Gardening

[Jenny]

Goldilocks and the Weeds

I know, right?

 

[Jenny]

Just back from plant shopping.

Picked up a ground cover hardy geranium at a garden club sale. Hopefully it will do well - it's certainly from a well-established mother plant, judging from the size of the roots I can see.

Also entire to the local ginormous green house and got more ajuga/bugle weed ("Mahogany") to start filling in another area, another of the long blooming hardy geranium I mentioned earlier ("Rozanne"), and two new contestants for the "Can I keep them alive" game. Both for at least partial shade - Dame's Rocket and Plumbago (don't have the tags inside to see what their real names might be). Oh, and a dwarf red Gallardia, to replace another one that didn't make it through the winter.

And finally, a flat of Impatiens and a hanging basket. The hanging basket is always iffy; I remember to water it regularly for a while and then something happens and the next thing I know, it's a goner.

Now I have to plant (and hope it's not too early) and dig up a daisy that I'm passing on.

 

[bounceswoosh]

None of my cucumber plants survived the surprise snow/freeze, and one of my tomato plants looks terrible - it already had a cracked stalk, so I think this was the death knell. As soon as I'm feeling better, I'll get replacements, I guess. Boo.

 

[Kimmyt]

I did my plant shopping today too, and filled my garden beds with dirt and compost. I'll let the tomatos and peppers sit a bit and put them in later next week when it's warmed up a bit. I ended up coming home with a bit more than I intended, which is usually how it works when I don't have a list to go off of. But I think it'll all fit.

 

[altagirl]

None of my cucumber plants survived the surprise snow/freeze, and one of my tomato plants looks terrible - it already had a cracked stalk, so I think this was the death knell. As soon as I'm feeling better, I'll get replacements, I guess. Boo.

Bummer, I was hoping you'd be as lucky as me. My peas, and even my lettuce (!) survived temps in the 20's and 6" or so of snow.

 

[bounceswoosh]

Bummer, I was hoping you'd be as lucky as me. My peas, and even my lettuce (!) survived temps in the 20's and 6" or so of snow.

Well, most of the tomatoes and basil look okay, the tomatillo plant looks like it will pull through, the strawberries are quite happy, and the anaheim peppers, surprisingly, seem just fine. I did okay.

 

[artistinsuburbia]

we spread 20 yards of mushroom mulch and are still turning more areas into rocks to avoid 30 yards. I'm going to go the preen route this year again. I know it's chemicals but I really HATE weeding. And with my momma so sick, something's gotta give. DH got the veggie garden tilled so it's off to the plant store for Sunday I hope. collected a few during the past few weeks, including pineapple mint??? smelled awesome and I just kept thinking mojitos!

@bounceswoosh...bummer. That really stinks. I hate when I have to start over. But I can cheer you up, I have a $500 hinoki (9' tall foundation plant) that's dying and one of my pear trees split in half last year and broke off....now this past storm split the remaining half in half. So I don't think the neighbors will put up with a 1/4 pear tree and it's too big for us to deal with on our own. Ugh.

 

[bounceswoosh]

@bounceswoosh...bummer. That really stinks. I hate when I have to start over. But I can cheer you up, I have a $500 hinoki (9' tall foundation plant) that's dying and one of my pear trees split in half last year and broke off....now this past storm split the remaining half in half. So I don't think the neighbors will put up with a 1/4 pear tree and it's too big for us to deal with on our own. Ugh.

I'm sorry. We actually just had a dead, massive shade tree removed, and a tiny little baby tree put in its place. The shade tree was probably 30' tall. It was finally really shading the deck. The whole process was somewhere close to $1500 - removal, stump grind, planting.

 

[artistinsuburbia]

I'm sorry. We actually just had a dead, massive shade tree removed, and a tiny little baby tree put in its place. The shade tree was probably 30' tall. It was finally really shading the deck. The whole process was somewhere close to $1500 - removal, stump grind, planting.

Seriously?? $1500?? ugh.. I hope not.

 

[bounceswoosh]

Seriously?? $1500?? ugh.. I hope not.

I just reviewed my bills - it was actually $1100. There was the removal. Then the stump grind. Then the new tree - we wanted to get something with a bit of a head start, so we bought a 2.5" diameter swamp oak - it's about 10' tall and buying/planting that was a large chunk.

 

[artistinsuburbia]

Well, the pear is a goner, either way. So that one is going to cost me. The hinoki is showing some signs of life finally, so we mulched the heck out of it with that compost/manure/shredded bark, mushroom mulch that I spoke of before. Now we just have to wait and see on that one.

But when hosing off the driveway, the mulch creates a sludge in the low corner, so I really got to play in the mud by hand scooping that into a bucket and spreading it into bare patches in the yard. Reminded me of making mudpies when I was a kid.

Got the veggie garden planted this weekend. Planted four varieties of peppers, six varieties of lettuce, leeks, shallots, walla walla onions, green beans, cucumbers, zucchini, yellow squash, broccoli, brussel sprouts, honeydew and watermelon.

On the flower garden front, I planted two hostas in a now shady area since the Japanese maple has grown so large and nothing else will grow there, planted two bluestone thrift in the rock gardens near the pool, two upright samba fuschia (no lie bought it because of the ski, lol), several trays of savannah coral seed geraniums, licorice plant, four coral petunias (another new find for me), a zinnia that was nearly dead because I bought it several weeks ago and am just getting around to planting it....

all in all a productive weekend. Anyone else get a good planting in this weekend?

 

[geargrrl]

Note to gardeners -always check the level of aggressive! I spent a few hours yeasterday digging out a bed of decorative zebra grass. Oops. I hit it with the roundup about two weeks ago, and then spent yesterday digging out the mats of stolons and root balls. <sigh> I should know better. OTOH, it did take about 14 years for it to get this way.
I have a tradtion of staying in town over Memorial Day and gardening while DH goes off with the boys. I've asked him to help me get a few bales of compost and strategically place them in the yard so I can distribute it as mulch, among other things.

 

[bounceswoosh]

Note to gardeners -always check the level of aggressive!

Wait, what does that mean? Is there like, a rating?

I got tired of weeds overtaking our flower bed - the previous owner had a real green thumb and enthusiasm - and planted a bunch of stonecrop to hopefully fill the space. We still get weeds, but it's more manageable. It's been fun watching the stonecrop grow from 8 or 10 isolated plants to this massive bed of thriving ground cover, but I have also noticed that it's growing out through the brick at the front of the flowerbed (cool) and also out into the lawn (that might not be so cool).

The nice part about this stuff is that I don't have to worry about messing it up when I dig up the weeds in the flower bed - it fills right in again.

Oh, hey - so what *do* you do once grass has seriously started filling in your flowerbed? There are tulips at the back part of this flowerbed, and the grass has fully taken over a lot of it. I've been pulling it out, but it seems like even more of a losing battle than weeds. Is there any option short of digging everything up? There's just one of those little metal strips; maybe putting bricks between the grass and the flowerbed would do a better job?

 

[Kimmyt]

Bricks won't help with grass, you'll have to dig down deep enough to get below the root system and then put in some sort of edging that goes down that far. And dig up all the grass to the roots thats in the bed.

 

[bounceswoosh]

Bricks won't help with grass, you'll have to dig down deep enough to get below the root system and then put in some sort of edging that goes down that far. And dig up all the grass to the roots thats in the bed.

I wonder if I could literally salt the earth without affecting the stuff on either side too badly ...

 

[geargrrl]

Oh, hey - so what *do* you do once grass has seriously started filling in your flowerbed? There are tulips at the back part of this flowerbed, and the grass has fully taken over a lot of it. I've been pulling it out, but it seems like even more of a losing battle than weeds. Is there any option short of digging everything up? There's just one of those little metal strips; maybe putting bricks between the grass and the flowerbed would do a better job?

Round up.
Seriously. Once it gets too think, there's no getting rid of it. AFAIK, there's no barrier known to man that will keep grass out. I routinely round up the perimeter of my beds. Once in a while I have to dig out sections of the flower beds and save what I can, but that's pretty rare.

 

[bounceswoosh]

Round up.
Seriously. Once it gets too think, there's no getting rid of it. AFAIK, there's no barrier known to man that will keep grass out. I routinely round up the perimeter of my beds. Once in a while I have to dig out sections of the flower beds and save what I can, but that's pretty rare.

If I wait till the tulip stems have completely died (sucked all the nutrients back into the bulb), do you know if Roundup will kill the bulbs? I need to plant new ones, anyway, I think - these have been going for over a decade, but they're starting to look a little sparse and droopy ..

 

[geargrrl]

My understanding is that tulips need to be refreshed. I think you can dig up the bulbs once the leaves die back and separate them.

 

[Jenny]

Note to gardeners -always check the level of aggressive!i

I'm going to have to keep an eye on one of my new ones, the Dame's Rocket. Reading up on it, it's considered invasive in the Michigan woods and byways, to the point where it's included in the "pull it up wherever you see it" campaign, like the garlic mustard plant is.

 

[MaineSkiLady]

Anyone else get a good planting in this weekend?

Still a wee bit early in this growing zone, even though it has been unseasonably warm. People are "jumping the gun" and might regret that - still some cool weather pending (for the record, it snowed here, measurably, on Mother's Day 2002). Throwing in some early stuff and hardening off flats now, hope to get it all done next weekend, on average schedule. Due to poor soil, we're not as gung-ho as when we lived elsewhere with great soil. But it's enough - for me.