The Gardeners Anonymous Blog

Greenthumb Sunday

Wisteria

Greenthumb Sunday

I bought this Azalea to celebrate the first day of spring.
Any excuse to buy a plant.

The Coolest Marble Fountain Ever

Not that kind of marble.
The roundy glass kind.
Cat’s eyes, steelies, agates.

The kind that my brothers used to make spending money with out behind the local Slot Car Race Tracks, next to the 7/11.
My brother Vince would take out his “Taw”, knuckle down and shoot, winning his opponents marbles and their money.

Maybe this is why my favorite thing at the San Francisco Flower and Garden Show this year wasn’t a garden, or a particular plant or pond or design. It was a simple bubbling fountain.

The fountain consisted of an oval shaped ceramic pot in chocolate and lighter brown glazes, filled with green marbles. The water bubbled up from the center of the pot and spilled over the sides to the base, which stood in more green marbles.

Confessions of a Worm Abuser

Well here it is: I’m comin’ clean. Allright, I’ll say it—I’m a worm abuser!

Here’s my story: about six years ago one of my best friends—and gardening—buddy moved. Yes, she moved away. I was crushed. The only thing I have to remember her now is this Damn worm composter she left me. Now I believe in composting. I’m just not that good at it.

There are too many rules.

There are rules about the location of your composter, about what to feed them, when to feed them, what not to feed them, how much to feed them. When to harvest the compost. What to do with the worms when you harvest the compost. Keeping the proper moisture. Maintaining a certain temperature. Blah blah blah.

In case you don’t know how a worm composter works, here’s a quick explanation. You throw kitchen scraps in a bin with worms. The worms eat it. They poop. The poop is called castings. The castings are great for your plants.

You are supposed to have bedding material in your composter. What? Bedding material? They’re worms. I can’t do this. I have children. Even if I didn’t have children, I have dogs. They’re hard enough. My dogs are lucky if they have bedding material.

My children sleep in beds. My dogs sleep on the floor and my worms sleep in my garbage. This is the way it should be.

You are supposed to shred your bedding materials such as newspaper, cardboard, and fall leaves. Nay nay, you can’t just throw the fall leaves in with your worms, they need to be shredded. Okey dokey. Evidently you can also use “chopped” straw and “aged” manure, even seaweed? This is a good one—compost. I’m so confused.

Here is a rule that does make sense. And one that I actually follow. You cannot put grass cuttings in with the wormies. Why? Can anyone tell me?
That’s right. Because grass will create heat and give off ammonia. Both of these things are deadly for worms.

Worms would rather have vegetable and fruit scraps, green leaves, annual weeds (with no seed heads that could sprout), bread, and eggshells. They love eggshells. They need their calcium, (just like me.) They also like coffee grounds and tea bags. I like to put coffee grounds in with the worms, 'cause it makes them work faster.

I don’t put in citrus, banana peels or corncobs. Worms don’t like citrus. It’s too acidic, and banana peels and corncobs take forever to compost. I don’t have forever. Oh by the way eggshells help keep the acidity down.

At my house it’s either feast or famine. I either have a huge amount of kitchen scraps or I’ve made frozen dinners for a week and have none. Here are some more worm rules about this. You are not supposed to dump large quantities of scraps or whatever you are feeding the worms because the worms can only eat so much at one time so your composer could start to smell. I also read that too much worm food could upset the worms. I’m not kidding. How do they know the worms are upset and what does that mean?

My method: remove lid, dump scraps in, replace lid, walk in house, read People magazine, wonder what our fascination is with Paris Hilton and why Brittney is not in a mental institution.

Gardener Blogger's Bloom Day, March 15, 2008

On the fifteenth of every month, Carol of May Dreams Gardens is kind enough to host Gardener Blogger’s Bloom Day.

Because of GBBD, all of us gardening enthusiasts can see what’s blooming in our fellow bloggers' gardens all over the world.

Thanks Carol.

Here’s what is blooming in my garden in March.

No words just pictures.

Stumble It!

Greenthumb Sunday

Muscari on my porch

Rose Rescue

The weather is nice again. You never know what you’ll get this time of year. So now we have spring-like conditions. The highs are in the low seventies and the lows are high forties to low fifties—pretty darn nice for early March.

As you might have guessed, I’ve been gardening.

I was cleaning out this area that has been taken over by passion vines and perennial morning glory vines when I heard this tiny voice saying “Help me, Help me”, sort of like Vincent Price in The Fly.

When we first moved into our house I transplanted a beautiful climbing rose from my last house that a friend had given me. But I planted it a little too close to the creeping passion vine and the perennial morning glory vine. The poor thing was drowning. It was covered in vines and was slowly being strangled to death.

How to Grow Orchids (Chigiy’s easy orchid care tips)

Every time I write an article, or feature an orchid on my blog I get comments from people who think that growing orchids is hard, that you need a temperature-controlled greenhouse, or a tropical island to grow these exotic beauties.

The truth is it’s easy to grow orchids, well, at least some orchids. The two I think are the easiest are cymbidiums and phalaenopsis.

Both these types of orchids require surprisingly little care.

Remember corsages?

We would put our corsages into the refrigerator after we were done wearing them so they would keep longer. We never did anything with them; we just kept them in the fridge and looked at them through their clear plastic boxes between mayo and the peanut butter.

I think the last corsage I saw was on the mother of the bride at the last wedding I attended.

Corsages are usually made with cymbidium orchids. So I couldn’t believe it when my mom started growing orchids—and they actually survived. Not only that but they thrived. And she grew them outside.

I don’t live in the tropics. I live in the Santa Cruz Mountains of Northern California and I grow my cymbidiums outside. When they bloom some time in April, the blooms last five to seven weeks.

I buy cymbidiums and keep them inside until their blooms fade.
When their blooms fade I put them outside with my other cymbidiums.

It’s cymbidium season right now

I keep some of my cymbidiums under a large redwood tree and some on my porch. I buy them when they are in bloom, some I received as gifts. I keep them in my house until the blooms fade then I move them outside and wait until the next April because they bloom like clockwork during that month.

Their flower spikes start in February and open in April. I keep them in the same containers until they split open and my friends notice. “Hey Chigiy, did you ever think of transplanting those orchids?” The truth is it makes me nervous to transplant cymbidiums. I hear a voice inside my head saying “If it ain't broke, don’t fix it.” After all they bloom like crazy. I had 48 spikes on one plant two years ago.

As it turns out orchids love to be pot bound. They actually grow better this way.

Greenthumb Sunday

Loropetalum razzleberry with snow drops