Another Walk Through My Garden

Ah, the garden. As Annacyclopedia says, it's a salve for my soul. The garden has been ticking right along these past few weeks. The clematis continues to shock me with it's sprigs and shoots and buds. Overnight, it sent out these two arms in a "Y" shape at the top, like it's just reaching up for something, anything, for it to grab on to. I might have to give it a new trellis-y thing to wind around.

The front patch is a massive tangle of lavender and rosemary and lobelia and creeping phlox. Our two giant wormwood plants that once stood tall over everything else are being challenged daily in every direction. It's the perfect environment for this dude:

He moved in about 2 weeks ago and hasn't left his post as guardian of the rosemary since. He's really fucking dedicated to rosemary, apparently.*

Anyway, the front garden patch is growing wildly, and I know that for the health of the whole, I will need to cut things back a bit at some point, but right now, I'm enjoying the insane tangliness of everything.

The stalks of the lavender flowers are growing in a giant whorl formation, topped by tiny purpley-silver buds. It looks so cool, and they smell amazing.

Our veggie garden is still doing it's thing. The beans came up pretty quickly and have been shocking us with how much they grow each day. The cucumbers are doing their thing, and the radishes, too. Sunflowers are poking up, and the zucchini are starting to put out flowers as well.

Here's a poorly labeled tour. Maybe if you click on it, you can see a bigger version...

Oooh, I need more room! Look at those beans go! Grow, baby, grow!

Anyway, now I enter the part of my post that will, apparently, garner hundreds of hits. Here is my Blackbird Spurge. It's grown quite a bit since I last took a picture of it.

Most people that come here looking for blackbird spurge seem to come here with some desire to know how to take care of it. I am no expert, but if this LIFE(+infertility) blog is the #5 hit when searching for "care of blackbird spurge", then it tells me that there must be a terrible lack of information available on how to care for these plants. So, I will do my best to give some information.

So. You've planted blackbird spurge and it's not working out for you. First, I'm sorry. It always breaks my heart a little when I've planted something that doesn't work for me (last year's Lobelia Cardinalis 'Queen Victoria' is a prime example from my garden), so I offer this information in hopes that you can be helped. If you've planted this and it isn't working for you here are some things you can try to fix the problem (and if you're Emily, some of this may sound familiar to you... sorry in advance for the repetition):
1. Water it more
2. Water it less
3. Give it more sun
4. Give it less sun
5. Move yourself to a warmer climate
6. Move yourself to a cooler climate

What I mean by saying that (yes, a bit sarcastic, but stick with me for a second...) is that frequently new gardeners- and I still consider myself to be one- attempt to focus on some highly complicated reason why a plant doesn't seem to be thriving (soil chemical levels? bizarre fungus? plant food?). And the truth of the matter is, those 6 things can make or break any plant. Sometimes, a plant just isn't right for your exact area, even if all the books say that this plant will work in your zone. Sometimes they just don't work.

In my exact case, even though I'm somewhere in zone 7, I'm less than an hour from both zones 6 (to my west) and zone 8 (to my south). The soil conditions where I live are terrible- heavy, backbreaking deep red clay that leaves your hands stained and chalky-dry when you dig it. But with a little amendment with compost to loosen it up, it turns into fantastically mineral-rich soil that can grow all kinds of things that may not otherwise thrive in this part of the country. My exact location also happens to be mere feet from the highest elevation in our county which also affects what will or won't grow here. And let's not forget global warming. Weather patterns are changing faster than we can track them, and that certainly doesn't help things.

I say all of that to drive home the point that, barring plague and pestilence, most plants can be cared for by ensuring that they receive the right amounts of sun, water and heat/cold. Back in Texas, I couldn't grow shit. The summers there are ruthlessly hot and dry. The sun beats down almost everything you try to grow. In that region, sticking with native plants was key. But here in Kurrr-lahnuh (as I've heard it called), it's far more temperate, so I can flex those sun/water/temperature factors a bit to get a non-indigenous species to grow. In general, I try to stick with natives anyway, and because it's more temperate, I have a lot more native varieties to choose from.

And there's one other basic factor to consider, and that is whether or not you are giving the roots enough space to take in the right amount of water. I highly recommend using containers when you're starting out with a garden. They give you the convenience of portability that you are denied when you put your plant in the ground. The biggest mistake that I make (that I continue to make...) is not giving my plants enough room, container or not.

Unfortunately, I think that this problem is what ultimately did in my lobelia cardinalis last year. I just didn't know how big the plant would be and how much room the roots would need. I bought the plants for their lovely deep purple foliage and their upright growth habit, but totally underestimated how tall they would try to get. They bent over under the weight of their increasingly tall and thick stalks because their root system was constrained to a tiny pot (well, 2 gallon sized, but still way too small for this plant). I tried everything. I moved them to a shadier spot. I moved them to a sunnier spot. I gave them more water. I gave them less water. I moved them to a breezier spot, and then to a more sheltered spot. It didn't occur to me until later that these sweet babies just weren't able to support themselves with their stunted root system and that what I really needed to do was to move them to a much larger container, or to plant them in the yard somewhere.

However, as I mentioned earlier, my soil kind of sucks, so if I planted them in the yard, I would also need to add some (composted) manure and top soil blended into the clay to make sure that the roots could get adequate water. If the soil is heavy and dense, or even if it's good soil but just packed too tightly, then the roots cannot adequately absorb oxygen, moisture and nutrients. So basically, even if you have a large enough container or you plant it in your yard, you still need to ensure that your soil is nice and loose so that the roots can breathe a little.

So.

To review. If you have blackbird spurge that isn't looking so hot (and by now you should have figured out that this applies to ANY plant that doesn't look so hot), try these things:
Adjust the light
Adjust the water
Adjust the temperature
Make sure the roots can support the plant (and make sure the soil can support the roots)

Above all, you need to make sure that what you plant works for the area you live in. That is the one factor you simply cannot change, right? Unfortunately, you cannot trust a plant tag or even a regional garden book to tell you what will or won't work (they're a great starting point, but won't be comprehensive enough for your exact area). Like I said, climate variations and global warming have made it such that print materials are just not reliable. The best thing you can do is to try. If something doesn't work, and you've done all of the above things, and you still reeeeeeally want to try again, get with your local agriculture extension and see if they can help you. Or try a different variety of the same plant. Or try a different plant altogether. My vegetable garden this year is a great example of that. I just don't know what's going to work or not, so I've planted several different varieties in hopes that one or two of them will end up being things I want to plant next year. And next year, I'll repeat what worked, and replace what didn't with another experiment.


Mmmmkay. And now, back to the pictures.

Variegated wallflower. Want to know how to take care of it? Scroll up...

I don't know what these are called and that really bothers me. I threw away the plant tag before my Asperger-like plant-name-memorizing tendencies took over, so I will forever more have no idea what it's called.
Quick! Someone make up something so I can name this damn thing and move on.
Make it scientific(read: in Latin, fake or not) so I'll believe you.


No space is exempt from hosting some sort of plant. This is a Hosta, just about to bloom,
that we put in an old container on our front porch.


Soon you will be ripe enough, and then I will EAT YOU RIGHT UP.
You don't stand a chance, blueberries...

Lastly, here is a picture of Tradescantia Spiderwort 'Sweet Kate' (why, yes, I am. Thank you.). I scared the crap out of H a few mornings ago when I, uh, eagerly pointed out tiny flower buds on this plant. See, last year, we bought the spiderwort to place on either side of the entry to our porch to replace those Queen Victoria lobelia that had gone so wrong. And in the beginning, they put out pretty blue-purple flowers that were open only first thing in the morning. The rich blue against the shocking lime green foliage made this a plant that I so desperately wanted to survive (it's name didn't hurt it's favor, either). And H, in typical H fashion, quit watering it as soon as it showed signs of fading**. He insisted that this was just another plant that had died on us. We set them aside to be neglected through the remaining summer months. I insisted, though, that these darlings were going to make it, somehow. I moved them to the basement with some other plants. They got dark green, then brown, then crispy brown. But then, when I was taking our other plants out of the basement this spring, I noticed a bit of new growth. I took them outside and put them with our other plants. I was pretty sure that they would perk up a bit, but was doubtful that we'd ever see those flowers again. Slowly, the foliage began to stand taller and take on it's characteristic lime green hue, but no flowers seemed to be appearing.

And so, when I saw those flower buds as I was getting into the car a few days ago, I made a pretty loud and excited (and sudden) noise, which probably took about 5 years off H's life.

And then, this morning, as I was coming out of my house, I saw that the flowers had opened up, I dropped everything, spilling the contents of my lunch sack across the porch (and you KNOW how I feel about that...), and pulled out my camera to take some pictures of these beautiful flowers.

Sweet Kate, indeed. So PRETTY!

And so, thus ends this week's tour of my garden. I really had a lot more to talk about (like how H got all fucking pouty when I told him my summer class meets from 5:30 to 7:30 pm M-Th 'cos he just didn't know what he would do with himself for two whole hours every day since we share a car and how it was ruining his gaddamn life to have to suffer through the horrors inflicted on him by his selfish, selfish wife because she has to be a selfish, selfish cow and go back to school. And how when we came home from dinner, I couldn't even look at him until I had run for an hour*** while listening to my iPod at top volume**** and then spent another half an hour cooling off in the garden, and even then STILL had to calm myself down several times while explaining to him that his reaction was not fucking cool). But ultimately, it all seems less interesting and less important than taking a photo-tour of the garden. I start talking about my plants, and I just can't be angry. It is a salve. It really, really is.

*Yeah. Way to go with the personification of the inanimate, Kate. That's just SO clever. Damn, you're funny.

**You know, I like to think that I'm smart, but it wasn't until recently that I figured out that if I wasn't happy with the way H was doing something, that I could certainly do it myself. If my gentle bitching nagging guidance doesn't get the desired result, then maybe I should just do it myself. So, now I do the watering. And it's a MIRACLE! Things that last year were dead or dying are this year coming back to life! How ODD...

***In all fairness, it was a 2:3 ratio of running to walking. BUT, somehow I required my IRL BFF reminding me that I was (duh) training, which meant that I was teaching my body how to do this kind of stuff and that even the simplest maneuvers (one foot in front of the other, quick-like) would require some relearning on the part of my body. DUH, your lungs are going to be pissy. Duh, your muscles are going to complain, but the point is to do it again soon so that your body can get used to it. And so, for 40 minutes, I ran 60 seconds and walked 90 (warmed up for 5, and cooled down for 15). I was able to run at a much faster rate than the last time. I think the treadmill did the trick. I'll eventually go back outside, but for now, I've got to get my heart and lungs back in shape, and that's more gentle indoors than out. I stretched like mad afterwards, and feel much less sore than I did the last time. Slowly but surely, I'm figuring this shit out. It's frustrating as hell to have taken what feels like an enormous step backwards, but I'm relearning, and I'm determined to do it absolutely right this time. Yep.

****FUCK, I LOVE TRIBE CALLED QUEST. They rock my middle-class world in the realest of real ways. I find myself with arms flailing overhead, fists pumping, whilst trying to run because I just must shake something when I listen to this, and shaking my ass leads to tripping, which is, like, not good while on the treadmill. I defy a human being to listen to that and not be driven to shake their ass. Truly.

Gnome says, "Step off my rosemary, yo."