The Yellow Farmhouse Garden

There are still a few Cottonwood seeds floating around today. I think this is just about the end of them for this year.

It apparently has been a great year for Cottonwood seed production. The seed crop was the biggest I have ever seen.

Look at the seeds on this tree, the masses of seeds are as big as pie plates!

We didn’t get to enjoy all the floating cotton as much because of all of the high winds we experienced during the peak of Cottonwood season.

I actually enjoy watching Cottonwood seeds float by… there is something soothing about it. Yes, they can collect in piles at times. This seems to upset some people, especially the “neat nicks” among us.

To me, it’s a reminder of when I was a child. Those floaters meant we were really in summer and school wouldn’t be starting for a long, long time.

Bob

With all of the hustle and bustle of planting 1000′s of flowers and vegetables these past couple of weeks, I almost missed the show that my Passion Flower was putting on.

I planted this from seed about three years ago, this is the first time it has flowered. There are three Passion Flower plants in the green house.

The actual flowers themselves are borne on a vine. Each flower seems to last a day or so then another takes its place. As you can see, they are very impressive, complex-looking blossoms.

These are the same plants that produce Passion fruit, which is used by some people as a mild, fruity tranquilizer.

Even though they look very exotic to us northerners, they grow wild mostly in the southeast states and South America. There are some species that are hardy enough to grow as far north as Tennessee and southern Pennsylvania. I don’t know what variety I have.

For those folks in the south this all may seem mundane, but up here in Michigan…it’s a heck of a lot of fun!

Bob

Over the weekend I needed to harvest a large bag of spinach.  There were two ways I could have done this, either pull the entire plant out by the root or pinch off leaves one at a time.

I prefer using the second method. This allows the plant to keep producing if the growing conditions are right.

The problem was that I had injured my hand a couple of weeks ago and the pinching motion really hurt my finger.  Using a pair of scissors  could have been used, but then I would have needed two hands… one to snip the leaf and the other to hold it and put it in the bag.

It came to me out of the blue… there was a way I could snip the spinach leaf and pop it into the bag all with one hand in one smooth motion, I would just use my Fiskars that I normally use for cutting flowers.

This handy little tool resembles a pair of scissors. It has a cutting blade and a springy clamp that gently holds the stem of the flower you are cutting.  This allows you to reach into a bed to cut a flower with only one hand.

I found out it works just as well on Spinach!

Bob

This year we have been fortunate to have a nice cool spring with a gradual warm up ( if you don’t count today).

One of the nice things about a cool spring, like the one we have experienced this year, is the way all of the spring flowers have lasted and lasted.

Remember all of those bulbs that were planted last fall?  (How We Plant Bulbs) Well, this year we really got to enjoy them. Last year the tulips were exposed to some unseasonably warm temperatures and only flowered for about three days. It took us longer to plant them than that!

Contrast that with this year’s flower display. Here is a photo of part of our bulbs. They are at about 80% blooming when this photo was taken.

These are tulips in the upper beds with Grape Hyacinths in the fore-ground.

A close up shot of those Grape Hyacinths.

Now you know what to say the next time a non-gardener complains about a cool spring!

Bob

Finally it feels like spring! I don’t mind this slightly cool weather. I seem to be able to work longer. Heat in the early spring is too much for me. So this is ideal for me to get my big pots planted that I put out on the extensive terrace that we have at the Matthaei Botanical Gardens.

The pots range in size from 2-3 gallons up to big square pots that are 2 ft sqaure by 2 1/2 ft. tall. I use more than 30 pots all together.

I’m using different soilless mixes this year. I can’t stress how important that is for growing plants in pots. Soilless mixes work so much better because real soil tends to compact too much in pots. Soilless mixes stay looser so roots have an easier time growing, get more air plus the peat moss and shredded bark in the mix holds moisture very well.

We are opting to use mixes with less peat moss and more shredded bark. The bark is a renewable crop while peat moss is being mined faster than it is be produced. Because it takes even longer than growing trees!

So I am using Metro Mix 380 and also Farard 52 mix. I’ll let you know the results at the end of the summer. I have the pots marked, as to which pot has which soil and I will compare how well they grow. I think I will have to fertilize differently but don’t know for sure yet. I will investigate the fertilizer requirements for the soilless mixes, and I’ll let you know

I usually fertilize every two to three weeks with a soluble fertilizer like Peterson’s or Miracle Grow. Don’t use fertilizer made for lawns. It has too much nitrogen and your plants will get to tall and floppy and more inviting to insect attack. I also use time released fertilizer pellets when I first plant. But don’t expect the timed released fertilizer to last all summer. It breaks down very rapidly when temperature are above 70 degrees.

Fertilizing that often , gives me great results. My coleus and cannas cause a lot of “oohs and ahs” when people see them. The coleus gets two and a half feet tall and nice and bushy and the cannas get 6 -7 ft tall in pots!

We could still get another frost so I won’t put anything out yet. I keep mine in the greenhouse but you could keep yours in a garage by a window or in the house by a window. If they are small enough and you have the energy put them out in partial sunlight on nice days but don’t forget to bring them in at night. You could start a number of plants in smaller pots to give them a head start and then transfer them to your biggest pots when you are ready to put them out. This year it doesn’t even look like I will put them out for Memorial day! It is still too cool at night.

So we may have to wait to enjoy our summer flowers but have you noticed that the spring flowers like daffodils and wild geranium and tulips are lasting longer this spring. One flower’s loss is another flower’s gain!

Bye for now, Judy