Tag Archives: spring gardening

Got Wildlife?

Springtime flowers in the woods, with white and purple flowers
Some of my favorite native spring flowers are in bloom this month: great white trillium, wild ginger, trout lily, jacob’s ladder, wild blue phlox, cut-leaved toothwort, spring beauty, virginia bluebells, and bloodroot

We’ve been having lovely weather lately: warm, sunny days in the 70s. Cool evenings. Low humidity. The garden is awake and thriving, and I’ve been spending lots of time outside working on projects and just trying to soak up all the joys of the season. The pollinators and other insects are emerging, and watching the carpenter bees happily buzz around while we’ve been out spreading leaf compost and planting has really given me a mental boost.

There’s a lot of activity in the garden: the creeping phlox are blooming, as are the candytuft, broad-leaved phlox, and our flowering dogwood tree. The maidenhair and ostrich ferns are also waking up.

April in Ohio is officially Native Plant Month, and watching all the native wildflowers come alive again is one of my favorite parts of the entire year. We’ve included quite a few native wildflowers in our own garden to enjoy: bloodroot, wild geranium, dutchman’s breeches, jack-in-the-pulpits, rue anemone, wild ginger, trout lilies, woodland phlox, spring beauty, great white trillium, and common blue violets. Spring ephemerals are perennial flowers, mostly found in woodlands. They like life in the shade, sprouting up in early spring before the leaves on the trees branch out, shading the ground where these flowers grow. Spring ephemerals bloom for a very short window of time, in some cases like bloodroot, just for a single day. They provide very important nectar and pollen sources for the pollinators which are emerging from their winter shelters. Many native plants aren’t yet in bloom, and without our spring ephemerals, these important members of our ecosystems wouldn’t have the food and resources they need to stay alive.

I’ve been checking out the wooded trails at the local park a few times a week, because new flowers emerge daily, and it’s such a treat to watch them all in this short window of time. Back in our own garden, I’ve been regaling the husband with the play-by-play as each of our own spring ephemerals sprout, and the neighbors probably wonder who the heck I am, outside in my pajamas, hovering over tiny flowers with my camera, cooing at the ground about 55 times a day.

I can’t seem to get enough of the garden lately. In the evenings, I’ve been painting a few of my favorite native plants, like these big bluestem, prairie dock, purple giant hyssop, echinacea, st. john’s wort, and creeping phlox.

Warm weather has brought with it a list of the usual springtime gardening chores. Unlike my pile of laundry, I don’t tend to avoid these. After a few months away while winter did its thing, I’ve been more than ready to get my hands back in the soil. We ordered a pallet of leaf compost and have mulching all the beds with it. As the mulch goes in, I’ve been slowly cleaning up the beds from last year. Once the temps are above 50 degrees for at least a week, the insects that overwinter in last years plant stems are awake, and it’s ok to cut them back. Our plant debris goes into a large pile under the deck to slowly compost and provide habitat to birds and other insects.

Our new fence was installed a few weeks ago, a long overdue process. On one side of the house, our neighbors also have a fence, so we didn’t put a fence back on that side. Now, there’s about 8″ of extra growing space. In that space, there were a few invasive species that somehow grew up between the fences. We spent a satisfying afternoon ripping out a callery pear tree (now illegal to sell or buy in Ohio, finally!), some multiflora rose, and a thicket of amur bush honeysuckle. We’ve moved a few plants around and I’ve already hit up my favorite native plant nursery in Central Ohio, Scioto Gardens, for some great native shrubs and plants to replace the riffraff that used to be there. An arrowwood viburnum, black and red chokeberries, and allegheny serviceberry will all be providing habitat and food to the local birds and insects. I also grabbed some purple prairie clover, wild ginger, lady ferns, hardy aster, spring beauty, and more dutchman’s breeches to pepper into other spots in the garden.

L’hôtel à Insectes bug hotel is officially open for business! The hottest residence in town, this hotel features all locally sourced materials, from silken strands of northern sea oats to freshly trimmed poke berry stalks. A private stone entrance leads to the check in desk, where you’ll choose your room. Whether you’re looking for locust twigs, oak blocks, egg cartons, or goldenrod stems, we offer something for everyone. Come stay with us today!

Food-wise, the produce sections of the garden are also steaming ahead. The basement greenhouse is packed with plants that I’ll very soon be hardening off and planting. (Just a reminder to check your last frost date before planting any tender annuals, like peppers, tomatoes, or flowers like dahlias, unless you plan to cover them on frosty evenings!). Outside, the coldframe is also hopping. We’ve been harvesting lettuce and spinach, and the nasturtiums, chives, and native plants I have growing from seed are also coming along well. Our asparagus patch started sprouting this week, and the garlic, onions, leeks, potatoes, and carrots I’ve planted are also looking well so far. I’ve also started making some sweet potato slips, that I probably should have started months ago, but just about everything else is on track for a nice harvest.

Another project I’ve been meaning to work on for ages now finally was tackled today. I made a bug hotel! We had an old box that some wine came in, which I used for the frame. I stuffed it full of recycled materials from the garden: twigs from last fall’s locust tree trim, dried grasses from the latest northern sea oats display, hollow stems and dried flowers from the pokeberry plant, and some other odds and ends I found while wandering around the garden. The husband also drilled a few holes in some oak boards we’ve had in the garage from a past project for the bees to enjoy. I am so pleased with the way everything turned out. As I was carrying it out to its spot in the garden, I found a stinkbug on the kitchen window, so I escorted him into the hotel to be the first customer. Hopefully he left a nice review.

It’s starting to rain, but before I go check on the hotel again (maybe someone new found it already!), I wanted to share a list of a few small things you can do in your own gardens to help encourage more beneficial wildlife this gardening season:

Wishing you all a lovely season, as our gardens wake up and start to grow. Happy gardening!

Jump-starting Springtime

Last months crocus display was another doozy.

It’s the last day of winter here in the northern hemisphere today, and the season is hanging on firmly. We’ve had flurries the past few days, temps in the 20s, and quite blustery winds. Of course, living in Ohio, if you don’t like the weather here, just wait a few hours. The high tomorrow is going to be in the 50s, which is what’s expected at this time of year.

Not that I’d have started my outdoor gardening last month on the 70+ degree days (our last frost date isn’t until early May). However, it it has been interesting to watch all of the early growth outdoors grind to a halt. Trees had started budding out, and perennials were shooting up almost a month early. And then, in the past couple weeks, Mother Nature seems to have hit the pause switch.

Since I’m incapable of exhibiting any sort of patience, I haven’t paid this weather setback too much attention. I set up a greenhouse in our basement, and this years seed-starting has taken off with a flurry of planting. I spent this weekend transplanting seedlings that have already outgrown their first tiny pots. Heading down to check on the greenhouse has become a highlight of the day, and I’ve been obsessively monitoring the temperature and humidity as I watch all the little seeds sprout and grow. It will be awhile before anything moves outdoors, but what kind of gardener would I be if I didn’t test the limits of the greenhouse (and the laws of physics) by cramming in as many plants as possible?

The greenhouse is currently housing a collection of pothos, pineapples, a lemon tree, a few succulents, some madder root, a banana tree, and a crop of seedlings: basil, comfrey, cumin, oregano, sesame, cantaloupe, watermelon, leeks, lettuce, loofahs, bell peppers, poblano peppers, cayenne peppers, tomatillos, cherry tomatoes, paste tomatoes, petunias, blue false indigo, and swamp milkweed. Out on the deck, the cold frame is housing some spinach, and, creek sedge, yellow coneflowers, tall ironweed, blue false indigo, wild bergamot, and swamp milkweed are all basking away in recycled milk jugs until it’s warm enough for them to sprout.

The next few weeks should continue to be pretty busy. We’re having a new fence installed to replace the current one, which is beyond dilapidated. Once things warm up just a bit more, I’ll get the leeks transplanted outdoors, the carrots, onions, parsley, and snow peas planted, and the next round of seedlings will get planted in the greenhouse. Our asparagus crop should be springing up soon, a favorite of ours. And, I’m planning to mulch all of the beds around the garden with leaf compost.

Come April, I have a few shrubs to add to the yard. I’ll be nabbing a rain barrel and getting that set up. I’m also planning to rework one of our shade gardens by the wildlife pond. The compost bin that lives there may be moving around a bit, and I want to better design the space so things look a little more cohesive with the rest of the yard. It’s also entirely possible that I’ll be adding another raised bed so I have room for everything I’d like to grow this year (see aforementioned seed-starting mania).

So, that’s early springtime sorted around these parts. Hopefully your gardening plans are also coming together this year. If not, it’s only Mid-March. There’s plenty of time! Happy gardening!

One of the greenhouse shelves, packed full of lettuce and tomatoes.



May June be Fruitful

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The snow peas have been enjoying all of our rain showers.

It feels like this gardening season just started, but somehow, we’re already a week into June. I’ve been harvesting strawberries each day (this years crop has been very delicious so far), and yesterday, I collected the garlic scapes. I’m excited to pull the bulbs in a couple weeks here, but the scapes have so much flavor. I don’t know where these awesome things were hiding my whole life, but since I started growing my own garlic, I’m hooked. I’ve also started harvesting the first of this years herb crop: some thyme, bay leaves, basil, chives, and chamomile. Hopefully the next few months bring just as much delicious food from the garden!

Out in the raised beds, the seedlings I started seem to (mostly) be doing well. The peas are flowering and I had to add on to the trellis I built for them, as they grew taller than expected. The peppers are looking good. We’re going to have a bumper crop of potatoes. The cut flower garden is coming in strong. However, the tomatoes are looking… really sad. We’ve had a lot more rain than they really enjoy, and it’s been very warm, very fast, since I planted them out. I’m hoping they bounce back here and we are able to harvest enough for my portion of the family salsa crop.

Up on the deck, the jungle is faring much better. Out lemon tree is flowering again. I have my fingers crossed that the local pollinator population works its magic and we end up with some fruit. Our cantaloupe are also flowering, and the burst of cucumber beetles I saw in the yard has already been taken care of by the birds, leaving the cantaloupe alone. I started the green beans and black-eyed peas in pots this past week, and in typical legume-fashion, they’ve already sprouted up.

This years strawberries have been very sweet!

Out in the rest of the yard, my beloved peonies and clematis are about finished flowering. The daisies, canadian anemones, blue flag irises, ohio spiderwort, coral honeysuckle, nepeta, lavender, roses, asiatic lilies, and day lilies are all flowering this week. Our milkweed should be starting here shortly, and I am really exited to see the swamp milkweed again! It’s name absolutely doesn’t do this amazing plant any favors, but it’s my favorite native plant. Not only does it support monarch caterpillars, but the plant blooms with gorgeous little pink and white flowers for a few weeks each year at the end of spring. The flowers are, hands down, my favorite smelling thing in the garden. They smell very sweet, without the perfume-scent of roses or lilacs. And in addition to supporting our endangered monarchs, bees and other pollinators flock to this beauty. I can’t recommend it enough for gardeners in the Midwest. In a container or out in a bed, swamp milkweed is a GEM.

Now that the bulk of the planting for the year is wrapped up, I still have to finish a few landscaping projects around the yard. The Great Pond Area Widening Project has been put on a slight hold, due to a lot of rainy days, followed by a string of days that have just been too blazing hot. I’m hoping to get the rest of the sod pulled out this week, so I can mulch the area and shift a bit of planting around to fill in the new space. I’ve been seeing a lot of bees on the spiderwort that lives there, as well as a few dragonflies and damselflies. It’s a pleasant way to spend some time, just pausing for a bit to watching all the pond residents buzz around the flowers.

Hope that you’ve had a chance to stop and enjoy all of the plants and flowers growing near you. Happy gardening!

The bees have really been enjoying the Ohio Spiderwort flowers this spring.

Flowers, Flowers Everywhere

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This gardening season is off to a hot start!

It has been an intense few weeks in the garden. Everything always seems to happen at once at this time of year, and I waver between feeling completely overwhelmed and excited at all the activity. We’ve had a lot of rain this month, and some unseasonably warm temperatures, so all the plants have been growing like wild.

About everything is finally in the ground. I started an absurd number of plants from seed this year (after swearing to myself I’d be reasonable- ha!), and nearly everything has made its way outside and into the dirt. I still have some beans to find room for, but my seed stash is pretty sparse again. I’m looking forward to harvest time! I started a lot of new (to me) things this year.

Many plants are living in containers on the deck this year, since we don’t have quite enough room for everything out in the beds. I find that some days, it’s far easier to manage pots, both for watering and harvesting. Wrangling the hose around the yard and willing myself up and down the deck stairs to gather up everything out in the beds gets to be a bit much when I’m having flare days from my autoimmune disease. So, having things close to the kitchen really ups the odds that I’ll pay the plants their due attention!

The deck probably passed its Container Capacity (the amount of pots the husband has to wade through to get to the grill) about 20 plants ago, but I’m excited for everything to grow up and start blooming. I have quite a few different vining plants (cantaloupe, pie pumpkins, watermelons, loofahs, madder, morning glories, and coral honeysuckle) on the deck this year, and oodles of herbs, fruits, veggies, and flowers for the pollinators. I don’t plant annuals out in the beds in the full sun since they typically require watering almost daily, but on the deck, where there’s some shade, I can stretch my watering to just a few days a week.

Living on the deck now, in addition to the vines, are: bay laurel, calla lilies, a chenille plant, begonias, petunias, parsley, two types of fennel, a lemon tree, basil, lettuce, spinach, cosmos, potatoes, mint, four types of thyme, chives, zinnias, oregano, aloe, four pineapples, cumin, indigo, nasturtiums, chamomile, a banana tree, swiss chard, ranunculus, tomatillos… I’m sure I’m forgetting something. Oh! The stairs! I made a “Stairway to Salsa,” on the deck steps, with more tomatillos, sweet peppers, and druzba tomatoes. So, clearly, a normal amount of plants.

Out in the raised beds, I’m impatiently waiting for the garlic scapes to show up. With our recent warm weather, I’m expecting to see them here by the end of the month. Once the garlic bulbs are able to be harvested, I’ll probably plant up some more lettuce. The rest of the beds are packed pretty full. Our first bed houses the permanent asparagus patch (which was delicious this year), and I added some potatoes. The next bed is hosting the paste tomatoes, marigolds, and more potatoes. (There are also four grow bags of potatoes on the deck- I think I could feed the entire Midwest with the number of potatoes I planted this year). Our third bed houses the aforementioned garlic, lettuce, cucumbers, parsley, basil, and a handful of poblano peppers. The final raised bed is mostly devoted to a cut flower garden this year, and in it lives a boatload of onions, carrots, leaks, bachelor buttons, love-in-a-mist, zinnias, calendulas, and a trellis of snow peas.

Out in the flower beds, I’ve added a lot more native plant seedlings. I grew several types of milkweed- common and swamp (my favorite- it’s so pretty and smells divine!), yellow coneflowers, ironweed, prairie dropseed, big bluestem, switchgrass, indiangrass, little bluestem, rudbeckia, broom sedge, violets, wild bergamot, and yarrow. Everything sprouted up nicely this spring and has since been moved out into the beds as I’ve been weeding, removing invasive creeping charlie and creeping jenny, and cleaning up the stalks left from last years perennials. I’ve also been tossing in sunflower seeds along the fenceline. They grow up quickly and bring me so much joy in the late summer while they bloom. Plus, the pollinators are always all over the flowers, and the birds eat the seeds in the autumn.

I’ve also been expanding the garden around the wildlife pond. It’s become one of my favorite spots in the whole yard. I love sitting next to the pond, listening to the water move, and watching the insects and frogs. I’m still not sure what species the frogs are, but they showed up a couple weeks ago and have been hanging out on the rocks and in the cover of the foliage around the pond. I’m so thrilled to see them back. I hope they have little froglettes and we end up with an army of mosquito eaters! But, back to expansion. I’ve been slowly removing more grass, and adding in extra native plants. I moved a bunch of the swamp milkweed seedlings (they loves the wet area there, and thrive in our obnoxious clay soil), as well as a few more smooth penstemon (another wet soil/clay lover), and an oak leaf hydrangea. I’ve wanted one of these hydrangeas for ages, and I’m so excited that I was able to plant this baby this year. They are native to our area, require almost zero maintenance (a must for plants in my garden), and they also grow just fine in our clay.

Thea area around the pond, mid-expansion

So, the pond garden is filling up! I added a water lily to the pond itself, and the canadian anemones and ohio spiderwort are in bloom now. Next, I hope to see the blue flag irises and our new buttonbush flowering.

Out in the front yard, the new pollinator garden we added by the street is growing in nicely! I added mostly native plants to this space as well, and every time I go get the mail, I see bees enjoying the flowers there. I’m hoping to add a few more plants this season since the terrible soil out there doesn’t seem to be slowing anything down. Closer to the house, around our locust tree, the bed we added two seasons ago is also filling in nicely. I stuck a few native prairie plants here, but there’s a lot more shade from the locust tree, so this bed houses mostly perennials that I’ve split from elsewhere in the garden. The final beds, around the house, are about to explode with day lilies, daisies, butterfly weed, and purple giant hyssop (a really lovely native alternative to salvias that are packed with butterflies, hummingbird moths, and bees all summer long). The purple bugleweed is also blooming now, which the bees seem to enjoy.

Indoor plants aside, that’s the garden for 2022! (I keep a few plants inside year-round, since they either require more shade than I can offer, or less water than we receive). Now that most of the clean up and the first round of weeding is done, I really won’t have too much more to do, maintenance-wise. I have a few more project ideas for the year… we’ll see how far I get. And, the pond bed expansion is ongoing. But, things seem to really be shaping up in the ole Happy Rabbit Garden. Despite my fretting, the plants seem happy. There’s oodles of birds around, enjoying the bug buffet. I’ve yet to be bitten by a mosquito (I will now that I’ve acknowledged that fact). I see bees out working hard and enjoying the spring flowers. It’s not always the space I have in mind, but the garden really is beautiful. Hope that you are enjoying a lovely spring with your plants as well. Happy gardening!

Small Fish in a Big Pond

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Hardening off the freshly-sprouted seedlings!

After waking up to thunderstorms in the wee small hours of the morning, I didn’t have tremendously high hopes for the day. But, in the afternoon, the sun came out, and it turned into a lovely time for gardening.

Today is the first of May, my favorite month in the garden. All the perennials are coming back up, there’s lots of trees and flowers in bloom, and it’s not yet so hot and humid that being outside for any length of time is miserable. We’re not quite past our last frost date here in Central Ohio, so I haven’t moved everything outside quite yet. But, I was able to start hardening off the tomatoes, peppers, cantaloupe, and flowers that I’ve been growing from seed indoors. The process takes about ten days/two weeks, so by the time they are ready to plant in the ground, it will be warm enough to plant them in the ground.

The deck is already packed full of pots. I started a bunch of native grasses from seed to add to the borders along our fence: Prairie Dropseed (Sporobolus heterolepis), Big Bluestem (Andropogon geradii), Switchgrass (Panicum virgatum), Indian Grass (Sorghastrum nutans), and Broom Sedge (Andropogon virginicus). There’s also pots full of strawberries, potatoes, thyme, chives, mint, and a bunch of native perennials, like Common Milkweed (Asclepias syriaca) and Wild Bergamot (Monarda fistulosa). The cold frame filled up very quickly this year, but we’re about past the time where I need it. Looks like I skated by starting too many seeds for yet another year!

Out in the raised beds, things are also filling up. Our asparagus is in its fourth year, so it’s really coming in nicely. We’ve already been able to enjoy a few harvests on the grill. The garlic I planted last fall is also looking quite nice. It should be time to harvest those bulbs here in a few weeks. Also out in the beds are some carrots, leeks, onions, snow peas, and potatoes. We’re going to have potatoes coming out of our ears this year. I have four grow bags full of them on the deck, and two more rows of potatoes out in the raised beds. I’m just trying to represent my Irish heritage well!

As usual, the deck is filling up with potted plants.

Just off of the raised beds is the wildlife pond that went in last year. I’ve had a few people ask how the pond had its start in life, so I thought I’d share the tale again, and give an update.

I’d had a small water feature in mind for a few years, but I wasn’t sure about what to put in. Fountains are EXPENSIVE and I thought a pond would be too much upkeep. Two years ago, I added a few small, shallow pots to the landscape, filled with water for the birds and pollinators to enjoy. I highly recommend this. It’s a simple way to help lure more wildlife into the yard, and things are easy to clean and maintain. But, with every viewing of the BBC’s Gardeners World, I wanted more.

Our lot is just over 6,000 square feet, which is below average for the US (you people with acreage are really throwing off the curve). It’s more than big enough for two fairly lazy people who hate lawn maintenance, and as I searched online for examples of wildlife ponds, I knew the yard was large enough to fit what I had in mind as well. I wanted something about 3′ by 3′, in a circle-ish shape, and shallow enough that I wouldn’t have to do much digging to put the thing in. So, one day, I told the husband that we were putting a pond in, and we started to dig. Well, actually, back that up. First, I called 8-1-1 and had the utility companies come out to mark our electric and cable lines so we wouldn’t hit anything. If you’re ever doing any digging in your yard, for a tree, a pond, or any kind of larger hole, Call Before You Dig!

So, yard spray-painted with lines marking the important things, we mapped out the spot for the pond with an old hose. I’ve seen this done before, and it’s a great way to “see” what your new project is going to look like before you start digging around. Just use the hose like a border, and make the shape you want. Once we had things outlined, we started digging.

The pond is about 2′ deep in the center, with tapered edges, and a little beach on one end. I specifically wanted a wildlife-style pond in the yard, and for animals to be able to get in and use the thing, I knew a gradual entryway was required. Once the digging was complete, we added a lining, using plastic sheeting. The sheet is fairly thick, and I folded it in half to add even more oomph to the lining.

The perennials are coming back in nicely this year, framing in the pond and helping to provide food and shelter to any critters who may be in the area. Now that the rocks have settled in, I have a few more to add, but I’m happy with the progress so far!

Next, we added some river rock and pebbles to the bottom, and along the edges. Then, larger flat stones went in around the border of the pond and along the sides, to hide the plastic sheet. Once that was finished, we filled the pond with water, and I used some old branches and sticks to line one end of the pond and make it look more natural and wild. This makes a great space for wildlife to hide and nest. After a simple bubbler went in to circulate the water around, that was that for the pond.

The area where we put the pond is mostly in the shade. It was a damp area to begin with, that grew a lot of moss and henbit. So, I added in plants that liked the shade and wet conditions, and used mostly species native to our area to lure in even more o the things we wanted, like dragonflies and caterpillars. There’s a lot around the pond, all perennials: an eastern redbud tree, a buttonbush, maidenhair ferns, wild geraniums, creek sedge, blue flag irises, sweet flag irises, jack-in-the-pulpits, rue anemones, sea oats, spiderwort, a pitcher plant, and a little grouping of hostas and heucheras. The native plants and trees (all but the last two) support over 100 species of caterpillars!

Today, I added the bubbler back into the pond for the season. I started with a little, floating solar fountain. But, after a couple of months, it bit the dust. So, I added in a little aquarium pump, that plugs into an outlet on the deck. It helps keep water circulating and the sound attracts more birds to the pond for bath time.

Other than that, I don’t do a thing to the pond, except weed around it. (And, today, I pulled a few leaves out of the water so they wouldn’t clog up the bubbler). I don’t use any chemicals to clean the water- the bubbler takes care of that. And we’ve had the neatest wildlife show up in the short time the pond has been around: all kinds of birds, dragonflies (just one can eat up to 100 mosquitoes in a day, in case you’re worried about the water in the yard attracting too many of the bloodsuckers), beetles, spiders, other insects, and most excitingly, frogs! Two arrive last summer and I hope we see more this year.

Some of the shade-loving plants and trees in bloom right now: great white trillium, dutchman’s breeches, rue anemone, and flowering dogwood

So, that’s the wildlife pond. It’s doing exactly what I’d wanted: luring in wildlife. And, it’s been fuss-free. Is the water always 100% clear? Nope. Does it look like a well-manicured water feature? Absolutely not. But, those things weren’t my goal. I wanted the space to look natural and I think we succeeded. This spring has already been filled with joyful moments and I wander around the pond, looking at the different wildlife which lives there- the insects, the native wildflowers, and the occasional bird, stopping by to wade around the beach.

Hopefully, this helps get you started if you’re interested in adding your own pond to the yard. There’s lots of books and resources out there to inspire, including this one that I used from the Conservation Foundation. Happy gardening!

The One Where We Save the Birds

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The Virginia Bluebells are in their prime right now, and looking absolutely gorgeous!

We had some very nice, warm weather this weekend. I think I could actually feel the stampede of people heading outdoors to try soaking up the sunshine before things cool off again. We’ve had a string of lousy weekends, with sleet, snow, rain, and general cold, so it felt pretty great to be outdoors, working in the dirt again.

I cleaned out a few of the beds, trimming back last seasons perennials, mulching, and weeding. I don’t care what grows in the grass (the bees have been enjoying our crop of dandelions already!), but I try to keep the beds free of all the creeping charlie, thistle, dandelions, and bittercress.

There’s been a lot happening in the raised beds lately. Our garlic is growing up quite well, and has been joined by the leeks that I started indoors the other month, along with some snow peas, yellow onions, carrots, lettuce, potatoes, and spinach. The crop of native plants that I grew from seed this winter have been thinned and moved to larger pots. And our asparagus crop is coming in. We harvested the first batch for dinner. Yum!

This weekend saw a trip to one of my favorite plant centers, Scioto Gardens, for some more native plants to add to the wildlife pond. I picked up some more Blue Flag Irises (Iris virginica), Jack-in-the-Pulpit (Arisaema triphyllum), an Oak Sedge (Carex pensylvanica), a Buttonbush (Cephalanthus occidentalis), and an Oak Leaf Hydrangea (Hydrangea quercifolia) to add to the native plants that already live around the pond. All told, so far, the plants we have living there play host to over 100 species of Lepidoptera (moths and butterflies)!

Our new Jack-in-the-Pulpits, flowering around the wildlife pond

Other than just simply enjoying caterpillars, moths, and butterflies in the yard, I’m making an effort to add plants that host these critters for a reason. Just in North America, in the past 50 years, we’ve lost 1 in 4 birds. This isn’t just happening in exotic, tropical rain forest locations. It’s happening in our backyards. The birds we typically see here in Ohio are all experiencing a mass decline. And a huge reason for this is because they simply don’t have enough to eat.

Lots of my gardening friends put up bird feeders during the winter months, myself included. But the largest part of most birds diets are from bugs, especially caterpillars. Robins, woodpeckers, blue jays, wrens, warblers, sparrows, chickadees, cardinals, and many more rely on caterpillars for their survival. And they need to eat a LOT of caterpillars! According to Douglas Tallamy, (Professor of Agriculture in the Department of Entomology and Wildlife Ecology at the University of Delaware) a single pair of breeding chickadees must find 6,000 to 9,000 caterpillars to raise just one clutch of young.

We don’t make this easy on them. Think about the yards in your neighborhood, or around your area. What do they look like? Are there a lot of native trees and plants around, or is much of the area covered in turf grass? While it’s hard to imagine having a yard without at least some nice grass to enjoy, it doesn’t support the insects that our birds need to eat to survive. Add in all the chemicals we dump onto our lawns to kill of weeds and “bad bugs,” and it’s no wonder that birds are experiencing such a tragic decline.

As gardeners, there is so much we can do to help out the animals around us, and honestly, we need these birds and insects to thrive for our own well-being, too. Without insects pollinating our crops and flowers, we wouldn’t make it. We all need a healthy ecosystem to enjoy, and this spring is a great time to consider ways to make a difference in your own yards and areas.

I know I’ve talked about native plant species already, but it’s so important to add these to your landscape! There’s a great tool out there, The Native Plant Finder, where you simply type in your zip code, and the site will show oodles of native plants for you to try adding to your garden, along with a list of how many and which species of moths and butterflies they play host to. Search for native plant nurseries in your area and try out a few this year. You will be amazed at what shows up, seemingly overnight.

Another great way to help out our pollinators and birds is to replace all of our outdoor security lights with yellow LED bulbs. Bright, white traditional incandescent bulbs, and LEDs, attract insects and birds in far greater numbers than warm, LED bulbs. You’ll help these critters out by diminishing the light pollution in your area, since many of our birds migrate at night.

Finally, a really important way to help out our local birds and insects is to stop spraying our yards and gardens with chemicals. We all like a healthy lawn, and no one wants to grow a bumper crop of mosquitoes, but the chemicals that we use in our yards, like pyrethrin, do not simply target mosquitoes. They are also killing off our bees, butterflies, moths, and birds. According to the National Wildlife Federation, “There is no way for companies to spray these broad-spectrum insecticides in your yard without also killing other insects they come in contact with, including bees, butterflies, caterpillars, ladybugs, dragonflies and other beneficial insects, along with the mosquitoes.”

So what’s the alternative? In my own yard, I let the birds, dragonflies, and other mosquito-eaters to it, but if you’re really concerned, there are some safer methods to mosquito-removal. Bti (Bacillus thuringiensis israelensis), is a bacteria that will kill off mosquitos, leaving our pollinators to safely fly another day. Fill a bucket with some water, and drop in a Bti tablet. The mosquito larvae will eat the toxin, and die off, while other insects fly away free. When you are able to, however, it really is best to leave well enough alone. Our bird populations and other insects that rely on mosquitos will thank you. And your yard will be much healthier for it.

That was a lot of information, but hopefully it wasn’t too preachy. I am very passionate about using our yards to help out our local eco systems, but I realize that it’s a different way of gardening than many of us grew up with. It’s all about balance. Planting a favorite rose or having a nice bit of lawn for the kids to run around in is not a problem. It’s when we don’t provide anything else that our winged-neighbors start to suffer.

Hopefully this spring, you’re able to add in a new plant or tree to your landscape that once grew there naturally. Maybe you just have a small porch and no yard at all- you can still add a pot of milkweed to that doorstep! It’s a sad truth that no one is going to fix this situation for us. If we want our planet to survive, it’s up to us to do the work. But we can make a very big difference, one plant at a time! Happy gardening!

The Jacob’s Ladder are looking stunning this spring!

April, Come She Will

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Nothing says “Spring in the Midwest” like pansies on the front porch!

Springtime continues, as does our wild weather. In the past week, we’ve seen temps in the teens, and the 70s. It’s snowed, sleeted, thunderstormed, and we’ve had high wind warnings and red flag advisories. Things are supposed to be a little calmer this week, with temps in the 50s and 60s, which is the average for this time of year.

I’ve been focusing my gardening efforts indoors lately (mostly so I don’t blow away). This past week, I started up the next round of annuals: calendula, cornflowers, cosmos, love-in-a-mist, nasturtiums, marigolds, and zinnias for the pollinators and a cut flower garden. I also planted some creeping thyme, basil, and cumin. By the time these start growing up, I’ll be able to move them outdoors, into the cold frame. I don’t have enough grow lights to keep too many seedlings growing indoors, so having the cold frame is a lifesaver.

A few weeks ago, I planted up leeks, tomatoes, peppers, cantaloupe, indigo, rudbeckia, and yarrow, and all of these have sprouted under the grow lights. It’s such a joy when your seeds sprout. The whole process feels a bit like magic to me and I’m so relived that everything is coming up.

Our hellebores are blooming up a storm lately.

Outside, in the milk jugs on the porch, the common blue violets, spring beauties, common milkweed, swamp milkweed, ironweed, purple prairie clover, wild bergamot, and prairie blazing star have sprouted. As excited as I was to see the cantaloupes sprout this past week, I was really over the moon to spy these native seedlings sprouting. Most importantly, they will help the pollinators in the garden this year, but they will also help the garden borders to fill in and look better. One of my goals for this gardening season is to move like plants things into groups, rather than just one of a species planted randomly around the borders.

This week, I’m hoping to get outdoors for a bit of cleanup. I won’t cut any of the perennials back quite yet- that will have to wait just a few more weeks until temps are warm enough that any nesting bees and bugs inside the stalks of these plants have woken up and flown away. But there’s work I can do in the raised beds. They need some more compost and dirt this year before I can start my cool season crops. I want to haul the cold frame up from the basement as well. I have a few long, narrow pots that I’ll plant up with spinach and lettuce here shortly.

I’m excited for these weeks of April. The spring ephemerals that I love will be blooming soon as the weather warms up, and the perennials are starting to pop up for the season. It seems like every day, new green shoots appear. On Sunday, the husband and I headed to our local metro park to check out which wildflowers were flowering.

I absolutely love wildflower walks. Every week, the whole landscape looks different, and spotting tiny little flowers poking up through the fallen leaves in the woods feels like searching for treasure. Sunday, the spring beauties (Claytonia virginica), bloodroot (Sanguinaria canadensis), and harbinger-of-spring (Erigenia bulbosa) were flowering. The toadshade (Trillium sessile) and virginia bluebells (Mertensia virginica) were budding, and should be flowering here soon. I’ve started growing a lot of these in the garden for myself and the pollinators to enjoy, and I cannot wait to see them all pop up in the flower beds!

Hope the weather is warming up wherever you are, and that your garden is also waking from a long winter. Happy gardening!

Bloodroot, spotted at Battelle Darby Creek Metro Park

May I Start Planting, Please?

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We’ve made it to my favorite month in the gardening calendar. I love May. Everything is green, many of my favorite flowers begin blooming, and I can finally go hog wild, executing the gardening plans. Our last frost date isn’t technically until May 9th, but according to the weather report, we should be in the clear now. (I’m probably jinxing things… last year, we had an uber late frost, and my entire state was outside, panic-covering veggies and annuals with sheets to protect things from the cold).

  • A few of our trees: eastern redbud, red maple, and flowering dogwood

I started hardening off everything that’s been living indoors last week. We’ve made it up to four hours now, over four days. I knew I’d planted a boatload of seeds, but I really do have a lot going on. I moved the grow lights down to the kitchen so I could haul all the plants inside and outside easier. (The seedlings were living on the second floor, and it took exactly one day with 11,000,000 trips up and down the stairs for me to decide that was so not continuing for the full seven days).

  • The Italian Sweet Peppers are flowering already!

The tomatoes and peppers have started to flower, which is kind of blowing my mind. I’m really excited to get these plants into the ground. I also have rosemary, basil, and parsley hardening off, as well as our lemon tree, a (newly arrived) dwarf banana tree, some madder, the ginger and pineapple plants that I started over the winter, some geraniums, and an amaryllis bulb.

The deck is starting to fill up with pots as well. The potatoes I planted have sprouted, and I just potted up the canna and cala lily bulbs that we grew last year. (They were living in the garage over winter, dormant and just waiting for warm days again). I have two pots of dahlias growing this year, well, they are just tubers now, but hopefully, they will sprout soon. And, there’s cilantro, two pots of lettuces, sorrel, fennel, a bay laurel, strawberries, tulips, aloe, mint, and some swamp milkweed. How’s that for variety? The cold frame is basically permanently opened up now so the seedlings don’t overheat and burn, and it’s housing the dropseed, little bluestem, prairie blazing star, zinnias, marigolds, milkweed, bachelor button flowers, borage, thyme, more parsley, oregano, passion flowers, and german chamomile. Things should be large enough to plant out soon here.

  • The calla lilies are growing again and ready for planting. I promise, the flowers look better than the rhizomes here would suggest.

Last fall, after the sunflowers had finished their display, I harvested a few of the seeds to plant this year. I’ve been doing this for a few years now, with nice results. I have Mammoth Sunflowers, and some Autumn Beauty, and I planted both varieties out in the beds this weekend. They both grow quite tall, so I plant them along the fence. I love when they bloom in late summer- they are so cheery, and the bees really enjoy them.

Out in the garden, things are beginning to really fill in. While not even close to it’s full volume, I’m very pleased with our first shade bed. It’s packed full of hostas, ferns, heucheras, great white trilliums, dutchman’s breeches, sedum, creek sedge, hardy geraniums, a rhododendron, hellebores, crocuses, brunerra, speedwell, and along the front edge, by the birdfeeders, are dozens of little sunflower seedlings sprouting up. The birds shake the seeds out of the feeders, and I just let the sunflowers grow, thinning them out a little for healthier plants. It’s not the ideal placement for tall plants- right at the front of a bed- but the flowers the birds grew last year were so pretty. I’m really a sucker for sunflowers, wherever they may grow.

  • The shade garden is popping back up and filling in quickly this spring.

I set up a little pot again this year in that flower bed, filled with some rocks and water for the birds and bugs to enjoy. It was a hit last year, basically a little bird bath, so I thought I’d give it a go again. The dragonflies really seem to enjoy the water features, too, and with the way they devour mosquitoes (an adult dragonfly can eat hundreds of those bloodsuckers per day), I am about anything that lures them into our garden.

  • Some of the sunflower seeds from last falls harvest

This week, we’re expecting quite a bit of rain, but hopefully, once that clears out, I can start in on the next big gardening project: pulling out the sod in the front yard between the sidewalk and the street (the hellstrip). Quite a few of the plants for that project are still growing in the cold frame now, and the other half are things I plan to split from perennials we have around the yard already. Pulling up grass is a pain, literally, but it’s the necessary first step. Any time I can get rid of more grass in our yard is a good time in my book. Once the grass is out, I can plant the new bed, get it mulched, and the next pollinator garden will be in business.

Hope the week is warm and sunny where you are, and that you can spend some time relaxing around all the new spring life outdoors. Happy gardening!

  • Our Giant Allium is blooming. I love these wild little balls of flowers, and I saw quite a few bees enjoying them over the weekend, too.

Spring Things

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As always seems to happen in the springtime, the days are flying by. The garden continues to pop awake, and the dogwood tree, tulips, creeping phlox, brunerra, rue anemone, virginia bluebells, and trillium are in bloom. The peonies are growing, and our clematis vines and allium have blooms, waiting to open.

  • Our ‘Jack Frost’ Brunerra in bloom in the shade garden

I’ve been doing some work on the new wildlife pond. I added a liner, and filled it with a bit of water. I hauled some river rock and pebbles to the backyard, which I’ve half spread out around the water. I’m looking into grabbing some larger stones to edge the pond, but I didn’t want to wait to plant the native perennials I’d picked up the other week. I have a boatload of native ferns and other shade and water-loving plants on their way to me in a couple of weeks to join the edge of the pond and to make more hidey holes for bugs and birds. Slowly but surely, I’m taking up all the sod around the pond to extend that shade garden. I’m really excited for that space to come together.

  • The pond is slowly coming together

We have two shade gardens in the backyard, right up next to the house. I have them both pretty packed with native flowers and sedges, and also a slew of ferns and hostas. I am a bit of a hosta fiend. I blame my dad. When we started the garden, he split one of he and my moms giant hostas, and gave it to me to help get my garden started. I love that thing. The leaves grow larger than dinner plates, in a deep blue-green, and it looks like a giant jungle plant. Since then, I’ve collected 11 more hosta plants, in various shapes and colors. They bloom every summer, with graceful little stalks of purple flowers that the bees enjoy. I saw a bumble bee sleeping inside of one of the flowers one year summer, and turned into a blubbery mess. I dare you to gaze upon a fuzzy bee, snoozing in a flower and not completely melt at the cuteness.

  • No bumble bees yet on these hostas

Our seedlings continue to grow like wild. I’m watching the calendar with anticipation, just waiting for the day I can pop my tomatoes and peppers into the ground. I’ve lost complete control over the tomatoes. I measured a few of them this past week, and they are now over 2′ tall. Normally, when I transplant them into the ground, they are 6, maybe 7″ high. These monsters are more than ready for the new raised beds.

Well, that’s all I have, for the moment. Don’t forget- this Thursday, April 22, is Earth Day! Because it’s spring in Central Ohio, we’re expecting highs in the low 40s at one point this week, with possible snow flurries. I try to get out to do some planting every Earth Day, but this year, it may be an indoor gardening sort of day instead. Wherever you are, and whatever your weather, I hope you can spend a little of your Earth Day enjoying and supporting nature. Plant a tree, or donate to a local conservation group. Check out a park, and help clean up any trash you may find. Unplug and enjoy!

Like Dr. Seuss said in The Lorax, “Unless someone like you care a whole awful lot, nothing is going to get better. It’s not.”

  • Our first asparagus harvest of the year was delicious!

Seed Starting: Round 42

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I can’t decide if I wore myself out yesterday cleaning up the flower beds, or if I’m still in a sugar coma from all the jelly beans I’ve consumed throughout the weekend…

Either way, it was an excellent weekend in the garden. Our warm weather was back. We headed to the park to enjoy the springtime wildflowers, and I went wild planting up the next round of seedlings. I started some zinnias, german chamomile, marigolds, prairie dropseed, little bluestem, button flowers, two types of thyme, and the next of our parsley.

  • I’m fascinated by all the different shapes and sizes of seeds, like these spiky marigolds

I also started some seed potatoes in grow bags on the deck. This is my first time growing them, but all the gardening videos I watched on YouTube indicate that potatoes are pretty easy crops, and obviously, I am not one to turn down trying out a new plant.

  • Putting the new potting bench to work

The potting bench continues to be the Champion of 2021. I spend time with it each day, even if it’s just to pat it lovingly as I walk past, grinning smugly to myself for a job well done. After I started all the aforementioned seeds, I re-potted the peppers and tomatoes (again). I can’t believe how quickly they are all growing. It will be another month before I can plant them out in the garden. Until then, I’ve had to do some maneuvering to make sure everything can still fit under the grow lights. It’s recommended to keep your lights about 4″ above your plants, and these beasty tomatoes keep outgrowing their space.

  • I am not used to my tomatoes growing so fast!

Back outside, the cold frame is stuffed to the gills with some of the new flower seedlings, lettuce, and herbs. It’s been another life-saver this year. I don’t have room for any other grow lights or seed trays with my current indoor setup, so being able to toss things outside has been awesome.

The milk jugs hanging out with the cold frame that I did my winter sowing in are also holding up well. I have seedlings growing in each of the containers, and I’ll be able to pop the top halves of the containers off here shortly. I stuck with all native plant species in those containers: swamp milkweed, purple prairie clover, and prairie blazing star. I’m very pleased that that method has worked out, and since the seedlings won’t need to be hardened off at all, I’ll be able to get them planted a little earlier. Score.

  • The cold frame is filling up with herbs, veggies, and flowers

Finally, I started the Giant Springtime Flower Bed Cleanup. Armed with gardening gloves and a new pair of shears, I’m slowly making my way around the yard, cleaning up the beds, and removing most of last years growth. I used to do this in the fall, but the last few years, I’ve been saving this job for the spring instead. A lot of wildlife relies on the seeds from your flowers, dried stalks, leaves, and other plant material for housing and food. This is an easy way we gardeners can all help out our local birds, pollinators, bugs, and other critters. Anyway, the old plant material gets popped into our compost pile, which we add to the veggie beds, helping to improve the quality of our crops. The circle of life tastes delicious.

Hope you are able to enjoy some time outdoors this week. I’m off to figure out where the heck I hid the spray nozzle for the hose last fall. Past Sara never makes this as straight forward a task as it should be… Happy Gardening!

  • Some spring wildflowers from a recent hike: bloodroot, purplecress, trout lily, dutchman’s breeches, and spring beauties