Posts Tagged ‘Gardening’

I’ve been in love with pitcher plants since we came across a log-potted growth of them at Bok Tower Gardens a few years ago.  I bought two earlier this summer to place on the back patio, partly to see if they’d make a dent in the insect population, but mainly because they’re just gorgeous.   […]

Several months ago I placed an order for about six different bearded irises from Nola’s Iris Garden.  Unfortunately, with all the reorganization we did out front, I completely ran out of room for them, and had to cancel the order.  Broke my heart to do it, since Nola has some spectacular Iris varieties, like Apollo […]

Received a load of new goodies for the right side bed out front from Plant Delights yesterday.  I have to say, their shipping packaging was impressive.  Damp, shredded newspaper around the plants themselves, and the pots wrapped in newsprint (sans print, of course), and everything cushioned by foam peanuts.  So, even though it is still […]

It’s official…gingers are my new favorite plants.  The peach butterfly ginger (Hedychium Kinkako) decided to bloom today:   The flowers will open up even wider over the next few days, making the stem appear covered with peach colored butterflies.  Y’know, hence the name.

Another weekend, another back-breaking, sun-baking day of labor in the yard.  Yesterday we finished up the front landscaping and soil stabilization…for NOW, anyway…by extending the front planting bed down the left side of the house. Once again I suck for not taking a “before” picture, sorry, but imagine tall grass with evil thick roots attempting […]

Via A, Thomas Jefferson’s garden journal! I’m going to start doing my own journal in copperplate, dangit.  I look back on some of my garden journal notes, scribbled in haste, with dirt smudges and the occasional squished mosquito as decoration, and despair.

Next year, do this: January:  Clean out beds, add fresh soil/compost/cow manure cocktail. February: Start tomatoes, cucumbers, ground cherry, melons, strawberries and all herbs inside in peat pots.   March: Transplant starters to boxes/pots outside.  Sow first corn crop. April:  Start peppers in peat pots outside in the sun, they need HOT soil to germinate. […]

As promised, the long-awaited (snort) post on Vigna umbellata, the red rice bean. First, some background…  The red rice bean is one of the top five most commonly grown green manure/cover crops in the world.  It grows thickly enough to control weeds, and fixes nitrogen in the soil.  The stems can be used as animal […]

We reluctantly dragged ourselves out of the beautiful air conditioning this afternoon to finish the front right side landscaping…et voila, part deux:   You don’t see this much down here in Florida, the side beds…it’s typically house meets grass in a perpendicular gathering of boredom.  My mother always had planting beds, even when we lived […]

So far this morning I’ve had a kitten with a foaming mouth…another kitten peeing in the dog’s bed…that dog’s bed totally not fitting in the washing machine, having to be stopped mid-cycle and dragged, soaking wet, out of the house to the back patio where it had to be hosed off and now left out […]