| April 1, 2005 Raining again. Electrician worked on the new pond wiring and lights but had to stop due to the rain. At least it will be good for the newly applied weed and feed. |
| |
| April 2, 2005 Got beds cleaned out more thoroughly and one more done. Found the strangest thing on the grass: looked like ropes of tiny eggs encased in some slimey substance. Thought it must be frog eggs as they've been quite vocal for the last week at night, but was bummed that they weren't *in* the pond. Lo and behold there's hundreds of eggs in the front pond--actually entwined around the Louisiana iris in the pond. Hoping to see lots of tadpoles soon, and then some frogs. Moved hemerocallis 'Pardon Me' into the daylily bed, as the rosemary was crowding it out. Pruned the rosemary while I was at it. Ordered roseS: 'Zephirine Drouhin', another 'Tamora' and an 'Eden', and another Meyer lemon since my old one bit the dust. |
| |
| April 3, 2005 VERY windy and cool. |
| |
| April 4, 2005 Electrician finished up the gazebo and pond today. We now have outlets, a working fan in the gazebo, recessed step lights going up into the gazebo and rope lights going down the side steps. They are perfect; exactly what I wanted. Got another small bed cleaned out. Dug up the "dwarf" buddleia and tossed it in the woods. It didn't look any too good, anyway, since I majorly pruned it last fall, and it got too large for the space. Then dug up lilac 'Josee' and put her in the buddleia place. Hope she lives; couldn't get a very good root ball. Got rid of all of the crocosmias--I hope. I decided I really didn't like them much. Mowed lawn. |
| |
| April 5, 2005 Wonderful weather. Bright blue cloudless sky most of the day and temp near 80F. Lilac 'Josee' a little droopy, so I watered it thoroughly. Finished pruning the roses, topped container hostas (seem to have lost a few this year), pruned the hydrangeas, dug up and divided yarrow, an aster, and baby's breath. Filled in those areas with more soil. Moved daylily 'Mardi Gras Parade' to a better spot for it--it's too small for where it was. Lost the Russian sage I bought late last summer. |
| |
| April 6, 2005 Another wonderful day, weather-wise. Dug up, divided, and repotted the large unnamed hosta in the back deck bed--it was getting too large. Put the pots by the footbridge to the gazebo. Cleaned out the back deck beds and the left side bed. Pruned the fig. Neighbors cut down another Bradford pear and pruned another one back halfway. Yippee!!!!! I really hate those trees. Lilac 'Josee' may look a little better today. Watered her again, anyway. Supposed to get rain for the next two days so that should help her, too. |
| |
| April 8, 2005 Roses and new Meyer lemon arrived just as I was about to go out of town. Sigh. BUT!! we have a few tadpoles hatching!! |
| |
| April 10, 2005 Back from a weekend out of town. Bought several things: hosta 'Cat's Eyes' (to replace the one that I lost over the winter), 'Feather Boa', and 'Sea Thunder', lamium 'Golden Anniversary', 2 primroses, a blue and a cerise. Also got 2 pond plants: a cattails and a white Japanese iris. Got yet another birdfeeder in the hopes of foiling squirrels. And got another pair of Sloggers gardening clogs to mainly wear in the house. I love those things! Put the roses in to soak over night. The Meyer lemon is covered with buds/blooms and smells heavenly. It does look a bit chlorotic so I'll give it a dose of Ironite soon. Nice looking plant otherwise. Roses look pretty good, too. Most of the frog eggs have hatched--we have hundreds of tadpoles. |
| |
| April 11, 2005 Got all three roses planted. Also tossed all the deck rail and hanging ivys. They did just horribly this year. Bought 4 Roosevelt (Boston type but more ruffled and stockier) ferns for the front porch, as well as 6 packs of tomatoes: 'Rutgers', 'Better Boy', and 'Parks Whopper'. |
| |
| April 14, 2005 Tadpoles continue to grow and are now quite mobile. LOTS of them have made it up into the waterfall tub. Planning on moving some anacharis--to which lots of tadpoles are clinging--from this pond to the new one, so maybe some of them will continue to inhabit that pond, too. |
| |
| April 15, 2005 The rest of this week has been rainy and/or cold. Sunny and nice today, but temp is supposed to plummet tonight. Hoping for a nice weekend so I can get some work done outside. |
| |
| April 16, 2005 Worked up the tomato beds, John put a wire trellis on the mailbox bed for clematis durandii, did some general tidying outside, moved some hostas to the front porch. Lost quite a few of them this winter. Went by Ponds Etc. Justin will bring fish and more pond plants soon. Strawberries and blackberries will be blooming soon. Did some brainstorming/planning re: the compost bins. Plan is to move them to the corner where hydrangeas are now. They're right in the center of my new beds, now, and a bit of an eyesore. I'll move the hydrangeas elsewhere. |
| |
| April 17, 2005 Broadcast clome, bluebonnet, cosmos, and several varieties of zinnia seeds in front beds and new beds. Planted/caged/watered tomatoes. Moved old waterlilies to new pond. Potted up daylily seedlings. Went to Lowe's and came home with: 3 flats of pink impatiens, 2 colors of creeping phlox, hosta 'Sharmon', 3 'May Night' sages, sweet alyssum, and a blue flag iris incorrected labeled as a yellow flag. Checked there and at Wal*Mart for more Boston ferns for the gazebo. Lowe's had none and the ones at Wal*Mart were mis-shapened from being crowded. Potted up new blue flag and put it in the new pond on the shelf. Water here is too deep for marginals--I'll have to add rocks to raise plants up. For now it's in the old pond. Planted 'Dasher II' cucumber seeds and put pots in the cold frame. |
| |
| April 18, 2005 Got 6 more Roosevelt ferns, 4 for the gazebo and 2 for the back deck hangers. Also got 3 yellow million bells, a Yubi portulaca, and 6 bacoba for the planters I want to hang from the back yard fence. Bare root co-op hostas arrived. Put them in water to soak for a while and got them potted up, as well as hosta 'Sharmon' and the cattails and white Japanese iris for the pond. The shelf depth is fine for the cattails, so I'll add a few stones for the iris. Strawberries beginning to bloom. |
| |
| April 19, 2005 Beautiful day; temp in the low 80s. Rain is on the way, though. John helped me arrange the plants in the new pond. The marginal shelf was
a little deeper than I wanted so he built part of it up with some stones to put the plants at the right depth. Sat in the gazebo for a little while listening to the creek. Soooo relaxing. John found the first tick of the season and I killed 3 mosquitoes the size of baby birds. The &%@$#& voles chewed off my recently planted 'New Dawn' rose--I swear the
end looked like a sharpened pencil, they chewed it so evenly. They also ate half of a spiderwort and I see several entrance holes, so we set 2 mouse traps at the entrance to the holes, baited with chuncks of apple. Got the Sweet Autumn clematis, the lamium, and the tiarella in the ground, as well as moving 2 hardy ferns from the new beds (too much sun) to the new pond area. |
| |
| April 20, 2005 Got one vole so we set more traps. Planted the sweet autumn clematis in the arbor bed. Dug up I. germanica 'Cameo Rose' to make room for it. Not enough sun there for the iris, anyway. |
| |
| April 21, 2005 Got the primroses planted before it started raining. No voles today, but those traps were baited with peanut butter. Going back to apple chuncks today. That bed is riddled with voles runs so this is war! |
| |
| April 22, 2005 A day of shopping. At Reynolds Garden Center I got hostas, 'St. Elmo's Fire', 'Queen Josephine', a second 'August Moon', and 'El Nino'. Also got several more gold perennial alyssum (will give my neighbor 1), some petunias for the sunny front deck rail planters that will go with the impatiens better (Wave petunias I got earlier can go in other beds for color), and a replacement for the murdered 'New Dawn' rose. Also found the deck rail planters for the gazebo, a blue bird box for the back fence, and some 'Spacemaster' bush cucumber seeds for containers. At Lowe's I found a hummingbird plant bracket to attached to a gazebo post and on which to hang a hummingbird feeder. Also got a trellis for the back fence for the clematis that needs it and 3 hangers for window box pots to hang on the fence. Got home just before a storm with heavy rain. |
| |
| April 23, 2005 Yippee! Got 2 more voles. Got fence brackets put up and the 18" pots looked too small. Got 24" pots and repotted the bacopa and put a white petunia in the center of each pot. Got the hummingbird feeder bracket put up on the gazebo and the feeder out. Put up the new blue bird nesting box. Found some coral pink Wave petunias at Lowe's that will look really good with the impatiens, too. Haven't decided which petunias I'll use. Got a deck rail bracket to hold a planter for the top of the right side rail. Since there's a trellis there I can't put a planter ON the rail. Filled a few planters with dampened Pro-Mix but it got too chilly to work outside--my fingers were getting numb. Also got the trellis put up on the fence for 'Blue Moon' clematis. Planted 'Spacemaster' cucumber seeds. |
| |
| April 24, 2005 We're on a roll--3 more voles! Setting the traps every day--we're bound to decrease the population eventually. Cold and blustery today--too cold to work outside. Saw a few snow flakes with the temp at 45F and it looks like it may rain with temps predicted to be down to freezing tonight. I sure hope they're wrong as the strawberries are blooming. If this wind keeps up at least no frost will settle. Bought 'Baby Fordhook' lima beans to plant as soon as possible, and a daylily at Wal*Mart named 'Purple Magic'. |
| |
| April 25, 2005 Another vole bites the dust. Bought 'Supersweet 100' tomato plants, 'Cosmic Pink' million bells, and 'Sundial Mix' portulaca for planters at Southern States. Emptied all dead hosta pots. Potted Japanese maple up one size and moved it into the corner where the dogwood tree (now deceased) was. Emptied the dead roses and put the red twig dogwood in the corner where the Lady Banks rose was. Rhododendron went where the red twig was. 'Gruss an Aachen' rose looks like it's only putting out root stock growth. Will wait a while before trashing it to see. Neighbor bought an elephant ears plant for me. Got all deck rail planters filled and planted, including on the gazebo rails. Impatiens in the shade and Wave petunias, new million bells, and portulaca in the sun. John attached the arbor, that was displaced by the gazebo, to the fence, over the gate and attached the solar powered lanterns to the arbor. Moved 'Pee Gee' hydrangea to under the front arbor. There are two apple trees blooming together for the first time: 'Emerald Spire' and 'Ultra Spire'. I'm so hoping there's some pollination going on and we'll get at least one apple this year. |
| |
| April 26, 2005 As I suspected, squirrels played in the planter outside the kitchen window. John made a cover for it out of green covered chicken wire. It's tight and contoured to fit the entire pot. Planted the pink Wave petunias in the iris bed. Potted up more impatiens for the back deck, the front porch, and the "sconce" pot. Planted the miniature mountain laurel in a back deck bed. Leftover portulaca went in the arbor bed, and leftover coral pink Wave petunia went into the mailbox bed. John also finished off the fence gate arbor, adding "legs" to give it more support and cut off the "gate posts". I'm trying blood meal on the back deck rail pots to see if it will discourage squirrels from playing in them. Trimmed liriope around the new pond. Pruned the forsythia to the new upright stems. Fed the blueberries. Treated the new 'Meyer' lemon to a dose of Ironite. Moved 'Endless Summer' hydrangea over about a foot so it won't be in the way of the new compost bins. Decided to put the old hydrangea across from the gazebo, on the left side of the door to the new storage room. Move Russian sage 'Little Spire' to the pond bed, where the crocosmia used to be. Moved agapanthus 'Headbourne Hybrid' to the "agapanthus container" and hoping that I'll remember to protect it this winter. Moved daylily 'Indian Giver' over about a foot to allow room for the rose I'm planning on putting on the fence gate arbor. Dug up 'Ruby Stella' for the same reason and put it in the center-left new bed. Finished potting/planting all but half a flat of impatiens and the 3 salvias. Moved daylily 'Minnie Pearl' from the left side bed, which the voles are tearing up, to the pond bed. Potted up two of the 'Supersweet 100' temporarily. |
| |
| April 27, 2005 I admit they're smarted than we are. Raccoons, I mean. The "Raccoon proof" planter cover proved to be less than ideal. In fact, it was mashed flat this morning. I mean FLAT. Right down onto the soil. Plants are trashed, to say the least. Got about 1/4 inch of rain last night. Not enough to do any good, but just enough to make it messy this morning. John made a metal frame to go under the chicken wire for the planter. Pretty sturdy, so we'll see. Also got some rabbit and dog repellant from Southern States to apply to the other back deck rail planters--they had been dug in, as well. Everything is potted up, including a coral geranium my neighbor gave me and 3 leftover white petunias. I'll try not to kill the geranium, but I'm offering no promises. More impatiens went on the front porch and several planted in the back deck beds. Kale pulled up. Top soil added and the pentagon bed readied for butter beans that will be planted next week. Dayliles from Dave's Garden co-op arrived. Soaked for several hours and planted. Started some daylily seeds and put them in the cold frame for a few days. No voles for the last two days. Sprayed the peach trees and apple trees. Treated all roses with Bayer 3-in-1 systemic treatment. Treated ponds with start-up dose of Microbe-Lift. Planted the 3 'May Night' salvias as well as the perennials I started last year: foxgloves, snow-in-summer, columbines, delphiniums, and dwarf hollyhocks. Weird weather today. Sun, wind, clouds, rain, hail, rain, sun, wind. Voles are getting smart; 2 traps had been sprung and the bait gone, but no vole. |
| |
| April 28, 2005 Well, the planter cover worked excellently. Not mashed down at all, but the hummingbird feeder and the new bird feeder are empty. Raccoon must have used it to reach them. Not surprizing. No rail planters were bothered, though. Wonder if he just got his fill at the feeders or if the repellant worked. Got one vole last night. Russian sage is looking droopy; I was able to retain no root ball, so essentially it was bare root. I'll be surprized if it lives. |
| |
Sign Our Guestbook