Relaxing
Last week I ordered the DVD for Around The World In 80 Gardens. We watched this a few years ago and really enjoyed it.
Lucky for us, even though this is a British DVD, our laptop allows you to select the region, so we can watch it easily. It’s nice to watch an episode in the evening after a long day of working in the garden. Sometimes I’m simply too tired to read and this is how I like to spend my TV viewing allotment.
What’s your favorite TV show?
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Quote of the Day: Laura Ingalls Wilder
“I am beginning to learn that it is the sweet, simple things of life which are the real ones after all.”
Coffee, cats, my sweetie, sunrises, camping, flowers, good food, and reading – these are a few of the simple things I enjoy.
What simple things in life do you enjoy most?
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Inspiration
I’m lucky that there are tons of lovely gardens nearby to visit. This is perfect for me since I’m trying to build a good database of photos of a wide variety plants. I sell photos to magazines and often get requests for specific cultivars. Earlier this week I stopped at the Merryspring Nature Center in Camden, Maine and took a few photos. I’ll post more photos from the gardens later this week, but I was drawn to this verbascum.
Unfortunately, the tag wasn’t very readable so I will need to do some sleuthing to figure out the name of this specific variety.
It’s quite a lovely plant, no doubt something that I can find seed for when I figure out what it’s called. I love tall plants like this, they can add such drama to a border. No doubt since it’s a mullein family plant it is healthy for the garden. Toby Hemenway, author of Gaia’s Garden: A Guide to Home-Scale Permaculture, 2nd Edition explains that mullein has a spike root that pulls minerals deep from within the soil. I’m always looking for plants that are both beautiful and beneficial.
Have you seen a must have plant recently?
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Quote of the Day: Toby Hemenway
“Of course, we want to live in an attractive landscape. But if we can go beyond what plants look like, and examine what they are doing, we can begin to create gardens that have the health, resilience, and beauty of natural ecosystems while yielding abundant gifts for people and for other species.”
-Toby Hemnway Gaia’s Garden: A Guide to Home-Scale Permaculture, 2nd Edition
Earlier this week I mentioned planting nitrogen fixing plants in the ornamental gardens for the benefits they bring to the other plants. There’s also a group of plants called dynamic accumulators that bring up lots of nutrients from deep within the soil. Whenever I plant a garden bet I try to add a few of these to my garden, comfrey is my favorite.
Comfrey is not only a wonderfully beneficial plant for the garden, it’s also beautiful as well. The bees LOVE it. It just so happens that many of my comfrey plants came from my grandmother’s house. They were passed on to my mom who passed them along to me. I use comfrey leaves for lots of things, not only do I use them as mulch around plants, I also put a few in the planting holes of anything I add to the garden. They are supposed to help the plants by feeding them and by stimulating root growth. I also dry comfrey to feed the chickens all winter. Comfrey is also nice because it’s easy propagate so you can have it growing all over the garden easily and inexpensively.
There are all kinds of dynamic accumulators, in fact many of the plants we call weeds are in this group. If you are interested in learning about this kind of companion plants I highly recommend the book quoted above. I checked this book out of the library so many times I finally purchased one for my library.
What’s your favorite companion planting group?
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Quote of the Day: Cesare Pavese
“We do not remember days; we remember moments.”
~ Cesare Pavese
My favorites moments in the garden are often those where I am enjoying the fruits of my labor and I find no better time than the golden hour of sunset.
I try to make sure I get out to enjoy this moment at least once a week, usually I have my camera with me. These moments make all the hot days of seeking worth while!
What moments have you been enjoying this week?
