Re: [gardeners] day off
Jane Burdekin (gardeners@globalgarden.com)
Tue, 16 Jun 1998 08:44:13 -0600
Margaret,
It sounds like you had a wonderful day. I can't believe after growing up
in Colorado that you forgot to take a jacket??? Your purchases sound
great, hope the day warms up for you. We were at 40 F yesterday morning
after some heavy rains on Sunday night. Highs have been 75ish here for the
last 2 weeks, I'm ready for some heat, and so are my tomatoes and peppers.
Don't work too hard planting today.
Jane
>Well, I took a day off from hoeing, mulching, killing Colorado Potato
>Beetles and turning compost, and visited some small country nurseries in
>western Idaho yesterday. My first mistake was not taking a jacket or
>raincoat. Second mistake was not insisting the owner get a shovel and sell
>me some of the curly mint that's thriving in her bed. She keeps bringing
>home sheep manure from her parents' farm in Jordan Valley, Oregon, and
>working it into that bed. Her lovage is about ten feet tall and must be at
>least three feet in diameter. Catnip leaves are about two by four inches.
>Guess she's improved the soil some.
>
>I also should have bought some of the blue-flowering sweet woodruff she
>had. She's grown it in the sun, though, so it looks more like clevers than
>sweet woodruff, tiny whorls of leaves, tall stems. She took us on a tour
>of their place (her husband has a full-time job, and she's busy raising a
>5-year-old, trying to take care of her parents 50 miles distant, and get
>her herb business started), and took us into the pasture to meet her pet
>horses and goats. The goats weren't very companionable, but the
>horses...well, they backed me up against the gate, and I announced I was
>leaving. I admit to being afraid of horses after having been run away
>with, bucked off, scraped off, bitten and stepped on by horses over my
>lifetime. How does a quarter horse get to be six years old and unbroken?
>None of them have been broken. Either they need a horse whisperer or an
>ear biter. P-tooey. The owner does need to wean her grown goats, though.
>Poor old doe's udder practically scrapes the ground, and one nozzle is all
>that works.
>
>My friend bought a flat of different herbs, I bought a couple more sweet
>basils. We drove into Caldwell for lunch (where there was a fat guinea hen
>pecking dead bugs from a car license plate and waiting for French fries),
>then drove a few miles back north and west to another small nursery we've
>patronized for years. Got our fernleaf Japanese peonies there for a
>fraction of usual nursery costs. I love columbines, and she grows them
>larger and lusher than anyone I know. Bought a yellow/red and a
>yellow/yellow one, plus two Pacific Giant delphs in one container (for the
>price of one), and a Casablanca delph too. A lemon daylily with
>wonderfully aromatic blossoms, Campanula groundcover with starry blue
>blossoms, and a grey artemisia with finely cut leaves (and no variety
>name). My friend bought flats of flowers and herbs, and muttered something
>about writing a check. I told her, in front of the nursery owner, not to
>write her a check because she'll launder the money. She did laugh. I once
>wrote her a check, she tucked it in her pocket, and the check was blank by
>the time she removed the laundry from the washing machine. The next time
>we went out there, she told me about it, so I wrote her another check.
>
>She had some yellow-blooming sedum covered in tiny bees. She said they
>were leaf cutter bees (her husband sells bee boards). Some farmer had left
>his bee boards with them, and the bees were hatching. She said he might
>not have any bees left if he didn't hurry to get his boards.
>
>Okay, so I didn't get any work done, but it was fun. My friend had had a
>lot of bad news over the weekend, and needed the outing. Now I've got more
>plants to plant, and frankly, it's too cold outside. This isn't El Nino,
>it's Gulf of Alaska. Temp is 42. Margaret