Laughing Ravens

 Most gardeners have a pretty solid understanding of which flowers bloom first. Expectations, you might say. For some, those first flowers come in the form of bulbs. But which ones? Like I said before, it is a slippery slope. This tulip was planted by a squirrel or chipmunk. In the lawn. Decades ago. the one, single, lonely tulip that we never planted   But then the bulbs start to transition into the early perennials and shrubs start to push up or leaf out. By the time the weather warms up, the rain stops, and the bugs come out... it is time for everything to suddenly become magically green. It can be an intoxicating green-ness, until the neighbor's mower shatters the reverie. Nothing ruins the daydream sunshine quite like the smell of exhaust and the roar of the lawnmower.    Purple smokebush, Cotinus coggygria 'Royal Purple' I try to get outside early in the morning. Before the sun, but after the birds. The birds get up absurdly early. The frogs stay up late partyi...

  What the heck is this?  Anyone who knows me would agree that organization is NOT my strong suit. Curiosity, absolutely. When May rolls around (and in April too!) and I start looking at signs of new growth in the garden, one of the first things I say is: "What the heck is this?" Sounds funny when I write it that way, because as anyone who has been around me for five minutes knows, there's a whole lot of profanity left out of that question. Why is this an issue and why should anyone care? Organization is a very personal thing... on the same level of personal as what happens behind the bathroom door. Organization is what separates everything (see what I did there?).  Years ago, when I first started gardening, I could remember all the names of all the plants I put in the ground. My neighbor, Marge, told me the name as I stuck the cuttings into the South Florida sand/dirt and that was that. The plant grew. The name was the name. Done. Then I got old. I gardened in lots of di...

 I've spent a fair bit of time over the last three days, wandering through the garden. With highs barely hitting the mid 40's, rain and wind making it feel much colder... it was tough to want to be outside. I spent last week running my second conference of the year. Despite the exhaustion, all I really wanted was to be outside among the plants and the birds.    Photo of iris reticulata, from Wendy Roller, irisarian extraordinaire (GRIS) This afternoon, the sun appeared long enough that it warmed slightly. Taking advantage of the light and leaving the camera behind for the day, meant getting close enough to get dirty. A few weeds, here and there, were pulled. Easy stuff with the soil wet from the last few days of rain. I don't understand people who try to weed their garden when the soil is dry. Way too much like work.  In an attempt to leave myself some breadcrumbs for a yearly almanac of what happens in the garden and where... I hope to record a few of the standout t...

Winter sowing in trays, stacked in layers This year, I wanted to try a couple new ideas with our winter sowing. For those who haven't tried winter sowing, at its simplest, it is just planting your seeds during the winter to give them a jump on spring. Perennial seeds do well, some hardy annual seeds do okay, and tender stuff doesn't survive.  One of the issues we have this winter is carryover from the spring/summer/fall. There are lots of pots of seeds that didn't germinate in the spring. A lot of the things I am reading about some of the more difficult seeds to start, indicate that it can take 2-3 years for seeds to germinate. And that also includes scarification/stratification of some form. Winter sowing usually makes that a simple solution, with the repeated freezing and thawing cycles.  We picked up these flat blue trays on Facebook Marketplace. I have seen similar things in use for bread delivery. They are lightweight, rigid and affordable. Best of all, they are perfor...