A Frosty Morn Delights

Frost is captivating. When looked at from afar, it relaxes the mind, slowing down a zigzag of pesky thoughts enough to get to the point of wanting to go on out and get close to it. The laundry can wait. And that goes for checking email too.

Solid ice in the bird bath is thumped out of its giant plant saucer. Shards lay gleaming on the frosted grass; the bath gets filled with fresh water.

Nothing showcases ice better than the hot pink of penstemon.

There's wind ready and willing to disseminate a dandelion's pollen, but the pollen says not right this moment, but thanks anyway.

A paprika heuchera stuns with picot edging of delicate lace along with a piqué interior of dots. 

A dried sedum clustered flowerhead's swaying in the wind on leggy stems isn't hampered by a newly acquired coat of rime.

Solar lamps encrusted with white accentuate the geometrical purity of a circle and a diamond.

Within sweet alyssum's flowerhead each tiny bloom bears a close resemblance to candied violets.

Weak, wintry sunshine washes over thawed Queen Elizabeth hedge roses facing east in the front garden, fading the vibrant colour into one of old, tattered, salmon-coloured silk.

Pots of lobelia adorning a series of sous sol window sills facing west are still holding onto their blooms since June! Their icy blue fits right in.

À la prochaine!

RELATED LINKS

How frost can harm and help your garden

Late Summer Garden 2019

There's a paradoxical edge in the air. The pervasive mellowness of late-summer laziness when much already has been harvested, specifically rhubarb, asparagus, peas, potatoes, strawberries, raspberries, blueberries, and blackberries, is brushing against the beginning bustle of sowing for autumnal crops such as beets, carrots, kale, and tansy along with picking plus preserving peaches, plums, the second flush of raspberries, and figs. Watering and mowing chores are being replaced by weeding and clipping hedges such as ivy, laurel, and the wild area's brambles. Ivy covering walls/fences and pergola pillars gets about four trimmings per year chez nous. This one will be the last until late winter/early spring. When the cutting back is vigorous, dead leaves tucked deep into the vines will show. Through time they will flutter down on their own accord or be covered with new growth. This final trim was done a little too late as clusters of berries which sustain starlings through winter already had started developing so though some unfortunately got the axe, I made sure the ones up high were spared as on the ivy-covered wall in the below photo's bottom left-hand corner.

But the bustle is not exactly a bustle. Even it is pervaded with a sense if not exactly of laziness, then one of satiety with the promise of more to come. This halo of contentment hovering over our little city plot is reminiscent of the much larger one that floated over a farming community we visited about ten years ago south of Grenoble. In exchange of our being custodians for a century-old country property while their owners went abroad we got to spend two weeks during late August in an active agricultural setting.  The large house more in shambles than not is referred to on local maps as Le Chateau hence at one point in our stay a pair of hikers stared with confused disappointment over the chain-barred dirt road entrance at the rather dilapidated structure in process of being renovated. We made sure the horses got their daily water and the orchard's apples got picked and stored. As we hiked around fields dotted with bales of hay and walked through narrow village streets where workers were making sure roofs were in good repair for the coming winter, this dual sense of activity laced with satisfied fulfilment was everywhere. 

At the moment in our urban garden, there's a bumper crop of peaches! As I pick up the fragrant ones volunteering easy harvesting by their dropping to the ground, I hear neighbours' chickens clucking, clucking, clucking along, in their own feathery universe, bringing memories of our stay in that farming village where the sounds of domesticated animals were everywhere, from horses to cows, and of course chickens.

The fig harvest looks to be a record breaker also.

Beets still have a ways to go in developing their roots, but a few leaves here and there have been plucked to go into minestrone.

It's a common saying among gardeners that the best crop yield often is found on the compost heap. Ours at present is covered with squash and tomato plants.

The front garden's lavender, abelia, purple plum tree, and potted heather are bathed in flitting shadows cast by the much taller and still fully leaved cherry plum and box elder trees. Within a couple of months the shadowy dance will become more subdued once those trees start to shed their leaves.

Companions to the heather are a solar lamp and floppy, chartreuse echeveria. The succulent will put out welcomed, cheery, bright-yellow blooms in late winter.

Lavender cradles pink, low-growing dahlias.

It will get a clipping after flowering.

Deadheading regularly will keep dahlias blooming right into autumn like these lovely, single, red ones set in a dramatic background of yucca with its sword-shaped leaves.

À la prochaine!

Sun Then Snow . . .

Though last week has been cold, I couldn't resist getting bundled up and strolling through the garden. The daffodils waved hello. How can they flaunt such exuberance? It's because last season their leaves were allowed to rot in place so as to nourish the underground bulb which became this out-of-sight powerhouse waiting to generate what we are seeing now: ornate lanterns requiring no light to shine.

Sweet violets are superb ground covers because they are evergreen shade-lovers, have fragrant late-winter flowers that can be candied, and spread readily through ballistic seed dispersal (click here to see it happening) plus myrmecochory (foraging worker ants carry the seeds back to the colony). To maximise flower visibility as the vigorous foliage can obscure the flowers, in late summer I take a line-trimmer to the beds and mow them down to a couple of inches above the ground.

Overwintered blue tansy (Phacelia tanacetifolia) cover crop has done its soil protection job well. Soon it will be cut down and forked in so it can do its soil enrichment task also.

Once ivy reaches the end of its vertical support, it morphs into a robust bush that bears fruit which nourishes birds throughout winter. There's lots of ivy chez nous. Some grows up the pergola's pillars onto its roof. There has been this one starling who I have been observing from my office. She flits in and out of the ivy, plucking and swallowing berries in a flash. Once I witnessed her indulging in a fast food feast consisting of ten berries which she ate in a New York minute.

What beverage to go with that dish of ivy berries, my dear starling? Water, preferably of the liquid kind, please. Freezing temperatures the last few days mean that ice is slipped out of the birdbaths so they can be filled with fresh water.

The daffodils and heather cheer me up each and every time I peek out my office window.

Just before the temperature dropped even further, Dirac the Cat, with the aid of fedar (feline radar set for profiting from anything) popped out to relish sunny warmth before . . .

. . . snowflakes came floating down . . .

. . . and kept coming down . . .

. . . until all was leaden grey, but with the dreariness made less by white fluff. By that time, we were inside; Dirac the Cat was munching a treat and I was sipping something gloriously hot.

À la prochaine!

The Not Quite Somnolent January Garden

Stroll around a garden. Yes, during January. Just dress warmly. Keep those eyes sharp and many wondrous sights will await such as the belated holiday gift of festive red and green leaves unfurling on a rugosa rose.

Pink tubular bells cover Erica darleyensis which tolerates neutral to slightly alkaline soil unlike most acid-loving heathers.

Dainty English daisies are starting to dot the lawn.

A cluster of tiny, downy flower buds on the bay laurel is turning rosy.

Lime and rust coloured lichens (a composite organism that arises from algae or cyanobacteria living among filaments of multiple fungi in a symbiotic relationship) are at home on the slowly decaying cherry plum tree.

Plump berries adorn a gold dust plant (Japanese aucuba).

The yucca fans out in shades of green, from light to dark.

Moss. Dots of it here. Larger patches there. And some the size of a throw rug making a well-weathered, low cement wall cosy in the frigid air.

Besides these encouraging signs of life, it is also inspirational to see plant parts usually hidden from view during spring and summer like a silver-spotted-with-gold rugosa thorn brightening up an otherwise gloomy corner . . .

. . . or spotting the remnants of summery largesse as in a rose of Sharon's overwintered, burst seed pod resembling a golden crown filled with ebony treasure.

À la prochaine!

Gardening, Like Life, Is All About Change

Last week saw a heat wave, this week is witness to cool temps and lots of showers.

Spruce, clouds, and a patch of blue

Eli the Kitten knows how to keep dry.

A nook in The Calm One's office

As does Dirac the Cat.

When there is a break between downpours, I head on out. The rain is so much better for various young vegetables than my valiant attempts at watering.

Can't beat beets!

Parsnips, which are wonderful, cream-coloured root vegetables with a sweet and earthy taste, have many a month of maturing ahead of them.

Its leaves bear a resemblance to another umbellifer, celery

Rhubarb thrives on moisture, so it's happy.

Sweet red peppers are already forgetting the scorching heat.

Though I will rig up some kind of protection against the sun for its tender flesh

Felines may adore catnip, but I suspect they love the smell of petrichor even more.

Beefsteak tomatoes as they grow are being twirled around the tuteurs

The peach and fig trees are as relieved as I am that they don't have to rely just on my spritzing them with a hose.

Laurel hedge, peach tree, & fig tree (upper right) 

As do Shasta daisies and hydrangeas.

À la prochaine!