Saint Baldricks Day in the Garden Listening to a Chorus of Singers

Posted on 15/03/2012 by Grumpa Joe

At my last Lions club meeting Lion Virgil announced that the Frankfort Chief of Police was going to shave his head as part of the local Saint Baldrick’s  event to raise money for cancer research. The club donated to his cause since the Chief is a Lion. Then, another Lion member raised his hand and announced that he too is going to shave his head to raise money. He wanted to have his business initials R N R carved into his sideburns, but I’m sure the hair cutter will only know how to do one thing, shave heads.

This morning, I attacked the garden in preparation for the Monet Vision 2012. The place is a mess. Fallen leaves tucked in every corner, spent flower stalks dried and ratty looking, I had to do something. So today, was Saint Baldrick’s day in the garden, I cut the grasses to make room for the new grass coming up. It is two months before our last safe freeze day on May 15, but the temperature is eighty-four degrees, and stuff is exploding out of the ground. Here are some head shaves to meditate upon:

Before the Head Shave

After the Head Shave

Pond Grass In Winter Dress

Pond Grass with Saint Baldrick's Treatment

Lake Grass After The Eighth Easiest Winter In Chicago History

Lake Grass Gone!

One of the best things to happen as I cut away, was the serenade of baby frogs in the pond. Every so often, I  crept to the edge of the water and stood real still to look for the singers.  Each time they shut up as I got close. Later, when I wasn’t looking, I spotted one jump out of the reeds a few feet away. They still sport a winter black coat. By July, they will turn a gorgeous green.

As part of the Monet Vision 2012’s grass shave effort to raise funds for childhood-cancer research, the Donate Now button below is active to allow you to do so. All funds collected by the Monet Vision 2012 will go directly to the cause.

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Baby Bugs Takes Out the Lobelia

Posted on 09/06/2011 by Grumpa Joe
Fictional characters on the Hollywood Walk of Fame

Image via Wikipedia

On Mother’s Day Grumpa Joe’s grandkids spotted a big fat wabbit building a nest under the dwarf pine tree. Grumpa Joe’s grandson Ben looked into his eyes and asked him not to harm the bunny. As tempting as it is to trap the little ba____d, Grumpa can not do it. A promise to a grandson is like a marriage oath. It is not taken lightly.

About two weeks after the wabbit spotting, Grumpa Joe spent a day pulling weeds. He yanked a big one from the base of the dwarf pine. A furry little creäture with long ears jumped out of a small hole, and ran for his life.

Since then, Baby Bugs hops around the garden to different places, always chomping on some greenery. This week, however, Baby Bugs found the Lobelia flowers. His ancestors took out the Lobelia last year in a blatant act of terrorism not seen before in the garden. Is it a wabbit thing, or does Lobelia taste like chicken’?

Today, Grumpa Joe spent a couple of hours building a new wabbit barrier that will be more effective than the 2010 experiment.

The 2011 Monet Vision will not become reality without a streak of royal blue accenting the pond. If this barrier fails, Grumpa will use more drastic measures to convince Baby Bugs to leave the yard.

“Don’t worry Ben, Grumpa won’t hurt him, . . . YET.”

Lobelia, a Basic Color in the 2011 Monet Vision is a favorite of Wabbits

The New Wabbit Barrier Dome

Eighteen Feet of Royal Blue Lobelia Highlights the Pond

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The 2011 “Monet Vision”

Posted on 06/06/2011 by Grumpa Joe

The 2011 version of the Monet Vision is beginning to take shape. The recent spell of high temperatures combined with the rain has made the garden “pop.”

Last year, I let the perennials do all the work. I didn’t spend a nickel on annuals. This year is the opposite, I am planting purchased material in colors I want to see, and spreading seed to fill in. Here are a few photos from which you may form an impression.

Looking toward the waterfall. as Garden Angel watches.

The first bloom of water lilies.

Several varieties of Heuchera blend with hostas

The Clematis is barely showing.

This show is to continue all summer long.

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The Monet Vision is Forming In My Mind

Posted on 05/03/2011 by Grumpa Joe

Boy do I regret not going to Arizona this winter. I forgot how dreary winter gets. Even though the days are getting longer and the sun shines bright on some days, the chill gets into my bones. It is funny how one can get acclimated to warmth so quickly. I have only spent three complete winters in the desert, but those three winters have won out over the sixty-nine winters spent in the cold. How could that be? If our bodies acclimate so readily to heat why has so much of civilization settled in the northern cold climates? I certainly can’t understand Eskimos at all. I also have a problem understanding Mexicans who sneak into the cold.  A hungry stomach must win out over a cold body.

Our days are getting noticeably warmer. We often see highs in the forty’s now, but the wind makes it feel a lot colder. Yesterday, I toured my yard io review the ravages of winter, and what has to be done to clean it up. Aside from cutting the many annual flowers I left up for the birds and for winter interest, I have a leak in my pond. That one worries me. It could be simple, or it could mean digging up pipes, or it could mean searching endlessly for a cut or pinhole. I don’t look forward to that. It might take Grey Goose and tonic to put me in the right frame of mind to “gett’r done.” Or, it could mean spending a ton of money to watch it get done. Right now, I have more time than money, but  I am short on energy and motivation. Perhaps the warmth of summer will provide the motivation. In the meantime, I look forward to the signs of spring. They are evident and causing the gardening juices to flow. Literally, the juices are flowing into the trees, and the shrubs, and Mother Nature is waking her babies. It is almost time to propagate and multiply.

Here are some of the things I see in late winter:

Nothing beats a late Winter sunset, welll maybe a Summer sunset, or maybe any sunset.

Magnolia Buds Coming Alive

Tired Rose Hips

Winter Lilac Prunings

Daffodils Coming Alive

 

The Water level Drops Four Inches in 72 Hours

Dried Annual Stems Ready to Cut

Barb’s Last Garden Angel Hidden Behind Spent Shasta Daisies

 

More Perennial Debris to Cut

 

Morning Glory Trellis Blown Down in the Blizzard

Magnificent March Sunset

I’m tired just looking at it all, but the Monet Vision is forming in my mind and I can SEE Summer now!

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Choo-Choo Hosta

Posted on 19/01/2011 by Grumpa Joe

My friends know that I am into gardens. I have a page dedicated to my Garden hobby. I often show photos of flowers and my garden in my posts. During the winter, I write about my indoor garden.

This weekend, I had occasion to scour through a couple of thousand old photos. I came across some that I had forgotten about. They are of my first real garden adventure. Prestwick is the neighborhood I lived in during another lifetime. The properties were large and there was room to make some nice things happen. There were trees, shrubs, lawn, and flower beds too. Previous to Prestwick, I didn’t really get into gardening, but Barb did. She was the master planter and color coordinator. I helped her with shovel work. When we moved to Prestwick, I got the bug, not for the horticultural aspect but for an aqua-scape. I fell in love with the idea of a pond. I told people that I always wanted to own lakefront property, but couldn’t afford it, so I built my own lake in the back yard. The idea became a reality and the rest developed from there.

I told a fellow engineer at work about my ideas for the pond while we were on a twenty hour flight to Singapore. A few months later he asked me  when I would get started. “Soon,”I replied.

“How soon?”  he asked.

He basically chided me to “s_ _ _  or get off the pot.”

“I can be there tonight with a backhoe.”

“Okay.”

I got home from work at my usual six-thirty and had supper with Barb. In the middle of our dinner the dishes began to shake on the table. “What is that?” she asked.

“It is probably Delmar coming to dig the hole.”  Just as I finished those words a blue tractor with a back hoe stopped at the end of our drive.

“What is going on?”

“We are digging the hole for the pond.”

“When were you going to tell me?”

“Now.”

That was the beginning of my love affair with the garden. It took several years to develop a pond and the surrounding landscape. Each year, we changed it to make it look better. I had a new vision of what it should look like after I finished the last one. Of course, each vision built on the last.

During the first five years I installed a little pond with a waterfall spilling into the big pond,. That wasn’t enough, I added a second  waterfall to spill into the little pond. After that, I was unhappy with the water clarity, so I designed a filter. A pump moved pond-water underground to the filter-aerator.  Clean oxygenated water returned  via a stream to the big pond. A little complicated, but it all worked pretty good, and it looked okay too. The fish were very happy and growing along with a variety of bog, and water plants. There was the sound of trickling,and splashing water to soothe the soul.

All the time I was playing hydro-engineer, Barb continued to plant a variety of perennials. She mixed annuals in between to add color and textures. The garden was shady, so she learned to plant only those things that grew well in shade like hosta and Impatiens.

We went to the Farmer’s market in town and discovered a vendor who specialized in hostas. He gave me a history of all the possibilities and varieties of hosta plants. Before long there was a collection of sixty different hosta varieties.

One year we were on a vacation trip to Michigan, We loved to stop in small towns and look at the shops. Out of a hundred shops, maybe one turned me on. This time, we found a shop that sold G-Scale Trains made by the Kalamazoo Toy Train Factory. These trains are commonly used in garden railways.  I never heard of a garden railroad before, but the idea was intriguing. Barb let me buy an 1850’s steam locomotive with a tender, a passenger car and a flatbed. It was on display around our christmas tree for the first few years before I got the bug to add a new feature to the pond;  add the train as an item of interest in the garden. What that translates into is track, and a train. No buildings, or people, just track, plants, and trains. The garden became animated.

It took a complete year to develop the 100 foot road bed with trestle, a bridge, and a tunnel.  The effort was worth it.

Here are some of the photos that started this long-winded piece of personal history.

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