Ah gentle readers, don’t do this to the garden design you so truly love. I’ve visited two flower shows in the last few weeks and there is a plague let loose on the land. With the popularization of the garden as indoor/outdoor room - an extension of the house kind of thing, we have a serious influx of really, really bad garden design.
It used to be that a person couldn’t really make a garden design mistake (more…)
I rather like garden benches and all my gardens have had places to sit. As regular readers will know, I believe if there isn’t a bench or seat in the garden the only time you’ll go in there is if you want to work.
I’m starting a series of color in the garden with this short video of Cantigny Gardens (a public garden outside of Chicago, Illinois). These folks do a tremendous job on designing for bold and brassy color (as well as relaxed formal designs) and for showing off plants to their best effect.
Now, I know that Southern gardeners have more winter flowers than I do but hey, you guys don’t have “winter” like we do in Canada. So here’s how we adapt and look at our garden. I do note that white flowers are big this year. Big white fluffy ones.
By now, many of you will have put up your Christmas tree, decorated it and stuffed presents under its skirts to tantalize and tease all in the household.
As most of you know, there is a long tradition of using evergreens in winter celebrations. Dr. C. Hole in the book, Protective Symbols in the Home, wrote that, “Long before the Christian era began, evergreens which flourish when everything else in nature is withered and dead, were regarded as symbols of undying life, and used in magical rites to ensure the return of vegetation. The sacred buildings of Europe and Western Asia were decked with them for the Winter Solstice rituals.” Most of no longer celebrate those Winter Solstice rituals, nor I suspect do we regard our trees as anything more than hangers to hold those decorations for Christmas morning.
Bringing Greenery Indoors
While our society is guilty of succumbing to advertising jingles and pressures, putting up Christmas trees just after Halloween in some cases, the traditions are much more restrictive than that. Christmas greenery was not to be brought into the house until Christmas Eve in most traditions – although this was probably more respected in theory than in operating fact. It was however to be removed from the house before Twelfth Night or January 6. The trees were not burned and certainly the holly and ivy used in decorating the house was never burned in the fireplace. In some parts of Ireland, the holly was kept and burnt under the pancakes on Shrove Tuesday.
Martin Luther
Legend has it that Martin Luther gave us our first decorated Christmas tree. The story goes that he wandered outside one bright, star-lit Christmas eve and was awed by the millions of shining stars. To celebrate this heavenly sight, he set up a tree for his children and covered it with hundreds of lit candles. Whether this was true or not, the first recorded use of a decorated Christmas tree comes from 1605. It was recorded about Stasburg, Germany, “At Christmas they set up fir trees in the parlours of Strasburg and hand thereon rose cut out of many-coloured paper, apples, wafers, gold-foil, sweets, etc.” Using decorated trees remained a continental European tradition for several hundred more years.
Christmas Trees Arrive in England
Christmas trees arrived in England with the court of George III in the 1800’s. The various merchants, soldiers and courtiers who accompanied him from Germany brought these Christmas traditions with them to this new court. However, using decorated trees at Christmas did not catch the public fancy until Queen Victoria and Prince Albert set up a huge tree at Windsor Castle. Reported in the press, complete with illustrations, the Christmas tree craze was born and we’ve not been the same since. I do note that there was a report in 1912 that Christmas trees were still only for the well-to-do. The landowners or merchants would set up a tree and all the children would be invited in to look at the lit candles and decorations. The poor could not afford such luxury. And such luxury it is. A friend of ours decorates his tree with candles and one of our Christmas outings is to visit and sit around a candle-lit tree sipping our mulled cider and hot chocolate. They are beautiful but one has to be very, very careful with lit candles next to a resinous evergreen.
First Electric Lightbulbs
After the introduction of electricity, light bulbs replaced candles and trees began to be erected in public place for all to enjoy. The first of the electric-lit public trees that is well recorded took place in Pasadena, California in 1909. Now, the use of Christmas trees is everywhere and I suspect the original meanings have been lost in that ubiquity. Just part of the landscape so to speak.
Practical note
As a note of practicality in this historical lesson, do keep your tree well watered this season. Not that it will live afterwards but if you keep it watered in its stand, the needles will stay green longer and not dry out. Dry needles are serious fire hazards and can be lit off by the heat of a nearby electric light bulb. Once ignited, it only takes three seconds for the tree to be totally consumed by flames and almost impossible to extinguish with household fire systems. A few gallons of water and a few minutes every day or two can easily prevent a Christmas tragedy.
Let me take this moment to wish all of you a very happy Christmas season. However you see or celebrate this holiday season, I hope you can find it in your hearts to bring some love into this world. Love, in life or gardening, is really the most important thing we share and my Christmas wish for you would be that you are able to find and share some love with those around you.
Winter seems to have arrived with a bit of a bang this past week. The lawn chairs are covered in snow and if that’s not a sign I’m not supposed to be sitting out there, I’m not sure what is. You have to love it though; the clean white snow covering everything is a clear signal that I should get on with next year’s gardening. Or at least make sure that whatever I’ve left undone in the house is well and truly taken care of. And here’s where my cold basement comes into play. I am watering every plant I brought indoors even though the mice seemed to have taken a bit of a shine to the geraniums when I put them down in the old cold cellar. The upshot of this is that the geraniums are a bit smaller now and the mice are gone, courtesy of a few traps, peanut butter and bait. I have high hopes that the plants will overwinter in the old way by being frost free but damp and without light. I know if I let them stay down there without water or in a heated basement, they’ll be dead come spring but the old cold cellar “should” work according to garden lore. I’ll get back to you though.
Houseplants
I’m also trying to decide what to do with the ginger. Last year, I let it almost freeze (or it did freeze a bit) and it was decidedly unhappy with me. This is the variegated ginger that has never flowered so perhaps it too is sending a message. Having tried bright light all winter, dormancy with little water and last year almost-freezing, I’m thinking that my season simply isn’t long enough for this plant. I suspect that grow-lights are the answer but I’m not committed enough to the plant to set up a growing system for one plant. I think it will get a cold room treatment this year and I’ll combine that with an early spring in the seed starter area and in-ground growing. And if that doesn’t bring it into bloom next summer, I’ll have one more plant for the compost pile. The only thing that will get it dug up next fall will be having produced blooms. There’s only so much room I want to give plants that don’t perform.
Rule of Watering Houseplants
The other plants are doing well although the basil I brought indoors has been dropping leaves a bit. I think I have to step up the watering there a bit. Remember the rule of watering indoor plants? I have to remind myself of it regularly. Touch the potted soil with your finger. If the soil is slightly damp, do not water. If your finger comes away bone dry, soak the pot. In this way, you’ll avoid over or underwatering and your plants will love you for the even supply of moisture. There’s no rule that says “water every third day” that makes sense to me because every house is different. And zones within houses are different; plants over heating vents require more water than plants stuck in cold, dark corners. Touch the soil with your finger for best results. And no, one of those fancy watering gauges is no substitute for your finger. I’ve heard more folks kill plants with those things because the readings are off. Your finger never needs batteries, never hides in a drawer somewhere you can’t find it, is readily accessible 24 hours of the day whenever you think of watering and doesn’t make mistakes. Why use a gizmo when you have a finger?
Garden Catalogs
The first catalog also arrived in the mail this past week. Yes! I’m now ready to start planning for next year. Mind you, I also have somewhere around 300 varieties of seed already in the basement hidden from the mice in mouse-proof containers. So my spring project is not likely to be choosing seed, but rather building a seed starting rack in the basement. Seems there’s a lot of things going on in the basement this spring. I suspect we’ll have enough lights down there to qualify as a grow-op by the time real spring rolls around. But it is still fun to look through the catalogs and find the treasures, the plants you really want to start yourself because you know they won’t be available in garden centres. That’s the advantage of having your own little growing area in the basement; you get to pick what to grow.
Overwintering Shrub Cuttings
The other plants that got to visit the basement this past week were the shrub cuttings I had taken last summer. I had great intentions of potting them up and overwintering them outdoors but it was a case of too little, too late on those. So the cuttings dropped all their leaves with frosts and reduced light levels, have been well and truly frozen outdoors, and are now downstairs in the cold cellar along with the geraniums. They should be fine down there; staying dormant until next spring. I will plant them in the ground next year in a small temporary nursery area so they’ll grow up into nice shrubs in a year or three. I need a ton of these plants for the landscaping I want to do so I suspect I’ll wind up taking even more cuttings next year. Watch out for your shrubs if I come to visit your garden!
Mind you, that won’t take place until next spring and for now, I have enough projects to keep me busy dreaming of next year. I’ll dream right on through this snow. And what projects are you dreaming of for next year?
Whoa Nelly! The biggest pond company in the U.S. is in a bit of an economic downturn and the owner Greg Whittstock was just asked to blog about his company at Inc.
This isn’t particularly interesting if you’re a home gardener but if you’re in the trade at all or are interested in corporate dynamics, this is interesting stuff. Just be aware that there’s a ton of very angry people writing comments (some of the folks who had to be let go in the cost-cutting)
But it’s a window into the nursery trade for sure.
I actually visited the building they’re talking about and took some pond tours courtesy of these guys last summer. They were very professional and helpful in setting this garden writer up with some great ponds to see and tour. So while I love their ponds, I’m not at all qualified to write about the business itself.
Ah gentle readers, don’t do this to the garden design you so truly love. I’ve visited two flower shows in the last few weeks and there is a plague let loose on the land. With the popularization of the garden as indoor/outdoor room - an extension of the house kind of thing, we have a serious influx of really, really bad garden design.
The other plants are doing well although the basil I brought indoors has been dropping leaves a bit. I think I have to step up the watering there a bit. Remember the rule of watering indoor plants? I have to remind myself of it regularly. Touch the potted soil with your finger. If the soil is slightly damp, do not water. If your finger comes away bone dry, soak the pot. In this way, you’ll avoid over or underwatering and your plants will love you for the even supply of moisture. There’s no rule that says “water every third day” that makes sense to me because every house is different. And zones within houses are different; plants over heating vents require more water than plants stuck in cold, dark corners. Touch the soil with your finger for best results. And no, one of those fancy watering gauges is no substitute for your finger. I’ve heard more folks kill plants with those things because the readings are off. Your finger never needs batteries, never hides in a drawer somewhere you can’t find it, is readily accessible 24 hours of the day whenever you think of watering and doesn’t make mistakes. Why use a gizmo when you have a finger?