Mammoth Gray Stripe

I just adore sunflowers. I'm not sure they're my absolute favorite, but they have a special place in my heart. Nearly every Thursday from spring to fall, I get a bunch of them at the Minneapolis Farmer's Market for my desk at work. And one of the few perks of a South Dakota road trip is driving past acres and acres of sunflower farms. As a beginning gardener, I grew a mini-sunflower last year called "Ballad" in a container on the veranda, and the birds loved it.

Given that I needed some more yellow in the back beds this year, I went out looking for standard-sized sunflowers to put there. When I asked at Mother Earth, the owner said she never stocks "normal-sized" sunflowers (er, um, Helianthus Annus) because they grow out of the seedling-sized pots in a matter of days. However, she assured me that they're very easy to grow from seed, sown right in the garden. (My favorite reference book on Minnesota Annuals said the same thing.) So she steered me to the seed display, where I found this little packet:

I reviewed the copy on the back of the packet. Hm. Easy to grow? Check. Attracts birds and butterflies? Check. Heirloom variety? Check. But then I got to a line in small print that read, "This packet contains enough seeds to plant a 100-foot hedge or privacy screen."

Now, I'm pretty sure that the entire perimeter of my backyard isn't 100 feet. That means that, if I accidentally drop the packet, the whole yard is gonna be sunflower city. Even scarier: what happens if I'm having a bad day, and come home and say "What the heck!" and fling them around everywhere? These things are ginormous; they have 12-inch flowers that can appear on the stalks by the dozen. They could take over all of Metropolis, people!

I bought them anyway and did plant a number of seeds around the fence. And now, we wait. Don't get me wrong -- I'm happy about the idea of sunflowers in the garden. It's just ... a 100-foot long privacy hedge from a little packet? That's pretty concentrated power. I'm not sure I'm responsible enough to be given sole control of these seeds. Who knows? Maybe the birds will eat a bunch of them and I won't have to worry about it. But until the seedlings sprout, I'm living in a state of both excitement and trepidation.

Sam, the Wonder Dog

Guess who's staying at our place for a few nights!
This is Sam. Sam belongs to our dear friend, Pat, who used to be one of the managers at Midwest Mountaineering. Sam is just plain amazing, so it should be no surprise that dog-training runs in Pat's family. In fact, his uncle, Rex Carr, was one of the legends in retriever training.

Pat and Sam have a pretty remarkable relationship. Although he's definitely in charge, she has enough spirit to keep him on his toes, which seems to be the perfect balance. I've never met a dog so well-behaved and, truly, so happy. Ever seen "The Dog Whisperer?" If so, you probably remember that he's always talking about how dogs who don't have boundaries and discipline are stressed out, so they act out. Sam proves this point perfectly, by being oh-so-contented within her boundaries. She always knows exactly what's expected of her, and because Pat has taught her to do everything he expects, she never has to worry or be confused.

In a bizarre fluke of the allergy world, Sam is one of very few dogs we've ever met that doesn't make Mason sneeze, which means that -- unlike other dogs -- she gets to come over and play.
We even took her on vacation up to Duane and Peter's cabin!

So when I got a phone call at work today asking whether I'd like to have some company for a few nights, I was pretty excited. I wonder if I can figure out how to take her with me to the Twins game tomorrow. She's so smart -- I'm sure she'd like baseball.

On the Other Side of the Country...

... it looks like Addie's having a pretty good time in her backyard, too. :)

What a Difference a Month Makes!

No wonder we get so excited about the change of seasons in Minnesota -- they move so quickly! Here's a look at the "hammock corner" of our yard in mid-April: it's pretty brown.

This photo is from about a week later; things are greening up a little bit.

Now take a look at a the same part of the yard in photos from the past weekend.

Quite a change!

A Tree Grows In South Minneapolis

I'm very pleased to introduce Amelanchier x grandiflora "Autumn Brilliance," also known as Serviceberry, Juneberry, Saskatoon and -- in New England -- Shadblow.

While we have two lovely mature trees on our lot (a birch and a pine), the veranda gets a heck of a lot of sun late in the day. For several years, we've been discussing how a small tree would help block some of that glare and soften the look of the back of the house -- which can be downright blinding in the afternoon sun. But which tree?

Well, before I started gardening last spring, I bought Landscaping with Native Plants of Minnesota, a fantastic book by Lynn Steiner. We hoped it would help us make smarter choices when it came time to do something with the yard, and it definitely did. I scoured it until I found what I believed to be the perfect tree, at least for us. Why?

• The Amelanchier is native to Minnesota, and there's a whole host of reasons that native flora is better for the environment and for gardening success.
• It's a great size: they rarely get bigger than 25 feet.
• The foliage is very airy, so it doesn't create a bunch of deep shade (which would seriously hurt my gardening efforts). Rather, it filters the light.
• It's the apotheosis of a four-season tree, as evidenced by the photos below of full-grown specimens. It has lovely white flowers in spring, berries that the birds love (which means the birds will eat them before they can mess up our backyard) in summer, firey red foliage in fall, and beautiful gray bark to look at once the leaves have fallen in winter.
  

So when M sent me a link to subsidized tree program at treetrust.org, I was thrilled to see that the Amelanchier was among the choices . We ordered the tree a few months ago, picked it up last night (when M encountered some kinks in TreeTrust's processes, but whatever), and took turns doing the digging to plant it.

A note about selecting the tree: We arrived at the pick-up location about two minutes before they closed (again, because of the kinks in the process), so they were already shutting down for the night. This meant that, instead of the trees all lined up in tidy rows (helpful for selecting the exact tree one wants), they were all grouped together in such a way that you couldn't distinguish the foliage of one tree from that of another. When I was told, "Pick any tree you want!" I couldn't really tell where one ended and the next begin, so I made the best guess I could and we brought our new addition home.

It wasn't until we got it in the ground that M said, "It looks a little, um ... disabled. Way to pick it, honey." Okay, maybe it tilts a little to one side, and it has a few yellow leaves (either overfertilized or underwatered, no permanent damage done), but seriously, I couldn't tell that any of them looked any different! My immediate response to M was: "Don't say mean things about our tree; you'll hurt its feelings." Of course, this only fueled the fire. M has now announced that clearly I was fated to have this exact tree, because it needs my love and attention, because, yes, it's "disabled."

Somehow, that concept seems really familiar.

April and May... So Far

All the gardening books and magazines tell you to keep track of what happens in your garden at particular times. The idea is that you'll have a reference from season to season about how quickly or slowly some plants emerge in spring, when things are in bloom, etc. It's a great idea: there are plenty of times this year that I've wondered when/whether something particular was supposed to be happening. I tried to take notes in a calendar off and on last year, but wasn't remotely consistent about it. Next year, though, I can just look back at this blog!

April Highlights

• April 10: Oo, there are little green tips on the lilacs!


• April 15: Tulips are poking out of the ground -- after I thought the squirrels got them all! Planted two kinds of spinach seeds in a wide bowl-type container. I’m hoping this will prevent me from doing what I did last year: pulling up all the spinach seedlings because I couldn’t tell the difference between them and weeds. The seed packets say that the spinach should be mature within 45 days.


• April 20: Raked up all the pine needles and old leaves out from under the pine tree and wow, what a difference!


• April 23: Got most of the raised beds built and about half of the perennials back in. Muscle paaaaiiinnn.


• April 25: The mystery groundcover under the pine tree is abloom with ephemeral white blossoms. I wish I knew the name of this thing! The leaves look like wild ginger, but the flowers are completely different.

May Highlights

• May 1: The clematis is just going wild! I don’t think it was this green or leafy until about August of last year, and I planted it in June. It looks so healthy -- a relief because I didn’t pull it away from the fence when we installed the raised beds.


• May 2: The tulips are completely pooped out already. Various resources say that if I want them to rebloom next year, I need to let the foliage completely yellow and die, then remove it from the bulbs, which should be stored until next year -- and even then, their re-emergence is a question mark. My first impression: it’s not worth it.


• May 3: The tulips have ended up in the compost pile. Maybe I’ll try different bulbs (Muscari?) next time.


• May 10: The peonies that I divided and replanted as part of the raised-bed project are about two feet high and have little buds on them. They look completely miniscule compared to our neighbors’ peony bush, but I figure that dividing and replanting them basically takes them back to square one, so I’m just glad they have buds on them. They also look a little crisp, maybe from all the wind we’ve been having? I’ll water them a little more as we go. Oh, and in theory, May 10 is the last average frost date in the Twin Cities -- meaning that it’s safe to plant almost anything now. But I think I’ll wait a little longer on the tomatoes.


• May 11: Oo, everyone else’s lilacs are in bloom -- it’s heavenly! It’ll probably be a few years before our little lilacs are bloom-ready, so I’m jealous! Stopped by the U of M Horticultural Society's plant sale and got eight Thunbergia (black-eyed Susan vines) for the trellises near the patio. They don't look great, but they were cheap. We'll see how they do.


• May 12: I’ve been waiting patiently for various perennials to re-emerge before I assume that the winter killed them, but it’s starting to become clear what did and didn’t make it. One of my three Campanula Carpatica “Blue Clips” looks terrific, and the others aren’t even visible, so I’m guessing they’re goners. Ditto with one of my three Heuchera “Vesuvius,” all the cinnamon ferns and, unfortunately, all the Gaillardia “Burgundy” -- which are favorites because they’re native, they attract hummingbirds and butterflies, and they’re a beautiful red. On the other hand, the four crested lady ferns under the pine tree are coming up, but soooooo slowly.


• May 14: Cold snap! Glad I waited on the tomatoes!


• May 16: So much wind lately! Brian and Brian down the street gave me a bunch of ostrich ferns, which I planted below the pine tree in the “woodland” area of the backyard. It was a great effect, but the wind has snapped the fronds (below) on most of them. I'm guessing two out of the ten will make it. Maybe it's the wind or maybe not, but clearly not all of the Thunbergia for the trellises are going to make it.



• May 18: OK, it’s been a month and the spinach seedlings are less than an inch tall. Something’s not right -- foiled again! I’ve given up and replaced them with lettuces: “Red Sails” and “Black-Seeded Simpson.” The good folks at Mother Earth also mentioned that they’d recommend putting in tomatoes now, so we’ve planted two Brandywines (sooo delicious), a Halfmoon China and a Black Cherry -- all on the bamboo tomato "teepees" that M thinks are so weird. Also bought more Thunbergia for the trellises -- these not only look healthier but much further along, as you can see in the photo below.

Go, Mom, Go! Redux

Mary Anne is back from Worlds after what sounds like the sailing day of her life. The International Melges 24 Class Association had this to say:

How tough was it on the last day of the 2007 Fullpower Melges 24 World Championship, hosted by the Santa Cruz Yacht Club?

So tough, with Monterey Bay cranking up 30 knots of howling chaos, that Dave Ullman, the winner, said, "We weren't racing at the end, just surviving."

So tough that Hank Stuart's race committee announced as the first race of the day was finishing that there wouldn't be a second -- a first in the class's 10 world championships.

So tough that 19 of the 58 starters did not finish. One, Corinthian Division winner Othmar Mueller von Blumencron of Great Falls, Va., lost half of his mast but finished with what was left of his rig.

Four or five other dismastings, a few blown-out spinnakers, one man overboard (recovered by another boat) -- those were the prices paid for sailing when the wind hits Force 7, with gusts to 35 (gale-Force 8) and five-foot seas form stair-steps up 10-foot swells. That's what greeted the fleet when it cruised out to the race course shortly before noon, and from then it got really nasty.

And while most participants interviewed sounded pretty freaked out, here's how Chris Doubek, helmsman for All or None (Mom's team) described it:

It was awesome! We had a great time. I think it was blowing thirty-something. We buried it a couple of times. We had one round-up, we put the jib up, backwinded it, dropped the kite down a bit, then got going again. We were flying. It was awesome! Awesome day! Loved it!

From the update I got, it sounded like Mom felt the same. Go, Mom, Go! :)

Bachman's + Birthday Gift Card =

Almost more pansies and herbs than you know what to do with...















... bamboo tomato trellises that cause your husband to say, "What the hell are those?"...















... and other good stuff.















Thanks for the awesome gift card, Dad!

Forget Paris

There's nothing like springtime in Minnesota, although Prague in spring probably comes close. :)

Landscaping!

My customary backyard activities -- at least, during the non-tundra months -- fall into two categories: gardening and loafing.

The loafing takes many forms: enjoying the outdoor fireplace we got for Christmas (thanks, Mom!), reading a book in the hammock (thanks, Dad!), drinking morning coffee on the veranda with the newspaper, having a beer on the patio set (thanks, D and D!) with friends or neighbors.

The gardening, detailed in other posts, usually involves planting, weeding, picking tomatoes, moving stuff around, more weeding and occasionally digging up a little sod to make more room for something.

However, on a recent weekend in April, my outdoor effort was about ohsomuchmorethangardening. It was officially landscaping, and believe me, I was pretty terrified about it.

Taking a Hard Look
This all came about because, like most Zone 4 gardeners, I spent all winter poring over gardening magazines, books and Web sites, dreaming of the backyardtobe. Given our winter, that's about seven months of absorbing all the gardening information I could handle. In addition to feeding my "zone envy," all this knowledge started pushing me up against some hard truths about what I did and didn't do last year.

In terms of planting perennials, here are some the things I did right last summer: researched and selected plants that perform well in my area and climate, listened to what the nursery folks had to tell me, and... um, actually that might be about it.

Among the worst of my garden-related sins from last summer: I didn't pay any attention to the soil. I had no idea what kind we had, and I didn't do anything to amend it. I figured it was difficult enough to get up to speed on selecting and taking care of plants that I hoped the whole soil conundrum could wait.

As I read and studied over the winter, I realized that whatever soil we had on our lot probably wasn't ideal for supporting a long-term garden. Oh sure, the peonies were doing fine, but they'd probably been planted before I was born and had plenty of time (and better care) to get established. What I needed for a real perennial border, it became clear, were raised beds.

You Mean I Have To Do What?!?
So I finally did something right: I called the extension service. I'd heard nothing but rave reviews about how helpful they were, and they were indeed. I just wasn't happy to hear what they had to say. I left the following voice-mail:

Hi, I just started gardening last summer, and I didn't really know what I was doing, so I planted a bunch of perennials in my backyard soil, which is pretty bad. I'm thinking of doing raised beds. Can I just pile more soil around my existing plants [I knew there was no way this would work, but I was hoping], or do I need to dig them all up and replant in the new beds? I'm really worried about my peonies; I hear they don't like to be moved.

A very nice master gardener named Carol called me back.

Yes, I'm afraid you'll need to dig up all the perennials and replant them. [Assorted tips and encouragement about the peonies, e.g., you're right, they don't like to be moved or divided, but it'll be okay, etc.] It sounds like a fun project -- I hope you enjoy it!

Fun? Not if everything dies in the process. Oy.

The Heavy Lifting
So I brought in some reinforcements to help, namely my husband. Those of you who know him well know that he spent so much time studying in the last few years that he's still itching to counter it with manual labor outdoors. Perfect! Over the course of two days, we:

• Dug up all the plants and put them in any container we could find (we just about filled up the garage);
• Stuck the tulips in some window boxes on the fence to foil whatever was eating them;
• Went through the beds and pulled out all the rocks, branches, remaining pieces of sod, and weeds (some of which, I swear, have roots that go all the way to China);
• Broke up the soil with a Garden ClawTM borrowed from a co-worker (you know who you are and I promise I'll return it soon!);
• Piled on about 40 wheelbarrows worth of compost and black dirt;
• Tamped it all down;
• Put the perennials back in;
• And took a lot of Advil for sore muscles.

Then I held my breath to see who'd make it through the trauma to re-emerge.

Before and After
Here's how one of the "beds" (if you can call it that) looked before:


And here's how it looked after, with visibly richer soil:
About two weeks later (below), not bad!:
Great exercise, great opportunity to improve the garden, and I hope I never have to do it again!

The Challenges of "Before" and "After" Photos..

… are threefold.

Challenge 1: Don’t Forget to Take “Before” Photos
In my last post about gardening, I included the one and only photo I have of our “original” backyard. It’s not even really a photo of the yard; it's more like the back of the house. I’ve got tons of photos of how ugly the inside of the house was when we moved in (not to knock the Edins, but that was some scary, 1970s-psychedelic, pinkandorangeandblack carpet upstairs, man), but almost none of the yard. My guess is that I knew we weren’t going to do anything with the yard for quite some time, so I didn’t need any reminders of how bad it was. Still, at this point, I wish I had more photos.

Challenge 2: Don’t Lose Your “Before” Photos
In an effort to make up for a lack of "original before" photos, I took a ton of pictures of the backyard last year. I suppose they didn't really count as “before” photos; they were more like “in-progress” photos. But I was really excited about everything they captured: how my plantings grew or bloomed (or died) over the course of the summer, how the beds slowly encroached on the lawn, how the shady corner was transformed by the hammock and hanging baskets of coleus, how hard Mason and Ron worked on the patio. I mean, they rented a freakin’ tractor and installed two tons of pavers! Dang! (It has to be “dang” -- I’m typing this at work.)

All in all, I think we had about 60 photos of the backyard. Until…

Now, I’m sure this was nobody’s fault, and I’m not even being sarcastic when I say that. Here’s the deal: We bought a portable hard drive because all my iTunesing was eating up a ridiculous amount of space. What we didn’t do was pay any attention to how it was originally configured, which was, evidently, to perform an auto-backup when plugged in.

Anyway, one night last October, feeling guilty about using all of M’s hard drive space with a) photos of plants and 2) whatever I’d randomly purchased on iTunes that week, I noticed that the portable hard drive was plugged in. Thinking I would be helpful and proactive, I moved all the photos from the whole summer over to it. I mean everything: all the backyard photos, snapshots from my trip to Seattle to meet Addie, pictures from Mom’s 8th place turn in the 2006 Melges 17 National Championships, not to mention all of M’s kayaking excursions, fun with friends from Midwest Mountaineering -- you name it. Ev. Ry. Thing.

I think you can guess where this story is going. Unless you think it has a happy ending. Because it doesn’t. Needless to say, the next time the hard drive was plugged in, it backed up the laptop -- from which the summer photos had been moved -- thus erasing the photos. A few moments of finger-pointing ensued about how the thing was set up and who should have known before using it, and all that. It didn't help that M reminded me how many technology projects I've worked on, to which my response is, "I don't do hardware." It passed pretty quickly (we don’t really do that kind of thing), but bottom line: I got no “before” photos from last year.

Side note: We now both know how to use the portable hard drive, which is to say that Mason uses it and I mostly ignore it because I’m still pissed. And I don't do hardware.

Challenge 3: Don’t Forget to Take “After” Photos
You’d think I would have learned from Challenge 1 (“Don’t Forget to Take “Before” Photos”), but not really. The problem is that I get exhausted, excited or some weird combination of the two -- any of which inhibit rational thought.

When I’m finishing up a multi-hour stretch of hardcore gardening (two words I never thought I’d string together), I’m pretty worn down, but I’m also so jazzed about what I’ve done that it’s almost hard to stop. Unless my wrist is really bugging me or I’m getting sunburned or there’s some kind of external time constraint, I’m liable keep going until I run out of energy or daylight. Either way, I’m happy, but tired and distracted. One night a few weeks ago, after working outside until 8:30, my brain was so unreliable that I left the garage door wiiiiiiiiide open with all my precious gardening tools inside. Remembering to take “after” photos? Please.

Oh, it’s possible that I’ll remember the following day, if it’s not raining, but chances are that if the weather’s nice, I’m too excited to get working again that I don't remember the camera.

I’m really really trying to be better about it this year. But it’s early yet, so we’ll have to see.