Garden Stories
Garden.True.North is about gardening in Zone 4,
sharing thoughts, ideas and tips for all northern gardeners.
sharing thoughts, ideas and tips for all northern gardeners.
Definition of “Falsy”: Okay, I’ll let you look up the definition. For this article I’m using the term to define plants that have in their common name the word “False”.
I wander around nurseries with hardly any idea about what I want, hoping that I will see something interesting to fit my garden. I’ve found some good plants this way. And I like wandering around greenhouses. However, this is not the best way to select plants because when I get home I end up walking around my garden with said plant in hand wondering where to put this new acquisition. I have some criteria for perennials in my garden: longevity, low maintenance, hardy in my climate, resistant to diseases and pests, no winter protection needed, long blooming or attractive foliage, not invasive, and doesn’t need staking. But sometimes I just want to have fun and I throw all those important criteria out. Sometimes that fun is something that has an interesting name.
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In the next few weeks I’m going to write about plants that have such unappealing names it’s a wonder they are offered by greenhouses and nurseries. It’s a testament to how good these plants are that they have overcome horrible common names. When at the garden center, don’t dismiss these after looking at their name tags. I’m placing these plants into five categories.
I know it doesn't look like much but the first leaf of the lilac indicates that it is time to plant beets, cole crops (broccoli, kale, cabbage, turnips, etc.), lettuce, and spinach. This is not just folklore but backed up phenology, the study of the timing of natural events. Lilacs are most commonly used for observation and to time gardening activity. I checked the soil temperature in my garden, it is 55-60 degrees. That is well in the range for these crops.
Here are some other indicators for planting:
May is one of the busiest months for gardening. That is especially so this year with our very late spring. Compressed into a few shorts weeks is garden clean-up from the long winter, prepping the vegetable and annual beds, visiting the garden centers for fresh new plants, and planting. Planting should be delayed until frost danger is at a minimum. Let’s face it, in our northern zone frost danger can happen any time during the growing season. Let’s get gardening!
I was reminded by an article by Olivia Heath in www.HouseBeautiful.com that gardening can be an exercise program. A British TV gardener and a retailer created a program calculating that a recommended daily allowance for gardening of 30 minutes a day boosts physical and mental health. In my viewpoint, not only will 30 minutes a day provide health benefits, but my garden would look a whole lot better. It’s actually pretty genius to embrace that goal since it would meet my exercise goal and my gardening tasks with one action. In other words, two check-marks on my daily to-do list.
April is one of those months where winter continues or spring makes an appearance. I’m anxious to get out into the garden but right now it is under 2 feet of snow. As soon as that white stuff has melted there are a few things that can still be done. Pruning dormant trees and bushes is tops on my list once I no longer need to use snowshoes to get to those plants. This is also the month to start seeds. Let’s get gardening.
Do you want no raking, no removing debris, no hauling mulch and drastically reduced work in cleaning up your perennial beds this spring? The equipment you will need is your lawn mower and broadcast spreader. And the timing is just about now, well not quite now with snow and ice still on the ground. But pretty soon. This year spring arrived on my calendar at 12:15 p.m. on Tuesday, March 20, 2018. This is the vernal equinox and the astrological spring determined by the sun’s position. I personally don’t feel like spring has arrived yet where I live.
Full disclosure: The pictures in this post are from prior years, we are still in winter mode. It’s the middle of October and I just checked the soil temperature. In my garden it is 45 degrees. We had our first hard freeze last night. It’s time to plant bulbs!
Many of us plant tulips and daffodils, but there is so much more that you can plant in the fall. These are generally referred to as bulbous plants. They have bulbs, tubers, rhizomes or corms that swell into a food storage organ enabling the plant to survive when it is dormant. Here’s my task list for June:
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Classes*Gardening in Small Spaces, April 30 at 5:00 pm Spooner Library, Spooner Archives
March 2024
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