Spring Springing, Pruning, Shearing, Fertilizing

Dear Gardening Friends,

I hope that you have been enjoying the little signs of spring that are opening up all around. I particularly like the opening up of tree buds. Here is a picture I tool yesterday with my iPhone of a hickory bud opening:

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Kind of cool eh? Like two praying hands...

So, with warmer weather comes renewed enthusiasm for getting out into the garden. That enthusiasm includes a desire both to make ready and to tidy, both of which desires may involve getting out and cleaning off your pruners. A couple of eager folks with pruners all ready to go have asked when was I going to get around to the promised pruning articles! So here is the first one.

There is much to say about pruning, but just for right now, as spring erupts and your gardener juices start flowing again, and you want to know what to do or not do now, I have just a few thoughts...

((Side note 1: while pruning or talking about pruning I often think about the line in Bob Segar's "Against the Wind" that goes "what to leave in, what to leave out." A perfect pruning question! And then there is that other great line not really so applicable to pruning, but I just like it - "wish I didn't know now what I didn't know then." Seriously....OK if you now have that song in your head, click here to hear it.))

((Side note 2: in editing this before sending I realize that I have changed case throughout from third person to second person to first person and back again. My seventh grade grammar teacher at Crayton would cringe, and I apologize to her and all other grammarians. It offends me too frankly; I am rather ashamed. I'll barely be able to concentrate all day thinking of it. But I'm hurrying and don't want to take the time to fix it right now, and I just MUST get this out before Mr. Arbuckle mangles his azaleas.)

The most important thing when it comes to pruning is knowing the plants. Plants vary greatly from one another as to when they bloom, when they set buds, and how they respond to certain kinds of cuts, and so forth.

So on this beautiful early March weekend you are armed and ready with newly cleaned and sharpened hand pruners ....but you are unsure. Should I prune this plant now or later, and what about that one?

This is an important question, for in fact, some plants set their buds for flowering over the last summer or fall. These flowering buds over winter and are ready to burst out in early spring! If you prune these now you will lose your spring flowers. 

So which plants are on the "do not prune" list for early March? Here are a few - they should not be pruned until after they have flowered. Some of these flower quite early. This is NOT an exhaustive list. Please write me if you have questions about a particular plant.

forsythia

azalea

regular mophead hydrangea

mock orange

dogwood

red bud

fothergilla

quince

oak leaf hydrangea

camellia

banana shrub

rhododendrom

pieris

burning bush

sweet shrub

loropetalum

pyracantha

viburnums (with exceptions)

spring blooming spirea

weigela

sweetspire

winter honeysuckle

Note: almost all deciduous trees set flowering buds before winter. It is a fine time to prune out dead wood, or take wayward branches back to the truck or bigger branch junction. Unless you like killing branches NEVER EVER just randomly cut limbs back whether a few feet or leaving stubs on the tree. Tree pruning will be covered in a future letter.

There are a number of plants that set flower buds on NEW growth, and if you are going to prune any of these, the sooner the better. A few examples...

knock out roses (most shrub roses)

abelia

limelight hydrangeas

nandina

crape myrtle

beautyberry

althea (rose of sharon)

chaste tree

lantana

butterfly bush

clethra

oleander

wisteria

summer spirea

hibiscus

And then there are the myriad of plants that you are not growing for their showy flowers...but first, a third side note...

I am often asked whether a certain plant flowers. Well, most of the plants we are talking about are angiosperms, or flowering plants. In other words, they produce flowers, and after flowers fruit (OK, some plants are sterile). The question is do we care about the flowers they produce? Personally I love cherry laurel flower clusters but most folks hate the fruit that follows so if a cherry laurel needs to be trimmed back no great loss.. Same with ligustrum. Or cleyera. Cleyera, if allowed to grow up to its normal height of 15+ feet, with a 10-15 foot width, has lovely little flowers and wonderful little fruit. It's a really pretty plant. But almost no one plants cleyera where it can just be a cleyera (this is the number one pruning "problem" - wrong plant for the space - another letter).

Folks just don't grow cleyera or any number of other evergreen shrubs for the flowery show, because there isn't one, so these plants can be pruned now for general shaping and tidying, especially if you forgot to do that last fall.

cleyera

elaeagnus

boxwood

hollies

euonymous

yew

wax myrtle

pittosporum

fatsia

leather leaf mahonia

photinia

auvuba

barberry

harry lauder's walking stick

tea olive

Of course knowing what to prune when and knowing how to prune them are different things, and if in doubt please do write. I'll address some of the how to's in another newsletter.

Just in case you missed the memo....DO NOT SHEAR.  In fact put away your hedge clippers and electric or gas shearers immediately. Have someone hide them from you. And do not let your lawn service shear. I have an entire letter coming about the evils of shearing. 

I've been asked about fertilizing. The simple answer is wait. Wait a few weeks. No need to get the plants all hot and excited only to be cruelly killed by a late hard freeze.

Well, that should be it for now. More about pruning coming....

February Gardening

Dear Gardening Friends,

I went for a long walk yesterday, Sunday the 6th, and saw all kinds of things blooming - forsythia, Japanese magnolia, daphne, camellia, tea olive, quince, lenten rose, and lots of wildflowers, including one of my favorites, a flower called lamium, that little purple flower that shoots up with a tuft of beautiful blue/purple flowers in a whorl around the stem, and dandelions, lots of dandelions!

Tree buds are swelling more and more, as they like to do this time of year, just waiting.....anticipating....I like buds. And birds. This can actually be a hard time for birds that gather seed and berries or eat insects, since seeds and berries may have been picked over, and not may insects are out yet. So it's a good time to "feed the birds, tuppence a bag."

And just when you think spring has come on warm weekends like we just had, February can surprise you. Do you remember the great snow of 1973? It was the most significant snow event in Columbia's recorded history. I remember it well and have written about it here - "The Great Snow of '73."

Before I get into all the good stuff to do in the garden in February, let me offer these words....Enjoy your yard! Bird activity is picking up, bulbs are breaking through and blooming, buds are swelling, wildflowers are blooming and it's generally a wonderful time of the year. Gardens are works in progress - never finished and never done and subject to decay and chaos - you know, kind of like people (well me anyway)...So...embrace the work-in-progress and enjoy your special place in the sun no matter what all needs to be done!

That said...

February is sort of THE month for pruning - except of course for trees and shrubs that will be blooming this spring or which bloom off last years growth. It is the best time to do heavy pruning and cutting back of overgrown foundation shrubs like holly or cleyara or pittosporum or euonymous. and if you have not yet cut back your lantana and butterfly bushes and hibiscus now is the time to do that too. It's a great time to prune Camellia sasanqua.

Roses should be pruned back over the next few weeks as well. Those of you with knock out roses - this is a good time to take the down to a couple of feet. The things grow like mad so they will over your head by summer. OK, a digression...I have come to peace with knock out roses. As long as I don't think of them as roses (given the absence of aroma and lame individual flowers), and do think of them as easy to grow, hard to kill profusely blooming shrubs, they're OK. I fact, I kind of dig them now. And speaking of roses, it is time to plant roses. Maybe this year will be your year to plant a rose garden!

Now is the best time to prune fruit trees like cherry, peach, pear - the "stone" fruits.

February is a good time to mow or otherwise cut back mondo grass and liriope. If you have not clipped back old worn leaves and stems of your lilies - including ginger lilies - do so this month.

With all this pruning it is tempting to think, OK, may as well fertilize too. But it is still early to stimulate plant growth too much. I remember my grandmother telling me many times of one disastrous year In the late 50's or early 60's a year that there was a deep freeze the first week of April (I think she said it went down to 4 degrees F) after the "sap was running" in all of her azaleas. She lost about half of them. That may have been a bit of a freak occurrence, but it serves as a good reminder. Weather patterns are pretty crazy over these months and we need to be careful not to stimulate a lot of new growth only to see it killed by a spring freeze.

February is a good time to dig and divide perennials like black eyed susan and cone flower, ground covers, ferns, and so forth.

February is still a good time to transplant shrubs and still give plants a chance to adapt to their new spots before the heat of late spring and summer come along. One problem I see often is that shrubs that are intended for shade or partial shade being suddenly exposed to full sun because of the loss of canopy trees. Once healthy acubas, camellias, azaleas, hydrangeas and the like are now struggling. So now is a good time to move them to a happier spot out of the blazing sun.

Oh, did I say February is a great time to plant new shrubs and trees? It is. So, let's get the plans made and the plants bought and planted before the hot weather comes!

For those of you who love birds and butterflies in your garden, perhaps this would be a good year for your garden to become a Certfified Wildlife Habitat. Look over the Garden for Wildlife page of the National Wildlife Federation website. I would be thrilled to help you attain this certification.

As with December and January, February is a a great time to remove unwanted vines and trees - english ivy competes with your shrubs for water and food and is easier to remove now making way for proper bed maintenance in the spring. Although wisteria is not an evergreen, it does not hide itself very well. It is actually easier to track down and get rid of Wisteria's underground runners (and root hubs) in the winter when access in and out of beds is easier. Green smilax shoots are easier to see ow, and the tubers can be removed just as well in February as in July. Honeysuckle is not evergreen but the bark also gives it away. It can be yanked quite easily right out of the ground. Wild grape vines have very distinctive bark as well. These vines and others are so aggressive that they swarm your other plants in early spring faster than you can shake a stick. May as well get rid of them now. Winter is also a good time to remove some of the more common pesky large shrubs and trees such as cherry laurel, ligustrum, hackberry, and so forth. Even oak saplings are easy to see and remove, as they often keep some of their leaves in the winter.

Of course I am available for these and other garden tasks. PLEASE feel free to forward this link along to anyone that you think might enjoy the reading or could use my services - in Columbia, Greensboro, or other towns in the Carolinas.

Thanks,

Joel

Why I Support Universal Health Care

I wrote the following on August 28, 2009 on a now defunct blog site. Since I have been deep into the issue of health insurance today, and receiving comments from various folks, I thought this was worth reposting...

I’d like to take the next 45 minutes to write a stream of consciousness case for why I support universal health care. This is a spur of the moment draft. I will perhaps edit as I get feedback. I wanted to get these thoughts down while I was thinking ‘em.

Let me say up front that I oppose nationalized health care, any sort of single payer plan, and Obamacare at least as far as I understand it so far. I am also, for the most part, a political and fiscal conservative.

Neither do I have a good working definition as to who gets to be included in the word “universal.” That is itself is a minefield. However that question is resolved I cannot see us turning our backs on the “strangers and aliens and sojourners” amongst us.

So how can I support such a notion as universal health care? When I look around and see some people who live in huge houses in gated communities and others who live in relative squalor, it bothers me. Yet I know that “the poor will always be with us,” and that pretty much any attempt to equalize things is doomed to failure, the cure being worse than the disease. I am OK with the fact that I live in a small house and one neighbor lives in a giant house and another rents a tiny apartment.

But when I look around and see that most people have some reasonable measure of health care and some people have none, and that many people are terribly sick and dying because of the lack of it, then I stand back and think, “wait a minute, this is just not right.” It is not unlike how I would feel going into a church and there being people who are poor and sick and dying on one side, and people who are healthy and well on the other side. I would be going into Amos mode. It would not be pretty. The very idea that the well-to-do side of the church could tolerate such a state of affairs would be evidence of deep moral failure.

The city is not the church. The community is not the church. Yet it bothers me only a little less than the middle and upper classes (struggling as they [we] may be in their own way) can sit back and be OK with the present state of affairs.

I am not a liberal and I am not of the mind to force the more well to do - by governmental fiat - to make this right, but it bugs me that WE, those that have health care and have some means, and WE, all us groupings and organizations of people who have a stake in this matter, aren’t voluntarily offering solutions, solutions whereby each of us bears part of the load. That bugs me. And to the insurance companies, medical associations, the AARP, health care workers unions, hospitals, doctors offices, tort lawyers, pharmaceutical companies, pharmacies, and every other group, I say, get your butts to the table. You’re going to make less in profits, wages, down the line. Accept it. Start offering solutions. What can YOU do?

To my fellow insured Americans, let me say this. If you’re OK with all your neighbors standing in line at the emergency room to deal with flu and minor injuries and other common sicknesses, then shame on you. 

And...You (and I) are going to have to accept that you cannot be covered for everything that you want or need. You must give up something – what are you willing to give up? You’re going to have to have higher deductibles or higher co-pays or else someone is going to have to triage all the various needs somewhere somehow. We can’t keep the current state of affairs going. It will all come crashing down.

And to you cigarette companies who deal in sickness and death, how do you feel about all this? Do you sleep well at night? And you companies pushing soft drinks to our kids in schools, and any number of other things bad for their health, are you OK with that?

Just because a person is willing to buy something if you sell it doesn’t mean you should sell it. And it certainly doesn’t mean you should push it. How are you different than the pusher down at the corner?

And to all of us knowingly and willingly living high risk lives smoking, eating crappy food day in and day out, drinking too much, etc., how is it exactly that we have any “right” to have other people bail us out? How is it fair for a health insurance company not to “rate” us, and charge us more?

The issue of health is a public issue. How we raise and feed cows and pigs, how we grow crops and bring them to market, what sort of poisons we put into the air and water, what sort of cars we drive – all this impacts the cost of medical care. The ground level ozone created by inefficient and gas guzzling and pollution spewing cars and trucks, by industrial emissions, do you not think this is a health issue? Duh, it is, and it is driving up the cost of health care everywhere.

How can it be in our national and economic self interest to have so many people unable to be productive because they are sick, uninsured, victims of bad habits that decent preventative care could reduce, unemployable, missing days and days of work? How can that be good?

So what do I want? Do I want to see the government in charge of health care? No. Do I want our system to look like the one in Canada or Great Britain? No. What I want to see is groups and people voluntarily addressing their share of responsibility in the whole issue, and their share of responsibility in looking after their neighbor’s well being. Everybody needs to give up some “privilege” in order for the whole to be just and right. In the end I believe that we will all gain and live in a more healthy and just society.

PS - As a postscript to my fellow conservatives. Obama is NOT correct about one important thing. This is not the last chance for a generation. The tide is moving inexorably toward some sort of universal single payer plan. If you don’t want that, then quit wasting your time screaming and yelling about socialism and use your influence to get the private interests to the table. For if we cannot do this voluntarily it will be imposed, and through that imposition the very socialism you so abhor will become the status quo. Enough of the red herrings and scare tactics. Do something positive.

Twenty Five Great Female Vocalists (Alto, Contre Alto) with Links

I have always particularly liked female vocalists with alto or contra alto voices. I don't know why really. Maybe it is because of the more melancholy nature of the alto voice. Anyway, I've put together a list of 25 favorite of these female vocalists (pop-rock-country - not "classical")) and offered a link to a corresponding You Tube video - preferably live performances when possible. I couldn't find a live performance for Joan Armatrading's The Weakness in Me," so it's just vocals and lyrics there. No doubt studio versions of some of these songs are better and purer, but I wanted live versions.

If you know of a better video of the same song send it my way. I know I've left out some great ones too. Please make some suggestions.

Many of my favorite female vocalists aren't on this list because their voices are higher - remember that.

When I was a kid I had a major crush on Marilyn McCoo, so I had to include her. I thought she was the most beautiful woman in the world.

These are not really in any order of preference except the top five or so. KD Lang will knock your socks off.

25. The Cranberries - Linger

24. Fiona Apple - Criminal

23. Mama Cass - Dream a Little Dream of Me

22. Brandi Carlile - The Story

21. Adele - Rolling in the Deep

20. Marilyn McCoo (5th Dimension) – One Last Bell to Answer

19. Karen Carpenter – We’ve Only Just Begun

18. Odetta – Careless Love

17. Mary Chapin Carpenter – Passionate Kisses -

16. Annie Lennox (Eurythmics) – Sweet Dreams

15. Natalie Mains (The Dixie Chicks) – Top of the World

14. Stevie Nicks – Beautiful Child

13. Connie Francis – Who’s Sorry Now

12. Florence + The Machine - Shake it Out

11. Judy Garland – Over the Rainbow

10. Grace Slick (Jefferson Airplane) – White Rabbit

9. Carole King – Natural Woman

8. Etta James - At Last

7. Linda Ronstadt – I Will Always Love You

6. Gladys Knight – Midnight Train to Georgia

5. Natalie Merchant – Wonder

4. Tracy Chapman – Baby Can I Hold You

3. Patsy Cline – Walkin’ After Midnight

2. Joan Armatrading – The Weakness in Me

1. KD Lang – Crying - or maybe even better, Hallelujah

The Sandhills

Joy in Joy

Yesterday I was able to work for a wonderful kind lady in her upper 70's, frail due to a long recovery from a broken leg which followed a surgery. Her yard/garden is beautiful but obviously has not received attention the last 2-3 years. Rather than give up in despair this lady has decided to do what she enjoys, which is garden, and she does quite a lot herself, despite bad arthritis in her hand, shingles, and need of a cane.

But she needs help. The yard is indeed too much for her as it is.

Her joy in seeing the garden "come back" is palpable. My job is to do all the needed pruning of overgrown plants and then also to go into her deep very sunny back beds (It was hot as hell yesterday) and get rid of the 6-7 species of vines, all the volunteer trees, and generally make safe spaces for her to start over planting what she loves. Yes, start over. She plans to get stronger and to do more than she does now.

We share a common love for four o'clocks. Anyone who loves four o'clocks is a friend of mine.

People say to me that is good that I get to do what I love. I do like plants and I like working outside. But what I really love is making a difference in the lives of my clients, more and more of whom I now consider to be my friends. And if the client is in his or her late years, the possibility of them having peace and joy in their favorite space surrounded by a history of living and planting is deeply rewarding to me.

I'm really not in the gardening business so much as the joy business...

Hydrangea

Today I walked into the backyard of a house a block down in order to do some pruning. The homeowner said it was a mess. So I walked through the gate and found myself almost speechless. It was beautiful mostly due due to the 4-5 kinds of hydrangeas blooming everywhere, none of which were the standard blue macrophylla.

Here is a picture  of the pink oak leaf hydrangea blossom taken with my iPhone.

There were also snow white mopheads...

And a white lacecap with bees going crazy, seriously, acting hyper crazed...

There was a delicate lavender lacecap just about to bloom. Didn't get a pic of that one. The overall effect was WOW!

Wisteria

Life is being in the present, looking to the future, remembering the past - all of these. We live in some combination of engagement, hope, and remembrance. Sometimes we want to reach back and reclaim pieces of the past, a past often symbolized by common things, like a vine over a door...When we were present in that past, we often wished we could close our eyes and stay in that moment forever. I felt that every single day with my young children...Anyway, here is a song about lives past, symbolized as it were, by a vine...

 

Test

Test post from iPhone

Happy Summer

It is June the 1st and I say "Happy Summer" to you, though what "summer" exactly is is about anyone's guess. 

Culturally we tend to think of summer as the time period between Memorial Day weekend and Labor Day weekend, inclusive. I like that definition. 

Astronomically of course summer starts at the summer equinox, or June 20 or 21. I always thought it was odd to start summer on the day that daylight begins to diminish. 

In the "weather" or meteorological" view that predominates in many parts of the northern hemisphere, summer consists of the months of June, July, and August. This was always how I looked at it growing up, well, until the school year started to eat up more and more of summer.

What makes logical sense in many ways is to go by average length of daylight, which would mean that the very middle of summer would be the summer solstice on June 21 (midsummer's night), with summer starting 6 1/2 weeks before that and ending 6 1/2 weeks after. We would do the same for winter, putting it 6 1/2 weeks on each side of December 21. 

Unfortunately the weather does not cooperate with this approach, since this would have summer starting in early May - barely Spring in some places north of us. We can thank the seasonal weather "lag" for this lack of scheduling cooperation. It takes a while for things to heat up and cool down. This is more or less due to the very high specific heat of water (aren't you glad to know that!). It takes water a longer time to heat up and cool down than about anything else, so, even when air temps are rising due to longer days and more direct sunshine, water absorbs a lot of this heat energy creating the lag in general temperature increases. And since there is a lot more water than land in the world, the "seasonal" association of summer with higher temperatures does not exactly follow the convenient midsummer night's definition. 

I'll go with June, July, and August myself. 

And by any measure I was a summer baby...

Fall Red Bud