The shamrocks and the birds

This past weekend I finally felt comfortable putting the shamrock plants out. The are kind of a fixture in the summer garden. The purple one especially draws the eye all the way to the end of the linden garden area.

Since we live in Minnesota, the shamrocks make their late fall to mid-spring home indoors. The night-time temperatures need to be around 40°F outdoors before they can go out in the spring. This year that was late. But they are out now, and the cycle for spring shamrock cleanup has begun. You see, every spring when I finally feel comfortable putting the shamrocks out, I am happy, and sad. Happy because the mat of dead stems that is hard to clear amongst the fragile live stems gets kind of “ugly” by May, and sad because the beautiful live shamrocks will get windblown, die back, and then take a few weeks to get their summer “coat”.

The wonderful part is what I saw first hand today as a robin flew back and forth between the purple shamrock and a nearby pine tree, plucking first big sections of the dead stem mat, and then finishing by plucking tangled remaining dead stems. It happens every year. And it makes my gardener/bird lover heart smile.

Can you see the robin? Another sat nearby and flew right behind over to the new nest location. I am assuming that is one of the pairs we saw “mating” in the past week.

Oh boy!

Here it comes – the best garden planting time of the year, some planned time off work, and ideas floating around in my mind.

The ideas mostly involve dividing hostas, but those are all really slow to show this year.

So far the daylilies and sedum have won the race over the hostas to begin to dot the garden with that fabulous color of spring green.

Spring Beauty

Beautiful spring. The crocuses blooming, the oak leaves saying goodbye, and a hint, just a hint, of bunny activity. Now I need to research – don’t rabbits like crocuses? I thought they did. Or is that the coffee grounds at work? Should I move that oak leaf covering the crocus or will that be the temptation tipping point for the bunny – who we often see, and its buddies. What is happening here? Ok with bunnies eating the garden??? It’s ok – those tulips don’t bloom – haha!

Well, for sure no more coffee grounds – that is in moderation only. Maybe leave it as it occured, and let the wind make the decision.

It did.

Spring again!

It is finally feeling like garden season, and some hope after a tough few months for the whole world. The pandemic has brought so much fear and sadness, and our hearts go out to all the families who have been affected and all who have lost loved ones. It is sometimes hard to imagine it has only been a few months. The heartbreak is incredible, and it seems like much longer. I just couldn’t get motivated to share garden news amid all of the tough news. But as sad as this sounds, at some point I decided reading and listening to so much aweful news and fearful projections was not good. I started to trust it was ok to severely limit partaking in media coverage and updates. It took a few weeks, but now some joy is starting to overcome the awfulness of this pandemic. And as the gardening season is fully arriving, it is bringing some positivity, very much needed during this difficult time.

Through the winter I dreamed and planned gardens. The association board work took form and the garden refreshes for this spring, now being done by an incredible local professional, are underway – 22 gardens at homes, and removing bricks, pavers, plastic trim, and various rock and mulch from around 42 trees and putting in only mulch. We hear it is healthier for the trees. A couple larger gardens integrated around trees will remain with rock, to be done in future years. The garden outside our home is one of those, and our landscaper reports the tree is well established and very healthy. Mulch may come in future years.

From my personal overwintered plants, the hibiscus is now back outside, as is the green shamrock. The green shamrock has mostly gone through its spring die off. I watched as the robins do what they do every year – pluck the dead stems by the beakful, and fly them up to their nest. It is the annual cycle. The robins get their materials, and the shamrock gets hardy and fills out again.

Of over 100 daylily seeds I planted this winter in pods indoors, 13 daylily seedlings came up. 11 daylily seedlings survived. In previous years I have direct sown our harvested seed in the ground at the townhouse. A few lilies have grown from that and this year I am anticipating seeing what the pollinators produced three years ago. For the extra work, this winter’s results were not awesome (I don’t think?) but it was an experiment. We’ll see if I do a repeat.

The gardens here are popping back like crazy right now, and it looks like everything made it through the winter. It’s pretty full, so of the daylily seedlings from this winter, I’ve decided to keep the 2 ‘South Seas’ parentage seedlings here, and 4 of the ‘Purple d’Oro’ parentage seedlings. 5 ‘Purple d’Oro’ seedlings are going to be in the year 2 test garden up north, with chicken wire the first year, to give them a safe start. I am hoping they eventually naturalize, and am optimistic, as I see entire fields of lilies up north that have made it. We’ll see.

More to come.

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The tulip greens are up – hooray???

The tulip greens are, of course, well up now. I have a “love/expect little” relationship with our tulips. Many produce abundant greens every year, but no blooms. I leave them in the ground, ever so hopeful. They are tulips that bloomed beautifully one, maybe two years, but then just fizzled out. It seems they find it very easy being just green.

Last fall, once again, I planted a large bag of tulips. I do see some up already. They are the ones poking up in front of the taller tulip greens that look like they will not have blooms again this year. We’ll see how the new ones do.

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There is, however, one large bunch of purple tulips that has bloomed abundantly for over a dozen years. They are so beautiful. I just love to see them again each spring. Many many years I have shared pictures of them and friends have loved their gorgeous color. They are just starting to pop up now.

I will keep you all posted!