Winter At Home 2010
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From Regan's Nursery - an orange climbing rose to go along with the newly yellow house. The rose is on the back fence though, not on the house.
A blue frog invaded the garden
Alex builds the espalier fence in front of the house. I later planted two Asian pear fruit trees, one on each side. UC research-based recommendation is to cut off fruit trees at knee height (see http://homeorchard.ucdavis.edu) and while that is painful to do, I took a deep breath and chopped away. So now it looks like little sticks in the ground. But where I cut, it is supposed to bud out and I can select the strong buds and the ones growing in the direction I want. I let 3 buds grow, one to grow up and be the leader, and one to go left and one to grow right. The espalier has 3 horizontal wires so after 3 years I'll have espaliered trees (if they don't die) that have 3 horizontal branches going left and right; each branch 18 inches above the one below.
I finally bought a new stove with 5 gas burners and two ovens; about twice the budgeted amount
Also finally, I put together the mini greenhouse for starting seeds indoors. Heating mats, grow lights, four shelves, plastic cover. It was in the garage for two years as I was terrified I would need to use tools to put it together. Turns out it just snaps together and took 15 minutes.
The unsightly compost bin. By the way I just started a worm bin as I have too many kitchen scraps to decompose fast enough in the compost bin, since Lu puts her kitchen scraps in there. If I stirred the compost weekly it would be hotter and faster but really.
First blossom of pelargonium (California native geranium, rather small and feathery, spreads nicely as a low groundcover that blooms most of spring and summer) (and fall)
Impatient for strawberries. The pot is in front of a native mimulus and some nice grey-green with yellow flowers small bush whose name I forget, and next to the self-seeding attracts-beneficial-insects-and-pollinators white alyssum.
Edward keeps a lookout. In the pot are California native bulbs, which are tiny and slow growing and I am very impatient for them to bloom already, but admittedly, I planted them too late (in late Jan, as opposed to early Nov, which is recommended).
Purple and white cauliflower grew at Almost Eden (the sunny community garden plot). Taste the same.
Volunteer lettuce popped up in the pathway at f53 (shady community garden plot). Must have been from the lettuce in my plot that I let go to seed (reasonable conclusion :-)) I orginally got little starts from Ann who said this lettuce is an Austrian heirloom variety and is sometimes known as speckled trout.
The succulent garden at f53 is growing in. Very hard to photograph - there are probably 20 species in there and in this picture, if you peer hard, you can pick out maybe 3 different plants (the big ones).
Lurker
Another lurker - Kate
After two months, the rose is leafing out and looks like it's on steroids.
Marianne Mueller, mrm@sonic.net
Last modified: March 10, 2010
From Regan's Nursery - an orange climbing rose to go along with the newly yellow house. The rose is on the back fence though, not on the house.
A blue frog invaded the garden
Alex builds the espalier fence in front of the house. I later planted two Asian pear fruit trees, one on each side. UC research-based recommendation is to cut off fruit trees at knee height (see http://homeorchard.ucdavis.edu) and while that is painful to do, I took a deep breath and chopped away. So now it looks like little sticks in the ground. But where I cut, it is supposed to bud out and I can select the strong buds and the ones growing in the direction I want. I let 3 buds grow, one to grow up and be the leader, and one to go left and one to grow right. The espalier has 3 horizontal wires so after 3 years I'll have espaliered trees (if they don't die) that have 3 horizontal branches going left and right; each branch 18 inches above the one below.
I finally bought a new stove with 5 gas burners and two ovens; about twice the budgeted amount
Also finally, I put together the mini greenhouse for starting seeds indoors. Heating mats, grow lights, four shelves, plastic cover. It was in the garage for two years as I was terrified I would need to use tools to put it together. Turns out it just snaps together and took 15 minutes.
The unsightly compost bin. By the way I just started a worm bin as I have too many kitchen scraps to decompose fast enough in the compost bin, since Lu puts her kitchen scraps in there. If I stirred the compost weekly it would be hotter and faster but really.
First blossom of pelargonium (California native geranium, rather small and feathery, spreads nicely as a low groundcover that blooms most of spring and summer) (and fall)
Impatient for strawberries. The pot is in front of a native mimulus and some nice grey-green with yellow flowers small bush whose name I forget, and next to the self-seeding attracts-beneficial-insects-and-pollinators white alyssum.
Edward keeps a lookout. In the pot are California native bulbs, which are tiny and slow growing and I am very impatient for them to bloom already, but admittedly, I planted them too late (in late Jan, as opposed to early Nov, which is recommended).
Purple and white cauliflower grew at Almost Eden (the sunny community garden plot). Taste the same.
Volunteer lettuce popped up in the pathway at f53 (shady community garden plot). Must have been from the lettuce in my plot that I let go to seed (reasonable conclusion :-)) I orginally got little starts from Ann who said this lettuce is an Austrian heirloom variety and is sometimes known as speckled trout.
The succulent garden at f53 is growing in. Very hard to photograph - there are probably 20 species in there and in this picture, if you peer hard, you can pick out maybe 3 different plants (the big ones).
Lurker
Another lurker - Kate
After two months, the rose is leafing out and looks like it's on steroids.