Sometimes I Don't Plant

I have an area that has been in a state of transformation since we moved into our house two years ago. It sits in a corner of our house as well as at the end of our drive/patio. There is a lot of run-off both from rain and snow melt which means it can be a basement issue. The former-former owners put down a strip of concrete next to the wall to help divert water away from the very old, stone foundation. 

A large hydrangea occupied the space, but it wasn't my cup of tea. Hostas occupied the space underneath with pretty bland varieties and imagination. I tore it all out and started from scratch with plants, but the drainage made that challenging and plowing snow off the end of the drive meant there was always going to be some damage. 

My youngest child was clearing out all the stone cover in her yard from the previous owners. She wanted plants, not red granite. We took home stone over the course of several months 10 buckets at a time until we brought it all home and had a pile on the concrete waiting for the next step. 

 

I scrapped and shoveled and sifted all the soil in this area and used it to fill sunken stump holes in our yard. The buried river rock was sifted, rinsed, and reused in a separate area that already had a river of river rock going through it. The junk went into old wood chuck holes that dot our rural property. Nothing went to waste. I kept harvesting soil until I hit clay. Once I hit clay, the drainage project began. I cut a channel down the center at an angle to pull water away from the corner of the house. Once we have a gutter and downspouts on the back of the house, this will complete the roof diversion of water. The channel met up with the well established low point drainage coming off the concrete. I followed old lines which I outlined with simple edging block which was also a gift from my daughter's house. 

 

 

 

I was gifted a large roll of weed barrier which I usually shun for most landscape projects. I used cheap landscape pins since holding this in place until I got the stone down was my main objective. I have no interest in planting this area, and the stone will never break down like wood mulch into an organic bed. This is the PERFECT application for weed barrier, (second only to putting it in my vegetable garden with my tomato plants to prevent soil splash, reduce weeds, and keep my feet clean). I used pins to hold it to the contours formed by my drainage areas cut into the clay bed right up to the edging. the only area not covered is the concrete strip you see at the bottom of the photo.

 

 

I painstakingly went through the stone rinsing off the soil that had stuck to some of the stone before laying it in my bed. My goal is to have this as sterile as possible, so removing dirt and possible weed seeds was important to me. There was quite a bit just from moving it out of the original beds at its former home. Now I have an area that hopefully won't grow anything and will be an appropriate area to pile lots of snow with some salt from driveway deicer. It does provide a very good area to hold plants during vacation or to serve as a mini nursery area.

 

 

 

 

Home seed gardening 101

The seed catalogues have been coming in since late fall with their beautiful pictures of growing season promises. We look at the costs of seeds and think to ourselves, "I could grow more if..." and you can. You will need extra equipment as most of us don't have a spot warm enough or light enough to grow at home. That is not what I am going to touch on in Seeding 101. I want to teach you about the WHEN of home sowing, not the HOW.

The first thing you need to do is inventory what seeds you may already have on hand so you aren't purchasing duplicates and spending money that your could have used on other gardening pursuits. In 2012, I started to track my seeds more effectively in an Excel spreadsheet.

I prefer the spreadsheet because I can sort this by any of the categories to make a usable tracking sheet while I am in my basement doing the actual work of seeding. I started winter sowing last year with very good results especially for hardy perennials. I can create a list by sowing week which creates a chronological list verses an alphabetical list. It helps me to track when I used saved seed and what year I collected it. There are also the very important notes that I transfer over from the seed packets. This helps me to remember which ones I need to soak ahead of sowing dates or to stratify early enough to achieve better germination. It also has tips for direct sowing outdoors and the temperature needed to germinate seeds indoors or out.

The one question I see all the time which is answered in so many ways is, "When should I start (fill in the blank)?" Someone with unlimited space will have a different answer than the person working with limited resources. The most important part of the equation is your last anticipated frost date. Someone can tell you that you can have your tomatoes in peppers blooming by mid-May in Wisconsin, but that doesn't mean you can plant them outdoors. Both of these are very cold sensitive crops. Even if a cold night doesn't kill them, the set back on blooming can be weeks of delay. The answer for when you should seed them is right on the seed packet. The companies you buy from spend the time and effort of providing this information for you so you can be successful. Follow their advice. The key to timing is not counting forward, but counting backwards. Look at this seed chart which any good grower will use when considering the timing of their crops to transplant time.

Take a look at 2023. On the left side of each month is a gray area which indicates which growing week we are looking at. The first week of the year is week 1. If you look down, you will notice that sometimes the week at the end of the month and the beginning of the month is the same number. When counting back from your frost date, count these numbers just once. Here's how this works:

I plant out my tomatoes and peppers in USDA zone 5b the first full week of June as the earliest date I will do this. In 2023, that is week 23. My seed packets tell me that this can be anywhere from 6 to 12 weeks depending on the variety I am planting. The latest I will plant is week 17 (April 23rd, for 6 weeks), the earliest is week 11 (March 12th, for 12 weeks). If I want my plants to be a bit larger and have the growing space of warmth and light available, I will choose the earlier date. If I have limited area and have to fit more plants in less space, I choose the later date. That is how you time your seeding dates.

I have included this very helpful publication from our University of Wisconsin Extension office which has a nice overview of sowing information for vegetable planting in our state. We do span several growing zones, 3-5, so adjustments have to be made based on which part of the state you live in. Check your own extension office for possible publications pertinent to your own growing area.

Happy planting!

Fall bulb planting

 

We moved into a new home after retiring from our city life. My policy as a gardener is to live life in a new spot for one year before making big gardening changes. It has served me well through the years as I have been able to see and save plants before excavating them from the landscape before I even knew what past residents left behind. Spring bulbs are something that are often lost in our haste to change the landscape.

My first tip is this...if you want spring bulbs you plant them in fall. If you want summer bulbs you plant them in spring. The availability at a good garden center will most likely be what you need to be planting that season.

I have two methods for planting bulbs. The first one above is to dig a trench to a depth slightly deeper than the bulbs I am planting. I then add back the soil to the depth that my largest (and deepest bulbs) will need to be planted. I can then lay out the bulbs in the trench to the desired density. In this picture I am planting one variety at one depth. You can use this same method to plant various depth bulbs at a greater spacing, adding soil after each layer until you finish with the smallest bulbs. If you plant in a perennial garden, it is easy to mark where your spring bulbs are by adding some grape hyacinths as they retain foliage through the summer. This will protect your daffodils or tulips that lose their top growth during their rest period.

My second method for planting is using a drill and bulb planter. This is a great method for inter-planting some larger bulbs such as alliums or daffodils among established plants to add some early spring interest before your perennials show up.

 

 

If you are in an area that is frequented by wildlife, choose bulbs that are resistant to feeding by deer, rabbits, etc. Bulb companies often mark their packages with this information as well as total height of plant as well as planting depth and spacing. Pay attention to planting right side up so your bulbs are point up through the soil, not down and then having to fight their way up. The top of the bulb often comes to a point. If you are planting roundish bulbs, there will be a more pronounced marking on the bottom of the bulb. 

 

Squirrels and other animals like to dig where you have been digging. If that is the case, laying down some mesh after planting will help decrease their digging. You can lift this up before growth begins in spring. There are also repellents that can reduce animal activity for digging and eating. Read the labels carefully to know how it must be used for effectiveness and safety, what animals it is targeting, and any requirements for reapplication after rain or watering activities. Do not over apply any chemical! They have been tested over years to make sure you are safe and that you don't damage the plants you are trying to protect. More is not always better and less does not always save money.

 

It may be too late to get some bulbs in where you live because the ground has frozen for the season. If not you can take advantage of bulb clearance bins to add some color to your spring landscape. My best advice is to buy from a reputable garden center. Big box stores have been a source of disappointment for me time and again. I have purchased items promising one plant to have something different come up in my garden. When you want pink lilies and they turn out white the waiting has been a disappointment multiplied. Mail order from a good company can be worthwhile. I have heard from friends this past year that their bulbs shipped well past the optimal planting time when our ground froze before Thanksgiving. It is always best to try and get your bulbs in the ground that season unless you are forcing them indoors. That is a whole set of instructions that I will not cover here.

 

As we go into the Christmas holiday season, I also begin my next year's plans. The catalogues are already coming... 

Strawbale gardens

We moved...to the country. I was thrilled at the prospect of having more garden space that was truly mine. I would develop it into a varmint-free enclosure where I could start to develop permanent garden beds that were mine, not to be handed off to the next person in line for the residential manager job I left.

That dream was a bit shattered when I stuck my shovel in the ground the first time. We were aware that the Niagara Escarpment runs through our land. Well, it is our land. Bedrock right below the surface. We have successfully planted here and there, but there is no big patch that we will be able to go down into our soil. We have to go up.

Fortune should have it that there is a large pile of old, but serviceable supply of small straw bales in the barn we now own. At first encounter we were thinking that this would become a major undertaking to remove it all so we could use this interior space for other use. The straw has now become a commodity, not a hindrance. 

I picked up books at our local library. One in particular was Straw Bale Gardens by Joel Karsten.  He clearly lays out the whys and hows of using this method. I got busy. I conditioned the bales for my strawberries and put them in.

I also used bales to frame out garden beds for my raspberries. I got a late start on it, so my garden is more of an overwintering plot with hopes that it will hold together through the growing season. In the end, I will not cart away the decomposed bales, but continue to built on this plot with hopes of having the raised beds I planned for my golden years of gardening.

This is obviously just a start. I will come back next spring with a follow-up on how things are holding together and how well the plants overwintered. In the interim, I am going to enjoy studying up and planning for the expansion of the straw bale empire in an old horse coral.

 

Canna potting time...if it isn’t done already

If your canna rhizomes are still sitting in a corner in the basement, now is the time to clean them up and pot them for the season. We did ours about a month ago in the greenhouse since the space and light are available to us. The longer cannas sit in storage, the more likely they will rot. 

I have detailed information and pics from a prior year for preparing and potting cannas. I won’t go over that here. This is just a reminder to pull your rhizomes out and get the season started.

Happy Spring!

 

Canning with ease with a few good tools

I haven't posted in years. My work life has been all-consuming with managing a greenhouse and nursery. I still garden and all those things associated with it. Blogging just hasn't been on the list of things to do. Grandchildren came along and there went the rest of the time I used to use for tracking my gardening activities.

 The corona virus has given me some extra time for a couple weeks. I have been on a close contact quarantine which keeps me out of work. Windows have been washed, the garden cleaned out for winter, vegetables dug, and all those piles of mail have been sorted and filed. Now I have some time to share a little bit of canning tricks I have come up with in the past couple years.

I bought the stainless steel pans so I could cook down maple syrup. They have come in handy for other jobs including canning. I am able to blanch a large quantity of vegetables in one batch. I can steam my jars before filling them. I can process items into them and reheat for canning. They are really versatile.  

The other thing I use a lot is a Camp Chef 2-burner stove that Cabela's sells. I have seen them on Amazon as well. I can do two large kettles at one time with twice the jars...and do it outside to keep the heat out of the kitchen. 

I also have a small fondue pot with a temperature dial that works very well for sterilizing lids and not occupying a burner on the stove. I can plug it in right by my jar filling area and pop them on with a small magnetic tool that lifts them out of the hot water with no fishing around to get them. I also found a jar filling funnel with the headspace marks on the outside so no more guessing. I found a good Foley food mill at a resale store and added that to the mix.

One tool that I find indispensable in my kitchen is an immersion blender. No more pouring hot liquids into a blender or processor. I do it right in the pot that I am cooking in. I don't peel tomatoes for juice or sauce. Just core and cut cut the big ones for cooking. I blend them and then put them through the Foley mill to remove the seeds. Sauces are so much thicker without all the cooking down. Check those out in the kitchen section of the store or on line. You will love it for cream soups as well.
 

Where I work

 I used to have the time to post on a more frequent basis. Since my return to the greenhouse and nursery as manager, my time and energy have have been redirected to a very full-time career. I had the opportunity to get a bird's eye view of our location last summer and took a few shots while above it all. I hope you enjoy a look at the facility from a seldom seen vantage point.