Tops the first story, maybe 14 feet.
Pretty Big Fig
Tops the first story, maybe 14 feet.
foundation planting
Tops the first story, maybe 14 feet.
Angeliqueomania, Anomolas, and Mystery Ferns
I can't stop looking at these tulips. And that leads to photographing them, doesn't it. And that leads to showing them on the blog.
Another of my favorite plants is the Climbing Hydrangea, Hydrangea anomola. Its really all year something else. I pulled two out of a garden that I knew was going under the bulldozer (cause I planted it myself!). I put it on the fence of the side yard. Only down side is that people snap the branches a lot.
But what graceful form, gestural.
Another plant, a fern I pulled out of that very same garden is coming back this year. I had my doubts because it is planted in the front yard, in sun all day except for the last few hours and is tucked between heat holding wall and sidewalk. But there it is, making its way back.
New Front Yard
Yesterday I planted a new front yard. I had this insight to share, a definition of a garden: A garden is a place that has easily-dug soil. That's it.
But its not a garden until this is true. What I did yesterday -not a garden. Not even now. But a front yard with new plants. If you have to work as hard as I did with a shovel and a maddox, its not a garden -yet. You have to make it one.
Together with two, at one time three others, we drove to the Red Hook Nursery District and then our local J & L. Five shrubs and 25 perennials later, but emptied-handed when it came to the desired tree, we took on another passenger and headed to J & L. There they saw it -the perfect weeping cherry tree. Nothing attracts a new yard builder like a weeping cherry tree in April. They had one in back, full-flowered branches weeping nearly to the ground. I could tell it was in a pot too small for its 2.5 inch caliper. As I tried to steer them back to the younger, more spindly cherries, they gravitated back to their desire. Sold!
The tree was some of the worst pot-wound, root-bound I've ever dealt with. I hacked until I worried, then planted the sucker. They were watering in at 9:30pm. What a day. Today I am shot.
I am always concerned when anyone wants to plant a tree three or four feet from their house. But the desire for what they see now is so strong, it overcomes rationality, its an emotional decision. After all, there are so many others on the block and they are fine, right? And the neighbors, they love it. It got lots of looks, and even a few comments. Nothing pleases like a cherry tree in April.
Winter Sown and Other Sowings
These are the broccoli and snap peas in the cold-frame. Man, those snap peas grow fast. Broccoli a little slower, but they have their first set of true leaves. In the back you can see my "winter-sown" experiment, also known as starting seeds in the cold-frame.
A closer look shows a sprout just pushing out of the mix. It took two weeks longer out here. The question? Will it be a better broccoli plant or will it be too late to resist bolting later in the season? Who knows, but I will identify it with a tag so that I know which one is which and take note of any differences.
On the other end of the broccoli experiment stick are these seedlings I planted last fall and covered with a plastic tent. My biggest problem here has been keeping them watered. The soil dries out much faster than I anticipated. This taxed the seedlings and killed off most of them while I was away for a couple of stints out of town. Two plants remain in fair health and another two or three are weak looking, but alive. If I had kept them watered I think I would be looking at good-sized starts. It seems that the new seedlings will catch up to the fall-planted broccoli pretty fast once March weather arrives.
A closer look shows a sprout just pushing out of the mix. It took two weeks longer out here. The question? Will it be a better broccoli plant or will it be too late to resist bolting later in the season? Who knows, but I will identify it with a tag so that I know which one is which and take note of any differences.
On the other end of the broccoli experiment stick are these seedlings I planted last fall and covered with a plastic tent. My biggest problem here has been keeping them watered. The soil dries out much faster than I anticipated. This taxed the seedlings and killed off most of them while I was away for a couple of stints out of town. Two plants remain in fair health and another two or three are weak looking, but alive. If I had kept them watered I think I would be looking at good-sized starts. It seems that the new seedlings will catch up to the fall-planted broccoli pretty fast once March weather arrives.
The winter protection afforded by the apartment building makes a good case for foundation vegetable plantings. South facing, wind blocking, heat holding and radiating add up to an ideal location for some winter vegetables.
Smashed Plants
And so my prediction of an early end to the season in my new plot on the side of the house came true. At least in part. Workers doing tasks on the landlord's building danced on the plants. Too bad, because if I had known when they were working, maybe I could have prepared. Well I learned an important lesson: don't plant right up against a house, leave three feet of working space.
Not that my garden is some kind of foundation planting, but just that there is so little space I needed to use every last bit of it. It could be said that every street-side garden in NYC is a foundation planting. Google foundation planting and all you seem to get are commercial articles about the project. Its maybe unfashionable to talk about it in the garden design crowd, but commercial landscapers do it by the truck load. I think it is funny how one of the articles mentions that people today like to garden privately in their backyards. This is true, but its also true that I like to garden in the only yard I have-the front. Its public and I appreciate the relationship I develop with the people in the neighborhood via this activity. I'll do a post on this in the future.
Anyhow, make it possible to get to your house if work may need to be done, sparing yourself the agony of smashed plants. Or pull out the plants before the worker's arrive. So as not to end on a bad note, here is a picture of my "Sheffield Pink" Chrysanthemum, doing well in its first year in the garden.
Not that my garden is some kind of foundation planting, but just that there is so little space I needed to use every last bit of it. It could be said that every street-side garden in NYC is a foundation planting. Google foundation planting and all you seem to get are commercial articles about the project. Its maybe unfashionable to talk about it in the garden design crowd, but commercial landscapers do it by the truck load. I think it is funny how one of the articles mentions that people today like to garden privately in their backyards. This is true, but its also true that I like to garden in the only yard I have-the front. Its public and I appreciate the relationship I develop with the people in the neighborhood via this activity. I'll do a post on this in the future.
Anyhow, make it possible to get to your house if work may need to be done, sparing yourself the agony of smashed plants. Or pull out the plants before the worker's arrive. So as not to end on a bad note, here is a picture of my "Sheffield Pink" Chrysanthemum, doing well in its first year in the garden.