I should be shoveling but...

White skies today.  Haven't seen that in a while and I'm glad we're getting some snow now.  Watching the flakes swirl past my window is strangely relaxing as I am hunched over my computer and working over the hot chocolate I shouldn't be having but am.

Native Tradescantia, probably Ohio Spiderwort

Yep, the snow we had in January didn't last long at all.  Two weeks of weirdly warm, dry weather really did a number on the snow cover.  I've been so worried about all the perennials and shrubs I planted this past fall. I have been watering some of them.  Will spring be drought-y too?  

Anyhow, although I need to go out and shovel, instead I've been working up a garden to-do list and tidying up my disorganized garden planner.  Among my notes I found multiple reminders to get more of a certain plant that I haven't spent much thought on...spiderwort.

Even when it's not in bloom Sweet Kate's foliage looks good

I have two kinds in my garden.  A native that just showed up one year and a cultivar with chartreuse foliage, "Sweet Kate."  Both bloomed well for me this past year.

I'm assuming the native is Ohio Spiderwort (Tradescantia ohiensis).  It has a long bloom season but the flowers close up on hot, sunny days.  It doesn't get supplemental watering but seems to be happy anyway and I've noticed some new plants starting to spring up around the bed.  I like this plant because although it reseeds itself it doesn't go crazy.  Also there doesn't seem to be pest or disease issues to worry about.

'Sweet Kate' Spiderwort

'Sweet Kate' also doesn't seem to have any big issues.  When I first saw it in the garden catalogues I thought it was very garish and ugly.  But knowing how easy these plants are, I decided to give it a try when I found a nice specimen on clearance at the garden center.

In my front shrub border, in a dark spot made darker by a couple of mature spruce trees, the chartreuse foliage of 'Sweet Kate' is lovely, not garish.  I have it paired with 'Wide Brim' and 'Sum and Substance' hostas.  I like the contrast of the hosta and spiderwort foliage.

It's curious, though.  Searching the 'net for info on spiderwort cultivars I noticed that often culture is listed as full sun and moist soil but my native plant tends to reseed where there's part shade.  And, it didn't seem to care that I wasn't watering it over the summer despite it having thirsty mature spruces as companions. Maybe the cultivated varieties are pickier?

I don't do any maintenance on mine but I read that cutting them back after a big bloom helps them rebloom and that they can get messy when it's really hot out.  I haven't noticed that myself but maybe summers here just aren't enough to make spiderworts miserable.

So, bottom line is I like spiderwort and I want more of them in my garden.  There are more cultivars on the market every year, including a couple with bi-colored foliage but I think I'll stick to the two I have.  Do you believe me?

Winter's Here

Still have our Christmas lights up;
sometimes I turn them on in the morning
so the kids can see them as they head out to school

The snow and cold are finally here.  So are the first of the gardening catalogs.  


Guess it was kind of silly to be so worried about a too-warm and snow-less winter back in December.  Now there's enough for the kids to make snowmen and I even saw a couple of snowmobilers out on the trails a few days ago.

Snow cover is a good thing so I'm pretty happy we've finally got some.  Also, fluffy white snow is just SO pretty, even when you are out shoveling before the sun is up.

I bought some Gnatrol for my fungus gnat infection but I'm nervous to use it.  The list of instructions and warnings seems awfully long for an organic product.  After all, it's just Bt.  I keep my houseplants pretty dry so the gnats have dwindled on their own.

I've started putting together a list of plants I want to get this year.  The viburnum from my front foundation planting that I chopped down to the ground last year did not return, so I've got a hole to fill there.  I love the planning part of gardening best of all.

Dead Aspens-What to Do?

Sometimes it seems like gardening is like politics.  You can be a ruthless dictator and spend your time defending your turf against all manner of fellow creatures, or you can be a compromiser and try to coexist peacefully with others, taking action only when the balance is threatened. Being the latter reduces time on the battle field but makes every decision complicated.

Take a dead tree for example.  We have several snags on our lot.  I recently had an arborist out to quote me for cleaning up our remaining buckthorn and he asked me if I wanted all those snags removed.  Now, if I wasn't concerned about wildlife I'd have had him take them all down, no other thought required.  However, we have a lot of woodpeckers on our little lot, including downy woodpeckers, who happen to live in dead trees.  So I want to be selective in which dead trees to remove.   

I love seeing and hearing the birds in our yard and I know they eat a lot of bugs so it's not just sentiment that makes me want to provide a haven for them.  They are worth it. 

Looks pretty pathetic with no snow...sigh....

So, only one will be coming down-an aspen felled a couple of weeks ago during our last bit of windy weather and snagged in an oak tree that I want to get pruned this winter.

Changing subjects...who would think that in January it'd be too warm to safely prune oaks? You probably already know, but oaks and elms should only be pruned in the winter so disease-carrying beetles don't get them.  I've seen the damage oak wilt can do to a neighborhood-it's scary!

Seriously, I love a 40 or 50 degree winter day as much as the next person but day after day?  It's gotta stop!  Bring on the cold...I've got yard work to do!

Hot Tubs Look Good in the Snow

Staying warm?  I'm trying to; anything below 20 and I avoid going outside if I can.  Guess I shouldn't be living in Wisconsin...

Anyhow, I think I promised to put up a picture of the neighbor's new hot tub, the crowning glory of his back yard landscaping renovation, and it is indeed glorious!  Hot tubs look good in the snow!  Now, I just have to figure out how to get an invite (insert scheming smile here).

Before it snowed I noticed that I have a lot of plants in my yard that haven't gone dormant yet.  And of those plants, a lot of them have purple or burgundy foliage.  I've scattered some pix of them throughout this post.

'Caitlin's Giant' Ajuga-bought some of these on clearance
 to try under my cedar out front; it's a tough spot-
even lamium and lamiustrum didn't care for it

January is starting off pretty quiet.  Not much new happening in my gardening life currently; we finished the retaining wall before the ground froze but not in time to plant the boxwoods I got on clearance late fall.

They are in my basement under a full spectrum lamp, along with some of my less-loved houseplants and outdoor tropicals.  It must be a pretty tortuous environment.  The cilantro plant I bought from the store died immediately after I put it down there.  My coleus starts also died pretty much as soon as I put them there; I guess I should have kept them in water on my kitchen windowsill a bit longer to build up the roots.  Too bad about the coleus, they were very pretty over the summer.

Some type of sundrops/primrose-
I didn't plant these so I don't have a tag for them

As for my Amaryllis; it doesn't want to go dormant this year.  Not sure what that's about. I'm wondering if it will bloom for me this year.  Last year it went dormant first before it put on new leaves and bloomed.

Buglossoides- these kept their color last year until the very end of winter

Other than trying to keep plants alive in the basement (it's cold down there but those plants are just too big and heavy to haul upstairs) I've been reading up on unrefrigerated cold-room food storage.  I think I'm going to dedicate some space in the basement for this purpose and give it a try.

Regular Heartleaf Bergenia-during the
summer I couldn't tell the regular from 'Eroica' (seen below);
however the difference in their fall color is striking

This winter I need to prune out the black knot fungus I found on most of the chokecherries in our side yard.  I also plan on taking down some big buckthorns.  I marked them with string earlier in the fall when they still had leaves.  I'm just not very skilled at winter tree identification.  There's always a winter tree ID class in late winter at the Retzer Nature Center but it's always on a weekend that I am unavailable.  Frustrating!

Other than that I don't have much gardening stuff to do other than drool over catalogues and draw out plans for the spring and summer plantings.  Oh, I even gathered up all my plant tags and sorted them.  They have their very own labeled plastic box now.  Ooh, I feel SO organized!

Well, gotta go and figure out how to get the fungus gnat infection I've got going in the house under control...

'Eroica' Heartleaf Bergenia's fall color

Happy Holidays!

Can you believe it's almost mid-December and I'm still puttering around outside weeding and such?  We've had a couple of decent frosts but the ground isn't frozen yet.  There's still some green foliage in my garden: columbine, bergenia, male fern, hellebore, thyme, lamium, and yes, that awful garlic mustard and motherwort.

Male fern grouped with hosta, false solomon's seal, wild geranium, solomon's seal and enchanter's nightshade this past spring

I am still surprised about how tough male fern has been in my garden; it's weird to see them still green in December.

Actually, they're one of three fern species that have done well for me this year:  Robust male fern, maidenhair fern (a native) and interrupted fern (another native).  All are in soil with an alkaline clay base naturally amended with neutralizing oak leaves, lots of root competition, and part to full shade.

The first ferns I planted were maidenhair, deer and male ferns. The deer fern struggled right from the start and by the second summer I gave up on it. Happily, the maidenhair went ahead and made itself right at home.  What a dainty beauty!

The two male ferns I planted also went ahead and carved out a place for themselves.  They haven't gotten tall but their clumps have expanded, despite no supplemental watering, in soil that isn't always moist.

It's hard to see here but if you look hard you can see the
brown fertile leaflets halfway up the fronds of this interrupted fern

I did not plant my interrupted ferns.   I didn't even know what they were when I found them in my front yard.  (Note:  Ontarioferns.com was the wonderful resource I used to determine what the heck they were)  Perhaps the previous owner planted them or maybe they showed up on their own.  Either way I don't give them much water and they have to compete with a tangled mass of spruce roots.

'Ghost' japanese painted fern and my other athyriums
seemed to need more moisture than my other ferns this year;
they did not like our drought-y fall

Some other ferns I've tried did not make it, maybe because the soil is too dry, or heavy and alkaline: every ostrich fern I tried quickly died.  I've got a cinnamon fern that is struggling along and the jury is out on the japanese ferns and other athyriums I've planted.   I hope these make it in my yard; deer and rabbits leave all my ferns alone (so far) and that is an endearing trait if ever there was one!

Puttering Around In November

Still a bit of color to be found in the November garden: smokebush, spirea, ninebark, daylilies and evergreens

I wasn't planning on blogging today.  I would never waste a warm day inside when its November, painfully aware that the next 4 months are going to be yucky and cold!  So I was out weeding this morning.  Yep, weeding.  (Still working on that garlic mustard and motherwort invasion I've got going on.)  Well, of course it starts raining and although I'm not against getting wet, it's not good to be tromping around on heavy clay soil when it's wet, so here I am, waiting for things to dry out a bit.

Some of my spireas turn reddish; others orange and yellow

There's not much color in my yard at the moment since most of my canopy trees are now leafless.  There are still a few sparks though.  My japanese spireas were looking quite fiery this morning and  I'd say that even my purple smokebush was smoldering a bit (oops, is that a pun?)   Actually the spireas paired with the yews make my front yard look like a tribute to the Packers!

I've got a couple kinds of diervilla scattered around the yard; some have nice fall color and some do not.   Not sure if its the different sun exposures or the varieties that are the cause.  Another bit of unexpected color is coming from my Kerria.  Their stems are a bright apple green.  Wasn't expecting that!

It's hard to believe smokebush is a native

I erected a chicken-wire enclosure around what's left of my oak-leaf hydrangea.  The deer damage looked pretty bad at first but after looking it over closer, it's just the tips and leaves that were eaten and there are still plenty of buds on each branch.  I know it's locking the barn door after the horses took off, but I'm hoping it'll recover if I keep the deer away from it for the rest of the winter.

Chickadees were out in force today but I didn't hear much else chittering in the trees. Haven't seen much squirrel or chipmunk activity either.  That's good because I also planted some bulbs today and I don't want those crafty little beasties watching where I put my Tarda tulips.

I'm trying something new this year: Snowflakes (Leucojum).  I thought I had purchased Snowdrops (Galanthus).  Oops!  That's ok though.  In fact, it might work out really well.  Although it sounds like cold hardiness may be an issue, the info I read on the 'net says they don't mind clay soil and a bit of dampness.  Also they are supposedly deer and rabbit resistant.  If it's true; I've hit the jackpot!  (We'll see what happens, I guess.)  I had been planning on planting daffodils in the woods but then decided they may not look right there.  I've still got time to get them in the ground if I change my mind.

Henry's Garnet Sweetspire can't decide
what fall color it wants to be

Well, the sun's back out; gonna go compost some tomato plants.  Later!

Japanese Maples Set Yard Ablaze

'viridis' cut-leaf japanese maple

We had our first snowflakes for the year today. Sadly, the weather that brought those fluffy flakes also brought strong winds that cleared most of the leaves from the trees in our yard.  It was a real pity because my two japanese maples had just turned color a few days ago, after our first frost.

Most of the fall color in my yard is yellow, with a smattering of red but almost no orange.  Luckily I've got  'Viridis', a cut-leaf japanese maple that turns from yellowy-green to bright orange in the fall-hot, hot, hot!     Not to be outdone, another cut-leaf maple, 'takeyuma' turns from a greenish-red to a red so bright it reminded me of the male cardinal that often comes to my cedar to eat berries.

I feel fortunate to have seen the show, even if only for a few days, because right before the maples changed color, deer came through my yard on a mission of destruction.  They ate my oak leaf hydrangea almost to the ground, reshaped my arborvitae (which they've never touched before) and, worst of all, they ripped apart the weeping mulberry that was my splurge purchase for the year.   These plants weren't on their trail and in a part of the yard that isn't easy to get to, so I was shocked at the damage.  It's a miracle that they didn't go after the maples too, which I had also purposely planted on hilly areas near the house to minimize their accessibility.  Needless to say, I was spraying Liquid Fence like a fiend the next morning.

'takeyuma' doesn't keep it's red color
in the summer shade but I like it anyway

When I was gardening in central Wisconsin, I pined for the chance to grow Japanese maples.  I've heard that they only last a few years before succumbing to the cold but now that I can grow them, I can't imagine not having a couple around.





There's a garden in Rockford, Illinois that is a must-see in October if you like Japanese maples.  Anderson Japanese Garden is a highly-rated Japanese garden that is lovely in the fall.  Once those maples change color,  Wowza!  It's like an electric shock seeing them beauties!

Cut-leaf maple leaves are so feathery!