a red witch's garden

Christmas

2009-12-24T16:19:34Z

I think a little Latin goes well with Christmas, don't you?

Sancte, bone, sub arbore pellem pone pro me
Bonissimam fueram,
Sancte, bone, sub noctem caminum deorsum rue.

And that would be my Christmas themed post. :-)

orchids

2009-12-22T14:04:24Z

I wasn't going to post much but yesterday I was taking all the shredded bark out of my orchid pots because they have been sheltering clouds of tiny flies. I guess the Ivory soap that I poured on the bark killed most of them because I did not see a whole lot of fluttering as I disturbed the soil. I have seen some mealy bugs on one of the orchids. I hate that. They are sooooo difficult to get rid of.
After emptying out the pot, I could see why they are hard to get rid of and how they kill the orchid while seeming to be on the retreat. There were all kinds of larva all over the root of the poor orchid which was rotting. There was still some moss around the root. I don't know how that happened because I did repot all of my orchids. There always seem to be mealy bugs in the moss which is why I prefer the tree bark for a potting medium.
Here is a photo of the poor root after I washed the bugs off of it. It should not be so wrinkled and black.

You can see, the plant up top still looks deceptively healthy. I would recommend removing the orchid from the pot if you ever see mealy bugs on it and give it all a good scrub before repotting. Maybe the bark should be baked in the oven on low heat to kill any eggs because orchid roots should look more like this,

They don't have to be this brown but they are nice and fleshy and dry. Orchids do not like damp roots which is why you should let the pot dry out between waterings. I forget to water mine for weeks and they bloom for me so they must like that.

Letter to Santa

2009-12-22T13:43:11Z

Dear Santa...

Dear Santa,

This year I've been busy!

Last Monday I donated bone marrow to kabbymoh in a life-saving procedure (300 points). In March I gave rattlesnakeroot a life-saving blood transfusion (50 points). In February I caught a purse-snatcher who stole torino10154's purse (30 points). Last Tuesday I ate my brussel sprouts (1 points). Last Thursday I saved a busload of nuns in Angola (326 points).

Overall, I've been nice (707 points). For Christmas I deserve a wedgie!

Sincerely,
aredwitch

Kumquat Tree

2009-12-12T00:45:52Z

I was sitting in the kitchen one day a few weeks ago and I noticed there was a flower on my kumquat tree. It was very surprising. I stood up to look at it and spotted about a dozen flowers. They are very fragrant and pretty. This immediately made me think that I might have some kumquats growing in my kitchen soon so I hit the internet trying to figure out what pollenates the flower. I still have no idea but I did learn that kumquat plants are very prunable which I am pleased to read since I chopped the top of the tree off about four years ago to keep it from outgrowing the kitchen. I also learned that they grow in cool areas and can tolerate a few degrees below zero. I have already noticed that since I leave it outside until late in the fall and have sometimes forgotten to bring it in before the frost. I was so pleased with this tree that I decorated it for Christmas with a few small bulbs.
I won't show you a photo of that but here is a photo of one of the flowers.

I Have Another Rabbit

2009-10-25T14:09:35Z

Fall is here and my back yard has been invaded by another rabbit. Rather than start a new set of rabbit stories, I am planning to take a break from my gardening blog. I have too many things going on and am doing none of them well so I should chose which ones matter most. I may be back in the springtime.

Slugs

2009-09-18T12:37:43Z

I should fire every toad on my lawn for sleeping on the job. I was up early on Tuesday and noticed slugs on my hostas. They had been looking like they were being chewed on but I thought it might be these red beetles that were all over a neighbor's hostas.
Nope, there were lots of slugs. So I got out a bowl with soapy water and I went around and scraped them all into the bowl. Slug problem is gone. I have not seen any since.
On another happy note, the grass seed I spread five days ago has already sprouted.

The Butterfly Garden is Gone

2009-09-13T18:08:00Z

It sounds horrid. The plants are not gone. Most of them have been dug up and moved to the backyard. The Birch tree is gone though. I thought I had a really good before photo but this is the best that I have,

taken in the early spring before everything gets really tall. You can see a bit of the disarray by looking past the garden gate here,

but it really doesn't show you how unattractive it looked most of the time. This is how it looks now.

I am sure it will be much better once the grass gets growing.

New and Improved

2009-09-07T13:44:45Z

The stump is gone. My husband tried to dig it up by hand, never mind the fact that he is no longer a spring chicken. A kind neighbor, who owns a bobcat, came over and helped to pull it out of the ground. Now that the spot is cleaned up, I can show it to you.

See, it is much improved but there is still work to go. I dug up my hostas along the side of the house because the ferns were growing wild and there was some strange grass getting in there. The Sweet Woodruff was raggedy and not worth saving either so I tore them all out and replanted the hostas. It does look prettier. I suspect the ferns of having harbored many mosquitoes so they were not worth saving.

I also pruned out the brown wood on the raspberries, thinned out the green wood and re-attached the twine to tie back the canes. I think the results are very satisfactory.
Not that I needed a new plant because I am trying to cut back but I could not resist this coreopsis.

The Birch Tree is gone

2009-09-05T14:30:32Z

I am not going to post photos yet because the stump needs to be dug up but I have chopped it down. Well, more like I have sawed it down with a bow saw and cut up the branches with my pruner. I feel as destructive as an orc.
It would be nice to post a video for the music of the day but it comes from a Disney movie called Melody Time. Those people are not shy about suing. If you posted any of it on Youtube, you would probably be shot and pissed on. Best not to post it then.

The Vandal Resistant Garden

2009-08-30T18:28:15Z

The Vandals were a Germanic tribe that swept across Europe in the fifth century with other Germanic tribes. For some reason, their name was associated with destruction for the pleasure of it. Really, this is Orc behavior - pulling down trees, trampling flowers, uprooting plants, smashing things for the fun of it. How does the front yard gardener save their garden from rampaging goblins?
There is no fool proof method but, last night, my front yard was vandalized and sustained minimal damage. I think there are some good reasons for that.
This is the flower bed at the front corner.

All they did here was rip the Dusty Miller out of the ground and toss it in a heap. They could have stomped through the flower bed but Purple Coneflower and Black Eyed Susans are robust plants. It would have hurt a bit. Shrubs are hard to break branches off too because you are likely to get a few scrapes along your arms. I would have a hard time pulling most of these plants out of the ground, even with a shovel because they are well established, but, for the unarmed, the stems are hairy and fibrous. They are hard to break and will cut up your hands. Barberry makes an excellent hedge plant for this reason, it has lots of thorns. Nobody wants to grab that bare-handed.
They went on to climb over the fence and pull up one of my stepping stones and smash it on the sidewalk. It is one of those cheap resin 'stones' that I picked up at a local grocery store's parking lot nursery. I think it cost me ten bucks. From the few large chunks that are on the sidewalk,

I would say they had a hard time smashing it to their satisfaction so they smashed a beer bottle and broke a large branch off of a boulevard tree (which you can see at the top of the photo) , instead of coming back to dig up the other two and smash them.

I do not keep any statuary on my front lawn since all my garden gnomes went off to see the world. Any neighbors that do have them, keep them on the doorstep so potential vandals would have to come close to the house to knock them over. Sounds like too much work for too little satisfaction. I hope they don't come back with tools.

Tom Bombadil's Beans

2009-08-24T02:25:28Z

When I was twelve and first read The Lord of the Rings, I was not well acquainted with plants and did not know the plants that Tolkien referred to in his stories. It is only in the last few years that I would be struck by some words in the chapter entitled "In the House of Tom Bombadil". Those words would be "his (Frodo) view was screened by a tall line of beans on poles......and the red flowers on the beans began to glow against the wet green leaves."
Of course it would be a tall line of beans, the hobbits are making their way East in the Fall and the beans could be as tall as ten feet. They must be Scarlet Runner Beans phaseolus coccineus since all other beans have white or lavender coloured flowers. Scarlet Runner Beans are more popular in England than in North America by some accounts. I grow then only for their ornamental value.
Does it mean anything that Tolkien chose to have Bombadil grow Scarlet Runner Beans in his garden? They are a heirloom variety of bean and were cultivated as early as 1750 but they came from the Americas. Bombadil as some sort of nature god, one of the 'old ones' or the oldest as he calls himself must grow an ancient variety of bean.

Teeming With Life

2009-08-22T02:07:34Z

My Culver's Root has been one of the better behaved wildflowers in my yard. Like any perennial, it will spread a little but it has never tried to take over my yard. I see articles in the news about the decline of the bee population but not in my yard. Bees really love wildflowers like Culver's Root.
It looks great and attracts all kinds of bees to my yard,

from this little itty bitty bee,

to this big fat bumblebee,

and a couple of sizes in between like this bee,

or this bee,

I have other stuff blooming in my yard at the moment like these really lovely daylilies,

but, as you can see, there are no bees. They fly right past them to the Culver's Root. Point is - you should plant some wildflowers. 'Nuff said.

Look Who Came For Dinner

2009-08-20T12:25:37Z

I was doing some yardwork last night when this little fellow caught my eye.

This monarch caterpillar is munching on some Butterfly Weed asclepias tuberosa. It has a very pretty orange flower and, unlike Common Milkweed, this milkweed still looks good after the flowers are done. That is why I still have it in my garden. It is in the part that I was digging up and/or destroying but I left the Butterfly Weed because I wanted to harvest the seeds. I grew these plants entirely from seed and they grew very well. I planted some at the very dry and sandy soil at Fort Willow and that plant is thriving.
I am glad I kept the plants or this little fellow would be homeless now or accidentally living in a compost heap. I honestly did not expect to find any Monarch caterpillars in my yard. I thought they only lay their eggs on Common Milkweed. I thought wrong.

More crazy plants

2009-08-18T12:14:06Z

I was digging some weeds out of my lawn and came across some yarrow, achillea millefolium. It was in a packet of wildflower seeds that my husband thought would be useful at the side of the house as a wildflower garden. Those multi-seed packs contained a few plants that are not even native like Poppy so labels are misleading. Yes, everything is a wildflower somewhere in the world but that does not mean they are lovely wildflowers in your neck of the woods.
The wildflower garden was a mess, full of weeds that I did not dare pull out while they were smallish because I did not know which were the weeds and which were the flowers. I still struggle with weeds in that bed. The yarrow is one of them.
It has medicinal properties, yes, and has a pretty flower but it is very hard to kill. I have been pulling it out for four years and I am still fighting it. There was some growing in the grass which is very difficult to pull out. Is there a well-behaved cultivar of yarrow? I don't know. I wouldn't trust it if I saw one.
This one is like mint, like goutweed, like periwinkle, you will be fighting it forever once it gets in to your yard.

Maddening Mint Marches On

2009-08-17T12:16:05Z

I planted some mint years ago. It's a lovely plant and makes a lovely tea that is good for stomach upsets. It also is great as a garnish in certain cocktails. I figured that I had a safe place to plant it. Here.

When we built the walkway, we dug down 8 inches - 3 for the bricks, 4 for the crushed gravel and 1 for the packed sand. The walkway was 3 feet wide and so I figured, if there ever were a spot where mint would be kept confined, this would be it. And then, after two years, I found some growing on my lawn. I tore it all out but I keep finding small plants growing here and there. It has been five or six years since I tore it out but yesterday, when I was weeding between the bricks on the walkway, I found two plants. I assume they grew from seeds that have been laying dormant in the cracks but it just goes to show you how resilient and hard to get rid of some plants can be.
I was at a neighbors years ago and was admiring her garden when I noticed she planted mint in her flower beds. I told her at the time that it was a risky move but she was sure she could keep it in place. Last year she told me that she should have listened to me. There is only one safe place to plant mint - in a pot - but even then seeds could get out by falling on the ground or carried in bird feces. Who knows? I would rather get my mint from the grocery store. That's all I am saying.

Crazy in the Heat

2009-08-14T13:36:59Z

I got all the black plastic down where I was intending to place it. I would have placed some more but I have tomatoes and leeks growing there and I still have hopes that I will get some. The last two weeks have been very sunny and very hot. It was 40C where I live yesterday and the day before that. I was out there in that heat digging up some shrubs and moving them. Always a risky proposition when it is this hot but I needed to get it down because the black plastic treatment works best when it is hot and sunny like this. So far the only thing I might lose from moving is a Potentilla which is rather strange because the blue roses are holding up. Anyway, it is all laid down and I don't feel compelled to move anything else until I have some cooler weather.
The area out front that will be seeded with grass seed will be weeded by hoe and rake but it makes more sense to seed when the weather is cool and the rain has returned. Grass seed loves the rain and cold. I am resting now and heading for the beach because I have not had enough sun beating down on my head.

All Hail The Froggie!!

2009-08-11T11:53:37Z

The Red Osier Dogwood has gotten so huge, in spite of my attempts to prune it back a bit. The particularly lovely flat rock beside it was no longer visible so I trimmed a space which looks like a forest chapel. Since the spruce that I used to make this a raised bed had rotted, I removed most of that so we could just mow around it. Or we could if the shrub were not so gosh darned big.

Anyway, Froggie could not be seen anymore either so I put it on the rock to be worshipped as a woodland god/goddess. And people think I have no religion. Hah!! I did some searching to see if there is a frog god of some sort and found the Egyptian goddess Heket or Hecate. She is the goddess of fertility. I do not need any help with that but maybe she can save us from the Giant Hogweed.

That little doggie in the first photo would make a nice sacrificial victim but Heket is vegan (according to me) and only accepts flowers as offerings. Hail Froggie!!

Third Tree Down

2009-08-08T13:54:07Z

I did not mention that I planned to cut down a third tree but I did. It was a Dwarf Alberta Spruce that I thought would stay small like Boxwood for years to come. I was wrong and I overplanted this one area in the garden so, since the spruce was the plant that I valued the least, it is the one that got chopped down. The obligatory photos as follows, before:

and from another angle:

and after:

and from another angle:

Looks better? Or at least less cluttered? I am hoping so. You might have noticed from yesterday's entry that the Diable Ninebark has migrated from one side of the yard to the other. I am not done yet. There will be other shrubs taking a trip soon. It is all part of the fun of gardening.

A Work in Progress

2009-08-07T13:32:59Z

As I already said, I am reducing the size of my garden and the first thing I did was chop down the two apple trees. Now I was tempted, as I was trimming the branches away, to keep them since they looked so much better with 3/4 of the branches trimmed off and their health would probably have improved. I reminded myself that if I was at all likely to keep on top of the trimming, they would never have gotten so overgrown in the first place and then I found a wasp nest on the fence behind one of them. That sealed the deal. I promised some photos and here they are:

This is before the Royal Gala apple tree came down and this is after I dug up my Diablo Ninebark (yes, the one with the aphid problem) and put it in its place.

I never took a good photo of the Golden Delicious tree before I chopped it down so I only have an after photo to share with you:

But here is my opportunity to finally get rid of those pesky chives that have been spreading and spreading around the base of the apple tree.

Yes, black plastic! It is the gardener's secret weapon to kill large patches of weeds! Round up might work faster but forget about planting anything there for the rest of that year, especially anything you might want to eat.

Giant Hogweed

2009-08-05T19:41:08Z

As if weeding poison ivy was not dangerous enough, the Red Witch has a new invasive species from Asia to worry about. I am talking about Giant Hogweed Heracleum mantegazzianum. I just read in my local paper that it is in the next township over from me. I knew there was some weird species of parsnip out there because I had heard of someone who had been on sick leave for six months already after exposure to it. And I knew it looked like Queen Anne's Lace but I had no idea it was so bad.
It is thought to have been brought over as a garden ornamental. Is somebody crazy??!!
Like poison ivy, you cannot mow it or you will spray sap all over yourself. Same goes for using the weed whacker. Round Up will work on in but the seeds can stay dormant in the ground for up to fifteen years according to the warning bulletin released by the Nottawasaga Valley Conservation Authority. If you get the sap in your eyes, you can become temporarily or permanently blinded. The rash can give you permanent scars. It is just bad.
Keep kids away from it. If you spot some in the province of Ontario, you can call the Invading Species Hotline (yes, we have one) 1-800-563-7711 or at www.invadingspecies.com or whoever your local authority is.
NVCA has produced a fact sheet with tips on what to do if you find some on your property.
http://www.nvca.on.ca/ws_par/groups/public/@pub/@nvca/documents/web_content/wspar_018838.pdf
Be afraid. Be very afraid.

Addendum: I found an American site that has photos of the plant at various stages of growth. It is worth having a look at in case you weed your garden by bare hand like me and you spot one before it becomes obvious what it is.
http://www.invasive.org/species/subject.cfm?sub=4536

I Love My New Camera

2009-08-01T13:48:30Z

I took some close up photos with it that I think turned out fantastic!!

This is a close up view of some Culver's Root flowers, veronicastrum virginicum, it is a 'false' veronica.

and this little fella. So shiny!!!

Wild Bergamot

2009-08-01T00:30:01Z

I am still thinking about what to do with my garden. I have begun pruning the Purple Leaf Sandcherries but I really wanted to rip them out entirely. Someone else likes them. But I do think the giant grass will have to be moved or destroyed. I like the grass but not where it is located at the moment.
I was up at Fort Willow and Wild Bergamot is blooming in profusion at the moment. It is also known by the name of Monarda Fistula and might even be called Bee Balm but that would be its red headed cousin Monarda Didyma. It is one of those tall grass prairie plants and thus is supposed to be drought tolerant. Butterflies love it as do Hummingbirds since the flowers require long proboscis's to extract the nectar. The cultivated ones I have grown in my garden have not been hardy enough.
This summer I planted some from a native plant nursery but they do not look anything like I would like them to.

Yeah, it looks sad. Maybe next year it will look better. The other one looks a little bit better.

But this is what they both should be looking like:

A Confession

2009-07-19T19:14:58Z

I don't really like gardening. Well, I do and I don't. I like having a nice yard but I don't really want all the work that comes with it. I have tried to make my yard as 'maintenance free' as possible and, for the most part, it is. But each bed needs a little bit of attention and, when you have alot of beds, that adds up to alot of attention. A real estate agent once told me that, as beautiful as my garden was, the size of it would scare off buyers. I am not planning to sell but the size of it scares me some days too. Some years, it is smaller and other years it is larger. I think this year it is going to shrink again. I am going to do some surgery on the garden, not with a scalpel, but with a machete or more likely my hedge trimmer. Stay tuned because my garden is about to change again.

If You Like Birds

2009-07-14T13:35:51Z

I was reading an article about how many native songbirds are on the endangered list and some suggestions for making your backyard an attractive habitat for birds. I have some suggestions of my own.

First off - birds and cats do not mix. If you have a cat that you let outside, don't put a bird feeder in your backyard. That might seem like a no-brainer but I have seen people do just that.

Second - although habitat destruction is part of the picture, cats being allowed to roam free is another reason why songbird numbers are in serious decline. I do not care about people who say it is natural for the cat to hunt and they must be free to roam; if we are going to talk about nature, the domestic cat is an animal from the Eastern Mediterranean region and, unless it can swim really well, it should not even be on this continent. There is nothing natural about the domestic cat which is the result of selective breeding and domestication as well as well as being carried over here by humans. Rant over.

Third - plants that attract birds. Dogwoods. Birds love the berries on Dogwoods. As soon as they are ripe, the birds are in the bushes and trees and gobble them all up. They also really like the berries on the Mountain Ash.
Birds are supposed to eat the berries on the Highbush Cranberry but the berries remained on my shrub year after year uneaten. Not that they did not like the Highbush Cranberry; its size and density of foliage made it a wonderful hiding spot, whatever ate the berries did not appear in my yard.
With all the pest problems I have had this year, my Dogwoods have been problem free, which is another reason to plant them. They tend to be small sized trees which makes them more suitable for small suburban gardens and they have four season interest,
For flowers, I would suggest planting Scarlet Runner Beans which Hummingbirds seem to just love. Monardas, or Bee Balm as well and, for over wintering birds, I leave out the seed heads of the Echinaccea Purpurea or Purple Coneflower. They are always picked clean by springtime and they attract Monarch butterflies.

Planting trees and shrubs are good for the birds because it gives them places to hide from predators and places to nest. Keep the kiddies away from the nests and the cats too.
"Grow a forest. Protect it from axes that hack
Then the Lorax
and all his friends
may (one day) come back."

A tip about whipper snippers

2009-07-10T11:45:09Z

I was talking to someone yesterday and he mentioned that his neighbor's weed-whacker stopped working and brought it over to him to have a look at. Shortly after his own weed-whacker stopped working. He took it to a repair shop and it was the ethanol in the gas that was responsible. It corrodes some of the inner workings that aren't made for ethanol. The Red Witch does not have a problem with her whipper snipper because hers is electric but, for people with acreage, being plugged in makes it impossible to get to the outer reaches of your property. So, a tip for you, try to get alcohol free gas for the whipper snipper.
We know Lunasceiling does not need this tip because she is never going near another weed-whacker in her life.