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Gardening Blog (Archive): September 2004
A gardening blog, generally organic.
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Tuesday, September 07, 2004
I hear that...I didn't do much gardening last year. I just felt buried dealing with the kids, and bummed out over the pocket gophers eating everything I put into the ground.
This year though, it was better. Some things did not get eaten by the gophers. It's true they're massively destructive but they do not eat everything (knock wood).
The daffodils sound lovely. We have some existing daffodils so I haven't bought any new ones. They're selling flower bulbs at Costco...I've no idea how good they are, but the price is right. We've got hyacinths--these are one of the symbols of the Iranian New Year. Not any particular color, just the flower itself.
Of course the trick is to get them to flower at New Year; usually they don't. I suppose you could force them indoors but I'd rather plant mine outside!
So...and we got some other bulbs since gophers don't seem to eat bulbs (knock wood). They've eaten our alliums but nothing else. We have tulips and crocus in colors the kids picked out.
Now you have to get a digicam. :) You can take pics of how the yards look right now. Then each year, you can take new pics. We should have done that here, since the yards were both crapola before.
I am going to see how the bulbs work out...I won't photograph them until I see for sure whether the gophers eat them. Gophers are profoundly depressing creatures.
--C. (formerly J.)
posted by TheBroadroom.Net at 1:39 PM (Pacific)
Saturday, September 04, 2004
I didn't do much in the yard or garden this year. Its not that I didn't have big plans for them. We were so excited to be in our new house and we'd really wanted to do things up right. Then DH's mom sickened and died in the very early spring and that kinda took the wind right out of our sails. It'll be 6 months, next week that she's passed. I'm hoping next spring will be better.
We're already making plans for the yard and flower beds. I want to rip everything out from around our front porch. Right now, its just several mum plants, some ground cover, a rose bush that never set any buds and weeds. I'll let the mums bloom just for some flowers and color and then they'll go. I don't like mums that much. We'll tear everything out and I want to plant a bazillion daffodil bulbs. I love daffodils and I think a mass planting of them will look lovely in the spring. Then, when those are done we'll put in some sort of geranium or maybe pansies for the summer.
The garden is just about done. We ended up with 4 tomato plants and more 'maters than we can use. I'd put in 2 romas, 2 cherry tomatoes and 1 purple russian. One Roma plant ended up being a yellow tomato plant. Those were fabulous! Not much seed and gel in them, lots of tomato meat. They were like candy, soooo sweet! The roma's turned out great, a very good producer. Again, a good meaty tomato. We don't like the seedy, gooey kind. The cherry plants were good producers, but they were supposed to be "currant" tomatoes, even tinier than cherry or even grape tomatoes. I don't know if they crossed with the other plants or if they weren't currant plants to begin with but they were just regular cherry tomatoes. Good, but not near as good as the yellows and romas. The purple russian never did anything. It just got tall and spindly and the few fruit it set, rotted on the vine.
I've still got 2 big bushes of basil I need to go cut back and make into pesto. YUM!
I planted 6 broccoli plants, but the bunnies ate them all.
I put in 2 rows of beans but they either never came up or the rabbits got 'em.
We had alot of cucumbers but they didn't get watered enough so they were to bitter to eat.
The red raspberry bushes are so loaded with berries they're bending over, but nobody here cares for them, so I don't even mess with picking them. The birds sure enjoy them and the bees. I'll dig them out later.
We've got a few decent apples on the tree. Not many, its been neglected for so many years its going to take a few seasons to get it back into shape. I'm hoping the baby Gala trees we put in this spring winter over well. Our old tree needs another apple tree around to help pollinate. I have a feeling that a few years from now we'll have more apples than we know what to do with.
~carol~
posted by TheBroadroom.Net at 1:35 PM (Pacific)
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