New Rules... and a Personal Note or Two

For the past seven months I have written this blog as well as another one. In this one I planned to follow the progress of my garden in Central Virginia and try to offer insight and advice to newer gardeners. Altho I have only worked my current garden for ten years, and it is the first one that I have developed myself from scratch, I have worked for many years in other folks' gardens - my mother's, my grandmother's, my aunt's, and my father-in-law's. I have learned from all of them, but have enjoyed going my own way with this garden.

It was my intention that the other blog would be a place where I would comment on the world and current events, and whatever caught my fancy. Unfortunately, I have recently found that I have had extensive writer's block for the other blog ... absolutely nothing has caught my fancy! Altho I had plenty to say here, I have not posted in nearly two months because I was so consumed with trying to figure out what to do "over there". Finally, sanity prevailed. I realized that I truly enjoy writing this blog; that this one has the focus that the other has lacked. So, I have decided to let the other blog lie fallow for a while and work here.

Since it's the fall, with winter well on the way, it may be difficult, but it's the right decision. For the next few months we will look at more guest gardens when we can. I have a number of ideas for a "how to" series to help newer gardeners get ready for spring, or to just give basic information. I may do some surfing and see what's going on in the gardening world elsewhere. And, we can't forget the pond - it's an important part of the garden. In other words, I am not quite sure what I'll write about, but I know that it will be related to the garden. I am also committing to at least one post a week thru February. There may be more than that, but I promise at least one.

I hope you will enjoy this blog and will stay with me. If you are not interested, I understand. Gardening is not for everyone. But what I finally realized is that it is for me!

Guest Garden - Urban Style

It's a lovely, crisp fall day in downtown D.C. and nestled among government office buildings and national museums we found the perfect urban garden!

In one of the many triangles formed when "state" streets cross the numbered and lettered streets is a marvelous urban garden plot. The land is owned by the National Park Service and will someday be the home of a monument to Dwight David Eisenhower - president, general, and cold war leader - but for now it is the home of about twenty garden plots.

The lone gardener that morning was a lady who has held onto her plot for years, she told us, and who admitted that although she and a friend have the rights to two plots, she has squatted on half a dozen others as their "owners" have deserted them. Apparently it is difficult to locate the coordinator, so the plots don't turn over very efficiently. When an owner loses interest or gets too busy to keep up with the work, she takes a little piece here and a little piece there to plant a little something more.

On the morning we met she was pulling up veggies that had suffered from the frost last week, and clearing out the last of the summer weeds. She had already cleared most of her two "legal" plots where she grows mostly vegetables and a few summer annuals. In an adjacent space she has some peonies that are buried too deep and need some attention. In another plot she has some Brussels sprouts and in a fourth, winter greens. She showed us several of her neighbors' plots where we found everything from tomatoes to exotic greens and from roses to masses of overgrown.... whatever! Unfortunately, most of the whole plot was in the sort of disarray that happens in the fall when the gardener loses interest, or it gets too cold to get outside.

In some ways this is the Cadillac of garden plots. Much of it is fenced and there is water available. [The killer for so many urban gardens is the need to carry in water. Most people just can't bring in enough water often enough to keep gardens going in the heat of a city.] There are also a couple of lean-to sheds for storing small equipment.

We promised not to tell the exact location of this garden, since the gardener hopes to gather up some more space and doesn't want the competition! She also doesn't want the park service to get the money for the Eisenhower monument any time soon! It was a lovely place to spend a few minutes and to make a new acquaintance!

Fall Projects

It's funny that just two weeks ago I couldn't get any energy or enthusiasm about working in the garden. It was the end of the dog days and both the garden and I had a bad case of the blahs. It's amazing what two weeks of cooler weather can do! Now I have fall projects and am excited to get started!

One: To improve the xeri-garden I started this spring. I've already admitted to you that I didn't let the soil settle before I planted this garden, with the result that now it's settled several inches and I need to add more soil. This week I bought most of the components for Mitchell's square foot garden, so I bought double and will use many gallons of this mix to add to the xeri-garden. I have also done some thinking about plants and have purchased several to finish filling out the box. A recent heavy rain and wind smashed one of the agastache 'Ada' plants, so I also need to do some trimming to get it back into better shape to withstand the winter.

Two: Plant fall asters and other perennials. I picked up five cerise asters to put in the back garden for some additional fall color. There are already some white ones starting to bloom, and some lavender and pink coming along so these will help bridge the bloom gap before the chrysanthemums open.

Three: "Fix" the nandina hedge's "bed". This one takes some 'splaining. Our neighbors at the back are nice people, but their yard is a bit junky for our taste. Fortunately, they have a euonomis hedge about 30 feet long that provides a nice backdrop for my garden across about two-thirds of our lot. It is taller than it needs to be, but I keep our side sheared pretty well, and have used it in my color planning. The hybiscus look great against it all summer as the the fall mums. Two falls ago I took all the little volunteer nandinas we had and started a nandina hedge to fill in the remaining one-third of the lot line. Unfortunately, I laid out the bed by eye, but while sitting on the ground. I used plastic edging pieces to enclose it and when I finished I discovered that it is nearly an s-curve - not at all straight. It is makes life difficult when I am cutting the grass and basically looks stupid! So, my plan is to put in steel edging and square up the bed. Some of the nandinas are now waist-high, so by this time next fall I will actually have a decent hedge back there and I want it to look less amateur.

Four: Irrigation. This is a tough problem. We desperately need to run some sort of irrigation to several parts of the yard, especially those with a lot of shade. I would like to add to our shade gardens, but none of them gets sufficient water to grow the things I would like to add. In all of them the plants have to compete too much with the trees that are creating the shade and there is no natural source of water. Whatever we do will be a big project, so I hope to do a couple of stop-gap things for the winter and then plan out something more permanent. Fortunately, most irrigation systems today can be installed "by the homeowner" and no longer require hiring a lot of expensive work done. I may need to get a plumber to run another outside faucet, but I hope that is all.

I cannot tell a lie. I wrote this two weeks ago and intended to give you some photos, but have just not had the time or energy. Am posting so that I can move on!

Betsy's Garden - Revisited

Early this summer I took you to see Betsy's garden - a wonderful round veggie garden that's pretty much right in the middle of her front yard in a very yuppy west end neighborhood - one where I have not seen any other veggies growing and certainly not in the front yard. Thought you might like to see an update.

Here's what it looks like now. That's okra in the center which is filled with pretty yellow flowers as it continues to provide okra. [We have had two dinners from it this week! - yum!] All around the outside are pepper plants of all sorts - bells of several colors, jalapenos, and dozens that are completely unknown to me. There are some annual flowers mixed in, altho the veggies have pretty much taken over the flowers. In all it's just a riot of happy, healthy plants. Close up it looks like this:

I don't know if she plans to do it again next year, or if she is planning to put in more normal front yard landscaping, but it has been fun watching it grown this summer. Kudos to Betsy for trying something new!