Grim and Grey

Not much time for gardening today.  Not much inclination, either.  It's chilly and rainy.  So much for our ability to bring warmth and sunshine wherever we go.  Still, the rain makes the maple blossoms fall like bright green polkadots onto our deck.  

When we first moved into the house (in late June) we couldn't understand why the previous owners had let leaf litter remain all winter long.  What else could explain the layer of rotting organic matter on the deck?  The next summer, we learned just what it was that could explain it.  There are a lot of branch tips on a full-grown maple and each one of them carries a largish number of blossoms.  The tree has a lot of stuff to deposit into the ground around it.  Unfortunately for our tree, it gets deposited into our composter and not (eventually) back to its roots.  

Last year, we had the tree cut back (it was attacking the neighbour's house).  Perhaps this year, we'll get its roots fed.  It's a nice tree.  I'd like to be nice to it.  

Plants at the Plot

We walked in via the Public Gardens and our own humble plot this morning.  The plot is looking very humble indeed.  

The peas are, shall we say, struggling.  Heaven only knows if/how they'll survive.  I am going to need to plant some others because I can't go for a whole summer without fresh peas.

The beets are now ex-beets.  So sad.  They came up all red and pretty and full of promise.  RIP beets.   I also can't go a whole summer without fresh beets.  It would kill me.  Oh! and beet greens.  I think it's well past time to get some beet seeds into the ground.  

The beans are even more ex than the beets.  I can't even find a corpse that I can be sure is beans. I took a picture including the most likely candidate, but it really looks just like dirt.  

The garlic is looking alright.  We can rejoice in small mercies.   

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.   

before

So, before heading away for a while, I thought I'd take some pictures of our yard.

We'll miss the very peak of the grape hyacinths, although they are looking very good right now.
Looking not so good are the nasturtiums, but they're planted.  We'll see if there is just a graveyard to admire when we return.  I hope they'll rebound.
The marigolds are still very small.  They aren't obvious, but there are 19 in the ground and hopefully some of those will survive to produce some pretty orange flowers for me later in the summer.
The tulips are looking like they might be out soon.  I am sorry to miss them.
The scarlet runner beans may survive.  The "lawn" surrounding them looks so awful, I suspect that they won't.
The ones by the house should have something to grab on to, but I haven't had time to provide it, so that won't go well.  Such is the life, I guess.
The full-sized hyacinths are really past it, but holding on.  They are delightfully long lived.
The daffs are wonderful.  Drunks walking by the house at 1 am comment on how nice they are (loudly enough for it to waft through my closed bedroom window).

We'll have to wait and see what "after" will be like.

Give me an inch...

I missed two days!  Yikes.

There will be a lot more of that over the next coupla weeks while I'm on vacation.  Ahh.

But, before we went away, the plants couldn't stay out of the ground any longer.  In went the marigolds, nasturtiums, and scarlet runner beans.  

It turns out that 19 marigolds is an awful lot.  I put some in pot and all, some I tore away a lot of the pot, and some I tore away all of the pot.  We'll see which ones thrive.  

The nasturtiums are just a write-off.  I shouldn't have put them into the ground, but I couldn't change the plan.  I'm not a plan-changer.  Anyway, they'll be nasty dead things by the time we get back and that will be easier to deal with than putting just-barely-living things into the compost.  

The scarlet runner beans are not so much of write-offs although they are much the worse for wear.  I meant to put them around a pole that sprouts out of "our lawn", but when I approached it with edger in hand today I noticed that the pole is leaking some oily stuff all around it.  That can't be good for the plants.  So, instead I changed the plan (maybe I am a plan changer, after all) and put the scarlet runner beans around the base of the guy wire for the pole.  However, I couldn't delude myself that there was room for all six there, so I put two over by the house next to the chimney.  If I have time, I'll hammer some nails in and tie string for them to grab on to as they grow.  Otherwise, they'll get to flop around until I come back and decide that they're a disaster.

 

Longish Quickie

I popped by the plot on my way in this morning.  (No camera, but if the rain keeps away, perhaps I'll pull by at lunch.)

The peas look OK, but sort of haggard.  Right now, they only have bamboo poles to grab on to and I think that the poles are too fat for the peas to grip.  I think they need string.  

The beans look dreadful.  I don't know if they'll make it.  Of the three plants I put in, only one has any leaves at all, and those seem to be in imminent danger of getting knocked off somehow. 

The beets look almost exactly the same.  REALLY not sure what to expect from them.  I hope I get a chance to put the seeds in before we go away.  I would hate to miss the season altogether.  

I had a longish chat with another plot gardener, Mary.  She gave us the onions.  They're Egyptian walking onions.  Her plot has many bunches of them.  She also has some really good-looking garlic coming up.  It puts ours to shame.  

She asked about our plants; not surprisingly, she wanted to know how we came to have things popping up so suddenly.  She said that sometimes the things grown on windowsills are too leggy and they don't flourish in the garden.  This, I didn't know.  She also said that hardening off is an art unto itself.  I know so little about hardening off, and I am doing such a crap job of it, that I am willing to believe that there are subtleties, but on the other hand, I think for now I am happy to be the inconsistent gardener and do what works for me.  To hell with what works for the plants.  

Sure, I'll be sad if there are no beans this year.  I'll be CRUSHED if there are no beets or peas.  However, this is a hobby.  I have a tendency to try to become a whole-hog expert in what I  do.  This isn't entirely a negative thing.  Being good at things is something to strive for.  On the other hand, being not good at things is something to deal with.  Enjoying things that you're not good at is an art unto itself.  (I learned that from 3-pitch softball.)

So, all in all, I'm glad I had that educational chat with Mary. I'm not sure that I learned what I was supposed to, but these little reflective moments are what the blog is all about.