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... 

May showers bring June flowers

 And still, it rains. The most astonishing part about this incredibly wet spring has been how dry the ground remains.  The wet weather has certainly pushed certain plants to show off in the most spectacular way, especially the iris.

 

I'm so happy to discover I can photograph some of my garden during the Golden Hour; my previous house was positioned perfectly to capture the beauty of my gardens as the sun waned, and I had thought I lost that magic light here.

Other perennials in bloom at the moment:

bleeding heart

columbine

catmint

ragged robin

clematis

I forget...

 

 

I'm astonished by how quickly the peony I planted by my little fence in front of the house established itself.  I really didn't expect it to bloom this year, or be quite this full!  I'm debating whether to plant another cream colored one on the other side of the gate, or a pale pink.

pale pink in the hillside garden

 Vegetables are doing well, too.  The lettuce is small, but it's growing.  The cabbage seeds have begun to push through the dirt.  Peas are growing well, and the potatoes have begun to send leaves through the soil.  My leeks are doing very well and the carrots are coming along.  I'm still moving perennials out of the hillside beds and to locations here and there.  

Finally, Nugget Watch 2025 has begun.  The old hen and an auntie hen have been hanging around the pasture for about a month now, and the other day I spotted the old hen with two nuggets!

 No sign of auntie hen, so I'm not sure if she was able to hatch any chicks yet.  Fingers crossed these two little ones are able to make it through the summer.

And once again, I'm holding my breath and allowing the boys to go on pasture.  Flea's insulin was within normal range, the lower end of normal, in fact.  I was so happy I cried.  I cried again watching him and Fargo race around the grass track yesterday.  It finally feels like I have my boys back. I can't wait to get the rest of the track done now!

Battle of the Microscopic Plant Killers

 Ugh.  I've been infested with white flies and what I believe are scale insects.  How does this happen?

The scale insects hitched a ride home with my baby bay leaf tree.  Sure, it was purchased at a reputable nursery, but that doesn't mean these places don't suffer from the same pests we do at home.  For the last year and a half I've been giving the bay tree bi-monthly rubbing alcohol wipe downs.  This has slowed the damage of the scale insects, but not stopped it.  Worse, they seem to have spread to other plants.  My celery plant is now covered with them.

 Yuck!  I cut the worst infested leaves and stems and soaked the plants with an insecticidal spray soap.  If you ever need to do that, pure Castile soap is fine; Dr. Bronner's sells liquid soap in varying sizes.  

Some of these pests are difficult to notice, but many of them secrete "honeydew", a sticky byproduct of their feasting.  Thankfully, that's easy to spot; it almost looks like water sprayed on the leaves.

 

I did the same treatment for the white flies.  These little turds look like minuscule grains of rice, and can usually be found underneath plant leaves.  I, however, found them in massive quantities on top of the soil in my seedlings.  Ew.  I've never seen anything like that, and I can't figure out where they came from.  The only thing I can think of is they were in the potting soil, much like the fungus gnats that hatch constantly.  Again, top shelf potting soil, which is disappointing.  I've read that to be certain there are no creepy crawlies in the soil, your best bet is to bake it in your oven before using.  To me, that sounds like something the companies producing the soil could probably do on a large scale so that each bag is pest free, but that unfortunately isn't going to happen.  So to war with flies I go. 

These are my over wintered Gerbera daisies.  They were really getting hammered on, so my first order of business was to prune them.  I used the same method one would use on ornamental shrubs or trees; take out the dead or diseased bits first, then remove any sections that are crossing/rubbing against each other, and open up the center for better air flow.

 

The plant on the left is pre-trimming, the plant on the right is post-trim. Once they were pruned, I sprayed the tops and undersides of the remaining leaves and the soil for good measure.  Kill 'em all.

 Outside, winter keeps trying to creep back in.  We'll have a few warm, classic spring days then BAM!  Snow, sleet, and freezing rain.  I'm not going to complain too loudly, because despite the snow and rain the last few months, we're still in a moderate drought.  

I just got my wheeled string trimmer back from the repair dude, so I can't wait for decent enough weather to start using it again.  I have the forest garden area to finish, and the bittersweet has already started coming back in spades along the unfinished fence line.  I did manage to turn and spread the manure I've been hauling to the bank garden.  I really want to get the back yard fenced in so I can let Calypso outside.  After about a week of not really being herself without Bizzy, she's started acting like the crazy cat she is again.  The last four or five months, Bizzy pretty much just slept all the time.  Before that, she and Calypso used to have their nightly Cat Olympics throughout the house, racing around and knocking things over, meowing at each other loudly and making skidding noises as they tried to race across the vinyl flooring.  Calypso has started doing that again, but alone it's not as much fun.  I don't think I'm ready to adopt another cat, but I know Calypso loves being outdoors.  I used to have to drag her back into the house when we lived at our last place.  So that's another goal for this summer.  I think that would make her very happy.

I'm starting to get antsy for planting season.  My leeks that I started from seed are about 10" tall, and I may plant them out under a cloche next week.  A lot of my seedlings need planting on into bigger pots, so that's another chore I can do to assuage the yearning.  If the weather gods ever smile upon us and stop sending sleet and snow our way, I can get the new cover on the little poly tunnel.  I've been getting extra chiropractic adjustments and keeping up with my acupuncture sessions, so hopefully my back will hold up better this year.  I've been getting my steps in, but I'm only averaging about 12,000+/- per day.  Hopefully when the weather breaks I'll be putting that number to shame!  

In the meantime, here are some of my favorite photos from the winter season.  Mostly birds because honestly, it's easy to photograph them from the window instead of actually venturing out into the weather.

 

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.