Facebookization

Why don't she write?!

Facebookization.

I've meant several times to start up again -- geez, it's been a year! But well... blogs (writing and reading) for me are huge time sucks. And Facebook is the huge time suck that I've been abusing most recently.

Note to spammers: that does not mean that you can graffiti my blog with your crummy, spammy links. I still delete those.

Anyway, I'm still alive, though parched with drought. Thinking about starting back up again, or at least posting every now and then.

The photos show something I've been obsessed with lately: I'm on a huge succulent kick, potting them up in thrift-store finds. I can't say which is more squee-inducing, finding new plants, or discovering containers that speak to me (marked way, way down).

Spring Break

It was warm! It was dry! Very unusual for our winter this year. I was afraid we'd missed the bluebells coming up, since last year by this time they'd been budding for at least a week.

There was no sign of bluebells at all, though; not a single leaf was sprouting. It's been cold. Unceasingly, mind-numbingly, give-no-quarter cold.



We did find a few little decumbent trilliums poking up (Trillium decumbens).



There were very few of them. These individuals were on one of the warmer, sunnier slopes. I thought I heard one of them sqeak, "First!"



A single budding Toothwort was nearby.



I was sure we'd find a few Hepatica blooming, but we had to be satisfied with their lovely leaves.



We grilled some salmon, took a nap, went on this little hike, then lounged in the sun. It was nearly 70°F (21°C). It's been so cold and wet and dreary lately. It was wonderful to have a break from all that, even if it was just for one weekend.

We cleaned up in the garden a little, pulling dry vines off their supports. This had been maddening, gloppy work when they were wet. We didn't even care that we were probably popping off dozens of morning glory seeds straight into the garden soil. There are hundreds of them there already. No, probably more like thousands. They were in this dirt when it was brought in. Every spring, we pluck the sprouts with zeal, but by summer's end the morning glories have always won the battle. But on a weekend like this, we just didn't care.

Indecisive cropping

I'm growing Zinnias for Hospice again this year. They're perfect for me: varied, easy, prolific, and forgiving. And, good for Hospice: long vase life.



I'm growing the same types as before, but their behavior this year (when not totally drought-stricken) is wildly different. The large varieties are doing so much better that I'd think they were different plants. (They're actually from the same batch of seeds.) We watered them last year, but apparently, that doesn't compare to actual rain.



The only problem I'm having...



... besides Japanese beetles...



... is indecisive cropping.



Can't decide which looks best.



I have that problem a lot.



Gave up after one try on this Peppermint Stick variety.

Daylily garden

I knew, in a theoretical kind of way, that there were a lot of varieties of Daylilies. It didn't really prevent my non-stop gaping at a Daylily garden, though.



One of our wildflower group couples gave us a tour of their garden this week.



Their main focus is Daylilies -- they have hundreds of them.



I doubt I'll ever be as dedicated a gardener.



But I'm lucky to have friends who are.



All the types were labeled, but non-dedicated non-gardener that I am, I didn't take down any names.



If you're dying to know about any particular one, I can probably find out.

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Daylilies are Hemerocallis sp. The name in Greek is a combination of Hemera (day) and Kallos (beautiful).

I wrote about words using Kallos before, when talking about Beautyberry. Every time I come across it in a botanical name, I still crack up, remembering that comment about a track team and their cry of "Callipygious!"

Why are my blackberries not getting ripe?

A friend told me this story tonight, and I figured I'd post it here to help blackberry-less internet wanderers.

My friend's blackberry bushes seemed to be on track for a banner year. Tons of blossoms. Scads of little berries forming. But never any ripe fruit.

What was going on? She searched the internet high and low, finding no likely answers. She became increasingly frustrated. Why were her #$%^&*@ blackberries not getting ripe?! It didn't make sense.

Then she found the answer by accident, when she arrived home in time to catch her husband lurking near the garden. He was eating all the ripe berries directly off the vine, and had been doing so for the last two weeks.

"That answer wasn't on the internet," she said.

Now it is.

Deer feeding

We have unwittingly set up a deer feeding station in our back yard.


Mother and son

For several years it has been a chicken feeding station, poached by no undesirable critters other than the occasional grackle or bad dog.

But our luck wore out, and it seems that deer have excellent memories as far as food is concerned. They're daily buffet visitors now.


Scruffy deer

Hubby thinks they're cute. "You won't think so after they eat the entire garden," I warn, but he doesn't believe it.

This would be the non-existant garden... the garden we've yet to find time to plant. When I moaned about it at a meeting last week, a man told me that he hadn't planted yet either. "The signs aren't good until Thursday. Then they'll last for about 10 days."

Since it's supposed to rain almost every day this week, I'm not overly hopeful. Instead of planting by the moon, we usually use the "when we're both here and it hasn't been raining buckets" method. And those signs have been terrible lately.

Conflict of interests

By coincidence, the state meetings of both the Alabama Master Gardeners and the Alabama Wildflower Society were held in Huntsville this past weekend.

I had a conflict of interests!



Actually it wasn't too bad, except for half a day on Saturday, when the AMG was winding down and the AWS was beginning.



We did not get as much time at the Huntsville Botanical Gardens as we would have liked.

This is their 115+ year old dogwood.



A trillium that doesn't know how to count. (It's supposed to have only three petals.)

A quadrillium...?



At a garden we toured, my favorite feature was this granite wall that the owner had built out of free scraps.

I didn't take my "good" camera due to forecasts for lousy weather, and of course ended up wishing I'd had it.




Especially when we hiked the Monte Sano sinks trail. I saw Squawroot for the first time...



...I didn't realize it was so big!



One night the banquet hall was late opening up, so I wandered the neighborhood and photographed enchanted medieval castles. (Or possibly it was just a backlit church with swirling clouds.)

I had a wonderful time, but boy are my feet tired.

Seven things

While I was gone, Twinks asked me to do a meme. I'm supposed to list seven random things, but since I'm contrary, I'm going to list seven things that happened during my lost four months. It's longer than my normal posts, but since I'll be out of town for a few days, feel free to read in shifts!

1. I joined The Gym.
Really, that's what the gym in Oneonta is called: The Gym. I joined with a friend, and wheedled my way into a good deal via a long-term, prepaid, early-hours contract. I can't say I've lost any weight, but I feel in better shape. I'm getting to know my friend a lot better too, since we gab for about four hours a week more than we used to.

2. I thought I'd found a diamond.
People with a five-carat diamonds don't shop at Wal-Mart, I suppose, but I was momentarily dazed by the karmic thrill of it all. My mother lost her engagement ring stone over 40 years ago, and I imagined it had returned, with interest! Turned out to be only a cubic zirconia though, drat. Here is how you tell the difference. I couldn't read a newspaper through the CZ, and was already dreamily wondering how long the police would have to hold it before it was deemed unclaimed. The dot test worked like a charm, though. Like a big, balloon-bursting charm.



3. The garden refused to bend to my will. Again.
I had fun with the Zinnia experiment though. I got a late start, and Powdery Mildew crept in when we left town for a week. The grass got way out of control, as usual. Somehow I still managed to grow a few flowers to donate to Hospice. Maybe next year I will finally have my act together enough to get them there throughout the blooming season.

4. I won a major award.
Because I could remember the Alabama state bird, mammal, fossil, etc., when an emergency preparedness expert spoke to our wildflower group. OK, the award wasn't really all that major, but I basked in the egghead trivia glow anyway. Then a guy even more pointy-headed than me whined that my answer of "some kind of whale" to "What is the state dinosaur?" wasn't up to par. "The Basilosaurus cetoides is the state fossil, not dinosaur!" he moaned. I hugged my MRE and ran out of the meeting room.

5. We let Anatoli go. He'd developed a lump that we decided may have been from improper nutrition or insufficient sunlight. Since he was wild-born, we figured he'd fare better on his own. We saw an unusually high number of anoles this fall, but I was never sure if any of them were Anatoli.

6. I had to wait in line to vote!
There were all of four people in front of us when we arrived at our polling place. An elderly couple let us cut in front of them though, since the man was still searching his wallet for ID. There were a few local issues on the ballot so turnout was very high. The tallies from my precinct, not exactly what you'd call a democratic stronghold, included:
Obama 45, McCain 450
Figures 52, Sessions 442 (US Senate race)
Tag fee increase: Yes 59, No 392
Wet/Dry referendum: Yes (Wet): 226, No: 270
The ratios for the whole county were similar. I still haven't figured out how Vivian Figures, a State Senator from Mobile, received more votes than Obama. Most people in north Alabama weren't even familiar with her. I read that her budget was $22,000; the incumbent Sessions spent multi-millions. (I have loved her ever since I read that she was able to get the outdated, misogynistic Alabama State Senate dress code changed... the one that said women couldn't wear pant suits or slacks on the Senate floor!)
We needed the tag fee increase ($15), which would have gone strictly towards road maintenance. I had a feeling it wouldn't pass, but I was surprised at the resounding defeat.
I'm glad we stayed a dry county. I wouldn't mind alcohol sales in stores or restaurants, but didn't want a bar across the street from us. Rural counties don't have a lot of regulations, so it could have been a real possibility.

7. Alabama football, woohoo!
I had to say that before we play Auburn and Georgia Florida, just in case.

More Zinnias

A mixture of Persian Carpet and
Old Mexico Zinnias (Zinnia haageana).

The catalog says that these make good cut flowers. And they do... but you'd better have a short vase. Most of the stems are only 3 - 4 inches long (8 - 10 cm).

I like these two types together. I had both last year, but made the mistake of planting them too close to something taller. They ended up in the shade half the day, and didn't produce well.

The catalog says 2" flowers (5 cm) and 2' plants (61 cm), but so far mine are about half of that.

Finally

We planted the garden pretty late.



So all we're getting now, in the way of vegetables, are long, skinny things.



Japanese Eggplant, Zephyr Squash, Cucumbers. No tomatoes yet.



The little cucumber that could. We bought what turned out to be an amazingly good plant, I think from the local Ace Hardware. Never bitter, despite my horribly uneven watering. And really, really prolific! This amount is from one day. (One plant.) I see cucumber-pushing in my future.

-----

Don't forget the Friday Ark.

Peppermint Stick Zinnia

We were late in planting the garden, so even the quick-starters are just starting to be productive. Last year, I wasted a lot of money on exotic seeds that never germinated. Since I couldn't be sure if it was the seeds or it was me at fault, I decided to keep the flower experiments simple until I had a clue about what I was doing.

Zinnias are easy. Zinnias truly are "Flowers for Dummies". So I bought almost every Zinnia mix that Johnny's offers.



The Peppermint Stick is supposed to be a "fully double bloom".



They're not exactly turning out like that, though. (Compare with the image in that last link.)



Maybe they need more water. I kind of like them this way, though.



One of the "small percentage of solid colors" they warn you about.



This one's trying to go for "double" I guess. Sometimes one of the petals is a solid color like this. I found that if I cut them at this point, those inner petals never unfurl. They seem to stay frozen in time at the moment of cutting.

Like all the other Zinnias, they have excellent staying power as a cut flower.

How to make it rain

Install drip irrigation.

June Garden Tour

It's really too hot in June to be touring gardens in Alabama.



I didn't want to miss this one, though. I'd previously only seen it in the fall, and knew if would be great in full bloom.



Consider the lilies...



Consider the drumstick alliums too!



My calendula never looked this nice.



He said this was Brazilian verbena, but it must be a cultivated variety. The wild version here isn't nearly as full.



Still considering lilies...



I have no idea what most of these plants are called. Obviously this one is a hydrangea, but I don't know the type. (I can probably find out if you're curious about anything in particular.)



Love those coneflowers.

The gardener said he'd lost a lot during last year's drought, but the garden looked fantastic to me. We got a lot of good spring rain, but it has tapered off severely in the past month. I'm afraid we're in for another dry summer.