did I jump the gun?

Our last frost was January 11th and warmer than normal temps have allowed me to begin garden clean up.  As soon as I can get out there, I do – there is much work to be done and I prefer to do it in small chunks.  However, as I sit at my desk today looking out at the rainy day and the 5 yards of compost I had delivered yesterday, I can’t help but wonder if I have jumped the gun.  Truthfully, it is early to begin this work.  The soil is saturated and we are likely to have additional frosts – possibly Monday night.  On the other hand, we have a string of sunny days in next week’s forecast which will be good for getting more work done.  Temperatures will be colder than usual, which I can handle if it is not raining.  My least favorite conditions to work in are raining and just above freezing.  Makes for a bad tempered gardener (what are you chirping at bird?!)

Transforming the mess that I see outside my window to a flourishing garden must be done in several stages. First up,  I take care of the storm debris and cut back the rotting & slimy perennials and squashed ornamental grasses.  For things like the Hakonechloa macra, I don’t even need to cut – the dead foliage just pulls out (can I say how much I love this grass?).  At this point, I leave any detailed evergreen perennial clean up (such as Heuchera) and pruning frost damage on my tender plants (such as Pittosporum).   To early to bother – more damage is likely and I’d rather leave them intact until the new growth comes on.  As I clear up the major debris, I spread compost.  I don’t bother with small debris – this gets buried under the compost and rots.  There are different perspectives about cleaning up garden debris vs just covering it to rot.  I prefer cleaning up the large debris & leaving the small.  Leaves are often part of a disease cycle, particularly fungal problems.  So I get them out and replace the nutrients they would provide with compost.  This theory of disease prevention only works when the compost has been produced correctly and pathogens in the source material cooked.  Otherwise you are just introducing new pathogens.  I also find that a thick layer of leaves just under a thin topping of compost provides a very inviting slug den and no need to make it any easier for these plant eating machines.

At first glance, the workload for this stage is overwhelming and with a two month break – I am a bit off my gardening game (right, bend at the knees, not waist).  It is by far the most physically demanding time in my garden – and when I am likely to be injured.  To keep myself mentally and physically intact, I develop a game plan before starting the overall clean up.  I then decide what my goals are each day before I head outside.  I also limit my time – the days of seven straight hours in the garden are over.  Adam does not appreciate a monosyllabic wife as I struggle to stay awake.  Worse yet, my joints & lower back threaten a full scale revolt if I don’t respect them more.  Having a specific plan ensures I stay on task and get the satisfaction of starting and finishing an area.  Adam and I team up – he hauls compost to small piles near my work areas (on tarps of course).  It may not be the most efficient approach, but I like being able to look out the window at a finished groomed area and see that I have made progress.  I find it most satisfying to focus first on the areas I see every day (entrance), while less visible areas (back of the back bed) tend to be addressed last.  While doing this, I am always mindful of access so I don’t tromp through finished areas to get to others.   Because commitments to client installations start in March, I try to have all of this major clean up done in my garden by the end of February – weather depending, of course.  Nothing like a foot of snow to slow you down.

My favorite winter clean up tools include:

• a large collapsible leaf bin
• a small tarp that can be cinched up
• a knee pad
• a trug
• a small metal hand rake
• a large metal rake
• the “claw” (aka a hand tiller) and
• my Bahco pruners

The name of the game is keeping debris and compost off of adjacent gravel and hardscape (while not losing my pruners), so I usually work with the tarp under me and at the edge of the work area so I can drag debris onto it. The tarp can then be cinched up and dumped into the bin (hopefully not dumping pruners).  I then leave the full debris bins for Adam to haul to our debris pile that just slowly decays yet never seems to get larger.  The claw is used to loosen soil where I have strategically stepped.  That’s right – gardening this time of year is like a game of Twister as I try to keep the foot traffic in the beds to a minimum since the soil is saturated.   You know you have done wrong when you see worms fleeing across the top of the soil you have just compacted…

In early March, I do any needed spring pruning.  Detailed grooming of tender plants, evergreen perennials & ferns follows as plants begin to put on new growth and the threat of late frosts passes.  March is also when I shuffle and replace plants.  This includes eliminating plants that are time sinks (based on notes from the prior growing season) and replacing them with proven performers for my conditions.  An ongoing process of trialing plants and only keeping the best in an effort to reduce garden maintenance.  April is feeding time as the soil finally warms up, also the time for hardscape repairs and improvements such as fresh gravel, and pot spiffying.   In May, ah May, we finally break out the furniture & cushions…

Whoa, I started day dreaming for a second there.  There are 5 yards of compost and 20 or so extra large bins of debris between me and the days of pillow plumping…

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sun!

Feeling the effects of what seems like weeks without the sun, I was thrilled today when it made an appearance.  Owen and I were out early enjoying the morning sun and then we went back out for an walk along the water in the warm afternoon sun.    What a day!  I feel like my sun battery has been charged…

"Did you say cookie?"

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knit wit

In November I decided to take my love of handmade winter woolies a step further and finally learn how to knit.  My mom is not much of a knitter at home in Los Angeles, but when she comes to visit the needles of fury come out.  She knits away for hours with cup of tea on the side table and the obligatory cat on lap (same cat who once unraveled a skein by stealing it and dragging it across the room). A picture of coziness.   This year, I decided it was time to learn…I also discovered I need reading/magnifying glasses.  I have to admit, it probably was a bit of a shock for Adam when he first saw his wife knitting AND peering over the top of reading glasses.

Being high energy serves me well most of the time.  Except in winter when work is less demanding and I can’t be outside reveling in meditative gardening chores.  Thus, I launched my new-found love with a vengeance and knitted up a storm for several weeks.  I have not moved beyond scarves (yes, I know…boring), but since I love the zen of knitting long uniform rectangles and my neck is always cold, it works well for me for now.  I also have found several other people who are happy to receive my knitted bundles.  Wonderful.  Saves me from burying myself in scarves and feels better to be knitting for someone else.

We have a wonderful knitting shop on Bainbridge Island – Churchmouse Yarns & Tea – http://www.churchmouseyarns.com/.   Churchmouse is a mouth-watering display of all things knitted and woolly.  Seriously.  Must be the British blood in me – I go to special place in this shop.  I’ve been to several other knitting shops and none can touch Churchmouse in terms of yarn eye candy and gorgeous project examples.  If only I could knit what I see there!  One day…

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harsh winter?

This fall there was a meteorologist frenzy as all signs pointed to a very strong La Nina pattern.  La Nina often equals harsh winters in Western Washington.  “The strongest La Nina since 1955″ was the banner, with this winter predicted to be a doozy of cold temperatures and heavy snows.  Thus far the winter has been stormier, wetter, colder & snowier than typical El Nino years, and I have the downed trees, flooding and flat plants to prove it.  Despite this damage, the severity of the weather is nothing new.  That said, we just narrowly missed a major snow event where the snow would have been measured in feet not inches.  What saved the day is where the storm landed (north vs south).  Having lived in snow country, I know there is a significant difference between a few inches and feet – our gardens are not engineered for that amount of snow (not to mention our houses).  I breathed a sigh of relief when they changed the forecast.

One of the challenges gardening here is that the winters are quite variable and we can get into warm cycles as easily as cold cycles.  While we “usually” do not have much snow – we can have freak events like the one we just narrowly missed.  The majority of the time we are blessed with temperate winters, yet once in a while get hit with a really nasty and damaging one.  Why is this a challenge?  We are not sure what to expect.  We plant things that may do just fine in the warm cycles and then can die a horrible death in the cold ones (all those tropical plants, for example).  The cold is not the only problem.  Heavy, wet snow – the kind we usually have here as our snowfalls hover around freezing – can be more damaging than hard freezes.  I noted several damaged trees and shrubs after the storm earlier this week – broken limbs and branches splayed in all directions.  The snow became more damaging with the rain that followed, saturating the snow and increasing its weight.  We were stuck at home on Tuesday morning because an enormous laurel hedge down the road from us had collapsed under the weight of the wet snow, covering the entire width of the street.

The snow flattens everything in the garden – I like to say it looks like elephants have been playing out there.  While it looks bad now, things will spring back or get new growth to compensate.  Most twiggy shrubs are fine as the branches are elastic enough to take being weighed down without snapping.  The plants that are most likely to be disfigured or damaged are the small conifers and shrubs that are columnar or rigid.  I keep a plastic puff duster with an extension arm for dealing with the snow.  Tuesday evening, I went out and brushed off my small conifers and shrubs that would be likely to snap under the snow’s weight.  I also gave the bamboo a good dusting off.   While it is very good about springing back, repeated assaults can lead to droopy culms.  Anything columnar should always be dusted off – such as upright junipers, Italian cypress or ilex.    These can also be bound before an expected snowfall to prevent the branches from splaying out.  They often do not return to normal and can look quite pathetic.

I have also come to accept that beloved plants which are supposed to be hardy here, really should be thought of as annuals.  Plants such as Stipa arundinacea (Anemanthele lessoniana) or Phormium ‘Platt’s Black’ tend to be short-lived.  Both are hardy down to around 15F and I have never seen temperatures that low in my protected garden.  Regardless, both fizzle out over time.  The Stipa will die back in a cold winter and while it can be cut back in late spring, it takes a long time for it to fill back in.   Sometimes the repeated assaults are just too much – I’ve had mature ones that are perfectly healthy going into winter, yet not come back the following spring after shearing.  Phormium are subject to the triple whammy of rot, frost damage and being squashed by snow.  I only use the dwarf  ‘Platt’s Black’ in my garden – no sense in getting attached to anything larger.  I used to try to cover these with Reemay – but seriously, covering Phormium is an exercise in patience.  If there is heavy snowfall after a frost, covering results in a pancake Phormium.   These can also grow back, but more often than not you spend the time trimming back all the leaves only to find the crown is rotten.  The other grass I adore, Carex flagellifera, also seems to be short-lived.  I have found poor drainage kills this one.  Contrary to what is said about this grass on nursery tags and in books, it definitely prefers drier soil…which is hard to come by during our winters.    Every spring, these are the three plants in my garden that I replace as needed.   While I love the color and form these plants bring to a garden, I limit them to my garden because of their unreliable nature in our climate.

Gardeners are like farmers.  We live and die with the weather and need to know what to expect.  I check about 4 weather sites daily to see what’s coming so I can prepare as needed.   Gardening in our climate can be an exercise in acceptance.    We get lulled into complacency during warm years, and taking zonal risks can be rewarding during these times.  By doing so, we also need to be prepared for loss.  We cannot change the weather, we can only roll with it and adjust as needed.  After all – when a plant goes south, it makes room for us to try something new.

 

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january, again

Here we are…January again.  My nemesis.  I know, get your little violins out.  Woe is me…

While we have been enjoying a sunny streak right (absolutely wonderful), this has also allowed some very cold conditions to set up shop.  We have not broken freezing for several days.   Even though my garden has been designed with strong winter interest, it is only January 3rd and I am ready for spring. Seeing all the frozen globs out there for days on end does not help.  Neither do the Reemay goblins that dot the garden – the frost cover has been on some of my tender plants for the past week.  At least I upgraded to Reemay from old sheets.  It does work wonderfully though.  With it, I can enjoy the fragrance of Star Jasmine (Trachelospermum jasminoides) every summer.

Now that the holidays are over and my life has returned to a normal pace, I am chomping at the bit to break the gardening sabbatical and get out there.  Taking a break from Thanksgiving to the New Year is enough for me.  As if working in the garden will somehow hasten spring.  Last year I made it to January 8th before I took to my blog to complain…I guess I am getting more impatient.   As hard as it is, I will wait.  It is much too early to be in the beds.

As I look at the frozen blobs, I question whether I should have done the cut back, clean up & mulch in late fall.  Whether to do the work in late fall or wait until February is a decision I struggle with every year.   I really covet a tidy garden once January arrives, however the decision is partly made by where I garden – under large trees which provide more than enough fall work cleaning up leaves and debris.  By the end of November when the first killing frost hits, I am ready for a break from the garden.  On the other hand, in February I thoroughly relish each gardening task as I transform the sleeping beauty.  After all, distance makes the heart grow fonder.   I also like to leave the decaying foliage through the wettest and coldest months to provide protection for the crowns of perennials and grasses.  The birds seem to appreciate this – kicking through the debris looking for bugs and seeds.  But here I am again in January peering out each window, questioning my decision to leave everything and plotting the work that needs to be done.  As if this will move things along.

Patience, patience, patience…while I wait, I will fill my gardening need addressing the aftermath of the fall weather.  The storm water in the lower gulley jumped its path this year (again), and I need to allow the water to go where it wants.  I also have the huge cedar that snapped in half like a toothpick…the fallen tree needs to be limbed and cut up, and the fence repaired.  I guess (hope) the weeks will fly by and February will be here…just 28 more days and believe me, I am counting…

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