Very Nippy Night

At about 6:15 am this morning, my thermometer read 5 degrees. That's cold. It took that kind of a night to finally kill (or at least maim) the artichokes (pictured below) and the chard I had planted earlier this year. The thyme doesn't look like it's been hurt at all.


Our small fountain is pretty but the I'm sure the pump is toast.

And lastly, the contorted filbert (Corylus avellana 'Harry Lauder') is really showing off at this time of the year.

Another World

Our family did a very different thing over the Thanksgiving break -- we took a cruise. No hassles with cleaning the house and cooking for relatives (this would be hassles for my mom, not me).

Anyway, our cruise took us to Key West, Cozumel, and Belize. Belize was probably the most interesting place we went. This is relative since we only had about 5 hours in Key West and got totally rained out in Cozumel. Regardless, here are some interesting things about Belize:

• They are a country with about 300,000 people
• They are the only English-speaking central American country
• They make cashew wine

This is the cashew tree (bad picture, taken from a moving boat)

Here's the wine bottle (I was pleasantly surprised by the taste!)

So this has nothing to do with horticulture in Pulaski Co, but just thought I'd share....

What does GREEN really mean?

What should it mean? Is it purely subjective? Maybe, I don't know. These questions are purely rhetorical. Does green mean sustainable?

Is growing organically being green? I think it depends. If I'm using something like Neem, which comes from trees in the Indian sub-continent (Wikipedia), and it must be shipped thousands of miles, is that really the best use of resources? Even if I'm using it on an organic garden in Kentucky? Or bat guano? Disturbing bats causes their numbers to decline, so is that sustainable or green?

Buying bagged compost that was made in Florida? Is that green? Is that sustainable?

What about lawn mowing, string trimmers, and leaf blowers? Today's mowers are gas guzzlers. They consume a large amount of energy and pollute our air with fumes and noise. Should we change the way we mow and trim? Should we demand cleaner gas-powered tools?

Is using manures on your gardens being green? Even if some can potentially carry bad, bad organisms that make humans sick?

I don't know the answers to these questions, they are more to ponder. To think about. To maybe change your idea of green.

Preparing for Winter

We've all heard the phrase 'putting the garden to bed'. I'm not fond of that phrase, really. There is so much activity that takes place in the winter. It can be pretty disruptive. Just think of all the freezing and thawing, frost heaving, all the microbial activity that continues to take place (maybe at a slower rate than summer). The snow, the ice, the cold winter rains. All these help with decomposition of organic matter over the winter.

I've given our garden at the office a nice layer of leaves -- just whatever I could rake up close by.


Then I was given some old straw bales left over from Halloween decorations. I would prefer to know my source of straw since I'd have some idea exactly what type of grasses made it up and -- more importantly -- if it came from a weed-infested field. But beggars can't be choosers.



I can plant right through this straw next spring. The worms should continue to work as it will be relatively warm over the winter with this nice layer on top. I'll take pictures next spring!

November Garden Images

Here are a few shots from the garden.

My artichoke plants haven't been killed by any frosts yet. Some of our annuals have bitten the dust as have some hostas.

Pyracantha berries are looking wonderful!
Calycanthus is showing some decent fall color especially when the sun hits it just right.
And lastly, our Itea virginica, Little Henry Virginia Sweetspire is putting on its red show.

Pesticide Poisoning? Clean Up When You're Done!

My dog, Lily, is all mutt pup. Not quite a year old, she runs the farm (literally and figuratively). Having had a very calm and slightly handicapped dog before (Emmylou had no right front paw) who passed away last year, I knew what I was in for with a puppy. But you know, you really never do.

Sunday morning she came in the house with tremors all over. She was also heavily salivating. I took her to the doggie ER. They suspected some sort of pesticide poisoning, either a permethrin or an organophosphate (like Sevin).

Although we could find no evidence of any pesticide jug that she had gotten into, it's a good time to bring up the issue of putting away things when you're done with them, especially pesticides if you have animals or kids around.

Lily had to spend the night at the vet but she's home and well now. Animal Care Center and Dr Hall, THANKS!

Bagging Apples

Ever heard of this? Apple bagging is simply placing individual apples inside bags while they are still on the tree. Bags are put on when fruit is about quarter-sized. Bags remain on til about 3 weeks before harvest. Bagged apples will not color up properly, so taking them off well before harvest is a must.

Why, why, oh why would anyone do this? Well, apples get plenty of disease and insect pests. Most backyard fruit growers do not want to apply lots of pesticides. So....by bagging fruit we are physically keeping the pest off the fruit without having to spray. An organic pest control method.

In addition to using the Japanese apple bags (from the website above), a UK entomologist gave me some nylons. Yes, there is anecdotal evidence that nylons (like what women slip on when trying on shoes) can work to deter pests.

I grow Liberty apple which is very disease resistant, but no apples are insect resistant. Here are my photos of bagged, nyloned, and not-bagged apples.



Pretty cool. But let me tell you, putting bags on apples is dang time consuming, especially the Japanese apple bags. Most of the bags I had put on had fallen off mid-season. The nylons were much easier to put on and did not tend to come off with bad storms and weathering.

The bagged apple was the biggest of the 3, shown below. And you can see what covered each of the 2 bagged apples.