day. Frank, my mentor, keeps his on all the time. Regular light bulbs will not do the job. Official grow lights are not required.
Carol’s don’t-do-it-yourself option
Too much trouble? Too iffy? No lights? Forget about potting up your own dahlias. Wait till May. Then go to a garden club or dahlia club plant sale where someone else already started the plants for you. Good for the club and good for early blooms. Details coming soon.
Commitment can be scary. Once I’ve committed to do something, I actually feel compelled to do it. There is no turning back. Which is why I made an external commitment about the patio. It’s one thing to be planning to build a patio someday. It’s another thing to post on the blog last fall that the time is coming this spring. Now I actually have to do it.
I knew that I was clueless as to what I wanted in a patio.
I knew I’d be restricted to what we (we being Mike) could do ourselves.
I knew the whole process would take time we don’t have.
So why, why did I do it? Because I am tired of looking at this…
The hardest part for me is getting started. I’ve done that now, so I hope for the project to take on a life of its own. I even posted my design quandary on Facebook. Here is a floating patio that Shawna Coronado then suggested. I picked this construction picture because it shows that she used a variety of materials. That appeals to me.
You can see her completed project at ShawnaCoranodo.com. I’m sure Shawna, the consummate green girl, would be so proud of us for reclaiming the bricks from a neighbor’s construction site. We couldn’t bear to see them go to waste.
We’ll continue doing our research and figuring out what we’d like to do. Suggestions welcome! Check back in to see some of the ideas we collect and how we are doing.
