May 2005

My 'America' spinach has withstood my torments much better than the 'Olympia' spinach. I had trouble with the 'Olympia' dampening off, to begin with. (I did start them inside; more on that later.) The 'America' looks settled in, but the 'Olympia' looks like it's hanging by a thread. I actually wanted 'Tyee', but Fedco was [...]

This just came in my mailbox: I just stumbled across this site, and it's great. I am desperate to ask some of the gardeners what to do about my poor tomatoes, but cannot figure out how to post. [Ed. note: You have to register and then be approved before you can post, but anyone can [...]

I ought to be going to bed, so this will shorter (for me). I find it highly annoying that we can go from having 86 degree weather one afternoon to having a 23 degree night, in less than 48 hours. It just isn't fair. It also isn't fair that even though it says on the [...]

Today is my grandma's 98th birthday. I originally wrote this essay for a Fine Gardening contest (which I didn't win), and decided to revise it and share it with you in honor of her special day. It's funny how gardens are such emotional things. You enter some gardens and feel as though you are in [...]

Dear Kathy,* The bladder campion is back again. This weed, Lychnis alba, always pops up in one place or another in my sunny back perennial bed. Last year this time, I moved one that had sprouted elsewhere in the back bed to my "white" garden, which had just been dug out and needed filling in. [...]

Several years ago, while passing time in a waiting room, I read a quote in Garden Design that went something like this: "Gardening [or was it farming?] is the only socially acceptable form of gambling." Ever since, I have regretted that I did not copy this quote verbatim or, at the very least, commit the [...]

Today I was infected with a virus called W32.Netsky.P@mm!enc. It arrived via an email sent to the address I have for this website. I download mail from that address with Thunderbird. As soon as the email was downloaded, Norton's notified me that I had this virus. I hadn't opened an attachment or even clicked on [...]

Yes, folks, this is going to be a sad post. Better get out your Kleenex. *Sigh.* Particularly sad after last year's broccoli, which was the most wonderful broccoli I'd ever had in my life, no kidding. That was amazing broccoli. First we must set the stage. . . After our terrible flooding (for most of [...]

This is a continuation of the post started on May 4th. Over the past couple of days it's dawned on me that my plant acquiring habits have changed. When I started out gardening, I drew a map of my first bed to scale and decided on a color scheme. Then I looked through the catalogs [...]