Ephemeral beauty

Botanists label many of our native spring plants as ephemerals, plants that live, bloom, and die back in just a short time.  While their days are short, the ephemerals are some of the most uniquely lovely plants in my garden.   It's difficult to find these plants in nurseries because their visible growing and blooming season is so short--it's hard to sell what looks like a pot of dirt.  Most of my ephemerals were carefully harvested from meadows and woodlands and transplanted to my own woodland garden.

While I only see these plants for a few weeks each spring, I feel their energy beneath the surface of my garden's soil.  When spring arrives, I watch eagerly for their foliage to appear and diligently keep watch for their delightful blooms.

I love the mysterious beauty of my ephemeral garden.

My orchid bloomed!

All of my adult life, I have attempted to grow orchids.  I've received them as gifts, gotten babies from other gardeners, and even purchased two of them at a yard sale.  The story has all been the same; they finished blooming (if they were blooming when I got them), looked puny for several months and died.

When I became a Master Gardener, I developed friendships with several expert orchid fanciers.  After listening carefully to their advice, I decided it was time to try again.  Right now, I own three orchids:  a night-blooming cereus, a small orchid of unknown parentage that I received as a cutting from a Master Gardener friend, and a phalaenopsis that my husband bravely gifted me for my birthday last year.

Orchids need highly aerated medium in a container that breaths well, bright (but not sunny) light,  humidity, lots of fertilizer and consistent watering.  I have been diligently neglecting my orchids, desperately trying to give them everything they need without killing them with too much attention.

About eight weeks ago, I noticed a bud stalk beginning to grow in the phalaenopsis.  The process was very slow but I ended up with two surviving buds.  Yesterday, the flowers bloomed!  

I am SO proud of myself.  Please don't remind me that just like germination, the gardener has nothing to do with blooming flowers.  Today, I just want to be proud of my hard work and determination.

Landscape design gone wrong

When I redesigned my foundation landscape design, I included two dwarf crape myrtles, the idea being that the blooms would create some colorful vertical interest in the summer and the trunks some architectural interest during the winter months.  I planted one of them on a sunny corner, the dwarf height of ten feet was important because this corner is the utilities connection.  I planted the second shrub in front of a blank brick wall; once again, the dwarf mature height was important to avoid having the branches growing into the windows and eaves of the house.

This plan seemed successful in the beginning.  The colors were brilliant and as the shrubs grew, the pale trunks were lovely in the winter.  However, someone failed to tell these happy crape myrtles that they were supposed to be dwarves that mature at ten feet.  The corner tree grew right through the power lines to a much taller height of about 15 feet (so far).  The central shrub grew to a massive height, climbing well over the roof line of our two story home.

For the corner tree, I evaluate the structure each spring, carefully pruning out any branches that touch or hang over the power lines.  Once it leafs out, the v-shaped opening in the canopy isn't obvious.  The giant crape myrtle quickly became a troublesome tree, requiring me to climb on a ladder or lean from our upper story windows to prune branches that were scraping the siding or trying to grow through the soffits.

Sadly, the large tree had to come down.  Not owning a chain saw meant that I had to take it out using my pruning saw.  It took a few hours but with some help from my parents, we got the job done.  The new plan will be to allow the crape myrtle to regrow, but this time I will let the tree grow in a multi-trunk form, pruning the individual trunks to the ground as they reach 10-12 feet in height.

Landscapers teach that it is important to plant the right plant in the right place but sometimes even the most careful landscape plan goes wrong because plants to know how to read their own labels.

New gardeners in my backyard

My husband and I have been privileged to host my parents for the winter.  They live in Minnesota but decided to test their wings as snowbirds by spending this winter in (relatively) warm Alabama.

Now that spring has arrived in my backyard, my parents are enjoying spending time in my gardens.  Although they would be welcome to sit back and enjoy, my Mom and Dad want to help me out.  They are busy picking up sticks and pinecones, raking sweet gum balls, and pulling out those pesky winter weeds.

They also enjoy taking our young tortoise, Mordecai, out to play with them.  Mordecai searches out and devours his favorite weeds, dandelions!

I love watching my gardening assistants hard at work, while I take photos.

Never trust bamboo

A bamboo stand looks so exotic; there are several in our area and they appear absolutely amazing.  Of course, all gardeners know that it is nearly impossible to contain the non-native varieties.  Asian bamboo is extremely invasive and nearly impossible to kill.  It takes a chainsaw to keep it pruned.  The only gardens that should grow bamboo are professional botanical gardens.

However, there is a native bamboo that grows in woodland borders in Alabama.  The stems are dainty and it tops out at a diminutive  eight feet.  The trees and other natives in the woods and meadows keep the bamboo contained naturally. 

I've admired this native bamboo for years so I decided to carefully give it a try in my own woodland garden.  Understanding that this plant could become invasive in the more fertile setting of a cultivated woodland garden,  I planted my bamboo in a container and then set the container into the ground, keeping the rim well above the soil line so that the rhizomes could not spread into the rest of the garden.  Whenever I worked that section of my backyard,  the plan would be to check that rim to make sure that the bamboo was not spreading.

My plan worked!  The bamboo grew and thrived in its pot and politely remained where it belonged. 

This winter I noticed that the bamboo had filled its container so I planned to divide it and add a second container next to the first one, creating the illusion of a bamboo stand. 

Since the weather was warm this week, it seemed like a good time to pry the bamboo out of the ground.  It was stuck.  After some serious work, I managed to leverage the pot out, only to discover that the reason I experienced so much difficulty was that the bamboo had punched FOUR separate holes through the plastic pot, launching rhizomes that extended as far as three feet beyond the container. 

The only solution was to remove the bamboo.  It had to go into the trash; it was too risky to even toss it into the compost heap.  What frightens me is that the rhizomes broke as I pulled them.  I know there are still sections of bamboo rhizome in the ground.   I will have to spend this spring and summer carefully inspecting my woodland garden so I can remove any bamboo sprouts immediately. 

Never trust bamboo!

If you love something, set it free . . .

"If you love something, set it free and it will come back to you" was just one of the many banal cliches popular in the 1970s.  The truth is something less exciting.  Setting something free is often the right thing to do regardless of the outcome.

Today, I set my little frog free because it was the right thing for the frog.

In the last few days, our frog was taking field trips around the living room but returning to his bromelid to sleep each night.  This morning, however, I found him in the kitchen trapped between the glass and the screen of a partially opened window.  It was clear that our frog was longing to return to his outdoor home.

I carefully manipulated him into my cupped hands and transferred him outside to the herb garden which is full of bright green parsley.  He hopped off my hand and vanished into the foliage.

I was amazed at how sad I felt to be saying good-bye to him.  He brought so much laughter and joy into our home this winter.   Everyone in our family loved to greet him in his bromelid home and he didn't seem frightened in our presence.

We hope he is telling his froggy friends about his fantastic winter holiday. 

Good-bye, sweet green friend.  We will miss you.

The miracle of germination

Along with many other gardeners in central Alabama, I've started my germination trays in preparation for spring planting. 

We discuss and utilize all sorts of methods to facilitate the process.  We clean the trays with soap and water to minimize the chance of infection.  We carefully choose a medium in which to plant the seeds; some folks purchase specially formulated soiless mixes while others (myself included) use the best aged compost.  We carefully warm the soil, keep the water saturation at the perfect level and cover the seeds with damp paper towels to keep them from accidentally drying out.  I even create a chart so I know exactly how many seeds of which varieties are in each cell.

Everyday,  I carefully monitor temperature and moisture, patiently (or impatiently) waiting for each tiny plant to sprout. 

The truth of the matter is that very little of what I do has anything to do with successful germination.   Germination is a miraculous process that God created for the propagation of plants.  Nothing I do actually makes the seeds germinate or causes the plants to grow. 

Gardening is participating with God in the act of creation and germinating seeds for my garden becomes the privilege of watching the miracle of creation unfold.