A year for dandelions

The dandelions are rampant this year. Untreated yards and roadways are full, full, full. It's a rather stunning vista. My yard is treated, so weedfree, but I've been digging them out of the flower beds and rain garden. Ugh.

Last week I forgot to mention that I attended an Earth Day event where two local nurseries were selling natives: Riverview Nursery and Chapman Lake Nursery.
From the former I purchased three culvers root, 3 rattlesnake master, and one spiderwort, and from the latter three common ironweed, three swamp milkweed, and three dense blazing star.

The four Aronia Low Scape Mound chokeberry shrubs, also in the above photo, arrived from Bluestone Perennials. So now I have some planting to do.

I also have some mowing to do. It keeps raining, which means twice-weekly mows. The temps are going to be low this week, which I don't mind as it keeps the spring flowers blooming longer.

On the birding front, a white crowned sparrow hung out with the locals under the millet feeder this past week. They don't summer here, so I don't expect it to stay. A pair of bluebirds are busy with their nest building. I hear wrens but am not sure if they have taken over the wren houses yet.

Around the yard... what I thought might be a mullen patch turned out to be dame's rocket, an invasive that I don't mind as it seems to just come and go with no rhyme or reason.

I severely whacked back one honeysuckle vine that was threatening to run rampant, then wondered if it would recover, and it is. So is the tree that has been growing up through it, but its days are numbered.

After several relocations and not enough sun, the rhubarb "patch" is finally getting established, just in time for pie season. My SO dug up a neighboring goldenrod clump to call his own, which helps with the sunshine issue.

I usually drag planters into the garage over the winter, but just didn't feel like it last fall. The catmint survived despite the frigid temps, so I repotted it (and will take better care of it going forward).

Out of the twelve coneflower cultivars I planted in the bed along the front sidewalk, only one survived the winter - lesson learned. Two ninebark shrubs are dead, dead, dead, along with one of the Canadian hemlocks. I'll give the ninebarks another chance, but that hemlock has already been replaced once, so a gold mop will go there. Some of the winterberry shrubs look peaked, but we'll see how they do. Otherwise, things look hale and hearty. Fingers crossed!

Ecological gardening

The New York Times published an article by Margaret Roach whereby she discusses ecological gardening with Douglas Tallamy. Since you probably cannot access the article without a subscription, I'll briefly list the four actions that are crucial for an ecological garden:

• Manage the watershed
• Support pollinators
• Support a viable food web
• Sequester carbon

That's a lot to ask of a suburban homesteader who has to abide by local tall-grass-and-weeds laws and whose neighbors employ lawncare companies that not only fertilize and treat weeds but also spread insecticide with every application, but a good place to start is to add natives and remove invasives.

Two books that can help guide us are Tallamy's Bringing Nature Home and his latest, How Can I Help? Saving Nature with Your Yard.

Tallamy suggests that one does not need to completely redo one's landscape, just add something beneficial here and there...

... like plant some goldenrod...

... but not hostas (which I justify because the hummingbirds feed at them).

Catmint is good... but I'm not sure whether the cultivar currently in bloom, Nepeta 'Cat's Pajamas', attracts pollinators. The other, Calamintha Nepeta Nepeta, does - a lot.

And so I try, best I can.

Word of the day: foliaceous

I've complained here about how my native plants are not very showy. By that I mean that there isn't much color besides green, green, green. It turns out that green is not green is not green. There are shades of green and textures and shapes that, when combined, create interest.

Foliaceous means resembling or pertaining to leaves. Mother Nature is very foliaceous. (Photo by my daughter while we kayaked at Chain o' Lakes State Park.)

And so is my yard. You just have to look with fresh eyes.

I finished transplanting the seedlings. Well, sort of. Some Profusion zinnias went in empty spots in the beds in the front yard, some volunteer zinnias moved from a container to the coneflower bed, a dozen or so Profusion zinnias went into the containers, the amaranth is now in a bare area on the south side of the house, and the leftover Profusion zinnias are now in a bed along the driveway at my SO's house. All that remains are the wild strawberry and wild petunia seeds in the refrigerator that I have been ignoring.

Two of the 'Amber Jubilee' ninebark were replaced this week, as they were more than half dead. They never developed roots. It's a mystery why one is doing fine but two did not.

My neighbor's lawn treatment guy has been a bit too generous with the pellets he spews about. Enough landed under the 'Perfect Purple' flowering crab to kill one catmint and seriously damage two others. I talked to the neighbor and she talked to the lawn treatment company, but I decided to be proactive and protect the replacements. (Said replacements had been in a container, transplanted to the coneflower bed where they were seriously overshadowed, so they are happier now under the crab.)

It sounds like the baby wrens have flown the nest, while a new (or same?) pair of bluebirds is inhabiting the bluebird house. The coneflower is starting to bloom, which means it is summer. The weather certainly says so. We've had some delightful days, but a heat wave is on its way. All I have to do at this point is keep all the newbies watered.

So green!

The spring surge of flowering plants has slowed down, but with all the rain we have been having, everything is green, green, green. I have been mowing every three days - good thing I like to mow and good thing I have a riding mower. It's been difficult to get much of anything else done in the yard, though.

There are still plants to be planted. Today I installed a very root-bound spiderwort, Tradescantia 'Amethyst Kiss'. It was a impulse purchase, something I have never grown before, but very pretty blossoms. It's not fussy about light, should bloom all summer long, hopefully will tolerate my heavy clay. I placed it at one end of the rain garden. Once it has recovered, I'll post some pix.

Last week the cup plant and common milkweed went into the "meadow". I checked on them today. The cup plant looks great, but something - baby bunnies, I presume - has been nibbling on the milkweed. I didn't think anything would eat milkweed. The same something has been chomping on the coneflower that is in that area. I would have thought the fencing would keep the little boogers out, but it looks like I will have to wrap the area in hardware cloth.

The aster I planted last fall has also fallen prey to the rascally rabbits. *sigh*

Another impulse purchase was this potted Kalanchoe 'Mandala Red'. I knew nothing about this plant, had never heard of it, but I like red. It won't get much bigger than this (9"), but will bloom all season long. I wonder if I can bring it inside over the winter and treat it like a houseplant.

Meanwhile, elsewhere in the yard, this honeysuckle vine, Lonicera sempervirens 'Major Wheeler', is getting out of control. Pruning only made it stronger. When the hummingbirds arrive, they will have plenty of nectar.

This early blooming catmint hybrid, Nepeta 'Cat's Pajamas', is doing just that.

Last fall, I brought home some bales of straw in the back of my CRV. When I cleaned out the car, I threw the bits and pieces under the Japanese maple in front. Lo and behold, it sprouted. So now I have a mini crop of wheat.

While I cut back most of the ragwort in front of the house, I left some standing and discovered that goldfinch like the seeds. I tried to put grape jelly out for the orioles and catbirds, but the rain keeps filling up the feeder. Oh, well. I'm sure they are finding plenty to eat this lush spring.

Fall colors

We finally had a light frost, followed by what used to be referred to as "Indian summer" - the last of the warm days (one assumes). The sweet potato vines are kaput, except for the one in the flamingo planter. Almost everything else is in autumn mode.

The catmint decided that all the warm weather we have been having means that it should bloom some more.

The serviceberry is putting on a show.

The 'Limelight' hydrangea has reached its pink stage.

The northern sea oats are past the copper stage, now a solid brown.

The swamp oak looks more robust leaf-wise than last year.

Sean from Sanctuary Natives returned to replace the butterflyweed that did not survive its first year. He says he doesn't often get to revisit installations, so we took a brief tour of the yard. Something that I don't think he realizes is that all his planning of what plants to put where will eventually come to naught, as the nodding onion, penstemon, and columbine will spread willy-nilly. I don't mind, just as I don't mind the grape hyacinth, 'Dragon's Blood" stonecrop, volunteer violets, and other plants that have hung on, despite the upheaval from last summer. They are all welcome.

Birds and butterflies

The New York Times (I'm a subscriber) is sponsoring a bird watching thing with the Cornell Lab of Orthinology. I signed up (and am having trouble logging into their eBird app) so I can report what I see in my backyard. Most of the birds I see are common for this area, with the exception of migrants passing through. But I do observe interesting behaviors once in a while.

While no one has moved into the bluebird box, I did see three male bluebirds duking it out on the roof of the garden shed. Two of them really got into it, slid off the roof and onto the ground without breaking apart. Two male cardinals were also challenging each other. In other activity, I witnessed the male wren chase off a sparrow that got too close to the wren house, pecking him on the head. Nesting time must bring out the aggression in all these guys.

Other observations: robins will chase away starlings, bluebirds will cede the mealworm feeder to sparrows, the bluejays are more interested in peanut splits these days than whole peanuts. I'm sure my observations are not unique, but it is a fun hobby.

Female cardinal

Despite the chilly weather, a few hardy butterflies have flown through the yard: a swallowtail, a cabbage white, something I can't identify, and this red admiral.

Red admiral

The coneflower plants and rudbeckia goldsturm are in the ground now. I put the coneflower in the last raised bed, which is L-shaped; the rudbeckia went into the L's inner corner. Both are behind the fencing around the birdfeeders, so no dogs can trample them. All that is left are container plants... except for the perennials on the south side of the house that I may move to the birdfeeder area, depending on how much digging I want to do.

While the redbud didn't bloom very profusely this year, the flowering crab and now the hawthorn have made up for their under performance.

Hawthorn

And one of the catmint varieties is trying to add more color to the front yard.

Cat's Pajamas

The Ego trimmer is assembled and charged, but I have yet to use it. More of the ragwort has been cut back, primarily so the flowers behind it - wild geranium, blue star, and columbine - are more visible.

I bought top soil to help shore up the berm around the rain garden, just have to get to it. The rhubarb that I put in a container isn't very happy, so I'm contemplating planting it along the edge of the rain garden. About 0.75" of rain fell last night, so that clay soil should be more amenable to being disturbed.

And that is the week that was.

Sometimes things go according to plan (mostly)

The rain garden install did start on Monday as scheduled. Sean took a photo last year of where the utilities were marked in the yard, and he felt confident that their digging would be safe. And he was right.

He was not so right about the "Dingo" being able to scoop up the earth. My clay soil is so hard and compacted that the crew had to break it up by hand before the Dingo could scoop anything. It was useful for moving the dirt (and tearing up the lawn a bit).

So instead of being completely done in one day, only the digging was finished by the end of Monday. Sean calculated the size by estimating the runoff from the roof over the den.

Tuesday it rained off and on all day, so no work was accomplished. The moisture did make it easier to install the plants - Carex bromides, a.k.a. brome sedge - as did a mechanical hand auger. They didn't use all the plants ordered, so that reduced my bill some.

Originally, they were going to mulch with river rock, but Sean mentioned using mulch instead. I liked the *idea* of river rock, but he said that by next year, the river rock would not be visible. So we went with mulch, another money saver.

And then it rained, an inch over the past two days. The rain garden appears to be doing its job, as not only is there standing water inside it, there is NO standing water outside of it. Whoo-hoo!

Besides the rain garden, the crew installed three ninebark, Physocarpus opulifolius 'Jefam', a.k.a. Amber Jubilee. These shrubs should grow to be 4' wide and 6' tall, a better fit for that space than the arborvitae. Also, more sun for the 'Limelight' hydrangea. I'm eager to see how that pans out.

Sadly, I was right about the pagoda dogwood meeting its demise from the soggy lawn. The crew went to cut it down, but it basically pulled right out of the ground as there were no roots to speak of. I thought about replacing it, but my yard and soil and moisture conditions are not really right for it. Why torture an innocent plant?

New plants that should thrive in my yard have been arriving. On the left in this photo are a dozen coneflower, destined for the last remainng raised bed where they should be protected from the perennial thugs. On the right are a bunch of catmint plants, ten Calamintha Nepeta Nepeta (I don't know why "nepeta" is repeated) and four Nepeta 'Cat's Pajamas'. Most of them are destined for the beds around the trees in the front yard, but the extras will go into a container for the deck.

Here is this year's messy robin's nest.

Last Monday, an oriole landed on the feeder, complained bitterly about all the commotion in the backyard, flew off, and has not returned. Yet. Some house finches have been sampling the grape jelly in the orioles' absence. And lately I have heard wrens, although no nest building has occurred yet. A bluebird tried to squeeze into one of the wren houses, which I mentioned to my son. I think I will be getting a bluebird box for Mother's Day. He's looking for one that is sparrow-resistant.

Everything is HUGE (including the weeds)

As a rule, I don't water lawn at all, shrubs and in-ground plants only in times of drought. This spring has been wet, wet, wet, and it is amazing what a lot of rain will do. Everything looks ginormous.

'Chicago Lustre' and 'Blue Muffin' viburnum

Wentworth highbush cranberry

Catmint

I should have included the blue false indigo in the front yard as well. Last year there were loads of volunteer columbine, this year only a few plants. The creeping phlox and cotoneaster both need to be restrained from world domination.

Despite the weeds, perennials transplanted last year are faring well. I couldn't remember if I planted cup plant or compass plant by the back fence. As this photo shows, definitely cup plants.

These blossoms looked like they were on the chokeberry shrub; that's how weedy my yard is. They are a nightshade of some sort (bittersweet?), an invasive. Pretty, though.

Today we've had several downpours between bouts of sunshine, producing a fair amount of humidity. I've been trying to spend at least a little time each day yardening, but family and friends have also need tending recently. Thank goodness for privacy fencing!

Falling behind

These pix are about a week old, record peak bloom times (more or less), and are already out of date. But here we go anyway.

I know I have posted photos of the blue false indigo before, but it has been one of the stars this spring. Every time I think it has peaked, it outdoes itself.

And it bloomed in succession, from south to north, so the show just kept on going. If only it bloomed all summer long. It's done now, of course.

I'm new to dogwood, so wasn't sure when the Pagoda dogwood would bloom. And when it did, it wasn't all that spectacular. I tried to get some pix, but the blossoms were all at the top and I was too lazy to fetch a ladder. This is the best I could do from ground level.

This catmint is another star that keeps looking better and better. What I thought was milkweed popping up in the middle of it proved to be Indian hemp, which I've decided to discourage since it can rapidly take over an entire area.

The Betty Corning clematis is further along than this pic shows. I have two; one gets more sun and is usually bigger and fuller, but they are both stupendous specimens. Last year I purchased new tuteurs for them. Luckily, I decided to anchor the tuteurs to the downspouts; otherwise, the whole shebang would have toppled over by now.

I think this is the 'Blue Muffin' viberunum, blooming away but rarely does it set fruit. It is done now too.

Despite my neglect, a few irises bloom each year. They came with the house. I couldn't decide which pic I liked best, so here are two.

These are 'Sunny Twinkles' allium. I planted them many years ago, and each year they look a bit better. They are not quite tall enough for the back of the bed, but they do peek through.

If they stood up more and splayed less, they would probably be more visible; I think they need more sun. In this pic, they are surrounded by 'Zagreb' coreopsis which is just going wild this year, spreading into large masses. This is the only long-lived coreopsis I have ever found. Can't wait for it to bloom.

This shrubby clump turned out to be yellow sweet clover, an alien. It no longer lives here.

The rhododendron was a disappointment this year. I also managed to miss the peak bloom time for the cotoneaster. That pile of mulch (which is nearly gone) has taken up a lot of gardening time.

Meanwhile, I decided to eliminate the asparagus bed. Keeping it weeded was just too much work. Since a farmers market may be found here almost any day of the week in summer (and once a week all year long), growing my own food has lost its urgency. Also, Costco. Need I say more?