Through the Hedge

Native groundcovers

2010-06-08T14:30:00.006-05:00

The Virginia native ground covers are starting to fill in under the mountain laurels.

From TTH20100531

The big round leaves are wild ginger, Asarum canadense. The mounds of pointy leaved plants (word of the day: acuminate = pointy leaved) are Virginia snakeroot, Aristolochia serpentaria. It is the larval host plant for the Pipevine swallowtail butterfly. I have only been found by Pipevine swallowtails once, two years ago. My little neighbor girls discovered the caterpillars and were thrilled. I sent one of them off to school with the cat in a jar and the butterfly book to show her class. She told me the caterpillar spun a cocoon while in her care. I never heard its ultimate fate.

Sweet Bay Magnolia

2010-06-08T14:22:00.004-05:00

This is Magnolia virginiana, the Sweet Bay Magnolia. I think it's a lovely thing. I do admire the big Southern Magnolia but my neighbors have them and they have maintenance issues. For starters, they get huge and I don't have room for another huge tree. Sweet Bay grows to about dogwood size with a shrubby, multi-stemmed habit. Southern Magnolia leaves are very tough, leathery things that do not break down well. They and the big seed heads have to be raked and won't even compost well. I like the color of the Sweet Bay leaves, light green on top and silver below. The flowers have a light, almost lemony scent and a nice waxy substance.

From TTH20100531

Edibles

2010-06-04T15:40:00.006-05:00

The asparagus bed got off to a rocky start this year. Winter 2009 set in early and hard before I got it weeded, fertilized or mulched. Weather stayed cold and wet in the spring until it started sending up spears. I did finally get it cleaned up and it got down to business producing. I love having lots of asparagus to eat and to share. I even got my neighbors, self-described picky eaters to try it. Bob brings me bags of cucumbers and tomatoes all summer so I was glad to reciprocate.

From TTH20100531

The herb bed became infested with wire grass. I spent a day digging it out along with a large dead rosemary bush. That gave me a clear space for the basil and other annuals in a good sunny spot.

From TTH20100531

Moving the basil gave me a little more room for greens. I always say I'm not going to bother with vegetables and then always decide to plant a few. This year it is the Mystery Vegetable at the back. It's a surprise for a friend who remembers it as a childhood treat. It will be harvested in the fall and then I can tell you what it is.

In front of that is some chard, then parsley. Buttercrunch lettuce is to the right. It has been struggling in a heat wave. I hope some will head up before it bolts.

In the fall I will plant some weird kale called variously Lacinato, Tuscan or Dinosaur kale. It has very dark leathery leaves, not curly edged like most kale. It makes a wonderful tangy salad. The kale is stemmed, sliced very finely, dressed with olive oil and lemon juice and then tossed with mix-ins. This week that is radishes, young local garlic and scallions. I could eat a bucket.

From TTH20100531

Rose genetics

2010-06-04T15:35:00.002-05:00

Autumn Sunset

From TTH20100531

is a naturally occurring 'sport' of

Westerland

From TTH20100531

I love them both!

Hedge Roses

2010-06-04T15:31:00.003-05:00

Darlow's Enigma with a few wild Virginia roses (pink) peeking out. DE was a 'found rose'. No one knows exactly what it is but the fragrance can carry clear across the yard.

From TTH20100531

Wild pink roses. Not the dreaded multiflora, a terrible invasive around here, but native Virginia and Carolina roses.

From TTH20100531

Hagen's Woods 2010

2010-06-04T15:22:00.004-05:00

March 21

From TTH20100531

April 10

From TTH20100531

May 29

From TTH20100531

Carolina Allspice in weedy mess

From TTH20100531

Ripening serviceberries

From TTH20100531

Scarlet elder, a favorite early ripening berry for birds. I whacked the bushes back pretty hard in the fall but they're growing fast.

From TTH20100531

New Community Project - Harrisonburg

2010-06-04T14:23:00.003-05:00

I picked up a flyer at Saturday's Farmers' Market. It's for the New Community Project - Harrisonburg, who describe themselves as a "faith-based nonprofit organization with the modest goal of changing the world". I like the looks of their projects and hope this may be an entry point for me to get more involved in community initiatives. I'm always glad to find new playmates!

http://ncpharrisonburg.wordpress.com/
http://www.newcommunityproject.org/grounds_keepers.shtml
http://www.newcommunityproject.org/

Wildflower meadow 2010

2010-06-04T14:20:00.003-05:00

Here is what it looks like at the end of winter:

From TTH20100531

Ideally you burn off the old vegetation but I live in a town where the neighbors and Fire Department would look askance, nay have a conniption fit, if I set fire to the backyard.

I tried an ordinary gas powered string trimmer and it could not cope. It didn't even make a dent in the tough stalks.

This is what I need:
DR String Trimmer
But alas, I lack the $500 to $700 for it and couldn't justify the cost anyway. I used to have one but lost custody in the divorce.

This is what I have:

De-thatching rake

It got the job done but it was a brutal job. I dragged at the stalks with the rake and periodically hacked with a machete, loaded it all onto a tarp and dragged it to the curb.

April 10

From TTH20100531

May 29

From TTH20100531

Mostly Penstemon in bloom

From TTH20100531

Bumblebees love Penstemon. I watched them burrow deep into a flower, back out and bumble on the the next.

From TTH20100531

Roses

2010-05-20T15:07:00.000-05:00

Westerland, my favorite gaudy Kordes rose

From TTH20100531

Plus Ghislaine de Feligonde, pretty creamy apricot thing

From TTH20100531

Equals this

From TTH20100531

My flower arranging skills are rudimentary but this worked pretty well. I cut a bunch of each rose, stripped the lower leaves, laid them on the kitchen counter in layers of color and sort of rolled it up and dropped it in the vase.

Spring Ephemerals

2010-04-10T15:12:00.002-05:00

Bluebells

From TTH20100531

Wood Poppies (Stylophorum diphyllum)

From TTH20100531

Fothergilla, OK, not an ephemeral but a very nice shrub. Honey scented flowers, striking fall color.

From TTH20100531

While we wait for spring

2010-03-10T13:55:00.003-05:00

There's nothing blooming in my yard yet so while we wait, take a look at David Schwinler's pictures of flowers. The site has interesting notes and lovely photos.

Sighting spring

2010-02-28T23:01:00.002-05:00

After this unusually cold and snowy winter there are signs that spring is on its way.

The varmints have emerged from hibernation. The hospital grounds where I work are overrun with ground hogs the size of basset hounds. There are dead skunks all over the roads.

But best of all, I looked out the kitchen window while I was fixing dinner and saw bits of green. I went out and sure enough, where the snow has melted from the long bed along the fence there are daffodil noses up out of the ground! It was already dusk so I didn't try to get a photo but I will soon.

Things for putting things in

2010-02-28T13:48:00.002-05:00

I received an email from SKS Bottle & Packaging, a distributor of plastic, glass and metal containers in upstate New York. Their representative, Kate Rosenberg, says:

"Our site features an index of gardening containers that could be useful for many projects, from seed storage and seedlings to feeding plants and composting. This index could offer both the novice and seasoned gardener many great ideas!"

Site Name: SKS Bottle & Packaging

I took a look and agree that it's a good resource. I am even more interested in their bottles and pots for homemade cosmetics and such. I make a hand salve, a last ditch treatment for gardeners' hands.

I take shea butter that I order from this fair trade site. I warm it in a sauce pan with an equal quantity of almond oil. I pour it into little pots and let it cool. I keep all but the container that's in current use in the refrigerator. I have used four ounce canning jars but these are much nicer.

While you're looking at the shea butter, take a look at these market baskets. I have one I take to the local farmers' market on Saturdays. Most weeks someone asks where they can get on like it.

February 6th, Higher and Deeper

2010-02-06T13:44:00.000-05:00

The snow kept coming. A large branch came down out of the big pine tree.

From 20100206

Carolina Silverbell with the trunk buried and American holly 'Dan Fenton'

From 20100206

The meadow

From 20100206

The shed disappearing

From 20100206

Likewise the porch. Later I let a couple of the cats out and found cat tracks going all the way around the porch. One evidently tunneled under the snow and in through the hole in the screen door.

From 20100206

February 5th snow storm

2010-02-05T13:10:00.003-05:00

We had a heckuva lot of snow for Virginia though we did not get hammered as hard as DC and Maryland did.

Here is when things were just getting started.

Red twig dogwoods

From 20100205

Oakleaf hydrangeas and Sweetbay magnolia

From 20100205

A lovely surprise to find in the snow. 'Jelena' witch hazel in full bloom. I had to shake a little of the snow off before I photographed it.

From 20100205

The wildflower meadow. Click here to see it in its summer glory.

From 20100205

Hazelnut catkins
The funny thing about hazelnuts, or filberts, is that the catkins, the flower, looks like little wormy things while the maturing nuts in their cups look like green flowers.

From 20100205

Fun indoors on a rainy day

2009-11-20T09:27:00.003-05:00

How do you amuse yourself when you can't work in the garden? I have been getting a flood of catalogs from nurseries and garden supply companies. Most of what they're pushing are holiday arrangements and house plants and garden tchotchkes. I'm waiting for the real garden porn to arrive, the nursery and seed catalogs. I love to sit with tea and catalogs and try to figure out where I can squeeze one more plant. In the meantime I will make do with what's on the web.

The owner of a Hometown Seeds sent me this link to their garden seed website. It's a nice looking site and they have a good inventory of annual, perennial and vegetable seeds. Go take a look and then leave me a comment with your favorite sources.

October

2009-10-18T19:04:00.006-05:00

It was too cold and raw to work outside today - strange for the middle of October. I took a quick tour and took a few photos.

A few late roses. This is Buck's Earthsong, the only one of his hardy roses that has done well for me. The rest seem awfully susceptible to black spot.

From TTH200910

Minou in her favorite lurking spot. The neighbor's wood pile is on the other side of the fence and the Chief Rodent Control Officer will sit here for hours waiting, waiting, waiting.

From TTH200910

The front bed, replanted last fall about this time. In the back corner I added a fothergilla to replace the dead Franklinia. There's a mix of evergreen and deciduous shrubs: Winterberry 'Red Sprite' (Ilex verticillata), Inkberry 'Shamrock' (Ilex glabra), Leucothoe 'Girard's Rainbow', Abelia 'Kaleidoscope'.

From TTH200910

I spotted this variegated version of a blue holly called 'Honey Maid' on a recent trip to the nursery. I had to have it even though I wasn't sure what I would do with it. I've decided to extend the back shrub island into the side yard, tie it in with the lone dogwood and plant the holly in the middle. That will also give me more room for azaleas next fall.

From TTH200910

The blueberries have finally taken hold and grown. These are Sunshine Blue, a southern highbush variety. It's supposed to be more tolerant of less acid soil so I tried them near the house. I have 3 or 4 other varieties at the back of the yard so they can all cross pollinate each other. Sunshine Blue is a nice landscape plant with blue green, semi-evergreen foliage and rather showy pink flowers. I had planted two sourwoods to give some height. One survived and is doing well. One died so I replaced it with a white fringe tree. My neighbor has one that's doing well and it's lovely when it's in bloom.

From TTH200910

Meadow in July

2009-07-15T15:18:00.003-05:00

This is the second full growing season for the wildflower meadow. I had imagined it as a swoosh of native grasses studded with flowers. Instead I have a 5 to 6 foot high, solid wall of blooming forbs. I'm not complaining mind you but I'm still trying to revise my expectations. The bees, butterflies and birds give it top marks. Here's what it looked like last year and the year before.

From 200907

May by Guest Photographer

2009-05-19T14:46:00.001-05:00

My friend Karen is a much better photographer than I. Happily she came to visit when there was lots in bloom and took these photos for me.

Mountain Laurels

Snowdrift, I think. I wish I didn't always lose the plant labels.

From Karen200905

Meadow about hip high

From Karen200905

Coral bells in the front bed. I grew these from seed labeled Heuchera americanum. Since the native has non-descript whitish flowers and these range from pink through salmon to red, I got duped. Still, these are pretty.

From Karen200905

Herb bed with chive blossoms

From Karen200905

Roses

Westerland, gaudy but one of my favorites.

From Karen200905

Autumn Sunset, a sport of Westerland. These are both Kordes roses. I have very good luck with them, hardy and though they get some blackspot, it doesn't seem to incovenience them.

From Karen200905

Summer Wine and Siberian Irises

From Karen200905

I've kept planting climbers along my neighbor's board fence. This fall I dug out Rambling Rector, an alarmingly vigorous white one and moved it to a friend's yard. In its place I planted an Alchymist, another Kordes rose.

Either Morning Has Broken or Sunsprite - whichever, it's a cheerful color.

From Karen200905

The Impressionist -
Once in a while Heirloom Roses produces a new rose that makes it worth doing business with them. They send pathetically small, barely rooted cuttings and the shipping from the West Coast is staggering. I had to have this and it has fulfilled it's promise. It's getting some size and will be trellised to my front wall. I think one of the parents is Distant Drums, a really ugly rose.

From Karen200905

May 2009

2009-05-01T20:00:00.001-05:00

May
The first flower on my pawpaw. Maybe next year the smaller tree will bloom and I'll get fruit. I finally got to taste one at a garden festival. It's creamy, sort of like banana but with a hint of something else. The blossoms are rather erotic looking, like something Georgia O'Keefe would paint.

From TTH200905

Some of the established native azaleas:

From TTH200905

I wouldn't stake my life that these are straight natives but instead are some of the commercially available hybrids:

From TTH200905

Azaleas

2009-04-15T18:49:00.000-05:00

Two winters ago I planted a bunch of seeds of east coast native azaleas. These are deciduous and fall into two main color groups: pink to white and yellow through orange to red. I joined two azalea societies so I could buy from their members' seed exchanges and staff from a couple of arboretums kindly shared some seeds. I've written about the perils and plagues of the seed starting elsewhere. These have been in trays or pots through two seasons. I wintered them over in the basement last year and ended up with 18 well rooted, well grown 1 gallon sized plants and 10 more smaller ones.

From TTH200905

The runts are in the basement under lights again but the larger ones are planted in Hagen's Woods, a large island of trees and shrubs in my backyard.

From TTH200910

The small things in the foreground are azaleas. There's also a Franklinia alatamaha to replace the one in my front foundation bed that struggled and died.

From TTH200910

I still have to make more chicken wire fences to hold off the rabbits. If I don't protect young trees and shrubs they will eat them to the ground during the winter.

Basement Light Cart
This is a shelving unit I bought at Lowes. Shelving.com sells the same sort of shelving in any dimensions you can think of. I added wheels to this set and for now am using some honking big compact fluorescents. I bought a bunch of long 'shop light' fluorescent fixtures and tubes and when I have time will hang those instead.

From TTH200910

Garden Bloggers' Bloom Day 4/15/2009

2009-04-15T17:39:00.004-05:00

Today is actually very dark and rainy so I'm going to cheat and show you the flowers I cut and arranged on 4/12 for Easter dinner. Except for the daffodils these are all still in bloom in the yard today. The bluebells have filled in beautifully this year. They look best when they are massed. I didn't think they would last as cut flowers since they are rather floppy in form to start with but they did very well. They started dropping flower heads this morning so I tossed the arrangements when I got home.

Visit May Dreams for more Bloom Day

The last of the daffodils and some sorta species tulips

From TTH200904

Bluebells and serviceberry blossoms for the kitchen table

From TTH200904

Bluebells and pieris blossoms for the dinner table

From TTH200904

Other things blooming in my yard:
Plum tree
Apple tree is in bud
Spicebush is just finishing
Wood poppies are starting

In the Shenandoah Valley the redbuds are in full bloom. The woods edge along the highways looks like someone took a broad paint brush and painted swathes of pinky purple.

April finally had some showers

2009-04-06T18:02:00.003-05:00

We got some very welcome rain and the effect is very visible. Grass is green, violets in bloom, redbuds all along the highway are in the deep purply stage.

I mowed the wildflower meadow and there is lots of new growth starting. Last summer this just swarmed and hummed with bees, butterflies and hummingbirds.

From TTH200904

I have daffodils massed in the long bed by the board fence. This bed cycles through daffodils, Siberian irises and daylilies with tall climbing roses at the back. One of the roses, a hybrid musk called Rambling Rector is becoming a monster. I have an Alchymist on order that I'll grow in a pot this year. If it prospers I may look for a new home for Rector.

From TTH200904

Cats contemplating daffodils

From TTH200904

The front bed has mostly spring ephemerals. And cats.

From TTH200904

Dutchman's Breeches

From TTH200904

Bluebells went from this

From TTH200904

to this

From TTH200904

Shooting Star (Dodecatheon meadia)
I planted a dozen of these last spring. So far I've counted 11 up this year. I love these. The flowers look similar to cyclamen flowers in colors from white through pink to purple.

From TTH200904

Garden Bloggers Bloom Day March 2009

2009-03-15T16:06:00.002-05:00

Head over to May Dreams to see bloggers reporting in on Bloom Day, the 15th of each month.

In my yard:

Crocuses in the rain

From TTH20090315

Cold wet daffodils

From TTH20090315

Hazelnut catkins

From TTH20090315

Mountain Laurel buds

From TTH20090315

Pieris just about to bloom

From TTH20090315

Robins

2009-02-26T08:33:00.001-05:00

I looked out the kitchen window this morning and saw several robins picking and pecking under the apple tree. They are the first I've noticed. Can spring be far away?

Let the blooms begin!

2009-02-01T13:27:00.001-05:00

My 'Jelena' witch hazel on the first of February.

From TTH200902

Baby pictures - Azalea seedlings

2009-01-19T13:06:00.002-05:00

Last winter I acquired a lot of seeds for eastern US native azaleas. I had to join 3 different azalea and native plant societies so I could buy from their members-only exchanges. It's tricky getting them started. You have to sow them on the surface of finely milled sphagnum moss, grow under lights, fight off fungal infections and eventually transplant the babies. The ones that survived I potted up and moved to the basement for the winter. They are growing like gangbusters. In May I'll move them to a protected spot under the apple tree for the summer.

From TTH200901

Listening to Catnip

2009-01-15T14:35:00.002-05:00

I planted two catnip plants in the herb bed last spring. Cats having no ability to delay gratification promptly uprooted and ate them. I bought two more larger ones and the night before I entered the hospital for my knee replacement I planted them out. I figured that would give them two weeks to get established before the cats could get at them again. The catnip plants flourished and all summer I would find cats wallowing and nibbling.

From TTH20081231

Cat, Interrupted

2009-01-15T14:29:00.002-05:00

My smallest cat, Minou, is a skilled and dedicated hunter. She has been staking out a spot in the back flower bed for weeks. I have seen her sit and stare at the same spot for an entire afternoon.

From TTH20081231

Wood pile again

2008-12-31T14:33:00.000-05:00

I did finish moving and stacking the firewood and spreading the mulch.

From TTH20081231

Hedginess

2008-12-23T10:59:00.010-05:00

I love the woods in winter because you can see in and through them. When they're leafed out in the summer they're just a solid mass. My back yard is planted all around with trees and shrubs, some with winter berries, some with colored stems.

Red twig dogwood (Cornus sericea 'Cardinal')

From TTH200812

I planted these first around the base of my big pine tree. They didn't do well, maybe because the tree sucked all the moisture out of the soil. I moved a few to the back yard hedge and gave these to my neighbor. They're planted along our joint lot line. He was surprised to find that they grew about 8 feet in one year and is eyeing them nervously. I told him if he gives up on them to let me dig them and give them to a friend who is planning hedge in a wooded area.

She has some dreadful neighbors who actually cut down a mass of trees and laid out a road on my friend's property. They've erected a fence and now want to plant it thickly with fast growing shrubs. These are incredibly easy to propagate. In the late winter, just as the buds begin to swell, you cut a bunch of long stems, bundle them into fascines and bury them in trenches. They sprout all along the length of the stem. These are supposed to be great for erosion control on stream and pond banks. I suggested that she include plenty of pokeweed so the birds will eat the berries and then poop purple all over the neighbors' house.

Viburnum trilobum (Cranberrybush viburnum) and more Red twig dogwood

From TTH200812

I have three kinds of viburnums in this back hedge. The dentatum berries are gorgeous, gun metal blue, and get eaten as fast as they ripen. Th nudum are beautiful when they are ripening, shading through green, pink and dark blue. They dry to raisins that hang on and get eaten slowly. The trilobums are the showiest, starting out bright red, freezing to a rust color and hanging on through the winter. They'r a food of last resort for the birds and get eaten by the returning flocks in late winter.

Viburnum trilobum

From TTH200812

Ilex verticillata (Winterberry Holly)
I think I love winterberry the best of all. I have at least half a dozen cultivars. This one was a surprise with its pale orange berries. Only the female plants set berries and there are two major groupings with different bloom times. You have to have male plants with bloom times that match. The Forest Farm hard copy catalog has a very helpful chart. Request one here.

From TTH200812

Compost hump

2008-12-22T13:51:00.003-05:00

I've moved the black compost bins behind the new shed and piled the extra in a hump. When I have a minute I will cover the hump with burlap, InterBay mulch style. The moist dark is supposed to promote the growth of micro-organisms and the barrier protects your larger wormy things from predators. I gave it a try last year and it did produce lovely compost.

From TTH200812

Pruning

2008-12-19T16:10:00.005-05:00

I have one huge old apple tree in my back yard and have planted a variety of smaller fruit trees. The apple kept growing out and over the porch roof, threatening to damage the shingles and clogging the gutter.
Last summer the peach tree was so loaded with peaches the weight nearly tore it apart. I had an arborist come out to see if my storm-damaged elm could be saved and had him give me an estimate on pruning everything that needed it. They came yesterday and I took the morning off to watch and try to learn. He was great about explaining what he was doing and encouraged me to give it a try on the smaller trees next year. I have a couple of books on pruning but had remained pretty timid about it. It really helped to see a live human perform on live trees.

After Pruning shots

Peach tree

From TTH200812

Apple tree

From TTH200812

The tree guys cut up the big branches for me so I now have three baskets of applewood chunks for smoking. I think they give the best flavor of any smoking wood.

From TTH200812

My old electric smoker finally burnt out with a bang and a shower of sparks. I bought this cabinet style smoker to replace it. I have an irrational fear of propane that dates back to Girl Scout camp and old Coleman stoves and lanterns which were notorious for blowing up in your face. Maybe next summer I will get up my nerve to buy a gas canister and try the smoker.

From TTH200812

Firewood

2008-12-19T15:55:00.008-05:00

I have a woodstove in the basement that I light when I'm working down there. It's also the only back-up heat for my all-electric house. I have burned up almost all of the wood I had on hand and couldn't find anyone who would deliver less than a cord. A cord is a lot of wood when it's piled in the driveway. I've moved about a third of it to the back yard now and will pick at the pile as the weather permits.

From TTH200812

A small amount is stacked right outside the back porch door so I can grab it and drop it down into the stairwell.

From TTH200812

The rest has to go behind the new shed.

From TTH200812

Minou the mighty hunter regularly patrols my neighbor's woodpile so I told her she was to have her very own. She spent one entire afternoon staking out a spot in the bed on my side of the fence with his woodpile on the other. I don't know what she was hunting and don't know if she caught it but she was very absorbed in the enterprise.

From TTH200812

Cat, Interrupted

From TTH200812

Mulching

2008-12-01T11:44:00.002-05:00

It took about 4 hours to spread mulch on the newly planted front foundation bed and the bed of blueberries at the end of the house. I was OK while I was working but my back and legs seized up that evening. I went over to a friend's house for dinner and didn't think I was going to make it out of the car and up her walk. A scotch and some wine helped.

From TTH200811

November

2008-12-01T11:40:00.002-05:00

It's looking more and more wintry. The bright colors have faded to tans and grays, punctuated by some red berries and stems.

From TTH200811

Laurel Hell

2008-11-13T17:03:00.003-05:00

I've planted this bed with mountain laurels and native woodland ground covers. Kalmias grow slowly but I hope they will eventually mound up and make my own little 'laurel hell'.

From Through the Hedge

Mountain Laurel - Kalmia latifolia

From Through the Hedge

Goldenseal - Hydrastis canadensis

From Through the Hedge

Wild Ginger - Asarum canadensis

From Through the Hedge

Virginia Snakeroot - Aristolochia serpentaria

From Through the Hedge

Jack in the Pulpit - Arisaema triphyllum

From Through the Hedge

This fall I added more native groundcovers:
Virginia snakeroot, Aristolochia serpentaria
Rattlesnake plantain, Goodyera pubescens
Allegheny spurge, Pachysandra procumbens

Autumn colors

2008-11-11T16:26:00.001-05:00

Itea virginiana 'Henry's Garnet'

From TTH200811

Viburnum nudum 'Winterthur'

From TTH200811

Winterberry, Ilex verticillata, an orange berried variety.

From TTH200811

More winterberry and coral honeysuckle, Lonicera sempervirens. This native, non-invasive honeysuckle gets red berries too. It scrambles up over the winterberry shrubs and makes a nice tangle.

From TTH200811

Red twig dogwoods, Cornus sericea 'Cardinal'. This variety gets cherry red stems in the winter. I had originally planted it in the front yard under a big pine tree. It never did well there so I gave some to a neighbor and planted some in the mixed hedge in back. We've both found it gets much brighter color in full sun.

From TTH200811

Fothergilla, two varieties, one the species and one Mt. Airy. Can't beat this for brilliant color.

From TTH200811

The Shed

2008-11-11T14:05:00.005-05:00

Here it is in all it's concrete floored, vinyl sided, non-leaky roofed glory. I moved in here in 2001 and the shed needed replacing then. It never rose to the top of the priority list because there was always something more important and because I knew this was going to be a big job. There isn't enough clear space at either side of the yard to have a ready made shed hauled in and I knew I was going to need the old one taken down, the cracked concrete dug up and a new foundation poured before building could begin. I had one picked out at Lowes but they and their installers aggravated the life out of me and I ended up calling the contractor who has done all the previous work on my house. This is the shed that Burt built.

From TTH200811

Inside it has shelves all along one wall. I'm going to add hangers for the tall garden tools. There's even room for the garden cart.

From TTH200811

Behind the shed
I had them build me a canoe rack so I could finally get it up off the ground. I can't tell you how many times I've had to drag it around the yard to get it out of the way of garden projects.

From TTH200811

The new cart tracks to the back yard:

From TTH200811

The contractors used a front end loader thing to move materials to the back yard. There was some inevitable damage to the lawn. I have some grass seed to sow if it ever rains around here again.

I don't seem to have many pictures of the old shed, probably because it had become such an embarrassment. Here's a shot from last winter that includes the tarp I had to stretch over the roof. The big spruce had knocked a hole in the roof so I nailed up plywood from inside and the tarp outside. Not pretty but it got me through one last winter. Do note the door hanging on my a shred. I tried screwing the hinges back on but the wood was so punky they wouldn't hold.

From First snow of 2008

The new shed is 12 by 12 feet, much bigger than the old one. The mower and garden cart fit nicely. It has floor to ceiling shelves along one wall and I was able to move all the garden clutter off the back porch, making it much more habitable.

Front foundation bed

2008-11-11T13:50:00.000-05:00

While I was home this summer recovering from the double knee replacement I had time to sit and contemplate the front bed and consider how little it pleased me. I had originally planted it with a variety of deciduous azaleas in yellows and oranges and then underplanted it with wild columbines and wood poppies. The result was a mess. The azaleas are leggy and ratty looking except when actually in bloom. The underplanted perennials made weeding a real chore. This fall I dug everything out, moved the azaleas to the back of the house and the columbines to the corner and bought a selection of low growing shrubs, most of them broadleafed evergreens. I'm very pleased so far with the effect and will see how they do over the winter.

Before

From TTH200811

Things in pots

From TTH200811

Leucothoe 'Girard's Rainbow'
I like leucothoe though it has a reputation for getting a bit messy with leaf spot and scorch. We'll see how these do.

From TTH200811

Winterberry 'Red Sprite'
A low growing, deciduous holly. I have some of these along the fence line in the backyard too.

From TTH200811

Abelia 'Kaleidoscope'
Small pinkish flowers on variegated foliage. These were just humming with bees at the nursery.

From TTH200811

The dark green shrubs are inkberries, Ilex glabra 'Shamrock', a dwarf cultivar.

From TTH200811

Beau thinks it looks much better now.

From HOC200811

Franklin Tree

2008-11-11T13:45:00.001-05:00

Read here about the Franklinia, discovered in the 18th century by the Bartrams, named for his friend Ben Franklin, and now extinct in the wild. All of the ones in cultivation are descended from a few seeds the Bartrams collected so the population is limited and genetically fragile. Here's a picture of mine. It has been in the ground for several years and is about 4 feet tall now. This one is a touch chlorotic but the flowers were lovely.

From TTH200811

The buds look like slightly fuzzy, pale green ping pong balls.

From TTH200811

Welcome visitors

2008-11-11T13:22:00.000-05:00

I will plant just about anything that is reputed to be attractive to butterflies or hummingbirds. I've tried to include host plants for butterfly larvae, especially for the varieties that have a very specialized diet, even when the plant is not very showy. Pipevine Swallowtail caterpillars eat pipevines, plants in the Aristolochia family. Dutchman's Pipe is a huge climbing vine. I don't have a suitable place for such a big thing and blanch at the thought of encountering fat black worms at eye level. Or horrors, having them drop on me from above. Instead I hunted far and wide and found one source for Virginia Snakeroot, Aristolochia serpentaria. Rod Angeroth runs Loess Roots and sells well grown, bare root plants. A few years ago he very kindly let me have some seeds and I grew the first few dozen plants myself.

From TTH200811

Late this summer I discovered an odd caterpillar crawling along my front sidewalk. It was unlike anything I had seen before so I got the butterfly book and found it was a PVS caterpillar! I tenderly picked it up on the end of a stick and carried it over to the bed with the snakeroot. OK, maybe that doesn't sound very tender but there's no way on earth I'm going to touch one. I found about a dozen more cats busily devouring the snakeroot plants. My young neighbors made the same discovery and brought their caterpillar to be admired. I explained what it was, showed them the snakeroot that it eats and loaned them the butterfly book to accompany the thing in to school for Show and Tell. I'm told that it spun itself a cocoon while in their custody.

I decided I didn't have nearly enough plants so ordered some from Rod. He shipped some great plants, much larger than my own two year olds with nice thick root systems.

Still life with apples

2008-11-11T13:18:00.001-05:00

From TTH200811

I have a big old apple tree at the corner of my back porch. There's no record of what type it is but a neighbor said he think it might be a Stayman. At any rate the apples are wonderful, very crisp and tart. The tree is way too big to spray even if I were incline so I will not bite directly into an apple without dissecting it first. Here are the last few in a plastic trug purchased from White Flower Farm though they're pretty widely available. It's lightweight and very sturdy and I find myself using it even more than my usual cheap plastic laundry baskets for weeding and hauling around the yard.

From Garden20070620

Hollies

2008-11-11T12:03:00.000-05:00

A few years ago I planted two different American Holly (Ilex opaca) cultivars. They couldn't be more different in form. I have of course lost the tags so can't tell for sure which is which.

One is growing very narrow and upright. It lost about a foot off the top in an ice storm last winter but seems to have developed a new central leader and will probably keep to a nice pyramidal form. I think it may be Dan Fenton.

From TTH200811

One lost its center to some insect damage and seems determined to grow into a shrub with no distinct leader. I don't know what it will look like when it gets big. I think this is Satyr Hill.

From TTH200811

Fothergilla

2008-11-11T11:49:00.000-05:00

In all its autumn glory.

From TTH200811

I've fiddled around with this bed. It's planted with fothergilla, dwarf itea and clethra, and New Jersey tea. Each shrub has fuzzy white flowers, some of the fragrant and all of them attractive to nectaring insects. Something is in bloom here through most of the season. I let violets grow up under them which looked lovely while they were in bloom and like crap later on. I've weeded them all out again but that will probably be an ongoing task.

Zen cat

2008-11-11T11:40:00.000-05:00

I usually spare my garden readers the cat pictures but here under the bird bath is a favorite basking spot for the cats.

From TTH200811

Sourwoods and Blueberries

2008-11-08T15:28:00.000-05:00

This bed is anchored by two sourwood trees, both still very small. They do not transplant well after they get big so the best approach is to plant small and wait. It's filled in with Sunshine Blue blueberries, a southern highbush cultivar that is supposed to top out at about 4 feet. They are especially attractive with blue/green foliage, hot pink flowers, tasty fruit and great fall color.

Probably sometime in July

From TTH200811

And again in November

From TTH200811

Autumn Sunset Rose

2008-11-08T14:54:00.000-05:00

This is the second year for Autumn Sunset.

From TTH200811

It is a sport, or genetic variation, of one of my favorite roses, Westerland.

From Roses 2007

Asparagus 2008

2008-11-08T14:49:00.000-05:00

This was the third year for my asparagus bed and the first year for harvesting. The thing about asparagus is that it all comes in at once and for a few weeks you have to check it and cut daily and eat as much as you possibly can before it's gone. Friends are usually quite willing to absorb the surplus. I cut asparagus and put it in my trug and carried it all around the yard and felt quite like Gertrude Jekyll.

From TTH200811

Wildflower meadow - 2008

2008-11-08T14:26:00.000-05:00

Here are some pictures of my new wildflower meadow as of July. The wretched looking red shed is now a thing of the past. I'll show you my nice new one in another post. Follow the label 'meadow' to see the history of this project.

I hadn't expected that I would see many blossoms this first year since I had read that a lot of prairie plants spend their first year growing roots. I was pleasantly surprised at the number and variety of blossoms. The meadow buzzed all summer and into September with honey bees, bumble bees, butterflies and hummingbirds.

From TTH200811

Wildflower meadow with heavily laden peach tree

From TTH200811

Stinkhorn

2008-11-01T18:24:00.001-05:00

This stinkhorn fungus popped up in my side yard. I will refrain from comment.

From TTH200811

I'm back

2008-09-05T12:47:00.001-05:00

I took a forced break from both gardening and blogging while I had both knees replaced. This is the three month anniversary of my new knees. I'm so thrilled at how well I have recovered that yesterday I stopped off and bought shrubs to completely replant one of my front foundation beds. Expect detail soon.

Bluebells

2008-03-24T13:22:00.001-05:00

The Virginia bluebells are up in the front bed in front of the oakleaf hydrangeas.

Last year I started some heuchera from seed and planted them out in front of the bluebells. They made it through the winter but the bronzy leaves disappeared into the mulch when I tried to photograph them.

Tree planting

2008-03-24T13:12:00.002-05:00

A local nursery was able to find me 'Moonglow' a particular cultivar of Sweet Bay Magnolia (Magnolia virginiana). I planted it in my front yard for a touch of something evergeen.

Last year my Forest Pansy redbud flowered, leafed out and died all within a few weeks. My neighbor's well established one died too. Neither of us could think of an explanation so I was reluctant to plant another one. Instead I got a Black Tupelo (Nyssa Sylvatica) to plant in that spot in Hagen's Woods. I had wanted another shade tree anyway and this is supposed to have very good fall color.

Nyssa sylvatica

Buds of Spring

2008-03-24T13:02:00.003-05:00

In high school I sang with a madrigal group and loved this one, by Wilbye I think.

Now every tree renews its summer green.
Why is your heart in winter's garments clad?
Then either spring with buds of love again
Or else congeal my heart with your disdain.

Easter afternoon I wandered around and took some photos of buds in my yard

The peach buds looked like fuzzy pussywillows.

The serviceberries will bloom soon. The buds are feathery.

Big fat lilac buds.

Scarlet elder like tiny purple cauliflowers.

Flowering quince ready to open.

First crocus

2008-03-01T12:50:00.001-05:00

March 1, 2008
First crocus of the season.

Let the mulching begin

2008-03-01T12:48:00.001-05:00

I had a brief period this winter without a pile of mulch in my driveway, probably confusing visitors who had come to count on it as a landmark. The new pile, 12 scoops worth, was delivered last week.

Excavation

2008-02-20T10:48:00.004-05:00

I thought I had done an adequate job of killing the stump of an old flowering quince before I planted the Westerland rose in front of it. No such luck. For two seasons I've been cutting back the shoots as they come up. This past weekend I bit the bullet and started digging. The job would have been much easier before Westerland became a huge, flesh-eating shrub. I'm down about a foot around the stump, alternately digging a trench and using the garden hose to blast around the roots to expose them. I'm hoping I don't find a huge taproot underneath it all.

Later that week - Success!

Weeding

2008-02-09T15:55:00.001-05:00

It was in the 60s this afternoon and I needed some air so I edged and weeded the asparagus bed. I had both wire grass and barren strawberry trying to take it over so it was a fiddly hand weeding job. I don't think a bare patch of dirt warrants a photo.

Witch Hazel

2008-02-09T15:52:00.000-05:00

Now in full bloom for the first time!

Witch Hazel

2008-02-05T11:38:00.000-05:00

My witch hazel 'Jelena' is about to bloom. It has never shown more than a couple of flowers but since my neighbor removed the maple tree shading it it's covered with buds. I'll post photos when they open. The flowers are striking, shading from copper to gold. This is not the native hamamelis but is a hybrid of some of the oriental species.

Snow at last!

2008-01-18T13:00:00.000-05:00

We got the first real snow of the year yesterday. We got about 6 inches and were spared the predicted freezing rain. My yard looked so pretty in the morning light that I put boots and a coat on over my pajamas and went out to take some pictures.

Snow on the rosemary

American holly (Ilex opaca)

Buds

2008-01-18T12:23:00.000-05:00

My hazelnuts are covered with catkins. I doubt that I will ever taste a nut from these shrubs but the squirrels will be pleased.

Berries

2008-01-18T12:18:00.000-05:00

I have planted as many berry-producing shrubs as I can squeeze into the yard. It's interesting to see which ones get eaten and when. Some, like the serviceberries get snapped up as soon as they ripen. Others persist well into the winter and seem to get eaten when birds return in the early spring. Here's what is out there now:

Winterberries (Ilex verticillata)

Rose hips (Rosa virginiana)

American cranberry bush (Viburnum trilobum)

Interbay Mulch

2008-01-10T11:22:00.001-05:00

Last year I tried a slightly different way of composting the yard waste. Interbay mulching is similar to sheet composting or lasagna gardening. You pile the debris into a long hump a couple of feet high and as logn as you like, then cover it with burlap. This originated in the Pacific NW where empty burlap coffee sacks could be had for the asking. I had a hard time finding burlap but finally tracked down rolls of it at the local farm co-op. The clerk there told me they stock it for the drama students at James Madison University. I criss-crossed cord over it and secured it with tent pegs to keep critters from digging it all up.

A couple of weeks ago I peeled off the burlap which was now pretty well sprouted with weeds. I raked up some lovely, finished black compost and shovelled it into the black compost bins for storage. I'll definitely use this method again but will not do it at the edge of my asparagus bed. It gets way too weedy for that spot.

No Mount Mulch

2008-01-03T13:28:00.000-05:00

For the first time in several years there is no mulch pile in my driveway! On New Year's Day I got outside for an hour or so and shovelled and spread the last of it on the fruit trees.

The meadow is seeded!

2007-12-18T10:59:00.001-05:00

I've spent 2 years preparing the soil and last week I finally got to plant! I took all the wildflower seeds and mixed them up in the garden cart with a mixture of peat, perlite and the dregs of potting soil bags, moistened well and stirred thoroughly. I broadcast the seeds by hand and then overseeded with three kinds of native grasses.

Prairie dropseed (Sporobolus heterolepsis) went along one edge. It was the most expensive and makes fairly low growing mounds so I wanted to show it off.

Side oats grama (Bouteloua curtipendula) is the tallest so went in a patch at the back as viewed from the house.

Little bluestem (Schizachyrium scoparium) covered the rest of the bed.

I've read that most of these plants will spend their first year growing deep roots and that it won't look like much above the soil surface. I will post photos as things sprout.

Wildflower meadow

2007-11-20T17:06:00.001-05:00

I spent the weekend doing a final weeding of the prospective wildflower meadow. All the yard waste has composted down to a couple of inches and now that it's raked out it looks like brown velveteen. The seeds have either arrived or are on their way and in a few more weeks when it looks like the weather will stay cold I will sow the forbs and grasses.

Things I will plant next spring

2007-11-20T11:35:00.000-05:00

3 more Sunshine Blue blueberries to replace the ones that got trampled.
A couple more southern highbush blueberries to keep in reserve.
Rosa alba maxima to be planted as a neighbor for Souvenir du Docteur Jamain
Rose 'Safari', a tiny thing from Heirloom that is a gorgeous pinky, salmony color.
A dozen Dodecatheon meadia, Shooting Star, ordered bare root from Prairie Moon, to be planted in front of the oakleaf hydrangeas with the Virginia bluebells.
Magnolia virginiana ‘Moonglow’, a sweet bay magnolia. This will go in the front yard in the space that became plantable after my neighbor removed the dying maple tree.
Aesculus pavia, red buckeye. This will go in Hagen's Woods to replace the redbud that quite mysteriously died.

Autumn projects

2007-11-20T11:25:00.000-05:00

The weather finally cooled off, we had a couple of good, soaking rains that softened up the ground and I've finally made some progress on fall chores. The yard looks pretty respectable now.

The bed along the fence is edged and weeded.
The sprawling roses are now tethered to the fence.
The daylilies and irises are planted.
The pot ghetto under the apple tree has been cleaned up.
The seedlings and rooted cuttings are outside where they will winter over.
The 'meadow' is weeded and raked and ready to be sown with wild flowers and native grasses.
The seedling wildflowers are planted in the 'meadow'.
The asparagus has been cut back.
I have started building this year's compost hump.
The blueberries are weeded and ready to mulch.
The fig is wrapped in row cover and mulched with a couple of bags of leaves I begged from a neighbor.
Dug the red twig dogwoods out from under the big pine tree, planted 4 in the back hedge and gave the rest to my neighbor.

Still to do:

Mulch the blueberries. I'm going to fill in around them so they become an
extension of the mulched edge at the back of the lot.
Shovel up last year's compost hump and see how it did under the burlap
cover
Weed and mulch the main rose bed.
Once I'm sure the weather will stay cold I will sow the 'meadow'.
Repair the garden shed roof. The poor shed needs to be replaced but this
should get me through the winter.

Cooler temps

2007-09-18T14:23:00.000-05:00

This past week we have had a very welcome break in the heat. Nights have been positively chilly and days beautiful. Sunday afternoon I cleaned up one of the foundation beds. I weeded out everything except the violets. I've decided to let them fill in as a ground cover under the shrubs since they are a larval host plant for fritillary butterflies. I saw quite a few investigating the patch while I worked. The back row is planted with fothergilla gardenii. In front of that are some dwarf iteas and dwarf clethra alnifolia. Two of the clethra 'Sixteen Candles' did not make it throught the summer heat. I was able to find 'Hummingbird' locally so planted two of them. I changed my mind yet again about the New Jersey Tea, ceanothus americanus and planted 20 quart sized seedlings as a front row.

All three kinds of shrubs get fuzzy white, fragrant flowers at one time or another during the year. They are supposed to be attractive to butterflies and hummingbirds.

Passionately prolific

2007-08-29T09:31:00.000-05:00

I had read that the passion flower vine, passiflora incarnata, is called maypop because it pops up all over the yard. I can attest that this is true and may become a problem. So far the vine swarmed up all over the Carolina silverbell to the point that it was weighing the branches down dangerously. I pulled a bunch of it off the tree and discarded it but there's still plenty left. It has set quite a few blob shaped green fruits. At this unripe stage they have an odd scent, not exactly pleasant or unpleasant. I'll see what they're like when they ripen. I think they're supposed to be popular with squirrels and other critters.

Change of plans

2007-08-03T12:55:00.000-05:00

It's so much easier to move plants in my head than with a shovel. I have some New Jersey Tea (Ceanothus americanus) that I was going to plant along the back edge of the wildflower meadow. I've been reading about maintenance and realized that you have to mow the thing each year, probably not a good thing for a shrub like the NJ tea. I think that instead I will move the too tall redtwig dogwoods out from under the pine tree in the front yard and replace it with the 2 foot tall NJ tea and keep woody plants out of the meadow.

This is both a host and nectar plant for butterflies. It also attracts insects that hummingbirds need to supplement their nectar diet.

New daylilies

2007-08-03T12:47:00.000-05:00

I am not entirely pleased with my daylily border. There are too many that are the approximate color of a school bus when I prefer clear yellows and peachy colored ones. I'm sure I used to have some of the spider formed ones but they seem not to have made the move from the old house. I found a vendor with amazingly reasonable prices on daylilies and placed an order. I've requested that they hold the shipment until September when the weather cools a bit. Maybe these aren't the latest and hottest varieties but they are pretty colors and think they will improve the border.

http://www.alldaylilies.com/daylilies.htm

Redbud, RIP

2007-07-16T10:45:00.001-05:00

Several of us on my street had nice specimens of the redbud cultivar 'Forest Pansy', the one whose leaves hold a deep red color all season long. For no reason anyone could guess Jackie's tree failed to bloom or leaf out this spring and was finally pronounced past help. I looked out last week and saw that mine had turned completely

Virginia soil

2007-07-16T10:42:00.000-05:00

Every one of my acid loving plants has started to turn yellow, a condition called chlorosis that usually means the soil is not acid enough to allow them to absorb iron. I had applied HollyTone and sulfur to the base of each earlier in the season but my next door neighbor pointed out that the roots have probably spread out further and the feeder roots are hitting our limestone soil. I've scratched the mulch away and applied the same mix at the drip line and watered it in. I hope that's the only problem. My native azaleas, mountain laurels and blueberries are all affected.

8/07/2007 Update:
I think this is working. At least some of the plants are starting to green up again!

Passion flower

2007-07-16T10:27:00.000-05:00

This is a new thing for me. It's Passiflora incarnata, called Maypop because its habit is to die to the ground in the winter and then pop up all over the place in May. I planted it last year and it performed as promised. It's growing up through the branches of a Carolina silverbell (Halesia tetraptera). Here are the first flowers I've seen. It is caterpillar food for Zebra Longwing and Variegated and Gulf Frittilary butterfly larvae.

Viburnum berries ripening

2007-07-16T10:23:00.000-05:00

It looks like all my viburnums set fruit but they're ripening at different rates.

V. trilobum (American cranberrybush) - Partly ripe.

V. dentatum (Arrowwood) - Fully ripe

V. nudum (Possumhaw) - Not even begun to ripen.

Planting a prairie

2007-07-13T14:02:00.001-05:00

I'm nursing my trays of seedling prairie plants, trying to get them through the summer heat until I can plant them out in September. I will then fill in with seeds of native grasses and forbs. When I started the project I knew that it was going to take at least a full year to establish the bed and get the weeds under good control. I hoped to get a good start by planting seeds in trays and overwintering them since many need cold to germinate and spend most of their first year growing a root system. I have some good sized plants blooming from the first winter and trays of very insignificant looking seedlings from this past winter. I'll plant them out but on the whole, I think I invested a lot more time and effort than the result justified. I learned some things along the way but if I had it to do over, would probably just wait until the bed was ready and sow seeds directly.

Some problems I encountered:
My temporary cold frames were constructed from half inch PVC pipe covered with plastic sheeting. The hoops had a rather flattened profile that let snow and water collect and collapse the whole thing. More than once I was out in the sleet cleaning them off.

Then I left the covers on too long and I think it got too hot. Many seedlings fried and died.

The cats thought the cold frames made a cozy place for a springtime nap. Having large hairy beasts lying on them didn't do the seedlings any good either.

Summer doldrums

2007-07-13T13:56:00.001-05:00

The daylilies are starting to make a nice splash of color along the fence.

Hot and dry. Virginia in the summer is hot and dry. The roses look sort of discouraged, the weeds have taken over the blueberry bed. I will spend the weekend weeding and watering.

My sister sent me home from Cape Cod with a rose and some irises that were not doing well in a shady bed. The rose is Mountbatten, sold by Heirloom as Lord Mountbatten. I had one that died so am glad to have a replacement. I'll nurse it along in a pot until the weather cools a bit in September. It's a lovely thing, full yellow flowers with the edges of the petals just touched with pink.

Coral Honeysuckle (Lonicera sempervirens)

2007-06-27T14:14:00.001-05:00

This is a native, not the invasive Japanese honeysuckle. It is not fragrant but is supposed to be a magnet for hummingbirds. I've not seen any hummers near it but I only saw them for about a week this spring even around their nectar feeder.

Coral honeysuckle comes in shades from deep red to clear yellow and I have three different cultivars at the back of my lot, behind the asparagus bed and scrambling up over the winterberry bushes.

Hedge roses in late June

2007-06-27T14:05:00.000-05:00

The wild roses, R. virginiana and R. carolina have already set hips. They'll be a food source for birds and squirrels in the fall. They're supposed to be edible by humans too but all processing instructions sound like a lot of work.

Darlow's Enigma, a 'found rose' and thought to be a hybrid musk, is still in full bloom. It puts forth flushes of white single flowers all summer long and is very fragrant.

Pimping for my plants

2007-06-27T14:02:00.000-05:00

Success is sweet. The cranberry bush viburnums (V. trilobum) have set tons of fruit which is just beginning to redden. Lots of the shrubs I have planted are supposed to bear fruit for the birds. The hitch is, many of them are not self-fertile and have special needs for sex partners. Some require a male and female shrub. Others simply need a second, genetically different member of their own kind. All must actually have overlapping bloom times with their pollinators. The Forest Farm catalog has an excellent chart showing workable alliances for winterberry hollies. The GardenWeb shrub forum has treatises on pairings of viburnums. I had to procure mates and perform the introductions.

Do order yourself a hard copy of Forest Farm's catalog. Even if you never buy from them it's a good reference tool.

Blueberries!

2007-06-21T13:08:00.000-05:00

I have now eaten two ripe blueberries off of my very own bushes. I have about a dozen bushes, none over 2 feet tall yet. They are southern highbush blueberries which I believe are a hybrid between northern highbush and the southern rabbit eye ones. They are supposed to be well adapted to the mid-Atlantic region. You do need several cultivars for cross pollination and overlapping bloom time. They are available from a number of nurseries. I think I have purchased them from Stark Bros. and Park among other places.

I lost almost all of the first ones I planted to hungry rabbits. I don't mean just the berries, the wretched creatures ate the whole plant right to the ground. This winter I surrounded each with its own little chicken wire fence and they seem to be thriving. There must be half a dozen cultivars back there and this one had lost its tag but the berry was large and sweet.

Pawpaw (Asimina triloba)

2007-06-20T10:13:00.001-05:00

This is the larger of my two pawpaw trees. I planted it two years ago and purchased it from Peterson Pawpaws in West Virginia. It started to bloom this year but a late frost blasted the small purplish flowers. My mom grew up eating pawpaws and did not speak well of them. I've read that seed grown pawpaws are quite variable in flavor, as are apples. Some growers have been identifying particularly tasty ones and then selling grafted plants.

Larger trees get a nice pyramidal shape and I like the long droopy leaves.

This is the main larval host plant for the Zebra Swallowtail butterfly.

The Herb Garden

2007-06-20T10:01:00.000-05:00

My herbs are in a bed that wraps around the screen porch. Conditions range from Hot and dry at one end to shady and moister as it disappears under the apple tree and around the far side of the porch. I do a lot of cooking and it's very handy to step out of the kitchen and into the herb garden. The lavender is in full bloom, smells wonderful and is visited by many bees. I cut a handful for flowers and added them to a plastic tub full of sugar. I have a recipe for lavender flavored shortbread that I want to try. Tea party anyone?

In the sunny part I have thyme, sage, rosemary, marjoram, oregano, several cultivars of English lavender.

In the shadier part I have lemon balm and then mint and woodruff slugging it out in one bed.

Basil, tarragon and parsley are in the transition zone from sun to shade.

My cats will lounge around in the herbs and may come inside smelling strongly of mint or rosemary. I need to put some catnip out there for them but it's hard to get it established. Cats have no ability to delay gratification and eat the stuff as soon as it sprouts.

The Impressionist

2007-06-20T09:29:00.000-05:00

From Roses 2007

The Impressionist, a climbing, English style rose from Heirloom Roses. This is just a baby sized plant but produced a gorgeous flower. The bud is bright orange and opens to a lighter orange, shot with yellow and and some outer petals that are pink. It's going to climb a trellis on the front of my house.

Virginia snakeroot (Aristolochia serpentaria)

2007-06-14T08:45:00.000-05:00

Pipevine swallowtail butterflies are one of the picky sorts that can only lay their eggs and raise larvae on a very few plants. Aristolochias include the big Dutchman's Pipe vine and the small groundcover Virginia Snakeroot vine. I don't have room for the big Dutchman's Pipe vine and the idea of meeting big black wormy things at eye level is disturbing so I set out to acquire some Virginia snakeroot. Not as easy as you would hope. Through a Garden Web forum I found a man who grows odd woodland plants. His nursery is called Loess Roots but he doesn't seem to have a website. He provided me with a packet of seeds in exchange for keeping records and telling him how I germinated them. I did one batch the winter of 2005 and another in 2006. They need winter chilling to germinate so I did them in flats of a soil and sand mix and got about a 25% germination rate which he said was quite good. The first ones are planted out in the front bed and the second are still in the pots where they wintered over. I didn't think either were going to come up but they are finally emerging and growing. Maybe next year I will get butterflies.

Roses

2007-06-12T15:25:00.000-05:00

Take a look here for a collection of my 2007 rose photos

http://picasaweb.google.com/susanvhagen/Roses2007

Wild Columbine (Aquilegia canadensis)

2007-06-12T15:23:00.000-05:00

I planted this all through a bed of native azaleas in front of the house.

Jack in the pulpit (Arisaema triphyllum)

2007-06-06T16:13:00.000-05:00

First one, then several of the Jacks I planted in the fall have come up! I've always loved Jack in the Pulpits. I grew up camping in Virginia and Maryland and once in a while we would find them.

Yellowwood blossoms (Cladrastis kentukea)

2007-05-26T16:10:00.000-05:00

This was very small when I planted it. You plant them small because they hate having their roots disturbed once they're larger. Since it has made this year's growth it is looking quite satisfyingly substantial. The yellowwood (Cladrastis kentukea) even put out a few blossoms. It doesn't bloom when young and not every year even when mature so I was delighted to see them. They look like creamy white pea blossoms.

Hagen's Woods - Still working on the big project from 2006

2007-05-25T14:42:00.000-05:00

On one side of the backyard I have planted a collection of flowering trees and shrubs, all eastern US natives. Trees went in first, a disease-resistant Valley Forge elm, a redbud, two American hollies, a Carolina silverbell and a Yellowwood, the tree shown in the center of the photo.

Several of the new disease resistant flowering dogwoods released by the U. Tennessee dogwood researchers. Appalachian Spring is resistant to anthracnose, the others are resistant to powdery mildew.

Each year I've added shrubs: Serviceberry, scarlet elder, Viburnums trilobum, dentatum and nudum, Spicebush, and Rhododendron atlanticum, arborescens, canescens, periclymenoides, and some hybrids of the native azaleas. I'm about to move some redtwig dogwoods from the front yard where I decided they're too big and straggly for the space.

This gave me a miserable job of mowing in, around and between these individual plants. This year I'm tying them all together into one mulched island. I'm using a year's worth of newspaper and making weekly trips to the liquor store for cardboard. A thick layer of paper goes down first to smother the sod, then mulch over top. It's not quite done but already looking good.

My efforts to attract wildlife have, in fact, attracted wildlife, mostly in the form of rabbits. Lots of hungry rabbits. I spent a couple of weeks this winter making small chicken wire fences to go around each young tree and shrub since last winter they mostly were eaten to the ground. 12 to 18 inch high rings seems to do the job.

More viburnums

2007-05-25T13:13:00.000-05:00

One of several cultivars of Viburnum dentatum, Arrowwood viburnum. Fuzzy white flowers now should produce dark blue berries later. Said to be very popular bird food.

Viburnums in Hagen's Woods

2007-05-25T13:07:00.000-05:00

Viburnum trilobum, American cranberrybush

This one has white flowers that look like lacecap hydrangeas. I saw the other day that they have set small green fruit that should ripen and look like hanging cranberries. They're said to be most palatable to birds after they've frozen so are useful for late winter and early spring food.

Wildflower meadow - Big project for 2007

2007-05-22T14:49:00.001-05:00

Winter of 2005 - 2006 I winter-sowed a lot of forb seeds in flats and got a good germination rate. Some the transplants died during the summer heat but I have quite a few in pots to plant out this spring. I did a lot more this past winter and have about 80 flats of seedlings. I'm not sure when the optimal time to plant will be. Here's the shelter I set up for the seedlings. It's made from the supports that used to be part of raised beds, 1/2 inch pvc pipe form the hoops. It was covered with plastic sheeting this winter and I've replaced that with shade cloth. I've got to work on the design. It is somewhat flattened on the top and that let snow and water accumulate and squash it. I left the plastic on too long and I think some seedlings fried. Either that or the cats squashed them since they decided it made a great place for naps.

For grasses I plan to start with three that are native to this area and supposed to be suitable for the soil and moisture. I don't want the very tallest ones so I have chosen Little bluestem (Schizachyrium scoparium), Prairie dropseed (Sporobolus heterolepsis) and Bottlebrush (Elymus hystrix/Hystrix patula).

In 2006 I laid out a teardrop shaped area that covers approximately 1000 square feet on the left side of the backyard. This is zone 6, full sun, mesic in spring to dry in summer. It's Virginia clay soil and a neighbor enlightened me to why I was hitting a near impenetrable layer about 8 inches down in places – an old railway bed ran through there years back. I killed the grass with glyphosate herbicide and have repeated applications every month or so. Used a broadfork to break up the soil to about 12 inches.

It has received most of last year's compost and fresh yard waste. By happy chance our town changed trash pickup rules and my neighbors brought me grass clippings all season. It looks like I have a good 4 or 5 inches of compost now that it has wintered over. I will need to do a couple of applications of herbicide this spring before I plant. I have some awful perennial weeds to get under control.

I'll plant out all the potted plants and seedling plugs, probably in June. In the fall I will direct sow more grass and wildflower seeds and see what comes up in the spring. I understand it takes about 3 years for it to look like much.

Here are the seedlings in the nursery, aka The Pot Ghetto

Weeding

2007-05-15T15:18:00.000-05:00

Last evening I spent a couple of hours sitting in the front planting bed and weeding out a gazillion maple seedlings from around the shrubs, a mix of mountain laurels and summer blooming native azaleas. I found that the native ground covers I planted last fall made it through the winter and are coming up nicely. There are plenty of wild gingers and goldenseals and I'm pretty sure there are three of the Virginia snakeroots up.

Snakeroot (Aristolochia virginiana)

Goldenseal

Wild Ginger (Asarum canadensis)

Mountain Laurel 'Snowdrift'

Spring ephemerals in the front yard

2007-05-01T21:45:00.000-05:00

These are planted in a bed in front of some oakleaf hydrangeas. Last year I added some ferns that will persist after the ephemerals disappear for the summer.

Fringed Bleedingheart (Dicentra eximia)

Dutchman's Breeches (Dicentra cucullaria)

Virginia Bluebells (Mertensia virginica)

Wood Poppies (Stylophorum diphyllum)

Peach blossoms

2007-04-05T22:03:00.000-05:00

Part of my backyard mini-orchard. I have apples, peaches, pears, sweet and sour cherries, plums, and paw paws. Southern highbush blueberries here and there. Mayhaws in the hedge. Maybe this will be the year I remember to spray the peaches.

Daffodils along the fence

2007-04-01T19:31:00.000-05:00

Last year I got up the nerve to ask my neighbor if I could remove the Japanese honeysuckle rooted on his side of the fence that was a constant maintenance headache on mine. We reached an accord and I removed a mass the size of a queen sized mattress. I've now got climbing roses planted here and there along the border. The first show here is a mass of daffodils.