Tulips in the office

My office tulips were just about to open when I left on Friday (typical!). They seem to have been given a little too much booze; they are very short. The flower is not really above the leaf. On Monday I'll try to use a real camera to take a picture rather than the crappy photoBooth cheat shown above. They don't get any real sun, but they do get indirect sunlight and nominal full-spectrum light when I remember to flick a switch.

More cheating

The crocuses in my office are done now, and so I popped to the shop and dropped another 4 bucks on 3 tulips. They're supposed to be yellow, too. I fished through quite a number of pink ones to get myself a yellow set. I don't know why I'm so anti-pink. Probably it's just that I'm violently pro-yellow when it comes to little pots of spring to enliven my workspace. Why would I go for any colour but that of the sun?

I'm especially in need of my spring fling because it's gone all grey again. We had a week of lovely bright sunshine (and bitter cold). Unfortunately, we're not getting pots and pots of snow like some of the Atlantic coast to the south of us. We're just getting plain old wintery weather. I can't complain endlessly about the little dribs and drabs of snow, though. I'm glad I'm not digging out 1m of snow. As you can see, our snow amounts to so little that even a pigeon can put a footprint right through it.

In other cheating news, I had a terrible trip to the local seed store over the weekend! What a bummer. They over-charged me by $15 on a $40 bill (did they think I wouldn't notice?) and were really quite evilly reluctant to correct their "mistake". They took a little pile of seed packets, found the most expensive, and scanned that in 4 times instead of actually scanning in all the packets. When I complained that they hadn't scanned in the packets correctly, they then scanned in each packet individually without removing the 4 times scan charge! Humph. When I finally got out, I was very angry indeed. And needless to say, I didn't complete my purchase. So I'm looking for a good on-line mail order source for seeds because I can't trust the local rotters. It really did get me down. Still does.

Popping In

I can't let a full week go by without adding something.  Lots of things are blooming.  The side looks great (I think).  I am busy and not up to much gardening.  I am ashamed of leaving things to slide.  I do not wish to document my negligence.  However, a week is a long time for me to leave this blog unwritten.  

In front, there is a pair of yellow tulips.   They are true yellow with a few brushes of red right at the edges.  The sweary one calls these "mustard and ketchup".   I don't remember these tulips from previous years, but they really must have existed in the past.  I certainly didn't put them in new last fall.

In the side, the wonderful old-style tulips right at the south end are all out.  I think there are more this year than there were last year.  This makes me tremendously happy.  I love these.  I wish I could remember their name.  I did plant them, I think, in an early year. 

The tulips I planted last fall are out now.  The "blue" (amiable blue) aren't blue at all.  Note the difference between the blueberry-juice colour of the tulips and the actual blue of the house.  I'm not complaining (much).  It's a wonderful colour.  It's deeper than shows up in pictures.  

The other tulips were Cairo and billed as gold.  I think that's a reasonable description of that colour.  I also think that they work well with the house colours.   I should remember all of those bits of red and keep these flowers away from pinks.  

I am happy with the tulips.  There is a variety.  They're lasting well.  After the first theft, they seem to be sticking it out.  It's a good time to be looking at the garden.  I wish I had more time and inclination to make it nicer.  

Clash

I remember now about these tulips.  Last year they were out at the same time as the orange-gold bulb irises and they clashed horribly.  

These white-rimmed pink ones, between the bulb iris patches, will presumably also clash with the golden orange irises when they emerge.  

These guys, next to the daffodils, are lovely, but not exactly perfectly matched side by side. Two of them have more orange than the other two.  Generally, I am in favour of pink and orange as a vibrant colour combo, but I think I might have to be a little bit more careful about tulip bulb positioning in the future.

I should remember this and move some bulbs next year.  Or cut them right away so that they don't have a chance to interfere with their neighbours.  But that does go against my philosophy.  

Splash of colour

The tulips, in various shades of bright pink, really bring the flower garden together.  They make it sing.   Even in the washed-out pictures I took this morning, I think that splash of red makes a world of difference.  

I am very much looking forward to meeting these tulips which aren't yet out.   I don't know what colour(s) they'll be, but so far it's exciting.

I am hoping against hope that all the tulips make it through mother's day unmolested and unstolen. 

Tickled pink

After weeks of me thinking that the tulips would be blooming "soon", the first tulips finally opened today.  Hooray.

Fits and starts (tulips)

Some of the tulips had flowers developing on Saturday.  The ones at the very bottom of the garden have quite a lovely iris-like development going on.

The ones between the grape hyacinths and the thyme are a little further along, I think.  It looks to me like it might come out yellow, but it's of course too early to do that kind of guessing.  

Another quickie

I did dig up the front corner and put lots of yummy manure and compost in it for the new things, plus bone meal.  I planted all the snowdrops and crocuses and a good number of daffodils and tulips.  I even planted all of the new bulb irises.  I dug up a few viable-looking old crocus bulbs and returned them to the ground, moving my dig site over a few inches as necessary.  I dug up a few truly horrible-looking non-viable gladiolus bulbs.  Do they ever turn into something nasty when they decay!  But then all of the early things were planted and it came to be time to put late things in the sunny sections of the yard.  

The thing is, the sunny sections of the yard STILL have zinnias, marigolds and one lovely nasturtium clinging to life in single-digit temperatures.  I can't dig them up.  I just can't do it.   I will have to dig into frosty ground when I next have a chance (3 weeks, maybe?) but I can't kill that sweet little nasturtium that I started myself from seed.  I can't do in the marigolds which have so obligingly filled my little patch with a pretty glow.  I cannot possibly harm the gorgeous zinnias which are still producing new buds, for crying out loud!  Even the gazanias, which aren't exactly flowering, but do have a few optimistic-looking flowerheads.  I find I can't touch 'em.  

I'm just an old softie, that's all.

tulips

Not too many different kinds of tulips and not too many tulip bulbs.  They're pretty and bright and intense, but people take them and they're more expensive than crocuses, which are also pretty and people don't take them.  

I tried to match them to the house.  This is probably stupid, but I did it.  I got a deep bronzy-golden kind called cairo, and a blue one called aimiable blue.  

Busy day

Actual gardening-type activity occurred today!  Not actual gardening, mind you.  But ... there was lots and lots of gardening shopping.

We went out to a big box store and got soil and planks to turn the front yard into something with more nutrients and fewer people walking through it. 

We went to our local seed store and got lots and lots and lots of bulbs.  I mean, lots.  It was a good haul.

Many posts to follow, all about the different types of bulbs.

Last Tulip

It's June 15, and the last of our tulips is passing its "best before" date.

This is the tulip that sits in the bad soil in the bad light in the bad part of the yard.  It was never going to look perfect and now it's looking positively haggard.  Nonetheless, from first to last tulips going some time in early May to mid-June is not a bad season.  

Tiptoe through them?

Time for a tulip update, I think:

The tulips on the side are finishing.  The pink ones with white edging have been making their way towards the sidewalk.    One of them has been beheaded.  

The others are still pretty, but definitely looser than they were at their peak.  

In exciting news, there is one in the experimental yard beside the steps in front!  

It looks like there may be another there, too.

That's not as many flowers as bulbs planted, but it's two flowers more than were really expected, especially given how that bit of ground gets treated.

Funny Old World

When I went to look up the link to the exquisite tulips of yarnstorm, I discovered that she went to the Keukenhof just before I did.  The world, especially as found on the internet, is uncomfortably small.  Of course, I don't know the blogger yarnstorm.  I just read her blog.  I haven't reached the point where I can leave comments (although if you're stopping by, feel free to do so; more power to you for breaking through the wall) let alone forge an actual relationship with an internet-person.  Nonetheless, it struck me as an odd enough coincidence to mention. 

We booked our trip to meet our own requirements, and were therefore pleasantly surprised that we happened to be in Holland during the tulip festival at Keukenhof (and on National Windmill Day).

Even though the tulip festival was in its last week and we braced ourselves for a lacklustre show after the hot hot hot weather, the gardens were spectacular.  

There were very few flowering fields, however.  In the above picture, you can just make out a purple stripe which is some tired tulips hanging on.  All the other stripes had finished flowering.  I am still having a hard time getting used to the idea that tulips are a thing that grow in fields like cabbages.  I can't believe how different it was a week before, but I think it's lucky I didn't see what yarnstorm saw.  It would have destroyed my mind.  

after

I'm back (although not yet back to gardening).  

I did see some absolutely wonderful other people's gardens while I was gone.  Probably I'll put some lessons learned from them into the blog after I've had a chance to filter the ~2000 pictures I took.  However, this blog isn't about other people's consistently marvellous gardens.  This blog is about MY inconsistent gardening.

The garden, having been neglected these two full weeks, is looking mighty fine even if I do say so myself.  My dire predictions of missing everything were absolutely wrong.  The grape hyacinths are busting out beautifully.

The daffs are STILL GOING!! 

Better yet, no-one has obviously stolen them.  A little while ago, a strange man suggested to the sweary one that he should steal flowers from the derelict school up the street.  Now, I have to admit that the thought did cross my mind that they have a really fabulous daffodil garden going on and presumably when the bulldozers finally arrive, the demolition crew aren't going to painstakingly rescue all of those delicious bulbs.  I have yet to work up the nerve to make a midnight raid.  I keep thinking that really, it would be like a public service to dig up those lovely perennials; the taxpayers' money went towards making that garden!  Surely it shouldn't be wasted along with the building.  Of course, given my inconsistencies, I am not the most worthy recipient.  Also, if my garden were awash with daffodils and the school garden had a my-garden-sized hole in its display ... I think someone would be able to put two and two together.  At any rate, I still have daffodils in my garden.  I haven't checked on the school.

The tulips are out, now, too.  

Even the late tulips at the dark end of the garden are starting.  I can't remember what this one was called, although I think it might have had something to do with a WWI battle site.  I do like it a lot, though. 

This has in the past been the best time for the garden.  I think I may have fewer tulips coming now than there were in previous years.  This may be due to some aging of the bulbs.  It may be due to my appalling habit of forgetting where the bulbs are and digging them up over the summer.  (They are then subjected to the indignity of sitting out in the open for months until I remember to plonk them into the dirt somewhere ... anywhere.  I did even forget to bring one bunch of unfortunates in out of the sun for really quite a shockingly long time.)  It may be because I haven't done much to make the soil nicer for them in the past few years.  The excellent tulip-obsessed blogger yarnstorm puts in all new tulip bulbs every year.  This shocks my frugal soul (what does she do with the "used" bulbs?), but you can't argue with her results.  

Of course, the real question is: "What survived?"  It's not enough to have a couple of beautiful tulips.  If I am going to be a gardener, I need to be able to grow stuff in more than one way.  

First of all, let me explain.  While we were living it up, sweltering under sun-drenched 30+ degree weather in Paris, back at home the temperatures were hovering around zero and steel-grey skies poured oceans of chilly rain onto the ground.  We didn't miss spring here because it delayed itself for a couple of weeks.  Our maple tree is in full flower.  The other trees (lindens, maybe?) aren't even that far along yet.  The natural world in this city looks very fresh and green, just like early spring.  

All of those hot-weather plants I dumped into the ground weren't going to enjoy the cold nights, I thought.  Little did I know that winter would return.  

Nonetheless, it looks like maybe the nasturtium is clinging to life.

There is the barest possibility that one or two marigolds will have survived the shock.  

The scarlet runner beans by the house are possibly going to make it in the long run.

The scarlet runner beans on the guy wire (the whole point of the srb's) look very much like they won't make it in the long run.  

The lavender, which I savaged, seems to have recovered enough to be producing plump leaves.  I would love to grow large quantities of lavender.  It's not really hot and sunny enough here to do it well, though.  

All in all, that's not the weed-ravaged nightmare I was anticipating.   

Hardening

The peas, beets and beans got another dose of it today.  The wind blew them all flat in the morning, but the afternoon was stunning, so they did alright.

So did I, for that matter.  It's not just the plants doing the hardening of today's title.  I am trying to get rid of my softie-ness.  The difficult truth is that yard work is hard work. 

The side yard is spring-ready.  I took out some stones, but mostly I tackled weeds and debris today.  I also dug up the spots that didn't have anything growing.  It looks better.  MUCH better. The front yard still looks derelict, but we'll deal with that in time.  

In the front, we still have snowdrops.  

We also have these delicate lovelies cheering up the entire place.

Even more delicate are these little star-like crocuses.  

The pickwicks in the front are just passing their peak.

The pickwicks in the side are pretty much finished.  I removed the rotting flowers from the main batch.  This is not a task I savour and I probably would have waited for the rotting to get a bit further along were it not for the fact that the pickwick patch was being eaten by clover (more on that to follow). 

The deep purple crocuses (with some pickwicks mixed in) are just finishing and they are going to get the chance to rot properly before I take away the flowers.

The zwanenburg bronzes are completely done.  I removed the mercifully dry remains of its flowers as I cleared out the last of the leaves and a few weeds from under their stalks.

The hyacinth is peaking.  Lovely.  

The grape hyacinths are coming up but they're a way from blooming yet.  

The daffodils are starting to look like they'll bloom soon.

Some of the tulips are looking promising.

Mostly, they're looking like tulip leaves, though.

I have no idea what's in the ground around the tulips there.  I hope that they flower soon to solve the mystery.  It's just possible that they're onions or garlic.  I remember thinking that any leftover sets we had should just be put into any convenient bit of ground for the sake of seeing what they did.  

I cut back the lavender.  

I cut it very far back. 

I cut back the marjoram (?).  It was attacking the zwanenburgs and neighbouring tulips.  I tore some of it out of the ground, too.

I went gonzos on the mint.  I am starting to think that maybe the mint was a mistake, after all.  I was happily cutting it back (it was choking some tulips) and thinking how well it was doing and then I found some roots.  HOLY COW!!  The mint is seriously sinister in the way it wanders around the garden.  I'm going to have to keep a close eye on that little bugger.  I suspect I could remove all the mint I know about and it would still be coming up in unexpected places.  I ended up digging out a large chunk of it, and also digging little trenches between it and the tulips and daffodils.  Any roots in the trench came out.  

I left this in the earth. I hope that it's something I want.

I also left this in.  They can't both be delphiniums, which is basically the only perennial that vanishes completely every year that I expect to come up.  The delphiniums actually look like this:

The tulips at the far end, next to the delphiniums, aren't yet out.  However, they are usually last.  And well worth the wait.  I think the picture shows how much worse the soil is at that side of things.  I believe that is part of the reason why the tulips are so late.

There are irises, which didn't flower last year but hopefully will recover from the transplanting and start blooming eventually.  I put them into the ground at the end of the season in 2006, so I think that they should be given a stern talking-to if they can't produce something nice this year.

The bits and pieces of daylily are not obviously dead.  Some bits have sprouted where the plant originally sat, and I think I didn't put any part of it back in the original hole.  I think they must be shoots from the bits of root (?) that were left in the ground in the chaos of trying to get that monster out of the earth.  We did get to the stage where we were hacking at it quite barbarously.  It wasn't an easy task.  I will have to remember that I split it in 2007 and remember to split all of those in 2011, and NO LATER.

There are these things which could be irises and could be daylilies.  Time will tell.

So, I did pull out a lot of that insidious creeping weed that at first I thought might be a herb.  I now am certain it wasn't.  I can tell the difference between the herbs and the weeds.  The herbs smell delicious when you hack at them and tear them out.  I don't fool myself that I got all of the insidious one, but I got lots and lots of it.  I think it's got such a stronghold because last year I managed to convince myself that it was alyssum coming back after self-sowing.  Oh, innocence; such a mistake.  

I don't know if I'll have any alyssum this year.  The marigolds could be a nice replacement.  The nasturtiums will fill in the ground where the runner beans grow up.  That's the plan, anyway.

I didn't take photos during the process, but in the front I still have some clover attacking the bulb plants.  What gives with that?  Why is the clover favouring the places where my dear old bulbs are coming out?  And why is clover so bloody impossible to get out?  I have been digging and digging and digging with my little claw, just to get to the point where the root is weak enough to break.  I know, you're supposed to get the whole thing out.   I can't follow the whole root when it's wrapped around the bulbs.  

The rhododendron is looking better this year than it usually does.  We had two in the back and they were so sad and hopeless that we gave them away.  They survived the transplant and are enjoying seeing the sun for more than 20 minutes every day.   The back yard has issues.

The biggest victory on the day is the "lawn".  That little strip of grass between the sidewalk and the street, which the sweary one spent a good half hour raking and clearing.  

This is the best it has looked since we moved in.  No, we're not golf-ready.  We're not about the lawn.  And if we were, we'd be very ... upset ... about that gash delivered by the sidewalk plough.  As it is, we can shrug it off and hope that the wound will heal. 

After several hours crouched over the beds this afternoon, I may be hoping for healing myself.