Who us? Snow?

One minute you're admiring the salvia "maraschino" and wondering at its longevity, and the next you're peering out the back door at this:

December was cloaked in the soft white stuff. What a display! There was a decided absence of cats in the landscape, but when they did venture out, we rediscovered the true meaning of the phrase "pussy-footing". Meanwhile, other creatures did show up, including my cousin Colin, and a friend.

Oak trees are messy

Have just spent a long time moving oak leaves from the top of the driveway down to the bottom, so that the city guys with the big vacuum cleaner can take them away next week. I would be happier about this if our oak tree was a garry oak, but it's not, it's just a normal, messy oak. It does look pretty in the sunset, though:

And the birds love it.  Lots of action this evening.  Here's the robin:

I thought these guys were cedar waxwings, but now that I'm looking at the photos, I wonder if they are grosbeaks. I know, not too similar, but it's hard to see them properly through all the oak busyness.

And here is more of the sunset (and starlings?), through the neighbour's tree (cypress?):

Whoops, I missed October

It was a really beautiful month, with lots of colour and rich, rosy-golden sunsets through the garry oaks. I kept looking at things and thinking I should take this or that photo and post it.  Sadly, I did not capture the brilliant contrast of the spikey green rosemary against the red of one of the japanese maples in the back. Nor did I document the smoke bush, flaming. I did get this shot of the little maple by the pond, though:

And here is the one miniature cyclamen I have in the bed by the back porch:

I love these things, and there are old, rocky gardens in the neighbourhoods around us that are just littered with them.  I want mine to creep like that too, but I may just have to go out and buy a LOT and plant them.  They're much better value than the autumn crocus, since they don't flop, and they last for all of September and October and into November.

"Where did the autumn go?"

Questions for those who know

First of all, did I get it right in the previous post?  Are these rudbeckia?  Or are they echinacea?

And what the heck are these?

They are tucked in behind the phlox and the alstromaria and the japanese maple and the rose and the clematis in that back quadrant that is also full of bindweed and something else invasive. I have never noticed them before! (I am also pretty certain that I didn't plant them.) But aren't they sweet?

Autumn has arrived

Yep, there are clear indicators.  The asters are in bloom next to the rosemary in the back yard...

the rudbeckia are going great guns at the foot of the driveway (need MORE of these!)...

... and the cats' bellies are at full extension, to maximize absorption of the somewhat paler sunshine:

Honorine Jobert

The japanese anemone always redeems itself at this time of year. Actually, it started blooming quite early - at the end of July - but it took until September to reach its full height and glory. It is especially tall this year, almost as tall as me (see portrait-by-geek above). Also especially glorious is the hydrangea, which has been blooming up a storm since the middle of August.  You can see it in the background.  Enjoy it now, since the nights are getting colder, and it is one of the first (after the hostas) to succumb to anything approaching frost.

"Yes, yes, the white flowers are very pretty, but did you notice that this tree is crooked?"

More catching up

I took this photo at the end of August, to show the "other" apples in the jardin. This is just a baby tree, and it had a hard start in life. When we bought the house the tree was leaning way over to one side, with its roots exposed on the other side. Every time Mum comes to visit she props it up with forked stick. This makes it happier, which has made it start to produce more fruit each year, which then makes it heavier, so it leans over again. Also, as the summer progresses, these other perennials start to swamp it too. I now know that they are phlox! The combination is (was) charming. Now I am picking the apples, for my own health and the health of the tree.

Catching up

You know how sometimes you stand up, stride out of the room with purpose, and then, within steps, completely forget what that purpose was? I think it happens to cats too. Oz looks like something out of a George Booth cartoon in the New Yorker.

I've had that same manic look on my face since the beginning of August. Around that time, I decided I should photograph all the daylillies for the blog, so that I would remember their various colours for next year, in case I want to move anything around. Here's the one picture I managed to get:

I like the closeup, but it sure doesn't help me remember which of the daylillies it is. Fortunately, the very next photo in the series helped me to ID the location.

It's probably not obvious to anyone but me, but Oz is pointing out that this particular daylilly is in the back border, to the right of the maple, to the left of the pergola-with-the-monster-rose, and just behind the lupins. Intelligent kitty!

The mysteries of composting

I could kick myself now for not taking pictures of this during the summer. My approach to composting is decidedly laissez-faire.  I just keep burying the kitchen scraps in the same old square wooden-slatted bin, without doing all the turning and emptying and babying that you're supposed to do.  So it's not too surprising that in the early summer I noticed some green leafy things growing out of the pile, looking as though they meant it. Hmmm, they looked sort of familiar, but they weren't one of the usual weeds.  I left them, and they grew taller and wider. Soon there wasn't too much room left for burying new stuff - I was sneaking in the peelings around the edges of the bin. But the leafy things were flowering - pretty little pale yellow flowers.

Then, last week, I got fed up - the leafy things were taking so much space I couldn't dig anything in.  I grabbed the pitchfork and jabbed at the roots of the leafy things, to pull them out and mix them in with the rest of the compost. When I pulled the fork back out, beautiful pale golden nuggets fell away from tines. My first-ever potato harvest! I scrabbled around in there for a good 15 minutes, pulling out the little beauties. Then I scrubbed them with the fingernail brush and left them in a little dish so that the geek could take their portrait:

And then we ate them for dinner.  Yum! Creamy, buttery goodness.  I must try to remember to throw out some rotting ones again next spring.

Uncovering the columnar elements, part 2

This is actually the "after" picture, believe it or not. Clearly I still have some work to do on this side of the little tree! (Can you see it, just behind the peony?) I started on the other side, towards the gate, and took the opportunity to liberate a hosta and a hellebore at the same time. Lots of excess cranesbill geranium, Japanese anemone, and mint. I now know these characters well enough to know that they won't be devastated by my attack. Rip, tear. The hellebore still needs some help, but the hosta now looks like a deliberate, established clump. Isn't it handsome! I left some anemone and mint at the back, to keep the ribbon grass honest.

And here is the little-column-that-could, isn't it darling?

"Oh, puh-leeze."

How 'bout them apples?

It is another bumper year for the big apple tree to the right of the back deck. The branches are so loaded they're drooping. I keep bonking my head on them when I try to get around to the compost heap on the side of the house. I think I will instigate an apple-picking party in September, so they don't all go to waste, rotting on the ground. Last year I tried to keep some in the fridge, but they got pretty mealy by the end of the fall. I'm not too sure what this tree is - the apples are huge, not too red, and flavourful. They're not the crisp taste sensations that smaller apple tree (over to the left of the deck) produces, but they're really good for pies and crumbles. The raindrops seem to heighten the impression of bountiful harvest, don't they?

The rain also left the smoke bush looking exceptionally smoky:

In the background you can see the monarda (bee-balm) doing its thing. It's really tall this year, and is standing up much straighter after a couple of rainy days.

Oz was too, until H came along.

Good news for the jardin

It's raining!

Uncovering the columnar elements

Mum and I planted two sweet little evergreens (help, Mum, cedars?) that are supposed to grow about 70' tall and stay only 1-2' wide. We put them right against the back fence, one to the left of centre, the other over at the right by the elderberry tree, so that, when they grow up, they will help draw the eye back and give a sense of depth and space to the view from the house.  If they grow up. Here's a recent photo of the one at the left, poor thing:

Can you see the columnar element? Nope, neither could I. Lots of convolvulus and seed heads of some really tall thing that bloomed at the end of May. Oh the guilt! So I got busy this weekend, and, mercifully, the sweet little thing is still there and is looking ok. I gave it a great big drink of water. I'll get back in there and rip out the rest of the weedy bit soon. But at least it can breathe, for now.

Of course, there's still its sibling on the right side to check in on:

Sigh.

Castillo de los tres gatos

Look what's new in the Texas jardín:

A moon flower bud! It looks a bit like the wretched convolvulus I've been hauling out all weekend, but it's actually kind of the opposite. It is not a horrible invasive vine whose white flowers open daily and curl up at night. Rather, it is a fairly well-behaved vine (when nurtured), whose white flowers open at night. For just one night! It is exciting to spot a big bud like this during the day, and even better if you remember to look again that night. Here's what you see:

Up close, it is a fabulously delicate piece of brilliant white parchment. Teya, either you just watered it, or a blessed thunderstorm just passed through!

Changing of the daisy guard

Today I've been cutting down a lot of the marguerites in the back yard, because they've pretty much had it. They're at their best in June, it seems. Now there are just lots of wizened brown stalks, plus the start of new leaves down at the base of each clump. Not to worry, though, because the shastas are just getting going in the front yard. We've got some real amazonian clumps, the sort that dominate the scene and make the neighbours think I know something about gardening after all. The regular shastas are good:

The ones with the split (double?) petals, though, are real showstoppers. I call them the "froufrou" daisies:

The cats were off sleeping in the shrubbery, but now Harriet has come inside and demanded to sit on my lap while I blog. Those of you who've met H will know that typing around her is a bit of an extreme sport! Voluptuous kitty.

This post is dedicated to Daisy-cat, in Toronto.

Harriet...

... the disapproving cat.

What's new in the jardin?

Here's something that wasn't in the rhododendron the last time I checked!

It's kind of fun, as an antidote to bending over and digging out horsetail, dandelions, and buttercups, to stand up straight and snap off the spent bloom stalks on the rhododendrons. Apparently it helps them set bigger, healthier buds for next year's show. So there I was, not thinking about much, breaking off the deadheads, pop, pop, pop - when all of a sudden I realized there was a buzzing sound, and it was getting louder, and - "OW!"  It wasn't really a sting, more like a little warning nibble from one of wasps who'd been carefully building this nest. What an intricate job!  If you look at the big leaf on the lower left, you can see that they've built the nest right over and around it, for extra stability. Despite that, my tidying had them lurching and swaying all over the place. I said "AGH", and went and got the geek, who's very easily enticed by the prospect of photographing bugs of any sort.

Lavender in summer evening sun

Excellent! I managed to lure the geek into the garden with his camera yesterday.  I should have enough pics to blog all week. Here, he takes my original composition to a whole new level.

Before & After

Before:

After removing half a branch from the acer:

Already an improvement, I think. Now I really do need to go in there and thin the plox. In case you're getting tired of looking at that same view, here is another:

From left to right: euphorbia, curry plant, lavender. All the purple flowers seem to be thriving this year.  I left last summer's dried bloom stalks on this lavender bush until late March. Then I cut all the dead-looking woody bits back to the little buds of green that were starting to show down by the roots. It seems to have liked the haircut. It's really hard to know when to prune, and how much to take off.  I still haven't figured out the curry plant's cycle. The books don't help. They're full of "when does it bloom, on new or old wood, from branch points or from the ground, etc." Do I pay attention at the right times? Nope. So I'm glad the lavender experiment worked, and now I've got it documented. 

Oh, OK, here are the deux chats:

What did I do today?

Can anybody guess?
Actually, I figured out that there was a pronounced wiggle in the offending branch, and much of the foliage blocking the view was out at the end, past the wiggle.  So I chopped at the wiggle, instead of taking off the whole branch at once.  I took a "before" photo, chopped, got the cats to pose, and then realized I was late for my 8k(!) run.  Now it is too bright to take the "after" photo, so I'll get one this evening. We can compare, and see if more chopping needs doing. 

Doing the jackmanii justice

There, that's better.

And here is a video of the maple and environs, made July 1, 2007.  Similar mess to this year!  But the foxgloves and daisies are a good spread. I think the sound got edited out, so you don't get to hear Oz being operatic. Perhaps I'll make an MP3.