Author: lwcmartin@bellsouth.net

Friday afternoons have turned into my favorite time of the week. This is the time that I get to spend with two of my younger grandchildren, Rowan (9) and Braxton (7). Jack picks them up from school and brings them to our house where we do “projects.”

While I work with one of the kids on the piano, the other kid takes Jack in hand and they do an activity. Part of my joy in all this is seeing Jack expanding his list of interests to include projects, though I know full well that his interest is really in being with his grandchildren.

When the piano lesson is over, we switch kids and do it all over again.

Last week, having run out of paint and glue, I decided that our weekly project should be gardening. I purchased two small planter boxes, potting soil, pansies and snapdragons and wrote out full instructions.

They had a blast. The kids were really into it and followed the instructions precisely and even Jack got his hands in the dirt.

I know that the plants would, at best, only put out 2 or 3 inches of roots throughout the season, so instead of trying to fill the entire box with potting soil, I used a “spacer” to take up room. After considering and discarding many ideas (bricks were too heavy, plastic peanuts were too messy and I didn’t have any plastic containers that I wanted to throw away) I came up with the idea of using an empty wine bottle. After the stress of election week, we had plenty of those around!

The kids put rocks in the bottom of the container for better drainage, then placed the wine bottle sideways and covered it with top soil (cheap!) placed their plants of choice on top of this, then filled in and around the plants with organic, moisture retentive potting soil (NOT cheap, but totally worth it).

The results were magnificent and hopefully they’ll remember to water so that the planter boxes will look good throughout the winter and will bloom profusely in spring.

But of course the end product was not the point of the afternoon. Instead, it was the joy of spending time with these precious children and my absolute delight in seeing Jack with dirt under his fingernails!!!

It’s almost November and change is definitely in the air! It’s time for a changing of the guard. Out with the old and in with the new.

Of course the basic structure of my garden will remain the same, the backbone and foundation on which it was founded. I have great respect and appreciation for these unchanging parts of my garden and work hard to keep them healthy.

But to keep all the garden looking good and thriving, it’s necessary to make some periodic changes. Generally, it’s a seasonal task and frankly, removing the old, spent, decaying plants and putting in something new, fresh and exciting is one of my favorite gardening chores. So, over the weekend, I pulled up all of my summer annuals, primarily rows of white pentas and verbenas and pots of begonias. I chopped down the okra tree and pulled up the last remaining tomatoes, all to make room for something new.

It’s always difficult to determine what to replace the old plants with because there are so many choices. Everyone has favorite plants they want to include in the garden. My vote is always for plants that are dependable and pleasing and ones that get the job done.

This year, like almost every other fall, I’ve planted dozens of pansies. I know quite well that they will not put on much of a show until spring but when I plant in fall, it’s with an eye toward the future. Planting in fall, rather than waiting for spring, allows them to put down roots and settle in before they are asked to perform.

In addition to the pansies, I also planted quite a few snapdragons and parsley. In the small area that I fenced in to keep the squirrels out, I put in lettuce, Swiss chard and kale.

I already have a lot of perennials so I only put in a few new and unusual things. I’ve always wanted to try tickseed sunflower, Bidens aristosa, and this seemed the perfect year to do that.

I love all seasons in the garden. And, I love all plants. But for the health, beauty and longevity of the garden, I know that change is good and now seems a good time to make those changes.

I was going through my closet yesterday, pushing warm weather cloths to the back to make room for the clothes I will (hopefully) need for late fall and winter. But it all made me think of the many plants that are named for clothing and accessories. So, here’s my “Botanical Closet.” Be sure to scroll down to see the full drawing.

The botanical closet is fairly well organized with (Indian) blankets, (shepherd’s) purses, (blue) bonnets and (Mexican) hats on the top shelves, though unfortunately, I do have a few moth (mulleins).

I keep my jewelry – jewel (weed), silver (weed) , (mari) gold and jade (plant) next to my (Venus) looking glass, which was also a logical place to put my lipstick (vine) and (cock’s) comb.

I have hooks for my (Joseph’s) coat, (monk’s) hood and (Dutchman’s) breeches and of course a special place for my umbrella (plant.). As I was cleaning up, I did happen to see a spider (wort) in the corner. Ugh.

My shoes, (lady’s) slippers, (fairy) slippers and moccasin (flowers) are below my more personal items, such as my (cow) slip and (lady’s) smock. And, for sentimental reasons, I’ve held on to my bride’s bonnet.

The floor of the closet is basically storage for all my box (woods). It’s a little dusty (miller) and yikes! I saw droppings from a mouse (eared chickweed.)!!!

In spite of the moths, mice, dust and spiders, it’s still probably more organized and a lot more colorful than my real closet!

Hope you enjoyed.

Laura

With masks being THE accessory of the season and pumpkins being the most popular seasonal fruit, I decided to combine the two and create a trio of masked pumpkins.

Instead of the more traditional scary faces, I chose to decorate my pumpkins with masks like those worn at a traditional Venetian masked ball.

I now fully appreciate a four year old’s passion for glitter. Armed with paint and glitter, ribbon, fake gems and jewels, and gold netting, I had a blast. Even though I love orange pumpkins, my color scheme lent itself better to the relatively new “ghost” or white pumpkins. And, being a painter instead of sculptor and much more comfortable with a brush than a knife, I painted my pumpkins instead of carving them.

Carving or decorating pumpkins at Halloween dates back centuries to Ireland and the myth of “Stingy Jack” (absolutely NO relation to my husband, Jack, in spite of his reputation for frugality). Stingy Jack was such a scoundrel that when he died, God wouldn’t let him into heaven but instead sent him into the dark night with only a small piece of burning coal to light his way. Jack put this into a hollowed out turnip and according to legend, one could see Jack wandering through the darkness carrying his “lantern.” Soon he became known as Jack of the lantern, then Jack O’lantern.

On the eve of All Saint’s Day (November 1) the Irish put a light into a carved turnip or potato and walked through the villages, remembering Stingy Jack. When Irish immigrants came to America, they brought this tradition with them but found that the native American pumpkins were much more suitable for this purpose than the smaller turnips.

I’ll admit that my fancy masked pumpkins bear only the very slightest resemblance to a hollowed out turnip with a lump of coal, but I had a lot of fun doing it. If you, too, want to spend a week painting and glittering and gluing, go for it. It’s cheaper than therapy.

I am a self-proclaimed wild fruit fanatic.

I’ve been known to hang by my toenails off a cliff reaching for the plumpest blackberry in Alaska and to brave both grizzly bears and huge mosquitoes picking huckleberries in Montana.

So, when I found my neighbor’s wild persimmon tree laden with fruit, I felt as if I’d hit a gold mine. The fruit needed another few weeks to fully ripen so I headed home to do my homework.

First, I called my neighbor to ask permission. He laughed heartily and said, “be my guest, take as many as you want.”

Next I went online to find the best wild persimmon jam recipe. At this point I’m in full – throttle – enthusiastic – project mode. I envisioned a row of small jelly jars, filled with beautiful golden orange jam, each tied with persimmon colored ribbon.

There were several videos about making wild persimmon jam but I chose one posted by an Indiana farm woman who starts off by saying you need at least three pounds of fruit to make 4 small jars of jam. Three pounds!!! Then she casually says “Wash, peel and seed the fruit.”

This might be a good time to say that wild persimmons, which are about the size of a golf ball, are not like the big, fleshy Fuji persimmons you buy in the store. The thought of peeling and seeding three pounds of golf balls was intimidating.

It was with more determination than enthusiasm that I returned to the trees yesterday. About half the fruit was fully ripe and it was so beautiful I regained some of my ardor for the project. I picked a soft, plump persimmon and, since I’d never actually eaten one before, decided to try it.

I peeled back the skin and took a small bite. My first thought was that it wasn’t too tart. My next sensation was of something sucking out every molecule of moisture from my mouth and wrapping my tongue in cotton balls. It was like a sip of the most astringent tea you’ve ever had – times a thousand.

I threw the persimmon down, called to Sadie and started running home, all the time thinking, “juicy fruit gum. juicy fruit gum.” But of course, we haven’t had that in the house for years. I downed 4 or 5 glasses of water and desperately searched the drawers for chewing gum. All I found was an old hard peppermint candy, probably a decade old. I scraped off most of the plastic wrapping and popped it into my mouth. It helped. It only took a couple of hours to regain feeling in my tongue.

Sadly, I put away the jelly jars and the persimmon colored ribbon. Obviously, not all my full – throttle – enthusiasm – projects work out. If it’s true that good thoughts make sweet fruit, It’s time to work on my thinking! Happy Fall to you all.

Laura

The fall garden is no place for sissies! Like adolescent boys vying for the attention of a pretty girl, these tall, gangly flowers tower over one another, pushing and shoving and demanding to be looked at – and admired!

Perhaps the most startling and outstanding, to say nothing of being the tallest plant in my garden this fall is my okra “tree.” At well over six feet, this crimson beauty is as straight and sturdy as an oak. We placed a chair near by and now one of our favorite places to sit is in the “shade of the okra tree.” It sounds like the title of a country song, doesn’t it?

The lofty heights are crowded with other flowers and plants that have spent the last five months growing and producing leaves and flowers. I can’t say that they are at their most elegant but they are at their most robust.

My beautiful blue black salvia is over five feet tall but isn’t quite strong enough to support itself so I’ve shored it up with poles and stakes. The bees and hummingbirds don’t seem to mind, they are still pollinating like crazy, getting ready for the long winter ahead.

My milkweed grew quite tall but I was very disappointed at the sparse bloom. This time last year the plants were laden with blossoms and my garden was a sea of yellow orange. Not this year! My suspicion is that the over-abundant rainfall that we’ve had this year has caused it to grow more leaves and stem than blossoms. I should have fed it some organic fertilizer mid-July but I didn’t realize that it was going to be a problem.

I transplanted some ginger lilies from the back yard. They are very happy where they are now, basking in the sunshine. Their beautiful butterfly -like blooms are sweet and heavily scented. The plants stand almost 5 feet tall and their leaves look like those of corn which makes it a fun addition to my urban garden.

My lantana has spent the late summer growing out, not up, but has claimed a huge amount of horizontal space.

It’s a glorious way to wind up the fall gardening season. It makes me happy to look at the sheer exuberance of growth and bloom. But still, this loud, pushy gangly garden also make me look forward to the quiet, small flowers of spring, which just proves that every season has a unique glory.

Happy gardening – in every season!

My husband, Jack, and I had the opportunity to spend some time driving down the Blue Ridge Parkway last week. We were way too early for fall color (and the crowds!) but the wildflowers were magnificent.

Jack, not being quite as well versed about the plant names as I am, kept asking for identification as we passed fields of flowers in bloom. And so I told him: Joe Pye weed, butterfly weed, iron weed, jewel weed….Finally he stopped me and asked, “are they all weeds? And, what’s the difference between a wildflower and a weed?”

Ha, a great question that botanists and naturalists have been trying to answer for centuries. You might agree with Ralph Waldo Emerson who said, “A weed is a plant whose virtues have not yet been discovered,” but you probably only agree with him if you are not a gardener.

Another, unknown author, said that a weed is only a plant growing where you do not want it to grow and according to that definition, there were no weeds along the Parkway.

Goldenrod was most prevalent and I identified 4 different kinds. The National Park Service thinks so highly of their goldenrod that they fence it in. Just kidding. But the abundance of gold behind the quaint split rail fences make them appear precious and beloved.

There is a triumvirate of weeds that blooms profusely in fall. Along the roadsides, especially in drainage ditches where there is more moisture, jewelweed is thick. Although it’s most commonly orange, there were great expanses of yellow jewelweed as well. This is a native Impatien, related to the popular garden plants.

Joe Pye Weed towers above the rest of the wildflowers, often reaching a height of 6 feet or more. This is a butterfly and bee magnet. Sometimes the bees get so full, they seem to doze drunkenly on the plant. The flowers are not brilliantly colored but are a soft pinkish brown color.

For brilliance, look for the bright magenta ironweed, a spectacular, tall fall bloomer. The stalk is rigid and difficult to cut down, thus the common name. This, too, attracts many butterflies. It is the larval host for the American Painted butterfly. Seeds are eaten by finches and sparrows.

As much as I love these colorful roadside “weeds”, I’m not that enamored with the more pedestrian weeds that persist in my garden. I have to agree with William Shakespeare, who said “Sweet flowers are slow and weeds make haste.”

I saw a sign once that I really, really want to put up in my front yard. It said,

“Free Weeds. U-Pick.”

Please, come on by, pick all you want!!!

For the most part, I’m happy to see any flower, any time of the year but when it comes to azaleas, I have to admit to a certain old – fashioned preference for keeping azaleas as belles of the ball in spring.

Seeing azaleas bloom in fall just seems to be out of the natural order of things, like keeping the Christmas tree up until Valentines’ Day.

Obviously, I’m in the minority here. Recently, as in the last 20 years, the nursery industry has gone ga-ga over Encore azaleas that bloom in spring, a bit in midsummer and then again in fall. There are countless cultivars now, offering these repeat bloomers in every color and size.

I don’t object to a few sporadic blooms on a shrub as the weather cools, sort of a last hurrah! before winter comes but to have a bush laden with pink or white flowers in front of trees sporting brilliantly colored autumn leaves kind of makes me shudder.

Nature herself puts up a good argument for fall blooming azaleas as the stunningly beautiful native plum leaf azalea, Rhododendron prunifolium, naturally blooms in late summer and early fall. This gorgeous shrub, with its bright red blooms, is native to a tiny section of southeastern Alabama and southwestern Georgia. It is definitely a fall blooming azalea that I am excited about. But with it’s brilliant, dark blossoms, it looks as if it should bloom in fall.

I know, I should be grateful for plants that extend the season, that offer beauty for as long as possible and that provide blossoms until frost. And I am. Sort of. Encore and the other fall blooming azaleas are great for other people’s gardens. But for me? I’ll take my azaleas with their lovely spring colors – in spring. But then again, I take down my Christmas tree the day after Christmas! It’s just the natural order of things.

P.S. Last week I wrote about caterpillars and today as my sister and I were walking down a gravel road, we saw a caterpillar that stopped us in our tracks. A full six inches long with spikes and horns, we stood and watched in amazement as it crawled across the road. A little research helped us determine that it is, without a doubt, a “Horned Hickory Devil,” caterpillar to the royal walnut moth. In spite of it’s ferocious appearance, it is pretty harmless. But impressive!!!!

Last spring I planted a small parsley plant in a pot right outside the backdoor so it would be handy whenever I wanted a sprig for flavoring or decoration.

Instead, I got magic. Last week, I noticed a small striped caterpillar on one of the leaves. On closer inspection, I found 4 more, all of which were tiny. A quick check helped me to identify them as the larval stage of the black swallowtail butterfly. Two of them were dark with white splotches in the center and I thought maybe they were a different species.

A little more research showed me that the tiny dark larvae were indeed the same species but they were still in their first stages of growth.

If you’ve ever read Eric Carlisle’s book to a child, you already know that caterpillars are VERY hungry creatures. I’ve been watching them every day, fascinated and astounded by their rapid growth.

Caterpillars generally go through 4 or 5 stages, or instars, where they shed their skin, preparing for a larger body. After three days, all of “my caterpillars” had moulted and were the more familiar green and yellow stripes with yellow and orange dots.

Black swallowtail caterpillars look very much like monarch butterfly larvae. The difference is that the monarchs do not have dots – just stripes.

Caterpillars are truly amazing. They have been called “eating machines” for a good reason. Their only function in life is to eat and they increase their body weight thousands of times over. To help them do this their bodies are equipped with an astonishing 4000 muscles! Swallowtail caterpillars prefer to feed on parsley, Queen Anne’s lace, fennel and dill.

Of course, the fatter the caterpillar, the more appealing they look to song birds and other predators. I am hoping that the close proximity to the house will provide some protection for them.

In the meantime, my parsley plant is looking a little……defoliated. But who cares? I can buy a sprig of parsley at the store for 69 cents. But watching magic unfold on my doorstep? Priceless!

For those of you who have been reading this blog for a while, you might remember that in Spring 2019, I wrote (rapturously) about seeing a white fawn in the woods close to Lake Lanier.

In the 18 months since then, a lot has happened (understatement!). But one of the fun things has been watching this beautiful little white fawn grow up. And, much to my surprise, “she” seems to have sprouted antlers this summer. So much for my instinctive feeling that it was a girl.

As far as we can tell, the deer is healthy and does not seem to be shunned by the other deer. He is not an albino, but a true white with some brown spots on his neck and face. White deer are quite rare, though there is an entire population of them on an island in a lake in New York State.

As enamored as I am with this deer, I have to admit to some feeling of frustration when I discovered that he and his friends had apparently had a feast in my carefully planted flower beds. Having never gardened with deer before, I just didn’t THINK about it, until I arrived to neatly grazed flowers, with just the nubs sticking above ground. They ate every leaf off every plant, including a small Japanese Maple tree.

So, out came the books, the websites and the gardening magazines on a search for plants that deer WON’T eat. And all the experts say that deer will eat anything if they are hungry enough. But, heavily scented and deeply textured plants seem to be low on their list of preferences. So, I tried black eyed Susans with fuzzy leaves, which they ate right up and continue to nibble on whenever it has a chance to recover. And yarrow, which has a strong medicinal scent, which at first they ate but have not yet eaten the new growth. They seem to leave alone lenten rose and most ferns and SO FAR marigolds.

I’m pretty philosophical about gardening with deer, I don’t depend on my vegetable garden to sustain us and though it’s nice to have a few flowers out front, it’s not absolutely necessary. And, even though they are destroying my garden, I am still thrilled when I see these graceful creatures bounding through the woods. After all, they were here before I was and have a more legitimate claim to the woods that I do. So, when I see a blaze of white running through the woods, I’m grateful to be in a place where wild things are still wild.