Flower Friday

It has been a strange year for my Spring bulbs.  First, the warm weather encouraged the earliest daffodilsin the front near the house to emerge sooner than they should have.  Then a bizarre hailstorm knocked those earliest ones down and 3 nights in the low 20s finished the job.  The flowers bloomed, but only laying on the ground.  They don't show up very well that way.

But some of those sent up a 2nd wave of flowers, so there was something to look at, though thin.  Still, I have some mid daffodils in front, and the flowers are jusr emerging.    Even that is a bit confused this year.  The new bed in the backyard has 2 kinds also. One is early and one is late, but they are both blooming together now. 

Half of each of those were planted in Fall 2015 and I doubled each type last Fall.  New plantings tend to come up late the 1st year, so I have 4 groups this year.  So the established early ones bloomed and got knocked down.  The new early ones and the established later ones are blooming now, and the new later ones are just emerging.  Things should make more sense next Spring!

Meanwhile, in the good news department, the 6 patches of hyacinths I planted in Fall 2015 never even emerged last Spring, but I let them be hoping some would show up this year.  And they HAVE!  Not as many as I planted but some is better than none.

The Fall 2015 tulips bloomed well  last Spring, but the leaves look rather ratty for some reason.  I assumed they were dying young, but I noticed that they all have bud emerging and that is a good sign.  I can't recall if the leaves were up when the hail hit, but that would explain the leaf damage. 

The soil is not great in the bulb bed, so I plan to fertilize well this weekend and cover the entire bed in 3" of compost when the leaves die back naturally.  I think I will cover it then in landscaping cloth to kill the weeds.  A year of the compost nutrients leaching into the soil should help a lot.  Here is the entire bed.  You can see the daffodils easily; the tulips and hyacinths are in clumps (18 of tulips and 6 of hyacinths).

 I would like more tulips and hyacinths, but you have to bury them in wire cages to protect them from the voles around here and that is a LOT of work digging large deep square holes.  I may just add a lot more daffodils between the cages.  I have an auger that fits in my electric drill and that makes it really easy to plant daffodils.  Drill a dozen holes, put daff bulbs in them, shove soil back over.  Voles don't bother daffodils!

The bottom edge of the bed has a double row of various daylilies.  As they mature, I'll divide and interplant among them.  A 30x3' thick band should look nice.

Every year things will get a bit better!

On More Normal News

Apparently, my Saucer Mangolias never stood a chance of blooming this year.  The flowers come out before the leaves, and every year is a gamble.  Their evolutionary strategy seems to be to bloom before all other trees.  I have no good idea why.

The hail that knocked off 20% of the buds was bad enough.  The freezes that followed for 2 nights killed the rest.  But if that had not happened, it wouldn't have matterred.

The next 6 nights are forecast to hit lows of 22F, 22, 23, 32, 28, and 19!  This is horrible March weather for this area.

The earliest daffodil stems fell over, so I don't know WHAT this freezing streak will do the the emerging hyacinths and tulips.  For the tulips, I may just have to wait til next year, but I am most worried about the hyacinths.

I planted the hyacinths late in 2015 and they did not emerge at all in Spring 2016.  But I gave them another year (hope springs eternal) and they are coming up this year.  If this freeze kills them, I will be very sad.  I've covered them with old blankets, but low 20s is very cold.

I know "global warming" means global and a warmer climate is actually less predictable and varied.  The warmer the climate gets, the more the weather patterns can move around and shift during transition seasons like now.

Nothing a gardener hates more than uncertain weather!

Sunday Outside

Today was even better than yesterday!  It reached 70 in midday!  I spread more compost in the wildflower bed.  I went light on it yeterday, not knowing how fr it would go, but I barely used 1/5 of the trailerful, so I was more generous today.

I have about 1/2" overall now and enough left to cover the seeds when I broadcast them tomorrow plus some to spread VERY lightly over them afterwards.  The need light to germinate, so they relly only want a sprinkle on top. 

And THAT leaves half the trailerload of compost for use elsewhere!  I have an surfeit of compost and what gardener does not want more compost? 

I will spread the remainder on the Spring Bulb bed.  As the worms work in into the soil, it will feed the bulbs roots and make them stronger next year. 

And I have good news about the bulbs!  I went to a lot of effort in Fall 2015 to plant tulip and hyacinth bulbs in wire cages to protect them from voles and squirrels.  The tulips came up fine.  But not a single hyacinth emerged.  I was ready to dig up the hyacinth cages and replant last Fall, but decided to with them another year.  Sometimes bulbs take some time to grow roots, and I had planted the hyacinths late.

Guess what I saw today?  Hyacinth shoots emerging from the soil!  I don't know how many will emerge and bloom, but however many come up will be good.  And THIS year, I will cover the spots where they grow with cardboard cut to size so that I will know where not to dig this year. 

And I am thrilled to see daffodils emerging from 2 years ago AND last Fall's plantings.  Just this one bed should have 4x as many as last Spring.  I now have 200 early daffodils, 200 mid-season daffodils, and 200 late-season daffodils!  Plus the usual old plantings of various daffodils around the backyard. 

I prefer tulips and hyacinths for color, but you can't beat daffodils for dependability.  I have some that are 30 years old now and still blooming.

And I've seen the first tulip leaves showing up. More than I thought I would have.  The wire cages seem to work as protection against the voles.  The unusually warm weather is bringing them up sooner than usual.  If it gets cold again, I will cover them.  But it is sure good to see them emerging again.  Tulips are my favorite flowers.  Especially the multicolored ones. 

Daffodils and hyacinths can't match THAT!

Solstice And Gardening

One of my favorite days of the year!  It is the most natural holiday I know.  The days start getting longer.  It means the next season is Spring.  Spring means light, warmth, and gardening.  And I am planning a lot for next year.

25 years ago, I was deeply into perennial flowers.  I bought from an online place that sold 3-packs for $5 and planted a dozen here and a dozen there, etc.  Some perennials aren't very long-lived; they kept dying out slowly and there would always be holes in the flowerbed.  And even at 3 for $5, they aren't cheap.  My flowerbed is 75'x8', so 300 perennials would cost $500 and half died out after 3 years.  And perennials only flower for a few weeks.

So I switched to annuals after I retired.  Annuals flower all season, they are available as seeds, and they are easy to grow.  Planting each year is a bit annoying, but I have time and 40 sq ft of lighted shelves (a 5 shelf 4'x2' rack with 4 4' fixtures in the basement).  Plus a 4 shelf 3'x2' stand at the southern-facing deck glass doors upstairs for germinating seeds that want warmth.

Anyway...  I can grow a lot on annuals from seeds.

But I still want some more permanent plantings.  I discovered "cottage garden" planting this past month.  It's a combination of long-lived perennials and self-sowing annuals.  And you plant stuff at random.  No big patches of one flower here and another there.  The idea seems to be that what thrives thrives and empty spaces self-fill.

We'll see!  I am going to give it a try.  Large portions of my flowerbed were flowerless last year, so most of it needed to be re-done anyway.

I have a large serious roto-tiller for work in large areas.  But this will take some detailed tilling.  So I bought a 10" wide electric tiller in September.  My first attempts using it were dismal!

The grassy weeds wrapped around the tiller blades.  10 minutes tilling meant 10 more minutes cutting and pulling grass off the blades.  I learned to use my string trimmer to cut the grass tops off and rake them away.  Then use the tiller to chop up the soil.  There were still roots that wrapped around the tiller blades, but easier to remove.  Better than manual shovel work, anyway!

I have a catalog from a company that offers a wide variety of cottage garden plants and seeds.  It is from 2011 (I keep interesting catalogs), and I have arranged to get a 2017 catalog in early January.  I have some long-lived perennials that will suit a cottage garden (coneflowers, goldenrods, daylilies), and I will be ordering seeds of self-sowing annuals when the catalog arrives.  I may order a few plants for which growing from seed is very complicated.

And I have 2 planting areas in the middle of the yard that I didn't do anything with this year.  Nice edged areas I can mow around to control invasive flowers.  I want one to be for Lysimachia ‘Firecracker".  It's invasive.  I tried to kill it for 2 years and it keeps coming back.  So next Spring, I'm going to transplant it to a 10' edged circle and mow around it.  That should stop the "invasiveness".  It's annoying but lovely.  Purple foliage and bright yellow flowers most of the Summer.

The 2nd edged area will be a wildflower patch.  I scattered seeds from a packet I bought last Fall.  The instructions said to raked the soil roughly, scatter the seeds and smooth soil over them lightly.  I got a few flowers, but not many.  Most are perennials that need 2 or 3 years to flower, so I will give them time.  

But another old catalog I have offers high-quality seeds suited for scattering on bare ground in Winter.  That's actually the way they normally grow, so I'm going to give that a try.  And they offer a flowering enhancement packet for $10 to give some flowers the first year.  I'm going for 2 of those.

The 3rd edged area is mostly planted already with caged tulips, caged hyacinths, and lots of daffodils.  I added 2 dozen daylilies, some common and some fancy.  

This year, I thought I would remember exactly where the tulips and hyacinths were.  HA HA HA!  Next Spring, I will mark the spots with landscaping flags so that I can plant flowers in between the spots.  I want no spot to be un-planted if I can manage it.  The bulbs like to stay dryish most of the year, so I need to plant Summer flowers that don't mind dry conditions.  So I may plant 200 marigolds of various varieties among them.  They like hot dry conditions too.  The point being that I will never deliberately water that 3rd edged bed.

They will do fine with normal rainfall, I just won't add to it.

A cottage garden bed, a wildflower bed, a purple Lysimachia bed, and a Spring bulb/Summer annual bed...  Should be a good view from the deck!

Catching Up With Weeds

I guess I haven't posted in a while.  I guess I haven't done much to mention.  Who gets excited reading that you watered the garden and routine stuff like that?  But such things do need to get done and in August, sometimes just keeping up with watering the garden and flowers is plenty.  Never mind all the inside work which I had gotten behind on as well.

So we had a couple relatively cooler days (meaning 90 instead of 100F) and I took a look around for other things needing attention outside.  Weeds are insidious!  They look about the same one day to another but after a few weeks have gone from a few innocent inches high to 2' high (some straight up, some spreading out sideways).

You may (or not, LOL!) remember that I set up 3 roundish prepared edged planting beds last Fall.

The far one was for wildflowers and I scattered 2 pounds of wildflower seeds there.  A little thin for the space, but I figured I would add transplants into the area later.  I have native flowers growing in a few areas and would add them to places without flowers.  The results have been rather "less than mediocre".  May have been 2 dozen blooms in the whole area.  But most were perennials and they don't bloom the first year much, so I will add more seeds and some transplants this Fall and hope for better next year.

The middle area was going to be for Lysimachia, which has lovely purple foliage and small yellow flowers, but it is invasive.  So I thought putting it were I could mow around would control that.  Alas, I discovered that it is also called Loosestrife and if you look at the common name "loose" and "strife", you can tell it is a problem plant.  I  found it growing in several places on its own and I am trying to pull them all up!  Now I am thinking several dwarf butterfly bushes intermixed with Knockout roses which are generally pest-free and self-dead-heading.  They have no fragrance, but you can't have everything.  I will add a few oriental lilies for some fragrance.

The near area is for color.  I planted 100 or so tulips  and another 100 hyacinths in mesh cages (protection from the voles) and a couple of hundred daffodils straight in the ground as they need no protection).  I'll be adding another couple hundred daffodils in early November.

The hyacinths never came up last Spring, and I figured I planted too late.  But as I was digging around, I found one of the cages and opened the top and pulled out a few bulbs.  To my surprize, they were all solid and had some roots!  They didn't get enough chill time to bloom last year but they seem firm and healthy, and I expect them to come up gloriously in Spring!  And if not, I will dig the cages up and try again.  And if they don't grow next Spring, I will dig the cages up and plant more tulips!

This Spring, I took divisions of standard daylilies (as odd as it might seem, I had a couple dozen 6" pots of daylilies just sitting around existing on rainfall for 2 years) and planted them between the tulip
and hyacinth cages.

 There's a reason for that; the tulip/hyacinth bulbs like to be dry in Summer, and lilies have tuberous roots that store water so they don't need watering in Summer (much).  They make a good combination. I think I will add some Sedum 'Dark Magic' as they are about a foot high and drought tolerant as well as blooming in Fall.  A drought tolerant threesome in Spring Summer And Fall would be awesome. 

But the near spot looked terrible when I paid attention to it last week.  Grasses were growing up all over and spreading weeds below them. 

So I took care of the tall ones first.  Well, there are only 2 good times to weed.  The first is when the soil is soaked.  The weed roots can't hold on to the loose wet soil.   The other time is when the soil is bone dry (unless it is clay).  In good soil the roots come up like they were growing in powder.

So I pulled up all the tall ones in bone dry soil.  I left that one small pile to show them pulled up.  Actually, I filled a trashcan with them.  Not that I would trash them; the nutrients are free and they are great compost after being heated up by sunlight in the closed trashcan for a couple days to kill any seeds.  They look like cooked spinach afterwards.  And then straight into the compost pile they go...

I have some annuals around the outer front edge just for some color this first year.  Being downslope, I can water them enough to keep them happy without soaking the tulip bulbs that don't want to see water until Spring.

And I'm putting up with the orange landscaping flags this year.  Some mark the small newly-planted daylillies (so that I don't pull them up thinking they are grass weeds - because they sure look a lot alike when you are tired) and some mark the tulip and hyacinth cages (so I don't plant anything on top of them). 

Next, now that the tall weeds are gone, I can get at the low-growing weeds. 

I'm Thrilled!

Yes, really.  When I was late planting tulips and hyacinths in wire cages I made from 1/2" wire and buried 10" deep in 2' square holes a but late (Dec-Jan), I didn't know what to expect.  Same for 200 daffodils that don't need cages, so I just used a small auger to make 10" holes.  I'm not a bulb expert.  I know they need chilling temperatures, but I wasn't sure if that was for the bulbs to just grow or for flowers to develop.

Well, now I know part of the answer.  There are tulips and daffodils emerging from the ground all over.  I saw the first tulips a week ago, then there were 15, then 26, then 46, and today I counted 51 tulips.  And I suddenly realized today that one type of the 2 daffodil varieties are poking up all over too.  I assume the other daffodils and the hyacinths are later-emerging and will appear in a couple weeks.  If some are growing, the others probably will too. 

Not anything to take a picture of yet.  An inch tall tulip leaf is rather insignificant, after all.  But I get to watch more appear every day, so when they get large enough in one group, I'll post pics.

I planted the tulips 8 or 9 to a cage; the hyacinths 7 or 8 (they didn't divide up among the number of cages perfectly). 

But even if they don't bloom this year (but have vigorous plants), it will be a success.  Because they WILL bloom next year if not this one.  I was mostly afraid they would just rot, being too warm this first shortened growth season.

In a few weeks, I will be transplanting purple coneflowers and daylilies there too, between the cages of spring bulbs.  Maybe add some Mums for Fall color

That was in just one of the 3 new planting areas I worked on last Fall after I had that annoying english ivy, poison ivy, and wild grape covered ridge removed in September.

The larger of the 3 got spread with some "meadow-flower" mix back in November.  It certainly is covered with "green", but I have no idea if anything good is growing there.  It could be all weeds (and I can tell that some are), but there may be some nice self-seeding annuals and some flowering perennials there.  I am encouraged because it is much greener than the last circle where I planted nothing yet. 

So the difference between those 2 patches SHOULD be the meadow seeds I scatterred.  I probably won't be able to tell much about that until mid summer.  And if it turns out to be nothing but weeds, I will cover it in black plastic to smother the weeds and try again next Fall.  And in fact, I may just grow 100s of individual plants and do the planting more deliberately.  But I'll hope for success this year.  A 20"x15' patch of natural meadow would be very nice.

And not just nice to look at.  The beneficial insects, bees, and butterflies would love it.  So would the cats!  Not just because they would have tall plants to sneak around in, the think undisturbed growth would attract all the voles in the yard for them to hunt.

Speaking of bees, I saw my first honeybees of the year moving among to blooming hyacinths near the house.  My yard is mostly organic (I sometimes have to get lethal with the poison ivy that invades from my neighbors' yards).  But that's not where the bees and butterflies are attracted. 

The 3rd circle is for the lysimachia firecracker.   I love the purple foliage and yellow starry flowers, but it is too spreading for my main flowerbed.  So I'm moving them to an edged circle I can mow around easily to contain them.  They are related to Loosestrife, but not quite as invasive (being a domesticated hybrid, I assume).  But kept to themselves, they are lovely all season long, grow thickly enough to shade out all weeds, and look impressive in masses.  They don't seem to have any serious pests or diseases either. 

So with the 3 patches, I will have a naturalistic meadow, a patch of 2' tall purple plants, and a patch with spring bulbs and summer/fall plants.  It might be a thing of wonderful constant changes though the seasons or a visually-discordant disaster!

You will all find out about as fast as I do.  The good thing is that plants can be moved or replaced or expanded.  

Weather

I have to admit that I appreciate the delayed Winter here.  On the other hand, the bad forecasts are driving me crazy.

I look at The Weather Channel website FOR MY ZIPCODE (which should be pretty specific) and it says 0% chance of precipitation for 5 days.  And so I walk outside to plant more Spring Bulbs (daffodils now) and heavy mist is falling.  Which means the soil is muddy.  ARGHH!

Well, at least I have gotten 90% of the tulips and hyacinths planted in vole/squirrel proof wire cages.  There are a few leftovers of each and I can plant them in pots to be enclosed in the garden area with hopes of getting blooms and replanting them next Spring.

I still have daffodils to plant, but they don't need cages (being toxic to the varmints).  I can plant THOSE using my 12" drill auger.  As soon as the rain stops...

And with just drilling holes and dropping bulbs in, the daffs go in fast.  Which is why I left them for last.  At least I'm done with the digging of 14'X16" holes 12" deep!

I always try to do too much.  LOL!  Well, better than trying to do too little.

I have a lot of crocus bulbs, but those are going in some large shallow plastic bins to grow in Spring and then be replanted in May along a border.

It didn't seem like THIS much work when I ordered all the bulbs last Fall!  I'm bad at estimating the work my projects require.  But it will be worth it in Spring and for many Springs to come.   I don't think I will be planting any more Spring bulbs for many years to come.

Tomorrow is supposed to rain all day.  Good.  I have some serious inside cleaning to do!

Tulip Planting Concerns

I have realized that all my tulip bulb planting efforts MIGHT be a waste of time.  Spring-Flowering bulbs like tulips, hyacinths, and daffodils (et al) need "chill time".  In other words, they have to get cold enough for long enough to flower properly. 

Tulips require temperatures below 50F to begin to chill.  The colder they are, the less time they need.   This has been an unusually warm December here.  We have set a couple of record high temps, but that wouldn't be too much of a problem if it also got cold sometimes.

We have only had 3 nights below 32F here this month and are not forecast to have another until JANUARY.  This is almost beyond bizarre!  The average frist hard freeze here is usually in late October and the ground usually freezes a foot down for the Winter by early December.

I sure appreciate the warmish weather for the ability to keep working outside, but what is likely to happen next Spring is that I will have tulip plants, but no flowers.  After all this work, that would be a hard blow.  At least (as I read on most sites), that won't harm the plants permanently, just prevent blooms next year.

At minimum, tulips need 8-10 weeks of freezing ground.  And since that isn't likely to happen until early January, I am going to need a late Winter keeping the ground really cold into mid-March.  And THAT isn't the usual pattern here.

And I still have 8 cages of tulips and 8 cages of hyacinths to plant!  And 150 daffodils, but they don't need cages (being toxic to voles and squirrels) so I can just use my drill auger to plant them individually.  And from past experience, I know I CAN plant 150 daffodils that way in 2 days easily.

I think I will take the hyacinths and plant them in some large plastic tubs I have.  The voles can't get into the tubs and I'll cover the tops with wire mesh to keep the squirrels out.  I can harvest the bulbs in May to plant them properly

These are probably the last tulips and hyacinths I will plant.  The Winters are getting too short for them to survive.  I shouldn't have planted these, but I got all excited when I had an excavator remove the 6' high ridge in the backyard and thought of things I could plant there instead of grass to mow.  I love to see almost anything more than grass...

And I still have 200 crocus bulbs to plant!  I kind of got in over my head this year.  But better to try to much and stay busy, then to try too little and look back with regret at wasted time now, next year.

But I also have to say...  I've lived in this spot for 30 years.  I've seen the changes in the seasons as only a gardener/landscaper can.  The ground used to be frozen solid by the start of December.  Now it happens at the start of January (this isn't the first year of warmish weather at Solstice around here).

Anyone who thinks the climate isn't generally warming isn't a gardener! 

More Tulip Planting

Why do I keep getting involved in these projects that are nearly beyond my ability?  It is easy to plan things, I suppose, underestimating the physical work required.  Back in September, I ordered enough tulip bulps to fit 9 each into 27 cages.  Seemed like there was plenty of time...

(Some of this may have been previously mentioned)...

But then I learned that the bulbs wouldn't be shipped until early November.  So no point in doing anything before then.  (coff, coff)  Well, yeah, I SHOULD have made all the cages before then, but I thought that would only take a day.  I mean, I have good metal snips and a couple of metal blades for my jigsaw.  It should be like cutting cardboard.

WRONG!  The first cut into the wire mesh bends the cut wire and those grab the snips.  And the wire mesh is so flexible, it just vibrates along with the jigsaw blade to no effect.  So each wire in the grid along the cutting path has to be individually snipped from straight down.  I counted once and each cage required 277 snips!  After 4 of those cage cutouts (and forming the cutout into a cage) my hands started cramping.  It took a week to make 20 cages, and at that point I decided I better plant some and see how well they worked.

Well, digging the holes for the cages couldn't be all that hard, right?  12'x14'x10' deep.  I knew I was in trouble at the first stomp on the spade.  Now, this is a 100% metal spade with a newly sharpened flat blade.  Roots, rocks, clay.  I had to pound in an outline of the cage, use my leverage fork to break up the inside portion of the hole-to-be, pry out rocks, axe roots, and shovel out the soil one level at a time.  The clay stuck to the shovel and had to be knocked off.  For every shovelful I scooped out, I had to do several different things!  Each cage planting took 30 minutes of hard work.

Best I could manage was 3 holes a day before I was exhausted.  I can still do that kind of work at 65, but I don't think I would have done much better at 35.  Back was sore, legs were sore, hips were sore.

But just digging the hole is only half the work.  The soil below the hole had to be loosened so hole wasn't just a smooth clay bathtub and so the bulb roots could penetrate.  Tnen I had to sprinkle in some organic bulb fertilers and mix in in the loosened bottom.  Then I had to add some 1/2 compost 1/2 topsoil blend I bought a trailerload of at a landscaping place and mix in more fertilizer.  Then place the cage on the bottom and add more of the compost blend (you don't want the bulbs ON the wire mesh).

Then set the bulbs in the cage in a way that looks "natural" (If there is anything less "natural" than this whole process, I can't imagine it), then fill up he cage with for blend (for good drainage).  Then add another couple inches of blend over the top and rub it around to make sure there was no air space in the cage.  Then shovel some of the removed soil back on top slightly higher than soil level to allow for settling.

As a final gesture of organization, I bought a package of styrofoam plates to use as placers, wrote the name of the bulb (I have 4 varieties of tulips) on the plate with a marker, and stuck the plate over the spot with a 10" metal tent peg.

That's ONE cage of 9 bulbs...

Then because it has suddenly become randomly rainy lately, I had to cover the entire area with a large sheet of plastic (which I have) so the entire area wouldn't become a sea of mud.  Naturally, with the rain comes wind, so I had to surround the perimeter with rocks.  Which weren't enough, since the plastic was blown loose each of the first couple tries.  I finally had to resort to using 12' sq paver stones and REALLY large rocks and old pipes etc to hold it down.

And since the plastic cover got blown loose the first couple of times and I had to let the soil dry some (and some days when the plastic STAYED on after that, it rained all day so I couldn't really do any work there anyway).

So here I am in late December, having planted only 12 of the 20 cages.  And everytime I do, I have hand-cramps a couple hours later (naturally, just the time I am trying to prepare dinner).  Muscle rub creme helps, as does an aspirin, but only about 30 minutes after they start.   Meanwhile, I'll be cutting up veggies and meat,  and my fingers just lock into place around the knife handle or cooking pot handle and I actually have to pull them off.

ARGGHHH!  I would worry more, but that only happens after a day of hard tool use.  But it still is really annoying.

I've gotten better at the process.  Between the spade, the shovel, the leverage fork, and the post hole digger, I can get the hole dug out a bit easier and faster.  The spade defines the outline, the leverage fork breaks up the soil inside the outline, the shovel scoops out the loosened soil, and the post hole digger takes up the lower level of soil better.  But, mainly, switching tools uses different muscles so I don't get sore so fast.  I have it down to 20 minutes per planting a cage start to finish.

Fortunately, we don't have freezing temperatures forecast again until January.  But therein lays a problem.  More about that in 2 days!

Another Moderately Busy Day

I'm not busy every day.  Some days I just get up late (a privilege of singlehood and retirement) make lunch, putter, make dinner, and watch a few science/nature DVDs.  But I usually TRY to do something useful each day.  Some days just don't work!

I had yesterday (Thursday) all planned out.  I would get up early (for me) at 10 am, use the riding lawn mower to tow the 5'x8' hauling trailer to the street, hook it up to the car, drive the car to the UPS center to drop off 2 boxes, drive the car (filled with empty boxes) to the recycling center, stop at the nursery on the way back to get 2 bucket-loader loads on 1/2 soil 1/2 compost (premixed is great there), stop by the grocery store where the double rows of parking spaces allow for a car and trailer, and get home in time to let the cats out.

Hah!  I stayed up til dawn, slept til 1 pm, and ate a fast lunch lunch.  Then the riding lawn mower wouldn't start.  I hadn't used it since late September.  The marine battery I keep in the shed was dead too.  So I went back to the house for the Jump-N-Carry JNC660 Jump Starter I bought a couple months ago to help with the car.  That worked!  

So I drove the riding mower (hereafter just "mower") around front to hook up to the trailer to move it.  Oops, forgot the key ring.  Back inside to get that.  Unlocked the trailer lock, hooked up the mower.  It some time to get the mower trailer ball directly under the trailer hitch.  The trailer was on a slope and held in place by wheel chocks so I couldn't move the trailer up or down hill.  And trying to use the brake lock thge the mower is in position is tricky.  It wants to settle back a few inches...

But I got the trailer and mower connected and brought the trailer to the street so I could get the SUV attached.  Hmm, I need a rake to spread the soil/compost mix level...  Another 200' trip back to the shed and 200' back to the trailer.  Oh, and I need a tarp to cover the load so it doesn't all blow away.  I thought I had the in the car, but it was a small one that wouldn't cover the entire trailer.  Off in search of a larger tarp I go!  

Didn't find the one I wanted (later discovered the one I wanted was covering plywood on the deck) but found one "almost" large enough.  Put that in the car.  Checked to make sure I had the bungee cord tie-downs in the car.  Nope!  Searched for the bungee cords.  In garage, in shed, in workshop...  No luck.  Re-checked each area.  Nope!

I wasn't at the point of checking the refrigerator, but close.  I use them for a lot of purposes, so I sat down and pictured them.  Couple of minutes later, I said "AHA!" and walked right to them.  I had a small basket of odds and ends left over from another project, and there they were!  OK, into the car they went!

Darn, I don't have my grocery list!  I made a list of all my usual items on a spreadsheet by category and with some blank lines after each for unusual items (and printed off a few hundred copies a few years ago).  I don't really need it for most things.  I know what fresh vegetables and meats I need, but its the odd items like ketchup or Crisco or minced horseradish I'll forget without the list.  Plus, going by memory means I end up with 3 jars of fancy hot gardeniera veggies in the pantry...

So I got the list.  Went to the SUV.  Noticed the sun was setting.  That means it is rush hour traffic, plus I don't want to do all these errands in the dark!

ARGGGHHH!  

So I set my attention to dinner and today (Friday).  I got up at 9 am, showerd etc, made a quick cheese/bacon omelet and toast, ate fast, and got going.  Hurray, I was on the road  at 11...

The UPS drop-off was easy, though it is annoying to stand in the place typing information into the computer to create a shipping label.  I have my computer mouse buttons reversed for comfort, so using the regular arrangement is awkward.  And their mouse pads are sticky so (between the two) it is hard to get the cursor on the spots they want.  And they are Windows while I am Mac, so some routine shortcuts don't work.  

But the label was made and printed eventually.  I brought my 2 boxes to the UPS clerk.  One box was a return of a crockpot.  My 35 year old one finally died, so I ordered a replacement.  I THOUGHT I was ordering the same size but with a removeable inset.  OOPS! It was huge (for me).  5 quarts is a LOT bigger than I thought.  Well, I have 5 gallon buckets I use frequently, and 1/4 that size seemed right.  Nope!  Apparently, I had a 2 quart crockpot before.  So I had a return from that with a prepaid pre-printed label.

It was the kitchen knife return that took all the work.  I bought a set of really great Wusthof-Trident kitchen knives from a Going-Out-Of Business store 10 years ago.  But I added a few individually.  One had a piece of the handle just fall off while I was cutting lettuce.  Wusthof said to return it to then VERY securely packaged.  

I can understand THAT!  Knives defy most packaging.  So I found a flat box 4" longer than the knife.  I cut pieces from another box to hold the knife.  The handle has two narrow spots, so I punched holes in one cardboard piece to match those and used twist ties to hold the handle in place leaving 2" all around the knife.  Then I placed the 2nd cardboard piece on top of the 1st and used duct tape all around it.  That knife AIN'T moving.

Then I put the broken handle piece in a sandwich bag (with a separate label inside the bag explaining what it was) and tucked it in between the cardboards and taped THAT in place.  Then I wrapped the whole thing in small bubble-wrap.  I added a copy of all the emails between Wusthof and I (with pictures) into the box after writing my name, phone number, email address on the copy.

When I was done, was was still some movement of the cardboard knife-holder in the box so I packed the edges equally around with styrofoam peanuts.  When I was done, an earthquake could not have made the contents shift around in the box.  I am nothing if not thorough!

So I got away from UPS in only 20 minutes.  On my way to get rid of the recyclable cardboard boxes...  

Naturally, there was a person ahead of me.  She didn't seem to have the slightest idea how recycling worked.  She had her trunk open and the workers were picking through the contents.  She had electronics, boxes, garbage, metal, and some non-recyclable junk in there.  Hey, if it is her first time trying to recycle, I'm patient.

So I decided to just carry my boxes from a car-length further away.  But one of the guys there took my boxes as I approached the cardboard compactor and said "She comes here every week with weird stuff and makes us take some stuff we really shouldn't accept for free" (actual garbage costs money to dispose of), "but if we complain we get in trouble".

I thanked the guy who helped me empty the boxes from the SUV, and commiserated with him about some of the strange "customers" they get.  Apparently some people try really hard to get their actual garbage "recycled" for free when there is a dumspter right there saying  "$1 per bag of garbage".  And they show up in luxury cars!

People are weird!

If you have read THIS far, you get an A+.

So from the recycling center, I went to the landscaping/nursery at the end of the same street.  I needed a lot of good soil to fill the cages of the Tulip and Hyacinth bulbs I am planting in an edged circle in the newly-leveled back yard.  I asked the "Loading Manager" if they still had the 1/2 topsoil 1/2 compost mix.  I told him I wanted 2 bucketloads and set my covering tarp so that the dumped mix would hold the front of the tarp in place, then went to the office to pay for it.

I went back out with the receipt and waved it to the bucket-loader guy.  He dumped one, then the 2nd.  I was spreading the load out evenly when I noticed he was waving at me.  Apparwntly, He felt the 2nd load had been a bit light.  He brought a 3rd!  Cool!

He didn't hang around like he was wanting a tip, so I gave him a big smile and a slight salute!  And he parked his machine and left.  

So I went to use the bungee cords to hold down the tarp over the soil in the trailer.  Imagine my surprise when I realized I had set the tarp sideways.  So I pulled it out from under the soil/compost mix and set it the right direction.  I tucked the front edge under the soil as best I could, and used the bungee cords to lock down the sides and back.

I hadn't driven 1/2 miles when the front came loose. so I pulled over to the side of the road to redo the front.  I'm glad I had an extra container of bungee cords in the car.  It seemed (and was) secure. But I saw some birdfeathers on the road (some unfortunate crow), and put several in the exposed (uncovered) back of the trailer where the "wrong" tarp didn't reach.  A little experiment on how much of the purschased soil/compost mix I might lose driving home.

The feathers were still there when I got home, so I guess I didn't lose any soil mix on the way home.  Aerodynamics are weird!

So I stopped at the Safeway grocery store.  They have double row parking spaces that can fit a car and trailer.  Did my shopping; won't bore you with that.  But I needed stamps and they sell them at no markup.  I had written on my shopping list "Don't Forget Stamps".  I forgot the stamps.  

So I got home, unhooked the trailer, covered the exposed part of the soil/compost mix with another tarp. Got inside at 1PM, opened the deck door and a few windows (it was 70F) and let the cats out.  They LOVED it.

Next time, the first planting of new Tulips and Hyacinths using the new-built cages and 1/2 soil 1/2 compost mix...

And if you have read THIS farther, you get an A++

Mark

Tulip and Hyacinth Bulb Cages

One of the biggest problems for Tulip and Hyacinth bulbs around here are the voles.  They are evil!  I planted 5 circles of 8 Tulip bulbs some years ago and in Spring, I discovered holes dug out from the surface and sides to every single bulb.  There were bulb fragments left.

Daffodils are no problem; they seem toxic to voles.

But I love Tulips and Hyacinths. 

So I am making wire cages to keep the little voles bastards out. 

I designed an efficient form to use 36" wide hardware mesh wire.  The dark line in the middle shows where 2 shapes are cut.

I cut many to size. ..

I figured out how to fold them into cages...

They are easily opened for adding bulbs when buried in the ground.

I still have time to plant the bulbs.  The ground won't freeze until January here.  Building the cages is labor-intensive.  I have 14 cages constructed and want 14 more for the 25' diameter edged circle I set in.

But I don't have much time left.  I'm sure gonna be busy next week, LOL!