Last update: March 17, 2006.

Welcome to my re-re-revamped gardening page. This time I really, really do plan on restructuring this web page.

The number of visitors to My Gardens since January 16, 1999:

Background

I've been gardening for over 25 years. First I started as a teenager in central Massachusetts then continued on and off for ten years in coastal southern California amidst a 6 year drought. Next I moved to northern Virginia where the climate was similar to in Massachusetts except the summers were a bit longer and much more hot and humid. My 3 year old flower gardens were starting to look nice and I was finally getting the hang of vegetable gardening (if you didn't count August when it was too hot to weed and my veggie garden essentially went down hill) when we again pulled up roots and moved to north eastern Michigan in 2000.

This is the new house. That indeed is a large maple growing through the front deck. That was the only landscaping.

This is our house 2 years later. The peony I transplanted from VA (originally from my grandmother's garden) flowered profusely for the first time (it's on the left side of the deck). I also planted a William Baffin rose next to it which survived the sub-zero almost snowless 2002/03 winter and another rose that year called Marsden Fireglow. My irises bloomed nicely too. In the yard I also made an island bed around some young red oak trees. I'll try to find some more photos of the nice blooms.

I'm in zone 4b. Summers are shorter than anywhere else I have lived, it takes some getting used to. Our new home is just a few miles south of the 45th parallel and 20 miles west of Lake Huron. It sits on a small sandy hill in the middle of a cedar swamp. We are surrounded by maples, oaks, pines, larch and of course, cedar. There isn't a lot of sunny space near the house, in fact the best locations are around the pond on the other side of the driveway. And that is where the veggie garden was put, surrounded by a 6 foot fence to keep out the deer.

Since we moved into this house in September of 2000 there wasn't time for a garden. I managed to platn the few irises and day lilies I brought from VA, they'd been kept in pots all summer. The one peony, a descendent from my grandparents' garden had to wait till spring to be moved from its spot at farm. I didn't think moving it twice in one yer would have done it any good.

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The PLAN

As much as I enjoy growing vegetables, over the years I have come to one conclusion. I tend to grow too many plants for 2 people and far more than I am willing to weed. In 1999 I had dropped the number of tomato plants from 16 to 8. Then 8 to 5; two or three slicers, one cherry, and the heirloom Yellow Pear. Deciding on which slicer will involve selecting 2 from the early varieties, Early Girl undoubtedly being one of them. I hope there will be plenty to eat as well as can. Since I learned to can in 1999 I can't imagine not having them in deep winter. It amazed me how fresh they smelled when I popped open the first jar!

Since the USDA zoning map places me in Zone 4b, it's the coldest region I have gardened. Fortunately, it's not too far off from Zone 5 which is where I grew up. However, it does mean a shorter growing season so I won't be growing watermelons, which is no great loss since they never grew for me even in Zone11. I'll still start seeds indoors but not until late February or early March since tomatoes are not planted outside prior to Memorial Day up here. And it's likely I will still protect them with walls o' water since we've been known to have hard frosts at the end of May.

Rain is also highly unpredictable and in 2005 we had one of the wettest springs since I moved. My veggie garden soil became a haven for moss and lichen. Veggies do not like competing with those. This spring I am moving my veggie bed about 100 feet west to a better drained (sandier) location. I will have to amend the soil with lots of compost and top soil to get it remotely useable. Thus far the grass that does grow there is thin and straggly.

Since 2000 I have also added an island bed of flowers in the front lawn, then tiered it in 2004. In 2005 I added another island of shrubbery interspersed with daffodils. This will be the first spring for those. I look forward to it.

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Vegetable Gardening

 

In the past I've grown: several types of tomatoes, horse radish, rhubarb, swiss chard, herbs, zuchini and cucumbers, pumpkins, potatoes, green beans, snow peas, carrots, radishes, okra, lettuce, corn and peppers. Some of those I didn't even like to eat. My new vegetable garden philosophy is fairly simple: I will not grow anything I don't eat, that isn't cheaper or better tasting from the fruit stand, or that I just don't enjoy growing. Therefore corn, carrots, radishes potatoes swiss chard, pumpkins and horse radish are out. My FIL grows plenty of corn and potatoes and lives 17 miles away. He also has a contained stand of horse radish (inside an old tire) and plenty of pumpkins.

I'm going to try okra again because it's so good in gumbo. One year I had great luck with Cajun Delight. The next year spineless Clemson was a disaster, I am trying Cajun Delight again this year to find out if it was just a fluke.

I'm growing some new (to me) tomato varieties as well. I also hope to expand my container gardening since I discovered peppers gorw better for me in pots. In 2005 only one plant grew to any decent height and it was the only one in a pot.

Usually I plan my garden out on graph paper except for 1999 when I tried it on computer. Graph paper is easier.

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Flower Gardening

Flowers are mainly in my front yard. (The back is just a slop down to the swamp and filled with trees). The soil is mostly sand and the edges are shaded with those aforementioned cedars in the swamp. Therefore I've been creating island beds surrounded by field stones and raised slightly higher with new top soil. Some things have down well and others have been disasters. And the deer, even with a large labrador living here, keep snipping the heads off of things. I have no idea if I'll ever see my one and only delphinium bloom. This is one reason I grow daffodils and not tulips. I had 6 tulips in VA in the middle of a large expanse of daffodils. Every tulip was eaten.

The deck which has the maple tree growing through it has 2 rose bushes, a couple peonies, one which has been there 4 years now and never bloomed. It's a sorbet and was bought through the mail. If it does not bloom this year I will move it.

In 2005 DH found the location of the septic tank and I stuck a bird feeder pole on the cover and planted annuals around it. The west side of the house is very shaded and gets sun only for a few hours in mid afternoon, there I have planted a PeeGee hydrangea , a forsythia taken as a cutting from my sister's garden in MA. There is also a common purple butterfly bush, one of 6 we got from the local conservation district pretty cheaply. It is slightly forward of the house corner so it will get a few extra hours of sunlight.

Around the base of 3 oak trees I have also naturalized some daffodils;Salome, Ice Follies and a big yellow one.

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Herb Gardening

I'm buying a Basil mix this year and some garlic chives. I figure I'll be putting these in pots. I've never been good at herb gardening, but I keep trying.

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