Home Garden Companion

Ilona's Garden Journal




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When Gardeners and Their Gardens Grow Old

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Photo by: Coley Christine
Weeds grow, and so it goes

It is a fact of life. Like weeds. You don’t even notice how it creeps up on you, but suddenly it is there and it must be dealt with:

Age

Two things begat this post, the fact that the heat has forced me to stay indoors and updating a post that had very good advice for older gardeners.

Advice that I must now seriously take for myself.

Heat

The heat advisories would have been laughed at and lightly dismissed in my younger years as a gardener. Today I did not even venture out in the morning because yesterday’s piddling work was too much and I don’t want to repeat the experience.

Yes, I had to recover from watering my containers in the high humidity and 90 degree temps that feel like triple digits.

Weeding and tending the vegetable garden will have to wait for more reasonable temperatures.

I’m Old

If I was thinking of “getting the garden ready” when I wrote that post of garden advice for older gardeners, that day has now arrived.
When gardens and gardeners age, change comesOld Gardeners Should...

I hate the idea of giving up my large yard and dreams of flower gardens, but reality is that something MUST change. It doesn’t help my state of mind that I saw the movie, ‘Iris‘, starring Judy Dench. It drove home the fact that aging people too often procrastinate necessary changes to their living.

Even when health problems or losses don’t necessitate such changes, other circumstances often do.

A List Of Garden Changes

Things I see that must change:

  1. I need more help- hired help must be found next year. For the first time in my life I think I will need to engage someone to occasionally do some of the chores.
  2. Spring is more a time to pay attention to pruning than planting. A mature garden looks unkempt if bushes are growing will-nilly.
  3. A more permanent solution to the fieldstone walk. Polymeric sand  for the cracks between the stones.
  4. Redesign garden space near the house.
  5. Lots of other things that I will need to brainstorm this winter.

Are you planning for the day when the garden demands more than you might be willing to give it? Has aging interfered with how you dreamed your garden would look?

What’s going on in your stage of life and how does that affect the way you plan to landscape?

 

Nature Will Have Her Way

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Nature takes no halfway measures.

When in balance, with the sure and languorous change of seasons, we are lulled into the belief that our regimes and schemes hold sway, that humanity is all powerful in its display of dominance and power. Our technologies collude in the illusion of control and eminent domain over earths terrain, climate and creatures.

But in its circuit through time, Nature will reassert the truth that our human powers are indeed very small in this domain of climate, weather patterns, and impending descent of ancient phases of drought or cold, or flood.

And the temporary cloud of our own habits, that of half-measures and dismissal of inconvenient truths is swept away. Nature’s set of boundaries and consequences, laws and regulations, rebalance with a vengeance. And not always in response to our interference; sometimes we are simply caught in the re-alignment that it must make within itself.

The message is clear, however. We may plan and rebuild, we arise from ashes and mud, but there is greater power and will than ours and we may only respond to it. We are part of the nature of things and the larger creation.

Of course, for us individually these lessons intrude into our consciousness. It does not take a hundred year flood, a wildfire of epic proportion or the fury of tornadoes and destruction of nine point earthquake to instruct us.

Nature takes no halfway measures; she will have her way.

To experience the birth of a baby, with the involuntary contractions triggered by hidden hormonal centers, to lose a treasured loved one to the arrival of mortality will impress us indelibly with the fact that in such things there are no halfway measures. It is all in, and we are best advised to align ourselves with its ebb and flow… for we can no more stop the waves of the ocean or its tides, than we may resist this.

Within, is found a certain joy for those who will embrace it. Not in the destruction or the pain, but in the realization of rejoicing in the process along the way. Growth and the miracle of life, memories built during our time with our beloved fellow beings, giving love, giving valued work, receiving connection and marveling at the beauty with awe and gratefulness.

Where do we find the strength to rejoice in times when we are pulled into “circumstances beyond our control”?

We look up. We hope. We believe.

And then we look around us, knowing that there will yet be good, beauty, and joy. In that, too, there are no halfway measures.

 

The Growing Season Review

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July looked best

You know how people like to summarize their year during December and especially at the turn of the year? Well, this is that time for Gardeners.

Premature you say? For me, I will yet again be absent from my garden and al that remains for me to do this year is planting and preparing for the next spring. The vegetable gardening will consist mainly of cleanup, and for some reason I am anticipating an early frost and onset of cold.

Every year for the past 7 or 8, I have been saying, promising, vowing to stay with my garden during the growing season. To be there when it most needs me, during planting in the spring, early summer weeding, and late summer harvest, and early fall planting.

I said that, and planned it in this year, 2014, as well.

What happened? I have little to report on except for what I didn’t do during the last part of the summer. My raised vegetable beds went to seed, the self seeded tomatoes took over the kitchen garden. And thistle invaded and made itself at home in the driveway beds.

Everywhere in my garden, the signs of neglect mock and jeer at my former promise of taking care of my garden plots this year.

Again, far more than any previous year, I put priority on spending my time in Atlanta with children and grandchildren. Not sorry, but having to pay the piper when it comes to many of my own plans. I have been there for more than two months over the summertime, in two visits.

The determination to make final headway in decluttering had also pushed aside the call of the flower beds, tending to trees and shrubs, and tidying the garden. And oh, I had started so enthusiastically, so diligently.

Yet, the inside of the house received far more of my time and efforts this summer. I managed to make real progress, and that is something I can’t regret! Cleared and renovated two bedrooms, cleared half the attic and assorted other spaces were given a lick and a promise.

Overgrown canes of Scotch roses and poison ivy were removed from the side of the house. what you don’t see are the piles of branches removed for the burn pile and the strands of poison ivy that was removed to what I call the “rot pile”.

What Do You Consider Success?

  • Are you happy to make headway on resolutions, or do you give up after giving it the old college try?
  • Do you need to attain perfection?   Does all else bow to the demand of this perfect accomplishment?
  • Do you tailor your life to smaller goals, so that the final results look better and the work is easier?
We probably all fluctuate between these three perspectives on success. Where we camp probably makes the finished picture.

In The Garden

Nature does not wait for our convenience, and fills in our absence with plantings and growth of its own making.

I would call this a year of mixed results and outcomes, in the garden and in life. But being an individual of rosy far-sighted vision,  I tend to make my decisions and priorities based on my belief that the short term sacrifices for long term goals will make the best choices. A year of weeds or even a decade of second class gardening is worth the exchange of showing the people in my life that they matter.

We each live with the choices we make, and spend the resources we have. The way that balances out in measurable benefit is not always discernible to those outside our own experience. I believe we must make our peace with that fact.

….And there is always next year.


Successes in My Garden

  • Cucumbers! I grew lovely, delicious cukes this year.
  • Sunflowers and wildflowers. The sunflowers reseeded, and american Meadows supplied seed for some pretty wildflower patches.
  • Trimmed and kept a few areas of the garden well, they will be easy to renovate this fall.
  • Had pretty Spring flowers.
  • Cleared long neglected side garden of poison ivy and overgrowth this past June/July
  • Enjoyed some of the loveliest summer weather in memory, here in Ohio.
  • Removed winter losses without too much sorrow.
Failures are many. Most are of the omission type.
The Beauty Bush came into its own in June
There were small joys here and there, heucheras!
pink petunias by the driveway
loved the pinks

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Visit Ilona’s Garden Journal on facebook: Click here
© 2014 written for Ilona’s Garden Journal by Ilona E. An excellent blog.

Why Your Plants Die

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Graves At Dawes Arboretum

If I looked at the list in my Plant Cemetery I might be led to believe I have a black thumb instead of a green one. I’ve lost that many plants. This is not a confession to relieve my conscience, but an illustration of one of the many realities of working with living things, of what it is to be a gardener- even if you never lose as many plants as I, sadly, have.

But instead of blaming yourself, like many would-be gardeners often do, you might take a closer look at your climate and soil conditions and even the expected lifespans of the plants.

In other words, it might not be you. Although in one sense, it does depend on our choices. Yet, with all the hype about the “ease” and sure success of offered plants, how can we genuinely expect to avoid some sure failures?

I’m writing this to set your mind at ease. Loss of plants is the part of the gardening experience that most garden  enthusiasts don’t want to talk about. However, it happens, as sure as the sun rises.

Native Rudbeckia, prob. ‘maxima’. Likely to survive.

Garden Conditions

We are all told to improve our soil, and some of us follow that good advice and add all sorts of yummy (for the plant) amendments. I don’t know if anyone double digs the soil anymore, but some of us old-timers did. We find the micro-climates and we plant with high hopes.

Sometimes that is enough.

But if you live with soils that have high clay content, or strong pH proclivities towards either acid or alkaline conditions it could spell death for certain plants. Being something of a plant collector in the sense I tried most anything that caught my fancy, or seemed like I must possess, so I had plenty of tough lessons in failures of this sort. That is why I will never try to plant azaleas and heathers, again, no matter how they call out to me in siren tones of beauty and fragrance.

If you choose to ignore the matching of plant need to soil conditions such as pH or whether light or heavy, you will likely suffer eventual loss of that plant. Maybe it will simply not thrive, but here in Ohio it will get a double whammy of some sort and outright die. Usually it is some combination of the improper soil needs, the addition of a bad drought or that really, really freezing cold snap that separates the hardy from the “would -be”.

Your Climate

That brings me to the thing most ignored of all nature’s realities. We don’t understand climate in the garden- I am convinced of that. After seeing a superb documentary on the ‘Dust Bowl’, I was struck by how climate patterns stretch over decades or more, and when we introduce foreign plants and cultivation techniques we can unknowingly brew a recipe for disaster. In our own gardens, over the short lifetimes of our garden work it isn’t always obvious, but the lost trees or perennials sometimes yield a warning that we are doing something contrary to the balance between ecological realities.

Sometimes it is simply a hard lesson like the year I lost my Chinese Chestnuts. My garden gets too cold for some things, not just because it drops to minus ridiculous numbers, but because the ground is often wet, the winds blow without any snow cover to blunt their desiccating powers,  and other such factors.

And I slowly learn.

Are you trying to convince me not to garden?

Not at all. When we live in climate-controlled buildings and cars for the majority of our existence we start to imagine things about the power we have to rule nature. And that starts to seep into our yards and landscapes.

Sometimes your plants die because they were never meant to live as long as you imagine they should. Or under conditions you place them in. Or because there are things in nature that are out of your control…. no matter how much you spray, fertilize, and prune.

What’s The Answer? I Don’t Like Plants To Die!

None of us do, but I suppose one starting place is to accept that sometimes your garden plans don’t go as expected, and times change, while plants sometimes die, and will certainly grow without much interference from us caretakers.

Yet, with skills and effort, we do make a difference over he conditions we can control. And that makes us gardeners. Learn, keep learning, and don’t lose hope or think that you have a black thumb.

One thing to learn is the native conditions of plants and match your garden with the right plants as much as you are capable of doing. Nurseries should help you with this, and if you ask questions and go to reputable ones, they will.

And most of all, don’t give up. Keep on planting.

Life is worth nurturing and enjoying, even if we can’t always hold onto it as we would.

After many years, I lost the ‘Fairy’s Petticoat’ phlox

 Some Reasons Your Plants Have Died

  • soil too dry
  • soil too soggy
  • too much sun
  • too little sun
  • soil not fertile enough
  • fertilizer burn (too much fertilizer)
  • not hardy enough for your climate zone
  • disease
  • damage from storms
  • lost to drought
  • crowded out by weeds or other plants
  • short lived plant
  • wrong conditions for growth ( pH, etc.)
  • insect damage

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Visit Ilona’s Garden Journal on facebook: Click here
© 2013 written for Ilona’s Garden Journal by Ilona E. An excellent blog.

Too Much Candy Is Probably Not A Good Thing

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valentines dayToo much candy? Why is she writing about this in her garden blog? You can blame it on an article I read on garden writing, Garden Photographs – some problems. And while I am not a big fan of ranting about garden topics, occasionally I read something that resonates with some underground opinion of my own. This essay on today’s method of garden writing, which is rampant in garden magazine publications and has spread into garden blogging, is one of those.

I love pretty pictures as much -and maybe more- than the next guy, just like I love chocolate. The finer the chocolate the better I like it, but too much chocolate is probably not such a good thing for me, and the proliferation of pretty picture gardening advice probably isn’t in the best interest of gardening either. We all like stylists, and the imaginary worlds they conjure up for us  – it is escapist fare that helps us dream and envision. But there are rude awakenings if we don’t match those utopian gardens and plants up with a little nitty gritty “truth in gardening” advice.

I’ll quote you a bit of the opinions and you can go read the entire essay, and maybe peruse a bit of English garden ranting in other articles at thinkingardens.co.uk.

“Awards are given to gardens on the basis of pictures of them and the common description of garden magazines as ‘garden porn’ tells its own story.”

“Professional photographers know what their editors want, and they serve it up again and again. Thus few garden photos convey a personal point of view”

“much of the eye-candy that magazines at present offer their readers are attractive pictures taken in a garden, not of a garden; typical of this kind are the close-up’s of flowers with a bee collecting pollen, or a drop of dew clinging to a petal. These may be beautiful images but they tell us nothing about the garden in which the picture was shot.”

” all these pretty garden photos seem to exercise a malign influence on those who are making gardens; too easily they forget they are place makers, the title ‘Capability Brown proudly gave himself, not exterior decorators.”

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© 2012 written for Ilona’s Garden Journal. An excellent blog.

A Curmudgeonly Gardener

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It could be blamed on the time of year, or it could be blamed on being cooped up in winter’s closed quarters. Or it might be the frustrated attempts to figure out yet another snafu in the maze of computer troubleshooting. It doesn’t really matter the reason, but I find everything a bit unnerving and irritating. Because of that it seems that many of my fellow gardeners seem much too optimistic…with pollyanna tweets and cheery reminders that spring is coming.

Harumph.

“A long way off” I feel like muttering.

I admit that I usually try to write about the bright side of things, myself …always another season, the silver lining, how cute the squirrel is, even though you know he just spent the last few months devouring all your crocus bulbs as appetizers to the main course of the tulips. As a gardener you try to flow with nature, but sometimes nature isn’t so easy to get along with.

So I’m irritated. Not at the squirrel who is just trying to indulge in a well stocked larder, but at myself. At the limitations and the foolish expectations, and let’s face it…. from a deficiency of sunlight. I haven’t been out in the garden for several months, at least nothing to speak of, and the skies have been mantled with gray for just a little too long.

So with the holidays behind, and nothing very cheering in the foreseeable short term, I will just grouse a bit and hope that somebody sends me a garden catalog soon. I sure need something to break the cycle of this grumpy winter stalled gardeneropath.

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© 2010 written for Ilona’s Garden Journal. Copyrights apply.
The image is the original art of olivamoon, whose etsy shops holds lovely little sculpture and other delights.