Nature

The thing we have a lot of on Glen.

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New Additions In The Garden

This has been a terrible week for gardening.  We have had a solid week’s worth of rain.  Sometimes, we feel the best time to plant and garden is on days when there is no direct sun and a little drizzle.  This wasn’t the case the entire week.  Most times, the rain came down in a torrential downpour.  Crazy rain is tough for a gardener here in Connecticut at the end of May.  The end of May is when it is time to get most things planted in the soil.  We were getting nervous.  Finally, there was a small break and so it was time to run out and plant.

There are two new plants that we added into our garden that we would like to introduce.  The first is Dicentra spectabilis ‘Gold Heart’ seen above in its new home on the far left.

The old-fashioned bleeding heart has been one of our garden favorites for years.  They are substantial plants that bear long, arching racemes of pink flowers.  ‘Gold Heart’ is the same classic beauty, but with one marvelous variation:  it has metallic gold leaves and peach-colored stems instead of the usual green.  Blooms start here in Connecticut in May and last several weeks, finally subsiding with the arrival of the summer heat.  They are long-lived, reliable and they will self sow.  We planted ‘Gold Heart’ beside its cousins.  Dicentra spectabilis ‘Alba’ is in the middle.  ‘Alba’ produces white versus the more common pink flowers.  A regular Dicentra spectabilis finishes out the row to the right and is already giving us a show of beautiful pink flowers.

The next new member of the garden is Uvularia grandiflora.

Also known as large-flowered bellwort, Uvularia grandiflora is a plant in the family Colchicaceae, native to eastern North America.  It blooms in May, producing large yellow flowers.  The top parts of the plant tend to bend downward due to the weight of the leaves and flowers.  The light green stems are round and the leaves are perfoliate, meaning the stem appears to come through the leaves at the base.

We love planting new plants into our garden.  We especially like plants that are more on the rare and unique side, like the plants we just added.  There wasn’t much time for us to plant more than these two new additions into our garden.  Unfortunately, the rain returned.  We are going back to building our ark in the meantime.  Do you have any rare or unique plants that you like that you could share with us on Acorns On Glen?

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Power Gardening Before The Rain

This is the garden after a power gardening session that got as much as possible in the ground before the rain hit.  We knew we didn’t have much time on Saturday morning to garden as the weather channels predicted a downpour of rain at some point in the afternoon.  Mother Nature at her finest.  We were actually able to get a lot accomplished before the first raindrops came down.  Our garden probably doesn’t look any different to you than when you first saw our raised bed garden earlier this Spring.  However, this time it is filled with seeds.  There are zucchini and cucumber seeds planted around the wire trellis in the back of the bed, followed by green beans, turnips, golden beets and red beets.  All of these seeds got planted and covered and then the rain started.  We’ll be honest.  We didn’t exactly meet our goal.  We had also wanted to get some live plants into the ground that were scheduled for planting this weekend.  These were some of the plants that are growing under our grow light in the basement.  Our eggplant, cabbage, cauliflower and brussels sprouts will have to wait.  Darn rain…good for the newly seeded lawn; bad for the backyard vegetable garden.  Take a few minutes to see our vegetable garden work this weekend and also see our gorgeous azalea bushes in full bloom.

So we didn’t get all of our gardening chores completed this weekend due to the weather.  Good Old Mother Nature is the hardest part of gardening.  You never know if she will be too cold, too hot, too wet.  The odds are sometimes better in Las Vegas.  Did the weather get in your way of a full weekend of gardening?

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Bird Thoughts By A Bird Brain

 

This is a sad fact…I am not a fan of birds.  Spring is the time to confess as birds seem to be everywhere now that the temperatures are warmer.  It’s not that I hate birds…it’s more the fact that they scare me to death.  This is not a new fear.  I have been scared to death of birds since I was a little boy.  If I can sit and watch them parade around by looking through a window, than I am fine.  If you remove the window and I see one, I go cold.  God forbid that a bird flies at or near me.  I involuntarily scream, sweat, run and have even been known to cry.  In fact, I remember my first bad experience with a bird. 

Mrs. Curtain lived behind one of our first houses in Iowa.  At the time we moved there, I was 3 and she had to be at least 83.  I have to be honest.  Women at 83 in those days did not look that great.  We say today that 60 is the new 40 for a woman.  That was not the case in the ’60s.  83 looked 83 or older.  Mrs. Curtain wore long dresses, had unkempt gray hair, wore black horn-rimmed glasses and not a stitch of makeup covered her face (not at 83 and probably ever).  To this day, here is how I remember her.  

However, the strange part is that I was attracted to her.  She didn’t scare me.  She was my friend.  Mrs Curtain was a widow, her children had moved away ages ago and she did what a woman of her age did in those days in a small farming town in Iowa.  She lived in a small house, tended to a large garden of flowers and vegetables and kept chickens in her fenced-in back yard.  Who came over every day to bother help her?  Yes, it was me.  I would watch her garden, watch her mow, watch her do laundry, watch her do most anything.  However, I was not allowed to help with the chickens.  She repeatedly told me that they were off-limits because I was too young to be around them inside their fence.  So I sort of obeyed her command.  That means that I would not go inside the fence but I would make sure that I found various ways to make the chickens crazy.  I would yell at them, throw rocks at them, poke them with sticks.  Anything to taunt them because they were off-limits to me.  One day, they had had enough.  A rooster broke loose and came at me.  There were claws, feathers, clucking, screaming and then the rooster laid a hard, sharp peck with its beak on my forehead before Mrs. Curtain came to the rescue.  I have never enjoyed a bird since that day.

I have done well in my life staying away from birds.  I’ve lived most of my life in the concrete jungle.  I have warned friends with free flying birds in their homes to lock them up or risk harm to them (I wouldn’t kill a bird, but if a parrot flew at me, I’m not sure what I would do in my panic).  Any event that I am at where there are also birds means that I either leave or sit in a secure, inside area.  All this changed when I moved to Glen Road.  Here in the country, birds are everywhere.  They literally are your neighbors.  I can tell you who lives in what nest.  I can tell you which birds are meaner than others.  I have even been able to shyly look at a few birds without running (remember the cardinals).  However, I would like to give them a few pieces of advice so that I can expand my love even further.

  • Do not begin to sing until 10:30 AM and cease your songs at 8 PM.  Oh, and all birds must sing the same song….just in different harmonies so they can distinguish themselves between species.  Cardinals can be like the sopranos, blue jays the baritones and sparrows the altos.  You see, at 5:30 AM, your loud and non-coordinated singing is just annoying.  You wake me up and it is not a pretty sound.  Get an alarm clock and a chorale director and let me sleep.

  • Get a pair of sensible shoes.  Your claws are sickening.  There isn’t a pedicure invented that will make your claws look better, so cover them up.  If you can find stockings, buy them and put them on as well.  There is just something about seeing a bird claw that makes me shudder.  Is it the scaly part?  The long toenails?  The way it moves?  Whatever it is, cover them up and don’t show them.  Admit they’re ugly and you are embarrassed by them and put some shoes and socks on them.  You’ll be a step ahead.

  • Install a toilet in your nests.  I don’t want to see it, clean it or worry about it.  More than this, I don’t want to feel it on me…EVER.  Get some class and install a little toilet to do your business.  You’ll get more dates.  Enough said on this one.

I’ll try to like birds better this year.  I’m taking little steps though.  I would like a hummingbird to come live on Glen Road.  That’s a good step forward, right?  Honestly, I am scared about the long beak thing.  Has anyone ever heard of someone losing an eye because they got too close to a hummingbird?

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What’s Blooming On Glen Road?

 

 This is Spring in full bloom.  It doesn’t take long to go from snow to full throttle Spring in the garden.  There is so much going on in the garden right now it is hard to keep up.  Look at the beauty (above) of an allium almost ready to explode into full bloom.  Soon, this bud will be a total sphere of purple blooms.  There are so many plants and flowers blooming and growing in the garden right now, here is a little tour for you to see the progress.  Come take a look with us.  Feel free to click on any picture in the gallery to get a better view.

Things change so fast in the garden.  I wish there was something that you could invent that would make these beautiful flowers and plants last longer.  What plants and flowers are blooming in your garden right now?

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You’re Bugging Me!

This is the downside of gardening.  Bugs, varmints, predators, insects.  They eat your hard work faster than you can hit the back button on your browser.  Squirrels, chipmunks, slugs when it’s wet…they can be fierce at times.  Each Spring, however, this is the first one we deal with….the Japanese beetle.  We’ll start off by giving the beetle some credit.  It’s a pretty bug with its red top.  When we traveled for work, United Airlines used to offer a Japanese bento box for lunch when you sat in business class.  Bento is a single-portion takeout or home-packed meal common in Japanese cuisine.  The bento box on United contained Asian-inspired foods and could be delivered to you whenever you were ready to eat.  Every time we see the beetle, we think of the bento box and its pretty color.  A pretty Asian lacquered red…a beautiful color….just like the color of the Japanese beetle.  The bento box on United Airlines was a good thing.  These Japanese beetles are a menace and must be destroyed.

Every year our lilies come up proud and strong.  We look at them and think that they are fine for another day or two.  They are good enough until we have time to come out and clean them of these beetles and their eggs that can mow our lilies down in a heartbeat.  We should know better.  The next day after we say or think this, we come outside and the lilies have holes all over them.  Guess what did it?  The beetles…these Japanese beetles.  So Sunday was beetle killing day.  We know this sounds rough, but they have to go for our lilies to live.  So we pick them off and squeeze them between a cloth and we also brush their eggs off on the underside of the lily leaf.  What a wonderful way to spend a Sunday.  So we sit there saving our lilies and then remember the fact that these beetles are quite frisky.  Porno beetles!  Get a room!

The only thing more distressing than watching nature porn is discovering the big chunk this couple took out of the lily right below them.  Sorry to all of you who have religion!

Speaking of the eggs the Japanese beetles lay, we sat there for two hours on Sunday brushing them off with a small brush.  Not a great way to spend the day and also one that requires bifocals.  These eggs are small and hard to see!

So this is the start of the crazy fight against the creatures that try to make our garden their meal.  It’s a fight between them and us.  We will tell you this….we’re determined to win.  So, hopefully you are reading this before lunch because it is sort of disgusting, but the fight is on.  It’s Acorns versus the critters.  We will win.  We are determined.  We are armed.  Hopefully, they will get tired before us.  Because WE ARE THE CHAMPIONS….of the world garden.  Are you dealing with bugs and varmints in your garden already this Spring?

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News From The Garden

This is a garden update.  Just a little update on all the planting that we’ve done over the last few months or so, both outside and inside.  First off, the raised bed gardens are doing well.  Above, you can see the rows of seeds that are beginning to pop out of the ground.  From the lower right, the first four rows are the spinach rows that we planted on Thanksgiving 2010.  Two flat leaf rows and two savoy leaf rows.  Next is a row of round radishes, followed by a row of French radishes.  They are the long variety of radish.  Next is a row of arugula and then two rows of lettuce mix.  Starting now through the end of the month, we will continue to plant more seeds and plants into the garden.  Our last planting will be tomato plants given that they need to be put into the ground after the chance of frost has past.

Our tuberous begonias have shown their faces from the bulbs we planted.  ‘Picotee’ is a little less bashful than ‘John Smith’.  Remember him, the tuberous begonia with scent?

Here are the dwarf citrus trees.  They are blooming so let’s hope that this means fruit is on the way.  That is the Calamondin orange on the top and the Meyer Lemon on the bottom.

Flowers are popping out all over the yard.  Here are some shots of our Tulips, our Rhododendron bushes and some Muscari armeniacum.  All so pretty.  We wish they would last longer.

Lots of plants are also showing progress in the garden as well.  Here is a Hosta getting ready to spread its wings and the slow-growing Stewartia pseudocamellia timidly saying hello.

What is most interesting to us is how quickly plants that we’ve put into the ground for only a few weeks are already growing.  Remember the Rhubarb and our princess tree rose ‘Grace Kelly’?  They are already growing and budding.

The best sign that Spring is here is the Weeping Cherry trees that we have here on Glen Road.  When the blooms come out in full force, you know that the winter is most likely over.  Hurray!!  Here is a little glimpse of the blooms.  We should hold our own Cherry Blossom Festival here on Glen Road.

So we hoped you enjoyed our little garden stroll and update.  Things seem to be doing well.  We are back outside now to keep things growing on schedule.  From here on out, there will always be weeding, pruning, snipping, planting and picking to do to keep everything in order.  How is your Spring garden growing?