Hydrangea Leaftier Infestation

Unfortunately earlier this year I saw that the leaves on my hydrangeas were stuck together - and inside was the larvae of a caterpillar that feeds on the leaves and the flower buds. Because I was so busy with my mom and kids at the time, I didn't take pictures, instead I just went ahead and opened the leaves that had been bound together and killed the larvae without taking any photos. These caterpillars basically destroy the flower bud and so you end up with less buds and less flowers on your hydrangeas. I ended up snipping off maybe 3 bound leaf pods per plant and carefully pulling apart another 3-5 per plant. It doesn't take very long but it is annoying when you walk away and realize you forgot to check the whole side of the plant! 

But as you can see, we're at the point where I need to deadhead the blooms so that's on my chore list for this week. Apparently in some varieties deadheading can encourage more growth and blooms. Since I received these as a gift, and not purchased, I will definitely experiment on 2 out of the 3. I'll deadhead and see what happens. 

The blooms on these are HUGE this year and last year I babied all three hydrangea plants so they would come back. I had low expectations since we had transplanted in the middle of summer and not in the cooler spring or fall temperatures where I would be able to control the elements a little bit more. BUT I'm so happy they came back, even with a little larvae - but now I know what to look for and I will be on top of the leaves that are bound together. The bound leaves are easy to spot (they literally look like bound leaves and it looks like they're making a home for a pest, which they are!). You can either snip off the leaves if you can't get it open being gentle OR you can pry apart the leaves very gently and dispose of the larvae inside the bound leaves. 

 

Rabbit Damage

 

This lily was still in the pot when the rabbits decided to decimate it. Luckily I found some fencing to put around it for the rest of the year. The flower buds are still at the top so I think we'll get some blooms out of it but I'm not sure how long I can protect it in the upcoming years.

Well, I discovered that using ground clove burns plant leaves. So don't use that to keep away bunnies. It also doesn't keep away bunnies. However, you can see in the background that I took this after installing new fencing. 

I planted a new succession of green beans about 3 days ago. I can see some of the bean seeds are sprouting so I'm hopeful we still get some green beans this year! 

These rabbits. They've actually taken down maybe 30 milkweed plants. I've truly decided to leave the milkweed until I don't see monarchs - then I'll pull the milkweed, weed out the invasives and the plants I don't want. So I have milkweed everywhere but there's also monarch eggs on the majority of it! I'm super excited about this. I thought they liked swamp milkweed more, so I didn't really give any thoughts about possibly having a bit of a milkweed and butterfly farm. Ha.

These Asiatic lilies have been eaten down a lot - but the bunnies can only reach a little bit of the group of plants because I have this area planted so close together. Also. there's Snow on the Mountain and I desperately need to weed this out. But also there's milkweed in this area and so I can't quite get in here without disturbing the eggs. It's not quite a win-win situation yet so I just need to keep an eye on all the potential butterflies. 

This lily is on my boulevard. The half of the stems that are next to the sidewalk have just been terrorized by the bunnies. 

This year I've learned that if you really want to save something and you're attached to plants - fence them. Don't risk trying a home remedy or the rain washing away a store-bought bunny mix. Sometimes with the rain in the middle of the night, you can't get out there fast enough and those bunnies will absolutely eat everything. 

This year I've seen at least 3 new bunnies that have survived the neighborhood cats, the hawks, the owls, the fox, and the coyote that live around us. I wish animals could read so I could put a sign up saying "PLEASE EAT FROM MY YARD." 

Next year my plan is to fully fence in a large portion of the backyard so I don't have to keep reaching over bunny fencing in my raised beds. I bought the raised beds thinking that it would deter bunnies and I was wrong. Instead I'm going to be researching the best way to fence in a small area, find an archway for a door, and figure out how high of a fence I'll need to keep the critters out. I will also start moving favorite flowers like my delphiniums, lilies, coneflowers, and hostas into the fenced area too. As a gardener we understand that we will have a certain amount of pest damage but I'm at the point where I'm no longer interested in being continuously disappointed every year and spending time and money on indoor grown plants (and veggies!) to then give them to the rabbits as food each spring. No, thank you. As long as I have the time, I'll share what I find here and I will update with pictures and plans too.

Early July Blooms

I don't actually remember planting this coneflower. It's tucked into a patch of Bee Balm (or Monarda if you're looking to google it!) and the milkweed has surrounded it. This is also next to a sedum - which I need to move to a better, more sunny spot where I don't have to pull out Bee Balm for the sedum to bloom.

But this coneflower is really pretty and had I remembered that it was there, I would have pulled out the encroaching other flowers around it. 

The Bee Balm has just started blooming and is in various states of growth, some of it is small still, other plants are just starting to bloom. I really enjoy this in my yard because I feel that it's long lasting - especially if you have it in various areas of sun & shade. It also doesn't have a ton of pest pressure which means that it's been incredibly reliable for me over the years and bunnies, squirrels, and Phil have left it alone. 

Self-seeded Snapdragon from last year. Light purple or lavender blooms with the dark leaves are really pretty and a great addition to my planters. I wish I could remember where it came from - I'm thinking I got a mix pack from Burpee and this was part of the pack. Now that I know that Snapdragons can self-seed, I'm going to toss out a few seed packets next year at the school garden and see what happens.

Purple is my favorite color. And magenta! But these striped ones are so cute.

Milkweed is blooming and even though it doesn't seem to look all that impressive from afar - when you look closely there's so many blooms and the little flowers are pretty detailed. My backyard doesn't have as much milkweed but what it does have, has been creeping into the grass and I've had to mow it down. I need the backyard to have some grass for Phil and Q to play soccer and the milkweed, if it's knocked into by a soccer ball will get everything sticky. I hate dealing with the sticky milkweed on soccer balls and other sports equipment.

Butterfly Weed is one of my favorites. It doesn't spread too crazy in my yard - this is easy to pull if you don't like where it landed. The seed pods are ginormous and so if you pull those in the fall, it will contain the spread if you find that it's spreading too much for your likin. I highly recommend this native for the pollinators. Butterfly Weed is the larval food source for Monarch butterflies. In my yard, I will see bumble bees, sweat bees - the ones with the bright green coloration, and occasionally other butterflies hanging around it. 

 

Waiting on Some Garden Blooms

Out of probably 30+ sunflowers planted, I have only about 3 left from bunny damage. Sunflowers were my mom's favorite flower but also CJ's so this year I wanted to plant as many as possible. As it turns out, they're also the bunnies' favorite plant to eat. I hid a few of the large Pike's Peak in some caging but then I ran out of cages that were open at the top so there's only one of those left of the 15 that I started from seed. I hid a few of the deep maroon sunflowers within Columbine next to the garage for the morning sun since the bunnies seemed to leave the columbine alone.

Bunnies also just loved the really small, new growth on Strawflowers so those I've caged. I pulled one cage off a Strawflower in the front yard and no damage in 4 days so I will pull the cage off the small Strawflower and see what growth that gains over the next week. Strawflowers start off with an unusual flower bud and I'm so excited to watch them bloom.

Zinnias in the backyard are finally growing by leaps and bounds daily. Unfortunately these have to contend with being trampled by the dog AND being part of a miniature monster truck track for Q. These are a mix, I do believe. Not sure what their colors will be when they bloom.

Snapdragons seeded themselves from last year. These are really pretty and I can't wait until the bright pink blooms are here. The bright pink contrasted with the dark green is such a fun and bright bloom. These decided to grow at the edge of the patio and I had such a hard time deciding if I should let them continue to grow or if I should weed them. I left them because I like snapdragons so much. 

This is a native plant. I thought it was a native liatris but I don't remember it looking like this last year? Too many leaves, but I'll leave it to see what it does because it definitely isn't a weed or an invasive that I recognize.

Like last year, I went ahead and planted artichokes again. I found they were extremely easy to grow and I'm happy to grow them again for the blooms. I don't actually like to cook with artichokes - I would rather buy the artichoke hearts already taken care of for me. HA. But the bright purple blooms are absolutely gorgeous and I'm hoping these get growth with the hot few days that are happening. I discovered last year that after they go through the cold vernalization you can neglect them a bit because they're part of the thistle family - so they don't mind drying out between waterings.

I can't wait to show pictures of blooms in a few weeks - or less for some of these!

 

Snap Peas

Snap pea tendril curls are just perfect.

This year I've had weird luck with snap peas. The school garden's came in early - now, with our cooler weather the pods are finally coming in. Mine at home, no pods but they are growing and I'm on my second succession because the rabbits are just awful this year! I was hoping for enough snap peas for a snack for the kids for a week but I don't think I'll have that many this year. I think it'll be enough for just one salad. Ugh. So sad! I'll do another succession starting in August, hopefully I'll have more then!

 

My Mom Died

 April was rough. May was really rough. June is just kind of MEH.

My mom passed away on May 16. That was incredibly unexpected. My emotions have been all over the place since then. The sale of her house has stalled since I can't do anything until I've been appointed Personal Representative. That really sucks. Because now I really just want her house off my plate and gone - I truly don't want to be there anymore. It's no longer hers, I just hope that another family finds it and they fall in love with it and make it a home. 

But I have to say, congestive heart failure is no joke. I'm absolutely positive that 65 years of smoking just wrecked her body. Her symptoms started last summer, which I think she hid and didn't want to tell me. At one point she had an endoscopy - the pictures showed so much cigarette tar on her insides. It was not good. And the water retention was insane - over a week the doctors pulled over 30 POUNDS of fluid from her body. When your heart isn't working properly, it takes a huge toll on your body. 

Her new heart valve failed right in front of me. She went from talking normally to basically dead within an hour, and this happened at her scheduled doctor's appointment. Thank goodness we were at the hospital when this all happened. This is not the first time I've sat with someone dying in front of me so I knew what to expect. It's not like the person just falls asleep in front of you. When someone says "they died peacefully" I'm like no, they fucking gasped for air and were delirious for quite awhile before it actually happened. So it's traumatic for all. 

And now that I'm not over at her apartment almost daily or talking to her on the phone, it's like I have this weird sense of guilt - like I should be taking care of her but I'm not. I've literally been going over to her house or doing something for her every week since we moved back her 17 years ago. That's a long fucking time of caretaking. She wouldn't ask my other siblings to help - just my brother for lawncare and basic house stuff until he moved out of state - so it was me that did literally EVERYTHING. I did grocery shopping, housework, donations, weeding, grabbed her mail every other day so she wouldn't have to walk to her mailbox, made her appointments for her, drove her everywhere. I didn't realize how much time that took up until a few weeks ago when I cleaned my house without being interrupted. 

So I have a lot of emotions running through me. I'm supposed to meet my family on Saturday and I'm not ready to release my mom yet. I will gift my siblings their portions of her ashes but I'm keeping mine. I probably won't be ready for a long time. Maybe next year or the year after. 

Spring Break Fun in Colorado

 

We had so much fun in Colorado this past week. The weather wasn't as friendly as we wanted it to be for doing outdoor activities but we toughed it out to do biking/hiking/skiing. I got hailed on just a few minutes after I took this picture! I don't remember ever being hailed on while on a hike so I was pretty much laughing on my way back to our rental house.

The mud was just amazing, even being on a mountain hike where it's pretty much gravel or clay. I'm not sure my shoes will ever be the same!

Beaver Creek after 12 inches of fresh powder was perfect! Loveland Pass was closed about 20 minutes after we drove through and I think that kept the traffic down so the mountain skiing wasn't as busy as normal. We barely saw anyone skiing and it was so much fun.

Also, skiing in a blizzard when you don't have proper ski-wear is hilarious. We thought it would be 50 degrees and slushy - as it turns out, no, no it wasn't. It was 25 degrees and a blizzard. I bought a light sweatshirt-ish jacket and didn't bring a shell so I ended up a little damp but it was still super fun.

I think I would definitely do a powder day at Beaver Creek again. Normally it's groomed but we were lucky! The past few days had been extremely dry and melty which means ice to ski on and quite frankly, I wasn't about to ski on ice - I'm at an age where that means a knee replacement and I'm not even close to risking that! However, it was really fun and I'm happy that we ended up with fresh powder. It was a great way to end our trip!

2025 Seed Starting

 Over the last few days I decided to start seeds for a Garden Party in June. My PTO President suggested I host garden party and so that's what I'm doing! I'm going to have everyone put together an herb pot - I think I'm going to collect pretty pots from my Buy Nothing and maybe some plastic ones too. I gave away a few tables from my mom's house that I'm now half regretting - but not by much because everything that comes from her house smells like cigarette smoke (oh, we got paint estimates and it's THOUSANDS of dollars to paint her whole house!). 

So... I started Lavender, Marjoram, Sage, Thyme, and a few other more woodsy herbs - those should be a few inches tall to go into the pots for planting so they should get a good head start for June. And then I will start more Basil, parsley, and cilantro closer to the date so they'll be ready too. 

I'm planning on having snacks and bevvies. I'M SO EXCITED. I can't wait to plan more!

Tough March - My Mom Has Health Problems

 Unfortunately my mom has been having health issues since mid-February. She's in the hospital for a second time since February 8 and it's been really annoying that I can't do garden stuff as much as I would normally. For example - I just started seeds and I didn't have all the tomato seeds I wanted. I don't have sweet pepper seeds. I truly haven't had the time to stop and look through everything and so here I am... making do with what I have. That's how I grew up and I suppose we just won't have large slicing tomatoes this year. That's also fine. I think I saw I might have beefsteak tomato seeds but I'll have to check - I decided to do 10 hybrid Bliss tomatoes and so maybe I will circle back to the beefsteaks. It truly depends on how long I have to stay at the hospital. 

We also moved my mom to assisted living several weeks ago so we're in the process of clearing and selling her house. That is so much work. If you have to clear an elderly person's home that stopped cleaning because they're in heart failure AND a smoker... you have my absolute sympathy and empathy. It's really tough to see and to deal with. And to clean up after. 

AND I'm getting ready to start seeds at school with Kindergarten through 2nd grade.

AND I'm doing a schoolyard garden presentation on Friday.

So at this point... if I start anything else and they live... it will be a miracle. 

But my mom has congestive heart failure and that's what happens after you've been a smoker for 65 years. Today I got to see pictures of her esophogus and stomach for possible bleeding and holy shit. The amount of dark black and brown tar from smoking is absolutely amazing and disgusting and awful and it's a true miracle she's still alive kind of a thing. So I'm happy to be there for her and I love her so I don't mind putting my stuff aside so I can be there for my mom. So just as an FYI - don't smoke and stop smoking because it's not good for you.

I'm going to try and post some photos of the seeds I've been planting and what's happening under my grow lights but I can't be certain of my schedule this week. I'll try my best.

Garden Gatekeeping

 A few days ago I was on Threads and I saw a post about garden gatekeeping. That's when you withhold information. Another post I saw was someone screaming that no one should be gardening unless they have acreage. 

Everyone has different garden goals. Everyone has a different socioeconomic status. Not everyone wants to grow vegetables. Not everyone has a yard. Not everyone has full sun to grow certain plants. Everyone has different access to water. And maybe people only have one good window with a 4 inch shelf on it and they only want to grow a cactus. You can't control everyone's garden goals and you can't make someone else have your same garden goal. 

You can't gatekeep garden knowledge because someone doesn't have the same garden goal as yours. Well, actually you can but then how does that help? Knowledge is power and shared knowledge will help your tomatoes be more resilient to the weather and diseases. 

As a Master Gardener I get questions about what chemicals to use in gardens because people don't want bugs and insects. Or what chemical to use to blanket cover a whole yard because of clover or creeping charlie or crabgrass. And here's my response - what's your gardening goal? what are you trying to achieve with your garden? what have you done so far? can we talk about integrated pest management? can I offer some suggestions that maybe you haven't tried yet? I also get questions about growing vegetable gardens in full shade, trying to grow full shade plants in full sun and vice versa. 

I love sharing knowledge because I want others to succeed in their garden goals. I want to show my experiments, my failures, etc... because it's important to me to share what doesn't work in my yard and in my small urban garden - I want to know if anyone else has made the same mistakes and maybe even get more information about how to change up what I'm doing. I also want to share what works in my garden so that others can try the same thing in theirs to successfully achieve their goals too. 

It's also important to share information so that we can teach each other from our mistakes. Like accidentally planting mint in the ground or realizing that sage can overtake a whole garden bed or that some herbs that are supposed to be annuals keep coming back or the bounty of volunteer tomatoes. And anything that works to keep out squash bugs. The more you know - the better your garden will be!

Imperial Artichoke Flower

A Wasp in January????!!!!

I found this Thursday morning in the parking lot of my dentist's office. 

So let's talk about entomology and climate change.

This past week I took part in a webinar about pollinators and climate change. One fact that stood out was that insects and bugs come out of hibernation based on temperature. Warmer weather = insects thinking it's spring and so they pop out of hibernation after however many days they are biologically supposed to after a cold period amount of time. Invertebrates life cycles are temperature dependent. When there are higher temperature days, this leads life cycles to speed up. What does this mean for us? It means that we can see more life cycles of insects in one season than before - so maybe multiple rounds of ticks, multiple rounds of Japanese beetles, multiple rounds of wasps, multiple rounds of other pests that can damage gardens, crops, trees, etc... And as we see here from this picture - our growing Zone in the Twin Cities has moved to Zone 5 which means that our average lowest temperature is warmer than before meaning we will absolutely see insects earlier than we have before.

So. Yikes. I'm not looking forward to tick season again this year.

 

Onions & Leek Seed Starting

 

I'm updating here from my Instagram stories. I'm slowly moving back because here I can give more information and better explain myself than in 30 seconds. But alas, I might still share more short gardening stories for my followers. We'll see! In any case, this is a continuation of an experiment. In this combined seed ball that was purchased late last summer - I decided to grow it to test it out and see what would happen. I have two more of these and so I think as long as the main seeds used aren't TOMATOES (which will grow pretty large and shade everything out), I would actually buy these again. I would definitely start it in a 4 inch pot so you can separate out the different plants and put where you need them - whether it be in raised beds, in-ground beds, containers, or pots. Clearly the Pak Choi is growing as well as the Basil but definitely the garlic chives never germinated. 

I started 16 cells of bunching onions, better known as green onions or scallions. I put maybe 10-20 seeds into each cell. Onions are fine growing closely together, when you want to replant you just separate them out and plant. Bunching Onions do not get large like varieties of yellow, red, and white onions so no need to closely watch these - they're ok just giving a little air between plants if you decide to up-pot them. Vents are closed to keep in the moisture. I do not have these sitting on heat mats, if I don't see any germination in a few days, I will get the heat mats out.

Last year I experimented with artichokes and just fell in love with the neon fuchsia flowers. They were gorgeous and actually fairly easy to grow. There's an absolute love/hate relationship with the thistle family for a reason - easy to grow but you don't want certain thistles in your yard! So I did 16 cells with 2 year old seeds; 8 cells have 2 seeds each.

Next is 8 cells of leeks. These take longer than you think in Zone 4 - technically we are now in Zone 5 - but I'm treating the heat and sun loving crops as though we still live in Zone 4. So these are started. I truly want just enough for Potato Leek Soup and maybe 3 batches. I don't need anymore leeks than that!

Onions - Walla Walla is the variety. I did these last year from starts and they were amazing. I think I had around 75 and the majority of them grew. It was easy. And so this year I am apparently starting them from seed which wasn't my true plan but I'll take it! I'll give these a few weeks to get started, if I don't see good growth then I will order starts maybe from Johnny's or straight from Burpee. We shall see!

I did take videos to share on my Instagram stories but I think I'm going to start using YouTube a little more and see what happens. Have a good week! Happy planting!

Seed Starting This Week Zone 5

 Oh, I am so excited!!

This week is the week to start certain seeds in Zone 5. I have onions, leeks, artichokes, and a packet of perennial flowers. 

A few things to note:

Onion family needs to start early because they need as much heat and sun to grow - peppers also need to be started early because they also like the heat and sun. Peppers can get big fairly quickly though so I tend to start those only a week or two before tomatoes. Nightshades in general are heatloving and will need heat mats to start unless in a room that's already fairly warm.

Onions - I will put 15 - 20 seeds into each cell, then spread apart a little when up-potted to 3 inch pots, then separate when I plant them in the ground in late April/May

Leeks - same as above

Artichokes - 1 seed per cell. Last year I planted 6 plants, 6 survived - 3 produced flower heads and I let all 3 bloom. THEY WERE GORGEOUS. This year I want to plant them in my front yard that gets direct sun for 12 hours to simulate their native region. I'm planning on planting out the rest of the packet, so approximately 15 seeds to start.

Packet of perennial flowers - received from MN Dept of Ag. Claims to be all native perennials, however, when reading the varieties that are included I have dealt with 3 in my yard that became invasive and wanted to take over. I will do 1 seed per cell to separate out what I don't want in my yard. Those plants will go to the hill at the school garden where they can take over and hopefully choke out Canada thistle and the weird non-native grasses.