A long fall season

This is a magical time of the year. In the Southeastern U.S., we have wonderful fall colors, spread out over many weeks.

In the foothills of the Blue Ridge Mountains and in the Southern Appalachians, where I live, it is a time of both senescence and renewal.

Yes, the leaves are turning color and dropping, but it's also a time for reinvention, as we move towards the quiet time of winter.

A post about a full moon, a number of years ago, has reminded me of its magic.

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My Garden at Rest

So as you can imagine, since it is Fall, the leaves are falling. Obvious statement, right. Well, what most of us don't realize is that the very leaves that fall from our trees are packed full of nutrients for our yards. Just look at the forests in the US. The soil under that canape of trees is some of the richest soil anywhere. Why, because of all the organic matter that is produced and not removed. I'm not saying that we should never rake our leaves or clean them out of the road. If we did that, we would have a lot of upset neighbors. What I am saying is that why not use them to dress our gardens. I did this last year with some success. The problem I ran into was that I did not shred my leaves fine enough, so they didn't break down nearly as fast as I wanted. Last year, I used my leaf blower (I don't know why they call them this since I was not blowing but sucking the leafs), and it didn't shred the leafs well enough. This year I mowed them...twice! And they got really fine. So I am expecting them to break down much faster. A couple of days ago, my next-door-neighbor wanted to be really nice and mow up all of our leaves. He DIDN'T get far. I ran outside and asked him not to mow them, so that I could...I wanted to keep them... As you can imagine, he just gave me this funny look, and said "okay". So here we are. I want to expand my veggie garden, so I will be doing something similar to Lasagna Gardening, developed by Patricia Lanza. We will see how I do. In the garden now is a lone Arugula plant and some Broccoli plants. so my garden is not at complete rest!

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Garden Blogger's Bloom Day

Okay, I know I am really pretty late in writing this post, but I just couldn't miss out on Garden Blogger's Bloom Day! I have been so busy with school. I had to right a report for my English 111 class that has been taking professor, she has been va bit of time. Not by any fault of myery helpful, the reason this has taken so long, is because I decided to change what I was going to write on two days ago! I just finished it, and thought that I owed it to myself to get this blog post up. I mean, I have preparing it for how many days, a lot! So this is pretty cool, my mom is starting her cookbook (finally!), it has been like pulling teeth in order to get her to do this. She is probably the best chef that is on the face of this planet. So this week it has been a nonstop cook-a-thon, just so that we can get pictures of all of her food! It would be me who is taking all of the pictures, since I am the one that owns the really cool camera! Anyway enough about this, lets get out hands dirty in the garden! It sort of feels odd writing and seeing all the pictures of leaves since it is snowing outside! Ahhh, the first snow! Okay, I am ready to pack up the luggage and go to Puerto Rico, yeah! I will have to post some pics of my trip to Puerto Rico, and hopefully when I go next summer you will all get the chance to see and travel with me in the pictures that I bring back. Any who, enough of the tropics...brrr its cold!

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Garden Bloggers' Bloom Day

Hey all, today is well, obviously October 15. But you may not of known is that today is "Garden Bloggers' Bloom Day,"This event was started by Carol who also has a blog. To find her blog just click "HERE." Basically the whole deal with this event is were you post your pics of ALL (or in this case some) of the pictures that I have taken this year. This is my first time I have ever done Garden's Bloggers' Bloom Day.

Here are some pictures of the zinnias that I grew this year. When I was mowing the grass my mower had grabbed one of the flowers and viciously pulled it off. I couldn't make myself throw this flower away, so I decided that I would do a photo shoot. I think I took 192 photos!
These photos turned out great!
I don't know about you all, but I know that my zinnias turned out GREAT this year. They were really beautiful this year.

I also grew a pie pumpkin this year. This was first that I have ever grown pumpkins, I actually grew it by accident. We had actually thrown some pumpin seeds into the compost bin, and there it grew. I saw that plant and left it there, sure enough all of my other squash plants died and this one plant survived and PRODUCED!

I also for the first time I grew Sun flowers, I planted 3 plants and had a great result. They filled up a whole 24oz jar plus one head that I grew for the birds and other animals. They got so BIG, I will be defiantly growing them again next year, and hopefully if I have room, some more too! Maybe later I will post some of the pictures that I have of the sunflowers when they weren't dried. The only thing that I had a problem with, was the spittle bugs that spat all over my sunflowers and basil. I thoroughly despise spittle bugs!

I also grew this year, along with last year, some pink prairie mallow that I bought from Jung's Nursery. That is one online nursery that I really enjoy shopping at! The mallow turned out so nicely this year, with lots of blooms, that just covered the plant. There was an added bonus as shown by the picture, Bees love it! So if you need help with pollination, you may want to consider planting some Pink Prairie Mallow , the leaves are also edible!

I hope you all enjoyed some of the pictures that I posted, I would have put up more (which I have plenty of,) but decided not to.

Oh but I forgot this one, and cannot leave it out. It was early in the morning when I was looking outside and saw at my feeder two finches. I couldn't help but take some pictures, as that my camera is always nearby. Here is one of them!

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Saving Seeds, Part IV Snapdragons

Alright, so I know that it has been such a long time since I have posted. What is new! So I figured that I would continue the seed saving series that I started ALONG TIME AGO! I think I left off with the peppers...So that means I am doing a series on....Snapdragons! Hey, who doesn't like snapdragons. Snapdragons have been around since the Roman times, they used to use them around the ancient temples. The first cultivated variety of snapdragons was first recorded by Carl von Linne in 1753. So yeah, they have been around for a long while.
I can remember when I was really young (each time I say this, all the old people just look at me!) My mom used to grow snapdragons in all different colors; form yellow, red, orange, white, and pink. I use to always go up to them and start to pinch them at their joints to make them talk. Being so small, I could never get the silly things to open their mouths! I would get so frustrated, I would eventually bruise the poor plants and the flower would usually fall off from the shear torment of the thing! To this day I still find it a challenge to make the snapdragons open their mouths! So if you have any secret to doing this, let me know.
Obviously you will need to have some simple supplies; your fingers (duh,) plastic bags, and bowl to place seeds in.
I like to wait until my seed pods are completely dry before I harvest them, as this way I can be absolutely sure they are dry. Once I find that the seeds are dried, You will want to harvest them into a bowl. When all of the seed pods are in the bowl, you will want to crush the exterior shell, this will release all of the seeds and allow you to have easy access to them. When all of the seeds have been taken out of the seed pods, remove the remaining shells out the seeds, so that you are left with pure black seeds. The snapdragon seeds should look about the same size as poppy seeds or small and black. With the snapdragon plant, if the seed pods were dry when harvested, you will not need to worry about drying the seeds as that they are very dry already.
Once all of your seeds have been collected, all you need to do is label and date your seeds! This will probably be the easiest thing you have ever done in your whole life!
If you have any comment or question, just let me know on the blog site! By the way Happy fall everyone! I hope this fall is one of the bests!

~Zach

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In My Mind

Alright, I know I haven't posted in a while... I have been so busy! I know think this post I am going to break away from the Saving Seeds Series, and just do something different! So hold onto your pant, it is going to be a bumpy ride!
I don't know about where you live, but for me, this is the time of year where all of the local nurseries are having their fall plant sale! Yeah, I am so plant happy. I know it may seem like now the whole world is at peace with itself, but this is not true. You see I told my self that this year would be different, that this year I would not go on a shopping spree and buy every little thing that is out there. Let us enter my head, no matter how scary this will be, as I travel my local nursery!
"Look at all of these beautiful plants, I could just buy each and every one of them! But remember Zach, you just came to look. I wonder if I should grab a shopping cart? I guess I would look pretty odd if I was walking around the nursery without one; yeah, I guess I will grab one, I just won't buy anything! Oh, what a unique purple grass looking plant, it is just so nice looking...I think it needs a home. So in the shopping cart goes that purple grass looking thingy! But of course I will stop here and just go onto the check out place...Wow look at those red Cardinal Flowers, they are so gorgeous, just what I could use for that spot near the side of the house; you know give it a little color, (Justification!) I think I will pick one or two up for safe keeping, and I'll just put it back before I will check out!
As I look off in the distance to see if anyone had seen my spur of the moment shopping, there in the corner was the most beautiful looking lavender I had ever seen! I think I will just go over there and look at it. After all, I don't have to buy it! Look at those deep purple flowers, it would go perfect right next to my coreopsis, and the lavender I have now is not nearly as colorful as these! I think I might have to pick up a couple of these!
As I turned around to put the lavender plants into my cart... my jaw hit the ground! Someone must have come up behind me, while I was looking at lavender plants, and put a ton of plants in my cart! Oh well, there is no way I will be able to put them all back were they belong, so I will just have to buy them. Besides, I am not buying allot!"

~THE END~

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Garlic

It is August and now is the time to start harvesting and planting garlic! If you have never planted garlic, now is the time to give it a try, and if you have then there is always something that you can learn!
Garlic (allium sativum,) just the sound of the word or the smell of it on some body's breath can send you running for your life in the opposite direction! What most people don't know is that garlic has a hugely long history. Garlic is believed to be first originated in central Asia and then brought around the world by traders. Now everyone knows what garlic is, even if they don't like it. However, if you are like my family and I, you know that the more garlic you use the better everything is.
I remember when I was really young, there was a next door neighbor girl who would come over all the time because she loved the way our house smelled. As she said, our house smelled like garlic. I tell you what, you will not meet very many people like her. Often she would leave her stuffed animals at our house for a week or more, so that the smell of our house would penetrate her toys, this way she could smell garlic at her house!
Now I am not saying that you have to leave your toys at my house, because if you do I will throw them away! What I am saying is that you too can have a house that will draw people from all around because of the pleasant aroma!
I was going to post the article that I wrote explaining when to plant garlic, how to care for it, and when to harvest it; but I found that the article is way too long to be published here. For your sake I will just leave the link for it, and if you want you can read it! Click HERE for the article about garlic or you can click on any of the garlic pictures
Hope you enjoy!



~Zach

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