Further lawn reduction, more edible garden space, and zebra longwings!

Zebra longwing on tropical sage.

Florida's State Butterfly

This year we’ve had a huge jump in population of Zebra longwing butterflies (Heliconius charithonia). Our property is aflutter with all their striped glory.  They don’t have deep wing beats like a lot of floppy butterflies–their wings hardly move as they fly.  They are skittish compared to some other butterflies, but they are mesmerizing.

This is Florida’s state butterfly and deservedly so, there are more sitings in this state than others. The larval food is the passion vine (Pasiflora spp), but they like it best when it’s grown in the shade.

I’ve been trying for years to create a welcoming habitat for the zebra longwings, so finally we’ve reached the point where this could happen and now we’re teeming with zebras. Continue reading my post over on Native Plants and Wildlife Gardens blog, Teeming with Zebras.

Just before starting the bed expansion & lawn reduction.
The shovel marks the new lawn edge.

Lawn removal

I decided that I needed more area for the edible beds near the garage and the elevated rain barrels because I was not going to continue fighting the weeds and the sandy soil on top of the drainfield mound.

It took several days (A day of gardening at this time of year goes from 7am to 9:30am at the latest.) of hard labor to accomplish this project.  But having the crops close at hand will make it all worth while.  I also took advantage of having virtually nothing planted here but the cover crop of marigolds to dig them under.  See my previous post on marigolds and nematodes.

Here's what the project looks like when we have removed about half of the grass.

The three large containers lined up at the edge of the mulched area will also be used for edibles.  They used to contain prickly pears and a yucca. I planted the yucca, but discarded the prickly pears. To the left of the containers you can see the rubber edging we pulled out up until that point. There was a joint near the rain barrels. You can read about our cool elevated rain barrels and how they have saved my back because I can now use a hose to irrigate the edible garden beds. You can also read more about the tool shed and how we moved it to this handy location in my post Two Geezers and a Shed. The shed post also provides a better look at this area before we started this project.

Almost done with the lawn removal.  Note the torpedo grass
separated out in the wheelbarrow.

Invasive torpedo grass makes the
job much harder.

The torpedo grass (Panicum repens) is a Florida invasive and probably came with the sod that the builder put down.  It's all over the property and we've been fighting it as it escapes from the lawn for all these years. My plan for most of the sod is to use it in my next compost pile, but I certainly did not want to include all of the torpedo grass.  I'm sure some of it did not get sorted out, but maybe I can spot it as I create the pile or later as it sprouts from the pile.

Making the bed narrower.

The bed had been too wide for easy tending, so now it
will be about 18 inches narrower in the middle.

With the narrowing of the fat part of the bed and the curve in the new addition,
this bed is probably not much larger than before.

 Mowing Curves

The curve was constructed so the mowing around the bed would be very easy.  We also left about six inches of flat surface inside the rubberized edging so the mower wheels would have a place to roll. We work hard to reduce the need for extra trimming after the mowing.

Time to resink the edging.

Dean pounds the soil around the edging for stability.

After having experience with this edging, we would probably not spend the money on it again. After a couple of years it gets covered with the turf and the weeds and sinks out of sight. We think it might be just as effective to run a flat shovel along the edges once a year or so to cut back the creeping weeds.  But since we already have it, we reinstalled it because it does help to some degree.

I still need to compost the marigolds and smooth out the the new part of the bed near the rain barrels.
And we need a new load of arborist's chips to remulch the path. We definitely added more planting area
in this bed--about 4' x 4'. I also gained some area in this bed because I moved the walking onions. I'm also thinking about adding another 4' x 6' bed in front of the rain barrels, but that project will have to wait!

The bed will sit for a few weeks to settle and to allow the marigolds to compost to some degree before I plant anything. At this end of the bed closest to the garage, I'll leave the marigolds until frost kills them in December.

Marigolds attract so many butterflies and other pollinators.

The next project: removing this weird tongue of lawn--it measures about 6' by 9'. I will plant a nectar
and pollinator garden. I'll use some of the sod removed from here in the bare spot left next to the
edible bed. This is the edge of the drainfield mound. I will not use the top of the drainfiled for crops any more.

Sunset from the front yard the other day.

I hope you are enjoying your gardening this fall.

Green Gardening Matters,
Ginny Stibolt

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Morning light

Morning light across the ravine

View through one of the kitchen windows

Fall is around the corner; the light reflects the changes in the sun's angle.

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A late-flowering native azalea

I was surprised to see that the Rhododendron prunifolium next to the garage was still in flower a month ago.

Curious, I thought.

And, I was even more surprised to see flowers when we came back "down the hill" a couple of weeks ago, and they're continuing to open.

Rhododendron prunifolium in June

And sure enough, this photo was posted in 2010 in June! Hmm, definitely a difference there. 

It's still covered with flowers today, after a cool, wet summer.

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Cleaning up for fall

I'm almost done "excavating" the main vegetable garden and the satellite garden in the Piedmont of their cloak of over-summering crabgrass.  It was thick, and more abundant than I'd ever experienced before, thanks to the exceptionally high rainfall this summer.

Evidence of deer and spotting of woodchucks (one has taken up residence under the garden shed) means that defensive measures need to be taken before greens are planted. Hrmph.

I'm fine planting recently received garlic, shipped from a West Coast farm, and dividing and moving around the perennial leeks, dividing

But with greens -- hmm, I might as well just say welcome, woodchucks -- I have something tasty for you -- help yourself!

I may try to use a row cover/hoop house barrier to see if that deters them short-term.   Or, I may just rely on my mountain beds for greens.  They're less susceptible to woodchucks because of the city location, although not immune.

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Nematodes, marigolds, and crop rotation

Marigolds as a cover crop: they are not only useful, but also beautiful and
attract butterflies and bees.

This summer, for several reasons, I skipped most of the summer crops and planted a cover crop of marigolds. I'd also planted a lot of marigolds around the tomatoes earlier in the season--about 3 marigolds for every tomato plant.

This is my experiment to see if I can reduce the root-knot nematode populations in my gardens.

First, as I've been preaching in my talks, just planting marigolds around the tomatoes does not prevent nematode damage. Here is the result...

Tomato roots are stunted and filled with nematode
damage even though the plants were surrounded
by marigolds.

The marigold roots have no nematode damage and
even have some mycorrhizae fungus intertwined.

While the marigolds can shun the nematodes, they need to be a cover crop that is turned under to reduce the nematode population in the soil. Having a cover crop also means that the soil gets a rest from the stress of growing a crop.

So here's my scheme: After pulling the marigolds and weeds, I dig out the garden soil about six inches to form shallow rows, then I add layers of fresh grass clippings, marigolds that were pulled last week, freshly clipped or pulled marigolds and then enough compost to bring the level back up to the original level. Then I chop the rows repeatedly with the shovel to break up the marigolds into smaller pieces. After that I add the original garden soil on top of the mixture.

We have an abundance of grass clippings right now because we were out of town for a few weeks. We had someone mow the front lawn while we were gone, but the back yard was a jungle.

The original garden soil has plenty of earth worms.

After smoothing the soil I sprinkle a light layer of grass
clippings and then cover with pine needles and
then irrigate with rain barrel water.

There's a very good reason why rain barrel water is important for this process: it doesn't contain chlorine that would impede the microbes that are needed to break down the grass clippings and marigolds. This is a form of in-the-ground composting. I will give these beds a few weeks before I plant the cool weather crops.

The walking onions need to be walked to another spot!
The onions are in the pot next to the garlic chives.

Crop Rotation

When you plant the same crop in one place year after year, it causes several problems, but here are the two biggest problems:
- It depletes the soil of the same nutrients over and over.
- Its soil-borne enemies, such as root borers, are already in place to attack it the next time.

Crop rotation by plant family helps to combat these problems, especially in organically managed gardens. For instance, if you plant parsley in one bed, plant a crop that is not in the carrot family there for at least the next two seasons.

This is easy enough to do if your crop lasts only one season, but with a perennial crop like walking onions or garlic chives, it's a different strategy. After my walking onions had been in place for at least six years, this year, they started to deteriorate. I usually use them for only for their greens, but when I dug them up, something had been eating their bulbs. So it's time to clean them up and walk them to an entirely new bed. I think I'll move them to the herb garden behind the chives. I need to plant some more chives there as well.

The garlic chives have only been in place for two years, so they are still looking good, but I'll thin them out to start some in a different location--maybe even a pot.

This year I grew lime basil and at this point in the season, the leaves are extremely citrusy and will probably not be useful for "normal" pesto. We'll see what we come up with maybe we'll think of something interesting to do with it.

How does your garden grow?

Green Gardening Matters,
Ginny Stibolt

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Ruby-throated hummingbirds

I just set up the hummingbird feeder late this morning after its summer hiatus.

We've had lots of hummers in the mountains over summer, visiting the masses of Lobelia cardinalis, Salvia guaranitica, Lonicera sempervirens, and Impatiens capensis, but didn't have a feeder set up (the one I bought early in the summer dripped and I thought I'd just rely on flowers).

The feeder in the Piedmont hangs from the edge of the porch and has been a favorite of hummingbirds over the years. There's a large oak nearby, perfect for perching and snagging insects.

So I was delighted to see a female hummingbird discover the feeder within half an hour--we were eating lunch on the porch, and although she was initially concerned by our presence (not to mention Woody, who was snoozing by the porch table), she proceeded to visit over a number of minutes.

Hopefully, we'll have more visitors, too.  A post from September of last year reflected on several whizzing around.

What fun!

A female visiting the same feeder several years ago

It was fun to re-read some of the posts that I've made in the past about ruby-throated hummingbirds -- they're such a great part of summer and fall.

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Wamboldtopia

Wamboldtopia is a special private garden in West Asheville.

It's a collaboration between two artists, working with different media: stone, ceramic and plants.  I first visited a year ago in May, when it was part of the Garden Bloggers Fling.

My eclectic garden club group visited a couple of weeks ago.  It was still remarkable.

The artistic elements were what stood out. The rainy summer and a shady garden were reflected in a subdued plant palette. The structural and artistic elements took the stage.

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