Howdy, madgardener, aka "maddie" here. Just leaning over the back
fence to holler a howdy at you out there in your own gardens, offering
an icy glass of not too sweet ice tea (lemon? sure!) when you take a
break off your knees weeding or planting something. I am happy and
proud to report that there are now three tomato's on one of my vines
next to the western fence, two squash blossoms on the Green Dragon
zuccini, and the third planting of vining green beans (forgotten the
name and it matters not to me as all I just want is fresh green beans)
has not only emerged, but in TWENTY FOUR HOURS grew not only first
leaves, but third leaves, spread the true leaves out to four inches
and are starting to look like I'd better decide whether or not to find
cane poles to support them or purchase the canes down the street for
them.....soon. I still need to sow burgundy okra again as I lost two
sowings to rabbits and apparently to Pester's the non-Krusty feline of
mine I brought with me in the relocation. In the past he's been
affectionately called Krusty the Kat during the spring and summer
months due to a mysterious skin ailment that caused him to krust
(scab) up horribly, but not this year!! and he's gained weight so
much so that he has the shape of a black meat loaf when he suns
himself on the back steps that lead down to the yard from the back
porch that houses the sedums, succulents and cacti plants...
Nope, apparently Pest or Pester's as he's often known by, has been
going to the bean patch and digging up the Jiffy peat pots and then
trying to use the loose soil...I have taken to sailing clods of dirt
at him and moving him towards the OTHER places where he CAN use the
loose soil (around the dead 150 year old pine tree stump on the north
eastern corner of the yard, for instance)
I apparently not only have a hackberry tree growing next to a long
drupe mulberry tree and the mulberry is loaded with luscious berries
that I pick as often as I can to eat, and stain me bare feets with,
but now the local flying dinosaurs have noticed the fruit and the
pooping has begun in earnest on the adirondak chairs that were passed
on to me (real ones, not those fake wannabee's, they are two piece
that slip into each other and you sit level no matter how the land
lays.....)
I had washed off mulberry and poop on one of the chairs and was
sitting quietly talking to James on his break and looked at the little
tomato and radish patch beside the fence and held my breath as a
yellow finch female visited the newly filled thistle sock I rehung
just south of the tomato plants. Last week I noticed the male as he
sat on grass that grew in the fence row and picked the seeds daintly
off. Then his wife came and I stood upstairs and rejoiced that there
were finches to add to the bird population and hope that eventually
when I finally get all of my perennials from my friend's house, the
birds will rejoice and spread the word that it's hospitable back
here....
Sugar dawg, the border collie/Black Lab mix has discovered there
are evil squirrels to chase back to their confinds of the yard behind
us and to the west where the old slave log cabin sits. I suspect soon
I can leave her outside one night to run the maurading rabbit from the
bean patch. I just hope I can twine the plants before the rabbit
discovers the bean buffet is open again. Smeagol is worthless, as his
left ear has blown out again, but he's company for Sugar and a loving
mutt.
I have radishes that are now in need of thinning, and Nasturtiums
making higher plants, soon I hope there will be flowers of deep red
and splashed with yellow. Time will tell who survives. Up front, the
Pot housing the Harry Lauder's Walking stick has sprouted two 4
o'clocks and I need to lift them and allow them to just grow in the
ground. I just need to locate the garden hand tools! They're still
MIA. I know I didn't leave them behind, but I fear they too are at
Karol's 48 miles away and that's all my seroius trowels and dibble
sticks and forks and even the ancient unusual bent asparagus/dandilion
weeder...sigh
My blue Salvia has gone weird on me. It's doing what is called
"facination" which is, the normal pointy flower tips aren't pointy.
The tips are spreading out and are flat with the tips gracing either
side of the top. All but a few plants have this oddity going at the
moment as the tips bulk up with the dark blue of the inevitable
flowers. I had a cactus that did that and discovered what it was
called and apparently any plant can do this. I eagerly check it
everyday for the time when the flowers set and will take pictures when
it does.
I've bent the blue columbine seed pods into the foliage so it will
reseed into the container it was growing in, and I harvested seeds
from a plant down the street last week and sprinkled them as well into
this container for hopeful seedlings later on. Now I am on the alert
to harvest a few peony poppy pods of my own to save in a seed envelope
(I did find those in one of the MANY boxes of stuff I packed from my
original nook) to sow in the fall for next spring. I know I will be
at this house at least through next spring.
I lost my original Zebrina sisters (there must be hundreds of them
back at Vinca Ridge by now unless they scraped the area around the
house with a back hoe, mingling in with the undergrowth trangle of
vinca major and towering 4's and damnit, the figs) but had a happy
discovery next to the fence behind the ancient pine stump. My
neighbor had one of HERS to seed on my side of her garden fence and
I've seen the familar striped petals of it. It's a welcome sight. I
also have spotted the marijuana-like leaves of the Swamp sunflower
that have turned up in these containers that need pricking out and
planted into their own space to tower and entice the finches to come
visit and scatter seeds this summers end. There are five packages of
cosmos seed to sow and hope they germinate however late it is.
Seashells and bright lights. I adore the ferny foliage as well as the
papery flowers that hold up to the summer's heat very well.
Now that we've invested in a lawnmower, I have an unending source
of green for the two compost piles in the far upper back yard, it's
just strange after 13 years to mow a yard where once there was no
grass of any kind, raised beds and only perennials jumping the edges
to grow in the paths. I'm hoping I have a clump of triple daylilies
left at Karols when I get there finally because I haven't seen one
clump of them here in Greeneville yet. I miss them too, as it's
daylily time. And you know how hard it is for me not to have the
towering, perfume of the Dragon lilies or the Park's lilies. I don't
even know if the bulbs have survived the pots I thrust them into. If
I lose the Dragons they can be replaced, but not the special Parks
varieties. Not the Shiloe, or Yellowstone that were the only
survivors of the six I originally bought. That's one of the poignant
things about gardening, no matter how much we love some plants or all
plants, eventually we'll lose much beloved ones or have more than what
we want of others. And right now, I miss the over abundance that I
once had. I will have it again so I can begin again to share the
bounty of future garden children, and I hope all my faeries return
home to me eventually.
I don't even have Jackmanii to comfort me twining around shrubs,
and sad to say I lost the shrub St. John's wort that I nurtured and
admired for 13 years as it attained exfoliating bark and all those
wonderful little yellow pom pom flowers for the little pollinators to
come dance upon. The list of fatalities is long, but I am grateful
for what is steel tough and has survived. And now the only solace I
have for ferns is a pot of tassel and Autumn ferns behind the
spaghetti pot of assorted heuchera's beside the front stoop. No
Japanese painted ferns, nor the Ghost fern I found at Stanleys and
planted next to the Japanese painted. Not even my "Nashville stainless
steel walking fern" has come with me here, and I don't know if I have
a toe of her to even be lurking in a pot over at Karols. It's like
not knowing where your children are! LOL
Since I can't find my hand tools, I grab an industrial kitchen
spoon and use that......where's a local Sears when I need it? (their
Craftsman hand tools are non-bendable and replacable if you happen to
kill them for free). I DO have my spades and shovels, so I'll just do
with what I have, as always.
Time has come to get home and thin the radishes and cut that never
ending green compost (grass) and hunt for brown to add to it to blend
properly. I will sow Burgundy okra in the soil in front of the beans
and a few cukes as well, I'll place them somewhere else later when
they germinate. I want cukes too. That's what's wonderful about a
new place to garden. Something new all the time to deal with. And
this place has SOIL!! not red clay to worry over and break down.
Just the ponder of what to do with that huge boulder that is taking up
1/4th of the back yard beside the house and back steps.

Thanks for allowing me to ramble on. I will visit again when there are
things to share.

maddie, up in the green bowl, surrounded by the Cherokee National
Forest and Appalachian mountains in Eastern Tennessee, zone 6b- 7a