Greetings on the Pink Moon (April Full Moon) 2015!

Moon Gazer, by Hayley Jones

Hello, Wren. It's been a while! But we're still here. I've been enjoying our activity on Pinterest lately; funny, not a platform I thought I'd ever get very involved with. A year ago I thought it was all just goofy crafty stuff, but now I see there is a whole lot of very interesting imagery, art and ideas there. Thank you my friend for convincing me to take another look! And thanks for joining me to post images on my Lady of the Woods and Witchy Gypsy Arty Hippie pages… Maybe some day I will have as many fascinating and beautiful boards as you do!

Spring is coming slowly to upstate New York this year; we've barely had 5 days above 40 degrees in the last month. The snow is nearly all melted except for really shady spots. A few crocuses are in flower and the daffodils are poking up their green shoots. I've been loving the pics of your garden, as always! Let's share some more photos of our gardens here soon, shall we?

Sissy Bananas...

There are probably many, many things in Tampa that don’t mind it one bit when the temperature falls below 40 degrees. Unfortunately few of these things exist in my garden. Even less now after two nights in the 30s.

Bananas are such sissies. They feel faint at 40. Both kinds.

A quick survey shows the blue and the red porterweed are gone again. I lost my entire crop last year, as did most of the nurseries that cultivate the plant. It was late spring before the garden centers restocked. The hummingbirds really love porterweed, so I will probably just keep putting it in.

The brugmansia are feeling woozy and the expected cold front on Monday will probably finish them off. These are well-established plants with deep roots, so they should come back. Some elephant ears are gone; some remain. They grow like weeds here. No problems.

The real troopers (so far) are the knockout roses and the dianthus. The roses in fact did so well with so little attention I planted four more late this fall. They were on sale 2/$10.

I followed this very drowsy bumblebee around the garden today. She fell off the blossoms a few times but got right back up and worked this dianthus. The dry air probably helped her build up some static cling to aid in the pollen gathering. I don’t know if Florida bumblebees hibernate or not but I’m quite glad that there are some flowers for them remaining.

I love bees… big drowsy bumbling bees in fuzzy striped pajamas.

Perhaps the bananas need more flannel...

October Haiku

Tree Shadow

A piece of the moon

Slips down the tarnished dark fork.

Quick grass laps it up.

Hello Peg,

This week in Tampa feels like summer all over again. Last weekend, I purchased flats of the 'cool season' plants... dianthus, snaps, pansies (love those faces!) ... and now they are all languishing in the shade on the side of the yard waiting for that 'cool season' to return. A cool front is forecast to come by for the weekend and there is also a rumor spreading amongst the cloud people that we could see some showers on Thursday. I may plant then.

At least it is an authorized 'sprinkler night'.

For anyone who does not garden in Florida, we rely on seasonal climate changes to augment our irrigation. There is a wet season (June-October) and a dry season (The rest of the year.). The appointed gods of water management control when and for how long residents may use home irrigation systems, including in-ground timed systems, hoses, micro-irrigation and just about everything else.

This October, while beautiful and in the mid-80s (until this week), has been extremely dry. So we have to water. On Mondays and/or Thursdays between 6 p.m. and 8 a.m.

I may just try sweet talking the cloud people first.

October Blessings,

Wren

Tulips! and those lovely end of season sales...

Good morning, Wren!

Today is sunny but cold. I sat outside having my coffee and pumpkin bread a little while ago, angling in my chair to have the sun on me! It should warm up soon. I plan to keep planting tulip bulbs today. yes, my box of 300 tulip bulbs arrived this week! It's a selection of Emperor tulips, early tulips that tend to perennialize. The selection includes red, orange, and white Emperors, plus yellow (Purissima), pink (Albert Heijn, pictured left) and pink/white (Flaming Purissima) varieties. The gardens at Emack and Bolio's will get all of the reds, plus some orange and white. Most of the yellows will go to one of my clients in Delmar. I may sneak in a few orange and pink ones in the various beds at Brushwood (Todd and I will be going out there the weekend of my birthday, and the following weekend my friend Krissy and I will go for Samhain). I love that these bulbs can be planted as long as the ground is not frozen; I've planted them as late as December!

Planted about half of the Albert Heijns and Flaming Purissimas yesterday; worked in some peat moss and manure mix to the soil which tends to be heavy clay. I am jealous of the Delmar soil which is loose, sandy loam! I must have already added at least a dozen bags of manure, mushroom compost, and 3 or 4 huge bags of peat moss to my garden since we moved in May. Plus some blood and bone meal to the roses and hydrangeas.

Doncha just love those end of season sales?!? I got a lovely Miss Bateman clematis at Lowe's the other day for half price; I'd been lusting after ordering one online for months. Also ordered a few more bulbs from van Bourgondien: some Delnashaugh daffodils, plus a mix of different yellow daffodils, some Ballerina tulips (a lovely orange lily-flowering tulip, which flowers in May, after the Emperors are done), some blue alliums, some Cote D'Azur lilies (fuschia!) and a few mixed Asiatic lilies. Also some white grape hyacinths, and some Blue Pearl crocuses. I confess: spring flowering bulb season is my favorite season in the garden.

But I am really enjoying my mums! I transplanted a few from my old yard, and ordered a couple from a catalog, and have bought quite a few from the neighborhood greenhouse, Lowe's and Home Depot. I have many colors now! (No, that photo is not from my garden!) Deep burgundy, bronze red, reddish orange, medium orange, golden orange, peachy-salmon, medium lavender, pale lavender, magenta, white, yellow, and a gorgeous rose pink. I love how most of them have girls' names: Fiona, Hannah, Sly Jenna, Beth, Spicy Cheryl, Golden Cheryl (Cheryl gets around, apparently), etc. Some faves I love but do not have yet are Penelope (buff peach) and Victoria (pale pink).

I just went through a bunch of photos taken in my garden this summer and am going to post an album of them on Facebook...but here are some favorites!

Asiatic Lily; I forget what the name is.


Green Man sundial in my herb garden.


Bunny in the yard next door, captured just after that Green Man photo!


A blue columbine; this was taken in early August! It came from the greenhouse and I planted it in August so it bloomed way later than normal.


"Bon Bon" Cosmos: I planted these from seed. Photo taken in early September.


One of MANY bees that covered my cat mint for weeks on end!

October means planting bulbs!

Good morning, Wren! We had two luscious days of rain and the flowers are shaking off their droplets and shining again! I also received the beginning of my spring bulb shipment this week, from Van Engelen and John Scheepers; really they are the same company, but Van Engelen sells in larger wholesale quantities.
So, I have some Twilight crocus bulbs, some Gypsy Queen and Sky Jacket hyacinths:
and some other blue bulbs, like Valeria Finnis muscari, and English bluebells (which are endangered, because of cross hybridizing with Spanish bluebells; the bulbs sold as English bluebells are a close imposter I guess, since it's illegal to dig them up in the wild now).
I must confess, spring flowering bulbs make spring my favorite time in the garden! But of course right now I am loving the mums, asters, zinnias and marigolds: so colorful! Next up: photos of my own gardens...

Too Early To Harvest...

Hi Peg! I am watching the Weather Channel daily now and eagerly anticipating the arrival of the 'fall cooling front'. It's a Florida tradition: the boundary between the 'hot weather plantings' and the 'cool weather plantings'. One day it's summer; the next day it's autumn. It can literally happen just like that.

I was at the garden center this weekend and did manage to resist the lure of teasing blossoms. (It's too early.) I left only with the honeysuckle shears I came in for. But promises were made... Oh yes, promises were most definitely made and the dianthus, phlox and grinning pansies know I'll be seeing them again soon.

Fall Puts On Some Lipstick

Hi Peg,

It seems strange to speak of fall when it will still be around 90 degrees here in Tampa for a few more weeks. But the gardens know it is coming.

The backyard sages are almost leafless now and I'll prune them to the ground next week. The pentas are bit bedraggled but since the bees are still working them over, I'll leave them until I can get some pansies, dianthus and snapdragons in the beds.

The bromeliads that Don Waterhawk planted for us around the Norfolk Pine in the front yard are about to bloom. No asters and red maple leaves for we Floridians! We're bringing out the lipstick!