George's Current Ramblings and Readlings

Composting in Place

June 6th, 2023

   Weeds rank high on most gardeners’ list of landscape vexations, but that’s one problem that’s never bothered me too much.

George on weed patrol with five-gallon bucket at his side.

   For one thing, my strategy of planting real plants wall-to-wall and mulching the limited or temporary openings doesn’t leave much room for weeds to get started.

   Plus, I’ve never minded going on regular weed patrols with my trowel and five-gallon bucket. I look at it as “harvesting compost.” Adding those young yanked weeds to the compost bin turns the enemy into an asset – plus it gives me an excuse to enjoy up-close-and-personal looks at the developing shrubs, flowers, and vegetables.

   The key is getting on top of the weed issue and staying on top. It’s so much easier to do regular but light cleanups than to try and corral an outbreak after it’s gone out of control.

   I know about that first-hand, too, after taking over a landscape that was completely ignored for 10 years.

See before and after photos of George’s landscape makeover

   Now is an important waypoint in the weed journey since June is a peak month both for the germination of summer weeds and the maturation of weeds that sprouted in spring. Allowing any of those weeds to go to seed will magnify your future troubles.

   It may seem overwhelming now as those weeds keep coming and coming. But the good news is that if you do a thorough cleanup now, the germination rate goes down from here on out.

   Some people turn to weed-killers for help. That’s a viable option if you’re careful how and where you spray and follow the label instructions.

   Not everyone has the back acumen and energy to get down there and pull, so herbicides become the only viable alternative to hiring out the weed-control work. (Landscapers usually lean to herbicides anyway and generally charge top dollar even if they’re willing to go the pull/dig route.)

   Kill-everything herbicides also can make sense as a one-time solution to bring a total mess back under control, essentially leveling the playing field for a fresh start.

   I’ve occasionally used spot-sprays but mostly avoid herbicides for a few reasons.

   One is that I’d rather garden with as limited risk to beneficial organisms, myself, and the environment in general as possible.

   Another is that I don’t like the look of the browned-out weeds left behind, which can take weeks to break down… unless I remove them after they’re dead (which is counter-productive if the point is to save work).

   And a third reason is that I like the idea of using the nutrients and organic matter in weeds as a compost ingredient. (I avoid composting toxic weeds like poison ivy or the few weeds that have gone to seed before I could yank them.)

   As I’m aging, I’m always on the lookout for ways to minimize work, especially the bend-over kind.

   One technique I’ve been using more and more is the idea of “composting in place,” or in other words, hiding pulled weeds under nearby plants instead of lugging them by the bucket full to the compost bin.

   I’m apparently not the only aging gardener embracing the idea.

Gardener’s Heaven

May 23rd, 2023

   There’s a place on this planet where the soil is rich and well-drained, where temperatures sit in the pleasant 70s all year, where the sun shines day after day, and best of all, where deer don’t tread.

My favorite garden view on Madeira… the quilt garden in Funchal’s Madeira Botanical Garden.

   This gardener’s heaven is the Portuguese island of Madeira, a volcanic blip in the Atlantic Ocean located 320 miles off of the west coast of Morocco.

   Its southerly location (about the same latitude as Charleston, S.C.) ensures year-round warmth, while its surrounding water keeps it in that stable and plant-perfect 70s range. It’s like eternal spring.

   Unlike in our deer-infested yards of root-blocking clay and extreme, erratic weather, plants in Madeira show their gratitude with incredibly lush, diverse, and healthy growth.

   I got to see what a difference prime conditions breed on a visit earlier this month to Portugal and its Azore and Madeira islands. (See pictures in a new collection I’ve posted on my Photo Gallery pages.)

   Given the trifecta of great soil, ideal weather, and few bug, disease, and animal attackers (a side benefit of ocean isolation), it’s easy to see why Madeira is sometimes called a “floating garden” and the “pearl of the Atlantic.”

How One of the Warmest Winters Ever Caused Some of My Worst Plant Damage Ever

May 16th, 2023

   How could this be?

This is what winter did to my planting of sweetboxes.

   After one of our warmest winters ever – including a January that was nearly 9 degrees warmer than average and a February that averaged 7.3 degrees above normal – my landscape looked like it had been to Alaska and back.

   Most of my variegated boxwoods were the color of toast by the end of March.

   A dwarf nandina, a leucothoe, an aucuba, a band of sweetbox, a trio of gold-variegated box honeysuckles, and a pair of Red Beauty hollies were in various states of brown with rings of fallen leaves at their feet.

   A dwarf ‘Hedgehog’ cedar – an elegant new specimen going into winter – came out the back end completely brown and brittle. Ditto for that little osmanthus I got as a freebie at last year’s Philadelphia Flower Show.

   The ‘Tonto’ crape myrtle I planted two seasons ago had nothing but brown, brittle branches and has died back to the roots.

   Even my plenty-hardy roses suffered noticeably more branch dieback than usual.

   You’d expect this kind of damage in a cold winter, like the kind of sub-zero ones we used to get… or that year the low went down to minus-22 degrees.

   But when winter days are primarily in the 40s and 50s, plants should be safe and happy, right?

   Not necessarily.

   The explanation here is twofold.

My Bulb Experiment: Three Years Later

May 2nd, 2023

   I wish I could say that my experiment growing 955 spring bulbs of 16 kinds has been a rousing success, carpeting my yard with vibrant color at a time when most everything else is just waking up.

These ‘Mando’ daffodils have been my strongest bulb-trial performer.

   But three years after planting, only four of my bulb groupings put on a good show this spring. The rest have dwindled into meagerness or disappeared altogether.

Read more on the bulb game plan and what got planted

   To get right to the point, the four winners have been:

   1.) Yellow-blooming ‘Mando’ daffodils, which have bloomed long and strong all three years from mid to late March in several front-yard beds. These are actually growing in number.

   2.) Siberian squill ‘Spring Beauty’ (Scilla siberica), a low-growing blue-bloomer that’s spread and seeded its way into a colony on a morning-sun driveway terrace bed that later fills with astilbes, brunnera, sweet woodruff, and hydrangeas. These also bloom in mid to late March.

A 25-bulb planting of summer snowflakes ‘Gravetye Giant’ is thriving after three years.

   3.) Summer snowflakes ‘Gravetye Giant’ (Leucojum aestivum), foot-tall plants that produce hanging, bell-shaped white flowers for about two weeks from mid to late April. All 25 bulbs I planted in another driveway-terrace bed are still growing, blooming, and steadily expanding.

   4.) Camassia leichtlinii ‘Caerulea,’ a little-known, seldom-used bulb that grows about a foot tall and produces bluish-purple flower spikes in late April. The 25 bulbs of these also have come back reliably for three years now, despite deer gnawing off the foliage of this supposed deer-resistant species.

   I should add here that I’ve had excellent results, too, with allium ‘Globemaster,’ a softball-sized purple bloomer that I planted four years ago (technically not part of this experiment).

   And now, the losers.

Spring at Phipps

April 18th, 2023

   Since few of you likely made it to Pittsburgh to see Phipps Conservatory’s 2023 spring flower show, I thought I’d share a few photos of it this week.

   Phipps Conservatory, if you’ve never seen it, is a 14-room Lord and Burnham Victorian glasshouse that dates to 1893. It’s filled with changing exhibits of tender specimens from around the world (including desert plants, ferns, tropicals, orchids, and a butterfly house) and is surrounded by 15 acres of outdoor gardens.

   Each spring, the conservatory stages a spring flower show. This year’s four-week show, which just ended, centered around a theme of Five Senses of Splendor.

A spring-time scene featuring a pond, Japanese fountain, and tulips was the centerpiece display in the central glasshouse.

   As visitors enter the main glasshouse through a second-floor entry, they were greeted by an oversized perfume bottle, adorned with succulents like strings of jewels. The bottle was surrounded by colorful gardens of fragrant plants.