Pink Firespike December 21, 2021

Pink Firespike looked pretty today.  This is a shade loving fall bloomer.  It freezes down to the ground.  each winter, and I cut down the dead wood in early March each year.  Butterflies are very attracted to Firespike.  There is also a red variety. 

Debutante Camellia December 17, 2021

 There is not much I can say about my beautiful Debutante camellia that I have not already written.  It is one of my very most favorite plants in my collection.

Biltmore Ballgown Abutilon December 18, 2021

 It was December 12 when I took these pictures, and we still had not had our first freeze of the season.  Interesting.  Some years we have our first hard freeze before Thanksgiving. Last winter I had made a note in my head that I would prune back these Abutilons (I have 3) in early summer to see if they would get bushier by the time their fall blooming season came around.  But the intense February freeze knocked them all back so much that they were barely at knee length in early summer. These are fun plants to grow.  They like some shade or morning sun.  They are fall bloomers, always a selling point for me.  

These two are in the Medicine Garden.  They were hurt worse by the February freeze than the one in the Star Garden.  But they clawed their way back, and the tall one bloomed.  

   

 

At the Farm December 5 - 10, 2021

 

Arrived Sunday morning.  Our cars were loaded with stuff for Christmas - presents, folding chairs, a new folding table, and all of my china.  Plus all the normal things we bring like food, a flat of plants and a bag of potting soil, clothes, etc.

• Leaves everywhere!  And raining down constantly.  Bert blew all the leaves from around the pool.  I will start raking again in earnest on Monday.  
• My neighbor Debra left me some plants by the front door.  Yarrow, some little bunch grass plugs (I think it's Cup Grass), an artemisia and a little native Fragrant Mimosa seedling. 
• I did some spot watering in the White Garden.
• I did some spot watering in the Rose Garden.  I hand watered all my roses in buckets.  I raked the walkway along the Long Border and dumped all the leaves and pine needles in the Rose Edge Border.  I pulled up or cut back all the Four O'Clocks along the walkway of the Long Border.  Mulched a few of my roses in buckets and around Caldwell Pink. 
• Watered all the pots next to the pool and in the Medicine Garden. 
• I planted a flat of Sweet Alyssum in the White Garden. Cut back some white salvias  and cleaned up some white black eyed Susan vine that was creeping along the ground.
• I raked some leaves into piles in the Greenhouse Gardens.  And I raked leaves out of a few beds where I have sown Nicotiana seeds.  
• Monday.  Worked.
• Messed with the compost piles.  I layered more greens in between the leaves.  The green cooks the browns.  You need that to help break the leaves down more quickly.
• During lunch I did a little raking and cleared leaves from an area in the Medicine Garden.
• I pulled up some red shrimp plant that had taken root in a few beds where it was not wanted. 
• I shot holes in a feed bucket that Bert brought back from hunting last week in preparation for planting a rose.
• I dug up Madam Antoine Mari and planted her in a bucket.
• After work I raked up leaves and dumped them in the unfinished part of the Star Garden and the Rose Edge Border and the Daffodil Border.
• Tuesday.  Worked.  
• Before work I dug up Heritage rose and put her in a pot.  Heritage has a wonderful scent, one of my best smelling roses.
• During lunch I raked and dumped leaves in various places  - the unfinished parts of the Star Garden, the Daffodil Border and the Rose Edge Border.
• I had Bert shoot holes in the bottom of 2 more feed buckets in preparation for digging up 2 more roses.  After that I will have only 1 more bucket that I am going to use to dig up a Sweet Olive in the Star Garden that has hung on faithfully for a decade, but it has never done well.  I have decided to give it a fighting chance by potting it up.  These feed buckets look pretty ugly.  But with some silver pony foot or some sedums draping over the edges, they will for the most part be hidden from view.  Plus over time they will sink a bit.
• I used the contents of one of my compost buckets in the Vegetable Garden.  Then I added browns and greens to it to start a new pile.  After work I dug up Madame Joseph Schwartz and moved her to a bucket.  A few Country Girl mum seedlings came up with her, and I planted those in one of the beds in the Rose Garden.
• After work I dug up my Gaye Hammond rose and put her in a bucket.  I'm all out of potting soil now.
• I mulched all the tubs that were not mulched yet.
• I spread mulch around the asters that I dug up and moved last week when I shortened some beds.
• Wednesday - already!  The week is flying by.  I worked.
• Before work I planted the five white yarrow my neighbor gave me.  I planted them in Mom's Garden (the White Garden / the Water Garden).  I also planted the artemisia she gave me.  It is the same variety as one I already have in there that I got at the plant swap a month or so ago.  So I planted it next to that one.  I'm hoping for a large stand of them next spring and through the summer.  I just love artemisias.
• During lunch I raked leaves and dumped them in the area I cleaned out recently near the pool.
• I pulled weeds in the Kitchen Herb Garden.
• I sat in the Rose Garden for a while watching the butterflies and bees and the myriad other insects that were flitting about.  We still have not had a freeze, and all the gardens are beautiful.  Everything takes on such a special beauty in the last days before winter.
• After work I did more weeding in the Kitchen Herb Garden, and I mulched a good part of it.  I really smushed down the mulch - I don't want any weeds to break through.  More to do there.  There are only a few parsley seedlings that came up from last year's harvest, some chives, mint and my adorable perennial, native chili pequin growing in my herb garden.  That's it.  I need to get some herbs!
• Bert walked around the gardens with me just before darkness set in, and then we took a nighttime ride around the property. 
• Thursday.  Worked.
• Before work I walked around the Rose Garden for a bit.
• During lunch I finished mulching the Kitchen Herb Garden.  It looks so good even though there is almost nothing growing in it.  It is a sea of perfect, black mulch.
• I raked a truckload of pine needles and dumped them next to the Vegetable Garden.  I will probably use most of them in the Orchard underneath the blackberry brambles, but I don't have time to do anything this week. 
• Did some raking and loaded up the truck.
• After work I emptied the truck, but I did nothing else. 
• Friday.  Worked.
• Watered the buckets in the Rose Garden.
• Headed home during the lunch hour.  Spending the night at Blake's to watch the kids, Cleo's recital on Saturday afternoon, Lights in the Heights at Josh and Amy's on Saturday night.  Back here on Sunday to decorate the tree.

A Week at the Farm November 20 - 28, 2021

 

This is Perl d'Or rose.

Arrived at work on Friday evening.  Bert was already here.  I have vacation all next week.  The weather will be cool all week.  Very poor planning on my part, I should have had some mulch on order for delivery so that I could start work on my fall list of maintenance activities.  But alas, I never even thought about it.

• Saturday.  I watered the Kidneywood and Tenaza tree by the Shade Garden and Vegetable Garden.  
• I sprayed herbicide on the back paths, under the arbor and in the large space next to the pool.  If I don't get the winter weeds knocked out now it will get too cold for the herbicide to be effective. 
• I dug up my Dr. Grill rose in the Rose Garden and planted it in a feed bucket.
• I dug up Carefree Beauty and planted it in a feed bucket as well.  It had been completely overtaken by purple gomphrena.  I could hardly find it there was so much gomphrena leaning over it.  It was leggy from being buried so I snipped off all the ends.  It should be much happier.  I had 2 growing in that bed, one died from vole attacks.
• Ray and Debra stopped by to ask about a tree in our back yard that has wonderful fall color.  It was my sassafras tree.  I have a seedling coming up nearby, so I offered it to her.  It's skinny, but it's about 4 feet tall - worth having.  She's going to come by some time after Thanksgiving and dig it up.  
• I raked in the Rose Garden for a bit and dumped the leaves in the Daffodil Border.  Watered here and there.
• Drove out to the road and dug up a bucketful of rock to fill in spots where I shortened those beds last week.  I still have more to do out there, but I have enough time to do it little by little.
• I turned my compost piles.  One of them was alive with ants, so I poured a couple of gallons of water into it.  That will get rid of them.  About an hour later I turned the ant infested pile again.  
• I raked up leaves along the edge of the arbor where Bert blows fallen leaves.  I dumped 3 wheelbarrows of leaves into the Daffodil Border.  Did more raking in the Greenhouse Gardens, but more to do there.
• I drove down the road and dug up another bucketful of rocks to continue filling in where the beds used to be.  Feels like I strained a muscle.  Bummer.
• Took a nap.
• Sprayed herbicide in the Rose Garden and along the Long Border and in the front along the front beds.
• Did some more raking in the Greenhouse Gardens.
• My wheelbarrow of parsley looks really good.  I have been ruthlessly looking for and pulling up anything that is not parsley.  I want a perfect bed of parsley in the spring for my caterpillars.  Last year I let wildflower seeds take hold, and the wheelbarrow was a mix of parsley and other plants.  My caterpillar activity was not nearly as good as the first year.  This is year three for my little science experiment.
• Sunday.  I went straight out to the Rose Garden and planted 75 Naples Onions next to the Noisette.  
• I sprayed herbicide along the sunny side of the Circle Drive beds.  And I sprayed herbicide along the Daffodil Border.
• Did some dead wood pruning on the Noisette.  Working that closely to it while planting the little flowering onions made me notice how much dead wood was in there.
• Raked in the Rose Garden some more.  And I raked along the driveway edge where Bert blows leaves off the driveway.  Dumped all the leaves in the Daffodil Border.
• When I raked near the Homestead Purple Verbena in the Rose Garden, I pulled it up and cut it away from the paths.  I planted all the cuttings in various places in the Star Garden and the Rose Garden.
• I did some raking in the Star Garden.  And I fussed around with the beds I'm decreasing, but I didn't really make any headway.  I am waiting for Bert to cut the cedar edgings to fit the smaller beds, but his saw broke while he was cutting down a tree.  So I will have to wait until Monday for the part to be replaced.
• I cleaned the white bench in Mom's Garden with Clorox and 409 mixed with water and a sponge and some elbow grease.  Looks much better. 
• Collected some seeds from my Fruity Pebbles Lantana and scattered them in a bed in the Orchard.  
• Napped.
• I did more raking in the Greenhouse Gardens.  Dumped all the leaves in the Daffodil Border.  While I was in there I cleared fallen leaves out of several of the beds where my Columbine seedlings are trying to thrive.  I also threw down lots of Nicotiana seeds in those beds throughout the last summer, so I will try to keep them cleared out.  No seed will grow where leaves are thick on the ground.
• I raked in the Vegetable Garden as well.  
• This is an important time of year for me.  Raking up the fallen leaves and spreading them in various gardens is an important part of my gardening regimen.  I can't buy enough mulch to cover all my beds.  It would be cost prohibitive.  Leaves and pine needles are my mulch in many areas.
• Spot watered in the White Garden. 
• Monday.  Grocery store first thing to get my Thanksgiving supplies.  Twelve adults, six kids.  Our contribution is turkey, pork roast, mashed potatoes and gravy, mustard and collards in ham (only because I have so much of that growing in my garden - it's not part of our traditional dishes), 2 cakes, muffins and some of the appetizers.  Also picked up some more potting soil to fill one more feed bucket.
• I worked on the beds that I am shrinking.  Bert cut the cedar edging to fit.  I finished digging up the soil from the areas where I shortened the beds.  I threw it all in other beds.  I dug up lots of rock from the road and laid it down in my new paths.  Still more to do there.  Lugging rocks is heavy work.
• I dug up another rose in the Rose Garden - Iceberg - and planted it in a pot. 
• I cut 3 big handfuls of a pretty sedum overflowing the sides of a pot and pressed them into the soil of one of the roses I planted.  It might not make it through the winter.  Some of those sedums I plant make it through freezing temperatures and some don't.  I can't remember if this one will or not because I buy so many varieties.  But a ground cover on top of the soil of those potted roses will help trap moisture. 
• I puttered around in the White Garden deadheading roses, pulling a few weeds and clipping plants that were crowding other plants.  
• I did some more raking and dumping leaves into the Daffodil Border. 
• Watered my sweet peas in the Vegetable Garden that I sowed a week or so ago.  They are just beginning to pop up.
• It was a beautiful day, sunny and cool.  Really a perfect day.   
• Tuesday.  Cold and sunny.  Thanksgiving is supposed to be a very rainy day.  Too bad.
• I made my gravy stock and some pea soup.
• I cleared out the area next to the greenhouse that has gotten a bit overgrown.  There used to be a bed in there, but I long ago quit messing with it because it was too hard to water.  Now some Beautyberry shrubs, Snakeroot and Poke have taken over in there which is fine.  But it's gotten a bit weedy.  I raked in the Medicine Garden and dumped all the leaves in there after I pulled up all the offending weeds.
• I turned over the soil in one of the beds in the Vegetable Garden that I sowed with rye.  The rye was pretty long.  I chopped up all the grass and will let it rest for the remainder of the cold season to make green manure.    
• I spent time in the Rose Garden just puttering.  I spread seed from my Red Shades yarrow.  I don't know if these many yarrow cultivars come back true from seed.  I googled it but couldn't find anything helpful.   Pulled a few grasses popping up in the corner bed.  
• There isn't really much to do right now in the gardens.  It's that wonderful time of year when the weeds are gone and the weather is beautiful.  I just walk around and do a touch here and there.
• Wednesday.  Baked.  Went to dinner with the Thomesons and the Gwyns.
• Thursday.  Thanksgiving.  William and family and Cleo and Koy spent the night.
• Friday.  Bert went hunting.  Spent part of the day with Josh, Cleo and Koy.  The girls and I gathered lots of peppers in the Vegetable Garden for Josh to take home.  Rested for a bit after they left.
• Did a bit of mulching in the Rose Garden - the Zepherine Drouhin and some of the roses I put in the buckets.
• Spent some time in the White Garden.  I collected seed off my Mexican Buckeyes and threw them at the base of the smallest tree.  
• I cut away all the bottom leaves of my collard and mustard greens and threw them in the compost piles.  Also gathered lots of Hoja Santa leaves for the compost piles.  Turned the piles. 
• Mulched the Marie d'Orleans and Beverly roses in the front beds. 
• Laid chicken wire down on the ground in the Rose Garden because I heard deer don't like to step on it.  We'll see.
• Saturday.  A total bust.  Rained all day long with no stopping.  Cold also.  I tried to go out for a bit despite the unpleasant conditions to do some mulching.  But I didn't last long.
• Sunday.  Rain is gone, but the sky was steel grey all day long, and it was cool.  
• I sowed some Moss Verbena in a spot where I thought I had already sown, but it either never sprouted or I was mistaken.   
• I spread mulch all morning in the shady part of the Star Garden.  I mulched around my Pearlbush, both my little camellias, my double red althea, my snowball bush and Veilchenblau.  And I spent a lot of time weeding and mulching in spots where I cleared.  I mulched most of the Bulb Bed that wasn't covered up in white mist shrubs.  I mulched around the white mist shrubs really well last year, so that will have to do for next year as well.  I reset some of my cedar log edgings as I went along mulching.
• I gathered seed from my Country Girl mums.  One stem happened to be brown, so I cut it, brought it inside to dry out then broke apart the flower heads just to look at them.  I have hundreds of mum flowers in the Rose Garden to deadhead, I just wanted to check out the seed.  I have spread seed in the past, but nothing much came of it.  I'm going to get more serious about it now because I want more mums in the garden.  They are so pretty in the fall.  In a week or so I expect they will be ready to harvest - the stems need to be brown.
• The Rose Garden looks really pretty right now, so verdant and healthy. 
• Spent 30 minutes or so putting away the last of the Thanksgiving decorations and gathering stuff to take back to Houston.
• I went down to the Orchard and spent a couple of hours mulching in there.  I weeded then laid down mulch.  I pulled up lots of pink salvia.  I did some raking.  A lot more work to be done in there.  But what I did looks good.  

Time at the Farm November 6 - 14, 2021

 

Arrived on Saturday with Charlie for our special one-on-one weekend.  We road the zip line, played in the fort, took walks, splashed in mud puddles, threw rocks, built rock piles, played dice games that he made up, played hide and seek, he rode the little tractor, drove the cadet, we made Christmas ornaments, we made him a bracelet from a kit, and we collected caterpillars in a bug box I had.  He went home on Sunday evening.

• Monday.  Worked.
• During lunch I pulled up lots of spent ageratum in the Star Garden.
• I pulled up all the arugula in the Vegetable Garden that had gone to flower.  This was the really skinny-leaved arugula that I don't like, so I pulled it up before it went to seed.  
• I turned over a section of bed in the Vegetable Garden and planted an artichoke that I got at the plant swap last week.  I had already cleaned up that bed and sowed kale and parsnips.  And although they were coming up, a lot of the little Purple Phacelia was coming up too.  I don't want to encourage that, so I turned the bed, planted the artichoke and then covered all the bare spots with pine straw to discourage any more unwanted growth. 
• I also planted a little Aristolochia Fimbrata in the Medicine Garden.  This is a little perennial groundcover larval plant (for the pipevine swallowtail butterfly) that I got at the plant swap.  I have one growing in that bed that I bought earlier in the summer.  This is a fun plant to grow with interesting flowers.  I'd like to get a bunch more, they are expensive though which is why I snapped this one up when it was my turn to pick.
• After work I picked arugula for a salad for dinner.
• I cut away some morning glory vines in Mom's Garden.
• I continued pulling up spent ageratum in the Star Garden.
• I pulled up some basil on the wane in the Rose Garden.  And I pulled up a bunch of straggly zinnias.  Deadheaded them and threw the flower heads in the bed.  I gathered seed from my Fruity Pebbles lantana and threw them in the Noisette bed.  
• Bert brought home a bunch of plastic feed buckets that he picked up in the pastures where he was hunting last weekend.  I'm going to plant my new roses in them - I'm fed up with the voles eating my roses. There are several spots where I want to plant roses in the Rose Garden.
• Tuesday.  Worked.
• During lunch I planted a perennial artemisia that I got at the plant swap last week.  I have two varieties now - one that I got from Connie and one that I acquired at the plant swap.  I planted it in the White Garden.  I also planted another of the prostrate fleabanes in the White Garden that I picked up from the swap.  
• I dumped all the ageratum that I pulled up yesterday in an erosion spot.
• I pulled up more ageratum in the Star Garden.  Most of it is gone, but I'll be pulling it up here and there for a while.  There is a lot of it.
• I pulled out Wedelia from amongst my double orange daylilies.
• I have decided to reduce the size of a few beds in the dry shady part of the Star Garden to make the paths bigger and make the garden more inviting in those areas.  There are 2 large beds that run alongside each other (remnants of Max's original garden).  I have a lot of black seeded moudry grass in both of them.  One of them has a blue Vitex tree in it.  And they have various plants that come up from seed (Philippine Violets and red shrimp plant mostly).  But they aren't particularly attractive, and they get really messy looking in the summer when the grasses spill over into the paths.  I am also going to remove part of a long narrow bed in the sunny part of the Star Garden to make a bigger area around a bench that sits in there.    
• After work I started turning over one of the beds in the Vegetable Garden that I had sowed with rye grass.  I sowed it to make a green manure.  Rye grass seed is a lot cheaper than compost.  The grass has gotten long, and I want it to be good and rotted when spring gets here.  I might have been a little soon, but in past years I have waited until it was three feet high, and it's really hard to turn and chop up.  If you don't spade it pretty well the grass keeps growing despite being dug up and turned over.
• While I was in there I roughed up the soil in the bed where I pulled up the arugula and sowed rye grass seed.
• Did a bit of weeding.  And I pulled up the rest of the red celosia and spread some of the seed heads in the Vegetable Garden and some in the Rose Garden.
• During lunch I drove in to Brenham and bought 4 really big bags of potting soil.  I will use them to top off several of the buckets in the Vegetable Garden and fill as many as I can of the buckets that Bert brought me from his hunting trip.
• After work I topped off 3 buckets in the Vegetable Garden.  I sowed 2 packets of sweet peas in the 3 buckets.  I had a lot of seeds, and I stuck all of them in the buckets which means they will be totally over-crowded.  Why should this time be different from any other?  Well, if I get a bumper crop I pull some up.
• Thursday.  Worked.
• During lunch I started working on a bed in the dry part of the Star Garden.  As mentioned, I narrowed the bed to make the path wider on one side.  I did that by digging up all the soil in a wide margin and pushing the cedar log into the space I created. I threw all the soil that I dug up in that bed and surrounding beds. Red shrimp plant had taken over in there, so I dug it all out.  I also dug out quite a bit of moudry grass.  And I dug out a half dozen or so tall Philippine Violets.  Now the only things growing in that bed are red cannas, Illustris colocasia, some Ox Eyes, and a few grasses.  I'm not quite done, but I ran out of time. I didn't attempt to find a home for any of it.  All the dug up plants went into the debris pile.
• After work I went down to the Orchard and pulled up lots of basil.  I ended up with a big pile just outside of the Orchard, all the basil is tall and woody.  But until the last week or so it has still been a good source of nectar for the bees. 
• Friday.  Worked.
• During lunch I continued working on the bed I began the day before.  I shortened it on both ends so that there is more room to maneuver around all sides.  
• I also started on the adjacent bed, making it narrower and shorter.  Again, I dug up lots of moudry and Philippine Violets.  More to do on that one as well, but I ran out of time and had to get back to work.
• Saturday.  At long last!
• I spent most of the morning in the Orchard.  I pulled up the last of the basil plants.  I cut back all the blue salvia in the Jujube bed.  I pulled up all the swamp sunflower, it was completely done blooming and all flopped over.  Looks like the voles had gotten in there and gone to town.  I'm trying to eradicate swamp sunflower from that bed, so for once, I'm okay with the voles. I cut off all the Philippine Lily seed heads and spread them throughout the beds in the Orchard.  That took a while because there are so many lilies down there.  I put on my long leather gloves and pushed up the blackberry bramble in the back corner and staked it as best as I could with 4 metal rebars.  I just wanted it up off the ground.  I raked the paths throughout.  Dandelions have made their appearance, so I pulled up as many as I could.
• Next I dug up a rose that was in the Orchard.  It was spending most of its time being smothered either by wildflowers or blackberry brambles depending on the season.  I planted it in one of the big feed buckets that Bert found last weekend.  I set the bucket in one of the beds in the rose Garden, filled the bucket with potting soil and planted the rose.  I think this rose is Baronne Henriette de Snoy.  I will have to look back at my notes, but pretty sure that's right.  I have had it with voles eating my rose roots.  So I will give this bucket idea a try.  I put doubled over chicken wire at the bottom of the bucket in case the voles try to chew through the plastic.
• Bert and I drove in to Brenham and ate lunch at a Cuban restaurant.  And we drove around the country roads looking at houses.  It was a nice time.
• When we got home I dug up the Beverly rose that I planted a couple of weeks ago and planted it in one of the feed buckets. Same routine:  chicken wire in the bottom, potting soil, and rose. 
• And in the third bucket I dug up Martha's Vineyard rose and planted it in a feed bucket.  The huge Bachelor Button growing next to that rose had just died (the voles chewed it right off at the soil level), so I knew the rose was in jeopardy. 
• So, we'll see how these roses do in buckets.  These are big buckets.  They certainly can't do any worse than they are now.  I have one more bucket that Bert brought home.  I will bring more potting soil with me next visit and dig up another one.
• Well, now that the weather has turned cooler at least the armadillos have gone quiet.  One less torment...for now. 
• Sunday.  Headed home really early to make it in time for Charlie's 6th birthday party.    

Butter Pat Mums November 13, 2021

I almost lost all my Butter Pat mums a few years ago, they just basically disappeared, I'm assuming from voles.  I transplanted the last few precious ones to a new spot, and they are coming back pretty well.  I don't do anything to these mums (to Country Girl either) although I'm sure pinching would make the plants bushier.  I love mums, and they are welcome blooms  at this time of year.