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April Impersonating December


FIRE!

 DROUGHT! 

TORNADOES!

 INVASIVE SPECIES! 

RISING SEA LEVELS!

This list of doom could get long but I’ll stop. The worst scenario we have going at the moment is waking up this morning to a Currier and Ives Christmas card. You might feel like enough is enough but don’t fear the snow, its adding much needed moisture and nitrogen to our environment. It really won’t stay around much longer. By late this afternoon all of the new snow had melted and the existing snow was attempting to. Patience.

The greenhouse is holding its own. There is a high/low thermometer in there so we have a good idea of what’s happening. Also the fan automatically comes on which is excellent. I’ve had the door open a couple of times already ~ not today.

There is a tendency to ask too much of a greenhouse. You really don’t want it to get too hot. I like a low of 40F and no higher than 80F. It has proven to be more difficult to control the higher temperature. There are vents and, of course the door, but it takes a good bit of monitoring to keep the temperature even. This is just one of the reasons why you need to give a greenhouse a great deal of thought before you either buy or build one. They are a lot of work.

That said, all of the plants in there are as happy as can be. I have extra tomatoes started for two friends and extras for me in case something horrid happens to the ones already planted in the bins. The vegetables are almost all started, annual flowers are broadcast into three inch pots. These will be divided as they gain strength and potted into individual pots. There will be too many of them but they usually find a home so that’s heartening.

The West Garden is bursting with minor bulbs. I love the minors. Once they have bloomed their spent foliage will be covered up by the perennials and shrubs that they are planted either underneath or near. The larger bulbs ~ daffodils and tulips for instance, will have huge leaves that you will need to let die back so they can feed the bulb from whence they came. That process seems to take forever. Plus the variety in the minor bulbs is so fascinating, you’ll get hooked on looking for more and more different varieties, most will do well here.

As I told you last week I went ahead and uncovered the bed, crossing my fingers that the temperature wouldn’t drop into the teens. So far its holding in the mid 20s for a low. The little bulbs seem to be unfazed by this, bless their hearts.

The crocus that had the most protection over the winter are blooming. By protection I mean the natural material from the perennials and shrubs they are planted among. I’m not big on adding extra mulch, although this is the time of year ~ with the freeze/thaw cycle in full swing, that it proves beneficial. I’m trying so hard to keep the foxgloves alive, they should have a good bloom this year but bulbs are growing among them and I can’t remove the spent foliage to set them free because it will uncover the foxgloves. I’m sure there are those of you who remember Ann Nixon and her magnificent foxgloves in Halibut Cove Lagoon, a whole mountainside of naturalized foxgloves. I have a photo on the refrigerator ~ a forever memory.

I have a subscription to The English Garden magazine. Sometimes I renew and sometimes I let it lapse. But I have it to thank for camassia, a bulb I had never heard of and that loves it here in the Far North. Be sure to add that to your list for this fall. It will even multiply. And its gorgeous.

I have also learned to leave the fritillaria meleagris alone, let them seed, multiply, run rampant. Which they do with zest.

But, back to the magazine, the gardens are so improbable, so out of reach, so in need of a team of gardeners. Vast sweeping beds of color. Every now and then they feature someone with a little garden and my heart sings. Now there is something we can learn from.

I love to have garden parties and I don’t want guests to feel bewildered in the garden, I want them to be comfortable, to enjoy the overall ambience. Think about this as the season progresses, albeit slowly.

Every spring Debi Poore brings me a handful of blueberry branches that soon bloom! Joy!

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