It was very odd to be gardening today....whilst it is still winter! Well, maybe not so much gardening as clearing out the decay of last year, but none the less, in a normal winter I would still have been spending the afternoon by the fire, drinking hot tea and eating toasted crumpets. After a misty, murky start to the day, I spent almost all of it outside, clearing out, cleaning up, and generally starting to get things ready for the new season. Things are budding out all over, which I still can't quite wrap my head around - last year nothing moved in my garden until May. The clematis is shooting out, the roses are pruned and sprayed and the boxwoods are starting to show new buds. I was delighted to find that after years of bronze fennel envy (mine never made it through the winter and were always quite spindly), my experiment of mulching heavily with spent compost in the fall has taken them through what little winter we've had, and there are some very robust new shoots popping out. All of my red kale and tomato seeds have germinated, and I'm planning to start some chard and white cosmos tonight. We look set for a slight cooling trend towards next weekend, but then the long range forecast suggests it will go back to being well above normal, so I'm optimistic that we're out of the woods for this winter. Hurrah!
lovely red shoots are bursting on my tree peony, and the New Dawn roses were pruned, sprayed with dormant oil and sulphur and fed with vermicompost today.
tasty chive shoots - perfect in mashed potatoes!
I re-layed the brick patio a couple of years ago in a herringbone pattern. I gave it a good hard sweep today, and it looks better, but I need to weed thoroughly and add some more polymeric sand to keep it looking pristine.
Lots of brush to send to the curb! Luckily yard waste collection starts this week.
This clematis jackmanii is bursting out far earlier than normal. I gave all of the plants with a love of alkaline soil a handful of ashes from my wood burning fireplace today, including clematis, peonies and lavender.
On another note, my friend, The Diva is singing with the Saskatoon Symphony tonight, in the Brahms German requiem. Wish we could hear her somewhere a little closer to Toronto soon.....but in her honour, here is a clip of Elizabeth Schwartzkopf in a particularly beautiful section of the requiem, which I know the Diva will perform beautifully.
After my little sojourn in Winnipeg, I came back home, to find the garden looking a little "blah". Although there are one or two things in bloom, in the front yard, things seem to be in a bit of a lull, with the spring flowers well and truly gone over, and nothing very showy ready to take over quite yet. There are some encouraging signs though. The new roses I planted this year are looking very healthy, have grown considerably and all of them have lots of buds developing. The peonies look to be only days away from bursting out and the geraniums won't be far behind. However, the forget-me-nots which have seeded wildly all over, and which were swathing the garden in a billowing cloud of blue and white were definitely in the phase of needing to be forgotten. SO, I quickly got to work, cutting back, hauling out and generally tidying up. On the plus side, I don't see any more signs of the dreaded japanese lily beetle for now, and the centranthus rubre, which I thought hadn't made it through the winter, has sprouted up nicely in the last few days, probably encouraged by the sudden blast of heat last week. On the negative side, someone has put a size ten boot in the middle of one of my lavender plants and broken half the stems, and aphids have attacked the climbing roses in the back yard (and it was too windy to try spraying with insecticidal soap). Such are the agonies and ecstasies of being a gardener.
This little dianthus was hidden in a corner, so I moved it early in the spring, to a nice sunny, well drained spot, close to the street....it seems to have adjusted well
Lots of texture, and shades of green, but not much by way of blooms! And those forget-me-nots have well and truly past their prime.
This self-seeded eryngium is starting to form it's flower. When in bloom, the whole thing will turn a ghostly silvery-grey.
Lots of white bachelor's buttons (Centaurea montana). I also now have a rogue patch of bright blue ones. They must have sprung up from seeds, are intensely blue and delightfully dwarfed.
Looking forward to the opening of the peonies.
My tree peony was so woe-begone, and outgrowing it's place.
Love my white clematis...I hope I can find the tag at some point to recall what the variety was.
Tree peony "after"....I gave it quite a haircut, and I think it looks the better for it.
This climbing hydrangea is a free gift from my neighbours, and is lush and beautiful, with it's lacey white flowers.
That looks better....tidied up and waiting for the next wave of flowers
Note the patches of bare earth.....see below for the solution!
After I'd finished with the clean up, I was disturbed to see quite a number of open spots, so off I went to Plantworld to find "just a couple of things" to file the gaps. A trip to plant world almost never ends with "just a couple of things" and yesterday I returned with:
a couple of dwarf delphiniums (Dasant Blue) to keep the one I already had company
On the plus side, the tree peony is bursting out, my white clematis likewise and I'm delighted with my aquilegias and anenomes. On the down side, the clematis I re-located to the front yard has either been bashed in a walk-by incident, or it has the dreaded clematis wilt.......ugh.
We had our first blast of summer heat today - 32 degrees celcius (39 with humidex). Fortunately it is much cooler here on the shoreline of Lake Ontario. The tulips have come to the end of their bloom, having been battered by a deluge on Sunday night and now frying in the heat of the day, so I went out after dinner with a bucket and scissors to deadhead and take stock. Whilst crouching down amongst the burgeoning foliage I was distressed to find something other than the usual detritus of human life that I seem to find intermittently scattered in the garden as a result of living on a main street (abandoned cell phones, car keys and sundry articles of clothing, not warranting further comment). I have my first infestation of Japanese Lily Beetle!
In my efforts to ensure I had something spectacular in bloom all summer long last year (a result of my anxiety at not knowing when the Master Gardeners of the local horticultural society would turn up to judge my efforts, after some kindly citizen anonymously nominated me for a prize Etobicoke & Toronto West Great Gardens Contest) I popped in a variety of lilies, bought in near full bloom, to fill in a few gaps. Now, they are growing back with great vigour, but are under attack from what might otherwise be considered a rather beautiful insect. The Japanese Lily Beetle appears to have arrived in the North East US about 15 years ago, and in the absence of any natural predators, has gone on to successfully colonize large swathes of the US and Canada, and now Mimico! I had my first encounter with them on a visit to the Toronto Botanical Garden last summer, where the lilies were completely denuded and looked like bejewelled sceptres, absolutely enrusted with ruby-red beetles. Utter devastation!
So, from now on, I will need to make regular inspections and see if handpicking the little blighters will be enough to keep them under control. If anyone has any good tips on controlling them, please let me know!!
PS - in case I haven't already tooted my trumpet on last year's Great Garden competition, I was first prize winner in the "alternative category" (how apt) for Ward 6. Unsolicited compliments much appreciated ;)
Here are some photos of how things look on the last day of May.
Tulips are over - what will be next to make a splash?
In the backyard, there are still a few tulips that look like they'll hold out for a few more days
On an impulse, I bought 2 standard gardenias to adorn the deck this year...they should like Toronto's hot and humid summer weather, and I can't wait to smell their perfume
My Chinese Tree Peony is starting to open - the flower petals look like the wings of a swan
I'm expecting a burst of crisp white from this clematis in a few days
Greg's Grandmother sent him home from a visit with a bunch of seedlings from her garden - she's 87 and still gardening and travelling intrepidly. Lupins, cardinal flower, lungwort, bachelor buttons and costmary were amongst those I could identify. The others will need to flower before I'll recognize them.
Japanese Lily Beetles are not the only troublesome pests in the garden at the moment. The squirrels love digging in my newly planted containers. A dose of blood meal will discourage them.
The anenomes have just opened, and delicately float in the breeze
The last week has seen more torrential rain, and the garden has been quite battered. Despite the weather, I've had quite a good showing in the front garden, and given that Mimico is "an up and coming" neighbourhood, and thus still a little rough around the edges, I've been pleased to see lots of people stopping by to take a look, and lots of folks snapping photos of the garden as they go past on their stroll. I have to say, I get quite a bit of satisfaction from thinking that my efforts help to beautify the neighbourhood, and hopefully bring some enjoyment to others.
The tulips have come up trumps again, after 6 years. Every year I anxiously await to see if this is the year where they get too tired and overcrowded to bloom well, and each year they continue to look lovely. I am on the verge of digging them up to make sure I don't reach the stage of overcrowding, but can't quite bring myself to disturb what seems to be a good thing. Maybe I'll wait for just one more year. In the meantime, I'll stick to my regimen of plenty of bonemeal and keeping the water away from them in the summertime.
The tulips are just starting to go past their prime, but have looked magnificent
One thing I have done in the last couple of years is try to find ways to not let the predominance of tulips in the garden become such an aesthetic problem after blooming. Some strategically placed companion plantings, such as aquilegia and lilies have now matured to the size where I think they will do the job of hiding the retreat of the tulips, whilst still allowing them a full opportunity for the leaves to die back naturally, allowing the bulbs to store up all that vital energy needed for perfect blooming next year. The extra light afforded by the absence of the locust tree should also help.
This tall lily will draw the eye after the
tulips start to decline
Here, peonies and hostas will be the focus
once the tulips go past
Change is definitely in the air though, and whilst today is still damp and grey, and a little on the cool side, the forecast for next week includes lots of lovely sunshine and much nicer temperatures. The next wave of early summer flowers, such as peonies, alliums and clematis are all on the verge of bursting out, and they should enjoy and change in the forecast, and they'll certainly have been well hydrated until now. No gardening today though - I have started on an arrangement of the Bach Italian Concerto for piano quartet, which at the rate I go, will see me through the rest of this year! There just aren't enough hours in the day!
In the meantime, here are some pictures of the state of the union in the garden, and although it's sad to see some things going past already, there's much excitement about what is to come over the coming months.
This area had become increasingly shady and will need a re-arrangment shortly. I plan to wait until the anemones are done flowering.
Although it's not raining today, there has been quite a heavy fog, which has left lots of droplets on the Lady's Mantle
This clear white clematis only blooms in early summer, but it does so before the New Dawn rose opens up, so it makes a good companion plant. It's also not too vigorous in terms of foliage, so it doesn't crowd the rose.
These dark aquilegias are just opening as the tulips go over, and the frondy foliage will hide the declining tulip foliage from the street view
These Alliums will be fully open in a couple of days. The peonies are already hiding my homemade woven dogwood stakes
My crocs were decorated with fallen forget-me-nots when I took these photos in the drenched garden
