Monday, August 21, 2006

Pond filters gross -- hostas good


My new pond fountain attachment and filters ran well for a week. I was hoping for longer, but oh, well. Live and learn. I hosed them off on the concrete block at the top of my basement stairwell. I thought that was so clever. I used to rinse them in a huge garbage can full of pond water so as not to disturb the water's pH level when I reinstalled the cleaned filters. I don't care about the pH anymore. Goldfish are hardy. And I'm running a Darwinian garden. Survival of the fittest is the name of the game. If you can't take the pH, evolve. Well anyway, the rinsing at the top of the stairwell thing isn't so clever. All that pond water gunk runs off down the stairs and clogs the too-narrow-for-my-liking drain down there. The water eventually went down the drain. But now the bottom of the stairwell is covered with slippery pond gunk. I really should scoop that out. Maybe I'll let it dry and then try and shovel it out. Maybe I'll just leave it there and see what happens. I'll spend my time watching the restored burbling of the fountains. And the hostas are in bloom. At least they look nice.

Tuesday, August 15, 2006

Crapemyrtles in bloom




My garden's creator liked to plant (a lot). She did a great job making sure to plant so that something was blooming in every season. Spring was for dogwoods and weeping cherry trees. Summer was for poppies and tiger lillies. Late summer brings forth black-eyed Susans and Crapemyrtle blossoms. Right now it's the Crapemyrtles that are the most stunning, like hot pink and purple fireworks going off in the limbs of my four Crapemyrtle trees.

Monday, August 14, 2006

Winging it in the water garden



My two backyard ponds were my most daunting challenge when I moved into this house four years ago. The former owners, avid gardeners who sold us the house themselves, kept pointing out its interior foibles, like a smudge on the family room vertical blinds. I kept thinking to myself, "Forget the blinds. I'm taking them down as soon as I move in. What do I do with those ponds?" They were rather vague with their pond maintenance tips. "Oh, we let it run all winter," they said of the pumps that power its fountains. "We've had such mild winters." My first winter here it snowed like Antarctica. I was pouring warm water on the top of the waterfall hose to keep it from freezing solid and causing the pump motor to burn out. (This past winter I turned the things off and used those floating rings to keep the water from freezing over) I fed the goldfish so regularly they mulitplied like mosquitoes and dirtied the water and filter so much I kept spending money on products meant to clarify the water and new filter pads. Eventually, I learned to let nature take its course. The goldfish are remarkably hardy. I haven't fed them in two years. I also have never scrubbed down the sides of my pond liner. I'm guessing that its providing them with enough microorganisms to keep them fed. And, each winter I lose a few to the cold. I figure it's survival of the fittest. I have about five or six fish in there now and they seem pretty happy. The water is plenty clear. Today, because the weather is finally pleasant again, I ventured out to Webb's Water Gardens in Fallston and purchased a water plant for my hot tub-sized pond. It's the larger of the two and while I understand water plants help to keep the water clear, I had never got around to putting one in there. The kids and I chose a Blue Pickerel Rush. I liked it because it took up a lot of space, flowers continuously and was only about $10. (I'm supposed to fertilize it every two weeks.) I also got a new adjustable bell fountain kit to attach to the pump filter in my smaller pond. I had noticed the "bell" of water coming out of the old one didn't hold its shape very well for very long. Since it was over five years old, I thought to try replacing just his part. It cost just under $20 and so far (I've had it running for about an hour) it looks much better. I think the pump itself (which runs about $100) should hopefully get me through another couple of seasons at least.

Sunday, August 13, 2006

Welcome to my Misadventures in Gardening


I fell in love with my house when I first saw the little bridge that arches over its backyard fish ponds. When we bought it, I didn’t expect that I was headed for misadventures in gardening. But the fact that I had to hand my newborn over to the master gardener homeowner in order to tour her outdoor wonderland should have been a serious clue. My husband was in a hurry to get to the next property, hopeful he’d find a nice small yard that would be easy to mow. But I was enamored of this house’s tiered garden wall holding lush English ivy, poppies in the springtime, Black Eyed Susans in the late summer and elegant lillies. After we moved in, I still considered the garden to belong to Ginger, who planted and nurtured it. I kept inviting my new neighbors to come see “Ginger’s garden.” I’d take my baby on nature walks around it each day, pointing out new blooms, taking pictures of her next to the tulips. It looked fabulous that first spring with its five dogwood trees in bloom and its weeping cherry gone all pink like a prom dress. Ginger told me — as if to quiet my fears of yard work — that most of the flowers were simply “volunteers.” Being a novice whose former residence was a townhouse built on treeless field, I was unaware of the amount of weeding and watering that even perennials require. I came to discover that Ginger had planted a dozen flower beds back there, a good-sized vegetable garden and flowers and shrubs that wrapped around the house. The magnolia tree that dominated the front yard dropped leaves that required raking almost year-round. And the pumps that kept water circulating in the fish ponds needed to be cleaned almost weekly to keep the filters from clogging — a task I found similar to wringing out a dirty diaper (which I was doing a lot of inside the house.) Since I had two little kids to care for, I let nature take its course outside. Spring was lovely. But by mid-summer the garden had grown scary. I’d head outside dressed for the task, wearing garden clogs and wielding a trowel. Moments later, the weeds that towered over my head chased me back indoors, screaming. I started stalking Harford County’s Master Gardeners when they’d host a booth at the area’s summer events. I was hoping to convince one of these avid gardeners to visit my yard and tell me what to do with it. No one seemed interested. I’m sure a landscaper would have been happy to help, but I was still convinced that all I needed was a little free advice to set me in the right direction. Eventually, I began decoding my garden’s secrets. I drove the kids back and forth to the Harford County Cooperative Extension office bearing pictures of different weeds looking for a diagnosis of poison ivy. In time, I became a bit of an ivy-spotter, doing it for fun in my neighbor’s yards, whether they wanted me to or not. I’m still in the decoding process, but then what gardener isn’t? I thought I’d use this blog to share my misadventures in gardening. Hopefully, readers with greener thumbs than mine will weigh in to guide me. Please read. Thanks.

– Stacey A