The Bank of Stoneridge

 Ah, dreams.  Projects.  Good intentions.  

Weather.  Time.  Lack of ambition.

My idea to turn the leach field bank into a corn and squash bounty has hit many snags in the last few years.  Once again the weeds and grass outpaced my gumption and I was looking at a three foot tall wall of green.  I even whined to my mother the other day that I just didn't want to tackle this project.  Then I had a change of heart.

Beginning today and lasting through the next three days, we are under a dangerous heat watch.  Temperatures will climb into the 90s with heat indexes potentially reaching 104*.  I needed to get at least one project done while it was still cool.  I had just mowed all the lawn areas and was frustrated by the bank project lying fallow, and so a wild hair was born. I pulled out my trusty wheeled trimmer and my mulching lawn mower, and got to work laying waste to that wall of green.

pre-mowing

post trimming

post mowing

Yaaaaaaaassssssss!  Doesn't that look so much better?  What really floored me was how much the flowers in the pathetic wildflower meadow area really popped once that mess was gone.

I had purchased some Blue Hubbard and acorn squash plants and wanted to at least get those planted before the heat set in, so I dotted them along the bank.

Now I need to keep this momentum up, because over the next few days I should lay cardboard barriers around my squash plants and cover them with mulch to keep the grass from growing back and overwhelming them.  If I can get just the immediate areas around the plants done, covering and mulching the rest won't seem like such a chore.  It's too late to plant corn this year, but I'll be in a much better place next year to plant.

Over on the other side of the property, my cottage gardens are looking amazing.

I can't believe how much it's filled out in a year!  I'm sure I have the extreme wet spring to thank for that.  The foxglove are just amazing this year, too, and lend a real English garden feel to the beds.  I was so happy to find my pastel yarrows that I grew from seed returned, as well as the blue fescue grasses and one or two of the baptisia.  

In the vegetable beds it's absolute chaos.  I haven't been doing well keeping the weeds at bay and the sides of the garden are completely overgrown with grasses.

 The veg proper side looks a tiny bit more controlled.

In the polytunnel, the tomatoes and peppers are doing great.  I actually have a tomato on already!

 The little water feature is doing better this year with less algae growth.  I've used pond shade dye to darken the water, and have added some oxygenating plants.  I've had to cull duckweed twice, but that's the tadpole's food source, so I leave what I can.  I finally brought my little otter statue out of storage and put it where it belongs, too.

The hot gardens by the mule barn are doing well, but I lost a lot of plants this winter.  The kniphofia I planted didn't make it, and the crocosmia are sad at best.  The little peach trees are thriving, though!  And the perennial red mums came back, which is great.  The Lion King Dutch Iris I planted are blooming, and do not disappoint.  My mother will look at them and say yuck - muddy colors, but I think they're beautiful.  I need to add more plants that will give it color earlier in the year, but there aren't many May/June plants that have the red, orange, or yellow colors that I'm looking for.  I may have to move on to annuals next year for the inbetween times.  The tulipa acuminta were stunning this spring, so I'll definitely add more this autumn for next year.

 

 

 

There I go again, making more work for myself... 

Putting the gardens to bed

 Always a bittersweet moment. 

As I pull up the remnants of what was another decent effort in the vegetable garden and cut back dead foliage in the flower gardens, I can't help but chastise myself for not being one of those gardeners who obsesses over each and every plant.  I don't have an amazing yield, I don't grow monster fruits, and I generally fail far more than I succeed.  I wish I had that drive, but I really don't.  Gardening to me is something I think I'm passionate about, but in truth it's more of a passing enthusiasm.  I might remember to water, if and when we have water.  I might remember to feed my plants.  I don't always prepare my soil before planting.  I don't always think about the angle of the sun or the days to germination.  And yet...somehow it always works.  Maybe not impressively, but we get a meal or two, there's always something I can share with friends and neighbors, and there's always a pretty flower to be admired, no matter how black my thumb may be.  Next year, I need to plant earlier.  I missed more than a few harvests because I hesitated.  This winter, I need to start a few more perennial plants from seed.  The money saved by growing my own yarrow, baptisia, and blue fescue grass has me hooked.  These are my lessons for this growing season.

Today I pulled up my corn and squirreled away the stalks for my mother to use as decoration.  After two days of absolutely driving, gusting winds, I was actually amazed they weren't all flattened.

 Once they were pulled, the garden looked so naked.

 But how about that cottage garden?  Both sides are still eeking out a bit of color.  I'm excited to see them next year.

Most of the vegetable beds have been cleared out and augmented with some amazing composted mule manure - it's 2 or 3 years old at this point and rivals anything you'd get out of a bag.  Garlic for next year is planted; Music and Premium Northern White.  I may try a softneck variety next year, but I haven't settled on one yet.  I also cleaned out the masonry tub bed that was nothing but moss and weeds, and gave that a refresh.  I've been ignoring certain beds and it's time I put them to use.

The edges of the garden really needs a good weeding and new layer of bark mulch, which will probably wait until spring.

I managed to tackle the hot borders, which took a day and a half.  I really need to practice better technique; prepare a bed before planting, not as an afterthought!

I don't know why I do this to myself. 

At any rate, I spent an entire day ripping hunks of grass and weeds from around what few plants were in these beds.

Planted some spring bulbs, perennial mums, and kniphofia into the bare spots, and gave each bed a generous layer of wood chip mulch.

I still have some finishing touches to work on, but they're well prepared for winter at least.

On the backside of the house, my homemade hand rails are beginning to show signs of rot, so out they come.  I'll use them as supports for the rambunctious asters on the pond side of the firepit area.  The raspberry trellis was a shot in the dark that didn't work out so well, so I will try something different next year.  The raspberry bushes didn't really get to a point where they needed much support anyway.  I really hope they put some growth on next year.

The gravel paths were about as successful as my gravel patios.  Crab grass is just a nightmare!  I had originally wanted to put in tiered steps using pressure treated 4x4s; I may do that next spring.  It seems like where I want grass, it won't grow, and where I don't want it, it thrives.  But how about the color on that Tiger Eye Sumac?  Just beautiful!

I never think to get a photo of it when it's lush and gorgeous, which is a shame.  I have to say, I'm really happy with this little shrub as it's not the invasive pest that our native Staghorn Sumac is.  Don't get me wrong, I do love the Staghorn; it's a great provider of winter food for many birds, and it gives the landscape an almost tropical feel.  The autumn color is fantastic, as well, but once you've got these thugs they can be difficult to get rid of.  This Tiger Eye, on the other hand, isn't showing any signs of suckering two years on.  Of course, my mother's favorite saying about certain plants is "the first year they sleep, the second year they creep, the third year they leap".  Maybe next year will see this little shrub explode, who knows?

And as it so often happens, over the course of days it's taken me to prepare this post, changes have occurred.  Four days later and we've had our first killing frost.  And so begins the next season.

Black Flies and Mosquitos and Ticks, Oh My!

 'Tis the season!  We're finally seeing the sun and temperatures are creeping upwards.  The grass is greening at a ridiculous pace, the trees are beginning to leaf out, the perennial flower beds are beginning to explode with life.  This also means the little vampire world of ticks, mosquitos, and black flies are hard at work making lives miserable.  I've already picked a half dozen ticks off of me, and the black flies nearly drove my uncle to the brink of madness when he was helping me set up the tiny tunnel.  I say helping, but in reality he pretty much did it all and I just assisted.  So yes, my tiny tunnel is up, and the seedlings have moved from the house to the tunnel!

We set it up in the driveway so it was near enough to a water source and in the sun.  It should receive 6-8 hours daily, with the house shading it in the worst of the afternoon heat.  Once the seedlings are all ready to be planted out, I'll fill this tunnel with buckets of tomatoes to see if they grow better in here or out in the open garden.  I'm really excited to try this!  If it works well enough, I'll find a permanent spot for it so I don't have to take it down every winter.

I also got my aerator set up in the little water feature.  My mom gave me this sphinx-like downspout a few years ago and it has a hole in the center, so I purchased a little solar powered water pump and voilà!  The water is now moving.

I'm not really digging the extreme upspray, so  I might dial it back just a little.  If I take the little cap off the pump nozzle, it will just bubble over and that might be better.  I'm thinking the spray might actually cause the water to evaporate more quickly, especially on a hot day.  Work in progress!  The frog eggs were hatching just when we had a deluge of rain - some areas received nearly 5" overnight.  My water feature overflowed the banks, and I haven't seen any signs of tadpoles since.  I'm not sure if any survived.

Out in the pasture, the daffodils under the mulberry tree are really starting to take off.

There are a few other flowers under there, but the deer ate every single tulip and hyacinth, so only a few fritillaries, squill, and one lone anemone break up the daffodil overload.  Hopefully they'll take off in the next few years and spread to add a little color to the fray.

In the garden the snap peas are sprouting, there's no sign of the potatoes, and I've planted some leeks and shallots.  I need to vacate a few more beds to be able to plant my onions.

The cool weather greens are coming along up at the house planter, too.

Now is the time when everything gets ahead of you.  Keep up!