Spring activities in the garden and along the Mississippi

Lots has been going on. As always I'm either busy birding or gardening this time of year. Therefore I find little time to talk about what's happening. On the garden front, my seedlings for the first time ever, have aphids this year. I have sprayed several times with Safer insecticidal soap which I believe may have slightly damaged some of the seedlings. Kind of a bummer. My fault though. The aphids came in with house plants I had outside in pots over the summer and did not effectively spray when I brought them in this fall. Those little buggers were just waiting for the opportunity to explode in population and my seedlings provided the stimulus.

Despite the cold spring, I have started moving some of the seedlings outdoors into my greenhouse. I decided this year to cover the green house with 70% shade cloth to prevent the burning that occurs with hardening off my plants. So far so good. It's been too cold (30s and 40s) to keep the young tomatoes out in the green house. Those came in again this weekend.

This year I have been working on new cedar raised beds. Construction is almost complete. We spent Saturday in the rain trying to finish that project. I am also devising a better fencing system around the beds to keep the squirrels and rabbits out of the garden. As it is, the squirrel dug up most of the strawberry plants I planted within a day or so of planting. I have not done well with strawberries since moving here three years ago. Therefore I decided to dig up the old plants and start new. Time will tell.

On the native plant front, I spent Saturday birding along the Upper Mississippi and observing the spring plants that were blooming. Hepatica is blooming both in my garden and along the Mississippi in Grant County, WI.








At Nelson Dewey State Park I saw the usual Pasque Flower, Hoary Puccoon and Bird's Foot Violet on the prairie trail.












At Wyalusing State Park and along the Mississippi River Parkway, Bloodroot and Dutchmen's Breeches were starting to bloom. Here in Fort Atkinson, I've noticed my Bloodroot finally blooming after 3 years of waiting. More later with pictures of my garden progress.

 

Spring Garden Clean-up Begins

Sunday the temperature here in SE Wisconsin reached 57 degrees. Took advantage of the warm weather and near entire thaw of snow to start preparing beds for planting. This meant cleaning all the old plant debris from 70% of my beds that I neglected to remove last fall. Certain plants such as the echinachea I chose to leave to provide seed for the birds. Who knows if they really eat it. But otherwise the days just got away from last fall. I also pruned my rose bushes. They are looking pretty woody and brown. I hope they survived the negative 20-something cold spell we had in January. Also raked the leaves from the northeast rock garden and north facing borders on the front of the house. Noticed tulips starting to sprout in the south facing beds along the house. The buds on the Rhododendrons are small as I knew last fall. I was not as attentive to the watering when I should've been. It will be interesting to see if they blossom this year. I'm planning to plant my salad greens, radishes and few cold germinating ornamentals when I return from Texas early April. Excited for another season with many projects in the works!

Amazing owls

Got out for a late afternoon walk today along the Bark River. The harbingers of spring were all around me....chickadees and cardinals singing and full of activity, flocks of geese flying overhead, red-winged blackbirds "clucking" in the distance and a killdeer calling out his arrival. When I approached the old growth area along the river, I "pished" some chickadees in closer who chattered and called around me. Their small little ruckus must have stirred a Barred Owl who flew in to check me out. As I rounded the bend and neared the owl, she flew off. However I pleasantly came upon a second owl, then relocated the first owl. The pair sat and watched me with vigilance. One gave out a scolding baritone hoot as if to say "get the hell outta here." I am suspicious there may be a nearby nest, given the owls stayed in fairly close proximity to me. Despite some searching, I did not find a nest, but intend to investigate further. Owls are such amazing and graceful creatures. I am always in awe when I see one. Hoo-Hoo.

Seed Starting

Decided in the midst of a late February snow snowstorm to start ornamental flower seeds on Saturday 2/21/09 (see picture left for a garden shot 2/22); started my tomatoes, peppers and passion flower seeds tonight. A little early for the tomatoes and peppers but I was eager and had the time to do it.

Seed starting trays were washed in hot soapy water, rinsed, misted with straight vinegar, set for a bit and then rinsed again. Used Jiffy Premium Seed Starting mix, doesn't have clumps and sticks like the non premium mix. Wearing a face mask, I poored the mix into a large black tub and poored near boiling filtered water into the mix, stirred and continued adding water until the mixture was evenly moist but not soaked. Filled my seed trays and small pots with the potting mix, tamped, added seeds and then topped off with a little more mix. Flats were then set out under full spectrum fluoro lights in my sunny plant room with clear plaster lids to foster a warm moist climate. The 2009 gardening season is underway. Now although I'm a bit late, I will stratify my native seeds in the fridge in hopes my wimpy efforts will result in plants later this year....

Gardening season is just around the corner...

This past Wednesday, Wisconsin experienced a brief thaw and I took advantage of planting the last of crocuses and tulips that I had not got into the ground this fall. The "experts" indicate I might not get blooms, could get foliage or possibly nothing. We'll see...I also planted garlic which I failed to get in this fall as well. Stay tuned for the results...

Attended the Wisconsin Public Radio Garden Expo this weekend and picked up about 15-20 bare root native plants. Attended various lectures including one on Ridges Sanctuary in Bailey's Harbor, WI. Apparently Ridges is one of the most biologically diverse areas in the Midwest. It has 25 of the approximately 40 species of orchids found in Wisconsin. Definitely on my list of destinations to visit this spring. Here's a link to their website: http://www.ridgesanctuary.org/index.htm. The website definitely under represents the amazing flora found at this place.

I'm getting excited about spring and am busy preparing to start seedlings. All my old containers and seed trays need cleaning and disinfecting. I started to work on this today. I was also inspired to start propagating more pineapple sage from cuttings. God knows what I'll do with all the plants as I think I started about 20-25 plants today.

Garden update

Well the season almost over with temperatures starting to routinely fall into the 20s at night. However I have been able to preserve my lettuce, cilantro, leeks and scallions by tarping these guys during those chilly nights.

Remarkably until last night I had green and hot peppers still growing, but I gave up with the recent forecasts of constant freezing weather.

So much to do now with house projects and garden clean-up lingering. Still need to dig up my tender bulbs.

My recently planted grass is growing well. My flame-weeding efforts did not kill back the clover but at least there seems to be more grass where there was once almost exclusively clover.

First Frost

Last night, patchy frost. Most of the garden survived with the exception of some hostas along the fence and the sweet pepper plant in the raised bed on the south side against the house. The sweet pepper plant was looking a little wilted this morning but for the most part in tact. I revived with some water. I was under the false impression my plants nearer to structures would escape the frost under the theory that structures would give off heat. Guess not. Looking forward to digging up plants today to salvage indoors especially some late bloomers that have yet to show