Weeding and planting

This rock is for you, Jaromey. Its a lava rock from the roadside near Clearwater. :-))
This rock is in the inner garden at the front and is surrounded by a globalaria (a very good plant), some thyme, and you can see the leaves from the fern leafed peony. Sorry to say, I forget the name of the bright blue one. The other rocks are flat and part of the rock path.

Today was another perfect day. Bit of clouds and warm. I finally got outside at about 2:30. The slight breeze kept me hatless, but the sun was not too strong. I pulled back mulch in the veggie garden and planted a few little rows - lettuce, radishes, yellow beans, swiss chard, cosmos, marigolds. I covered the seeds with a very light sprinkling of top soil. I put grass clippings between the rows. I have a couple of feet of space to plant tomatoes when I get them. I replanted the dill, as it did not seem to be germinating. I think the spinach is germinated, and the sunflowers.

I transplanted the daphne and the cyclamen into the new little rockery and added more pea gravel mulch over it all. Weeded it, although I have been keeping it really clean.

I did some weeding in the bed by the garage and next to the sidewalk. These beds are not too bad for weeds either. The newest area is pretty clean. The rhodos and ferms need a little more attention, but I will do them when I get to the space under the deck. This is dense shade but gets water when it rains and water drips down through the deck boards. I want to make a shady sitting area under here, eventually. I will need more cement pavers.

I have started to clean up the Japanese garden area. The little stone path and the beds have violets growing in every possible crack. The soil is moist right now, so it is easier to pull them out. It looks so much better when cleaned up.

I was out for about 3 hours today and got quite a bit done. My back is complaining though... just new muscles being exercised, I guess. We don't have much on this week so I hope I can be out in the garden without worrying too much about fingernails and hair! I think I got a bit of sun today, but can't really see it yet. I didn't get out and take photos. Maybe when I have things a bit more cleaned up.

There are so many of the plants in bloom now. This is the best time for my little rockeries. I am happy to see the lewisias expanding. The bulb oxalis are in bloom and looking good.

one of the columbines I have added to the garden. I love these flowers and so let them self seed and pop up all around my garden.
The stone path goes past the 'david' garden ornament and past the little stone wall (1 foot tall of flat stones, no mortar). The water tub sits at the edge of this wall. You continue past this water feature and around the corner to a little circle 3.5 ft diameter) containing a few rock plants and a sun dial. This little circle is hidden by the smoke bush on one side of the path, the california lilac on one side, the cedar hedge on the other side. The path leads around the small circle and opens onto the thyme circle. (7 foot diameter). The garden bench sits at the bottom of the inner garden within the enclosure of the cedar hedge and looking out on the thyme circle. I need to finish edging around the thyme circle to make it perfectly round again. The thyme is starting to bloom. I liberated 3 cement stones that lead across the circle to the bench to use in the back garden. They were mostly over grown with thyme. I replenished the stone spots with sand and compost and expect the thyme will have grown over them by summers end.
This stone path leads off the grass path and you enter the inner garden. The boxwood hedge is at the top of this inner garden and at the bottom there is cedar hedging. Within in this inner garden I have a water feature, a garden bench, a few decorative cement planters, some little rock plants and other special plants that I will show in the next posting. As you can see, this stone path needs to be cleaned up. I will put round up on it, this year. I don't think I will have time to redo the path with weed barrier and a good sand base with pea gravel in between the stones. It looks much better when it is cleaned up and the beds weeded.
As you come around the house from the back you cross the wide driveway of exposed aggregate and enter the front garden on this grass path, or go up the 2 steps to the front entry of the house. This grass path is about 4 feet wide and winds past the tiny rose bed. It is lined with boxwood hedge that now needs clipping. This grass path goes across the top of the garden and over to the neighbours driveway. They have a strip of grass along their driveway, so that it appears that this grass path continues around the inner garden. I have more evergreen honeysuckle hedge along the side of their grass strip. The honeysuckle pilea is rather like the boxwood, but has smaller leaves and a slightly more open appearance than the boxwood. I have planted some cedars for taller hedging within this little hedge. When they grow, we will have more screening from their driveway and from the whole street on that side. If you turn to the left instead of going along the neighbours grass path, you would go along their sidewalk. There is about 5 feet of their sidewalk and 5 feet of my plants between our houses.

I mowed the bit of grass today. I really like my little rechargable mower. No stinking gas, no cords to drag around. Its light and easy to handle. I did not mow the grass where the crocuses are along the front grass strip. The crocuses need to go brown and dormant before I mow them off.

I took the axe and chopped the runners of the black bamboo out of the rectangular flower bed. The hollyhocks and peonies are just coming up in that bed, with a few other perennials. This grass strip along by the front of the street contains the crocus field. I have some perennials, a current bush, the plum tree, the spirea, and a small woody shrub like perennial along a 5 foot strip right across the front garden, next to the crocus field grass. Next to the perennial strip there is small hedging. The form of the cedar hedge makes two rectangular beds on each side of this front garden. In between these two rectangles is the block where the bench sits, protected from the street view by the cedar hedge. The perennial strip has daisies coming into bloom at the moment. I will need to do some renovation in this bed, as I seem to have clover and lemon balm taking over.

The garden hose you see in some of the photos leads across the inner garden to the far side rectangular bed. This year I put fertilizer spikes around the plum tree and will be watering with this hose set to drip. I really want to see this tree produce. I have planted it in the worst possible place ... near the street and the neighbours driveway. Hopefully the fertilizer and better water supply will help it produce fruit. It had lots of blooms. The yellow plum tree at the back is forming tiny green plums. We will have the usual abundant crop from it. I have used up the last of the plum sauce, so will be looking forward to the plums this Fall.

I weeded a bit in the woodland garden. This area is getting a surprisingly good tilth, considering it has been the most neglected area. The weeds pulled out quite easily, after the rain we have had. The blue bells are not all blue... there are pink and white ones, so I have not gone after them to dig them out or mulch them over. I will try to keep the trilliums area clear of them, but otherwise, I think they can spread in the woodland area.

A few days ago I saw a yellowish bird in the back garden. On looking it up on birding sites, I think it was the female of the yellow warbler. I was hoping for a gold finch. So, since finches and I think this warbler like thistle seeds, I left a couple of thistles in the back corner of the woodland. But I really must get rid of the morning glory back in that corner.

There have been dandilions going to seed everywhere. I was not out for a few days because of the rainy weather and the car show... and now I see the dandilions have got right out of hand again.

My garden tour - Patio and Driveway areas

The spring bulbs along the driveway. At the top right corner you can just see a bit of the geraniums. The van is just to the left of this view. When the bulbs are finished there will be an oriental poppy, some creeping phlox, some arabis, but not much for the summer show. There are morning glories in the hedge that need to be constantly killed. I treat them to some round up painted on the leaves, but this never seems to be very effective. I will have to be more diligent, I suppose.
I have a tall cedar hedge that runs from almost the back fence line along between our driveways and up to where the front line of our house. This is excellent privacy. In front of the hedge are some perennial geraniums at the back garage end. These plants are carefree, evergreen ground cover. Tough and reliable. They are just now coming into bud. The van is in front of them so they are seldom seen. At the other end of the hedge there is an opening between the hedge and the moutain ash tree. This is a borrowed vista showing our neighbours' cherry tree in bloom.
This is a very nice statuesque grass like plant. It is going to show up better in the edge of this garden when I have taken out the artemesia. I might replace the artemesia with more of the sedum. Behind this plant and the sedum there are 3 Rose of Sharon shrubs. They look okay when in bloom but otherwise are not that great. They leaf out late, and the fall color is non existant. As you can see in the bottom of this photo, I need to clean up the daffodils that have finished blooming. You can see some of the arabis in this photo. The arabis is doing great in the bottom part of this 5 foot wide strip. I have added some aubretia to the mix and will be adding more this summer for a nice show next spring. Both the arabis and aubretia are evergreen with white blooms and purple blooms respectively. They make a nice ground cover over the dying bulbs. In this area I need to remove a torch lily that is old and ragged. I also need to weed out dandilions, other weeds, blackberries and be sure the rose we took out a year ago stops putting up shoots.
This is a very well behaved sedum. As you can see, it needs to be dead headed. I am about half way finished in cleaning up this part of the garden. I have added 3 bags of the compost to the tulips and other plants along in front of the cedar hedge.
At the street end of the driveway we have a Virginia creeper going up a utility pole. This plant makes a lovely dark green mass in summer and turns to glorious autumn colors. Right now, before it leafs out, you see its winter underwear. This is a silvery ivy growing up through the creeper and slowly spreading up the post for winter color. At the foot of the creeper post we have St.John's wort. This is another very invasive plant but if kept in check and planted in the right place it does real yeoman duty. Its good here contained within our driveways and the street. I have to clip it back every few years. I only got it partially done last fall. The St. John's wort is expanding towards the other plantings along this strip between our driveways. In the bottom left corner we can see the New Zealand flax plant which has not survived our cold winter or the snow it had dumped on it. I will also take out the artemesia that has been crushed by snow load.
These tulips sit below the bird feeder by the garage door and downspout from the eaves.
To continue the garden tour from the woodland area we come past the van and big green compost bin. This bin is emptied once a month and I receive a 20 litre bag of compost from the service I have hired noted in the side bar of my blog. This is the patio area between the house and the back garage. You see the grape vine just coming into leaf. The bird feeder is empty because the starlings have been at it. It took them no time at all to gobble it all up. You get a glimpse of the tulips beyond the garage. To the right in this photo you enter the back garden or go up the steps to the deck.