Our garden is big. Yours doesn't have to be to yield lots of great food and flowers

I did not hear this in person. Bill did (on Marketplace Money on NPR last Friday). But he couldn’t resist telling me about it, chortling loudly the while.

As well he might. According to him, a garden advisor – whose name he didn’t catch – had pronounced that “if you can’t keep your room swept, you shouldn’t try to garden.”

This struck me as so wildly improbable I thought he must have heard wrong, so I looked it up.

Sure enough, there in the synopsis:

“…not every budget-conscious person can make a garden grow and save money. Meg Favreau of WiseBread.com says that if you can’t keep your own room clean, most likely, you won’t be able to take care of a garden. Just go grocery shopping. But for those of who (sic) can maintain a clean living space…”

Arrgh!!

In extenuation (please see update below), the interview was about frugality, not horticulture, and Ms. Favreau was presented as an expert on all things frugal, rather than as an expert at gardening, or, for all I know, housekeeping.  But still. There may be a few personality traits that would get in the way of successful gardening – hating the outdoors comes to mind – but a deficiency of tidiness is emphatically not one of them.

A few reasons cleaning the house and caring for a garden have nothing to do with each other

1) No amount of housecleaning will create some new piece of furniture or decorative object that was not there before. But if you plant an inexpensive 6-pack of baby zinnias, you could have great bouquets for months.

2. No amount of housecleaning will create something to eat. We hold this truth to be self-evident.

3. Cleaning what does exist in your own room may improve the looks of that thing, but not transformatively. There is no way that dusting a steel clamp light will turn it into a crystal chandelier. Tend to a little tomato plant, on the other hand, and more likely than not it will become a great big green vine dripping with delicious crimson fruit.

4. Cleaning indoors may be good exercise, but opening the windows won’t make it exercise in the open air. Even the most benign cleaning products do not smell nearly as nice as newly-mown grass or blooming lilacs or the warm earth all by itself.

5. There are degrees of uncleanliness, but basically a room is either tidy enough to occupy pleasantly or messy enough to inspire discomfort. In the garden, no such dichotomy exists. Instead, there’s a huge spectrum of imposed order from maintained-to-the-max to utterly overgrown, and there will be recognizable benefits just about everywhere along the line.

6. With maintained-to-the-max we arrive at the most important reason Ms. Favreau’s analogy is bunk, and (because of what it implies) dangerous bunk at that. The one thing that will doom you as a gardener is being a control freak. Doing the work, yes. Good idea. If you put plants in the right place, weed, water, fertilize and similarly help Mrs. Nature to the best of your abilities, you will greatly increase the chances of reaping rewards from your garden. But you cannot for a minute assume that you are in charge. You’re not.

That’s one of the things that’s most wonderful about the whole untidy, ever changing, always productive process of gardening. It’s always a partnership, and the gardener is always the junior partner.

Some posts that might be especially useful for food gardeners just starting out (try the Garden dropdown menu for more)

High Return Vegetables

Tips for Success with Vegetable Seeds

How to grow Garlic

How to build simple, easy trellises for tomatoes, peas and beans

* Update: Ms. Favreau‘s gratifyingly mild-mannered mother wrote in (see comments) to point out that the synopsis was by no means the whole story and that she didn’t discourage gardening and I should give a listen instead of simply relying on the retelling from NPR. Fair enough, and I do apologize; you’d think I’d know better in a political season full of dubious out-of-context quotes. So listen I did and so can you if you click the synopsis link. As it happens, I don’t particularly agree with her suggestions for how beginners should get started, but that’s a whole different post and a far less emphatic one.

Yet all that said, post-listen (not surprisingly, she was analogizing room-tidying to weeding) the gist of  it remains and I still think the message was unfortunate. There are indeed reasons that food gardening may not be a money saver  - again, a different post – and there are crops that will fail unweeded: carrots, onions and others with small tops that are easily crowded out, but one of the great things about gardening is that you can still get a lot of food if you don’t weed very often. For instance, once her recommended zucchini – and other squash – plants get going, their giant leaves will shade out weeds and you won’t have to worry about them.

Magnolia in usual late April mode

The pattern itself is always the same: 1) multi-week warm spell, 2) magnolia blooms, 3) seasonally-appropriate frost comes, 4) flowers turn brown. But it used to happen between late April and early May. Then the whole sequence moved back to April.

In 2012, all March. Bloom started around the 10th and was thoroughly whacked when the temperature dropped to 25 degrees on the night of the 26th.

April 18th, three weeks and change after the frost - just a few late-opening dots of pink.

Meanwhile, the combo of February and March was the 3rd driest on record and April is not shaping up well.

I could go on, among other things airing the usual caveat that this is weather, not climate. But I’d rather cut to this not-climate’s effect on the maple syrup industry, as described in the crop reports written by Arnold Coombs, a seventh generation maple syrup producer and packer in Vermont.

Full disclosure:  The 2012 crop report abbreviated below was originally sent to me by the farm’s publicist, who thought it might provide a story about the connections between maple syrup and climate change.

Indeed it does. Especially when combined with Mr. Coomb’s reports from 2009 (best crop in the last 75 years) and 2010 (production dramatically below average).

Up, down, up, down, way hot, way not, dust-bowl dry and then hundred-year flooded, the globe is on a violent weather see-saw that is not well described by “warming,” a word that usually evokes something pleasant. “Climate change” is a little better,  but not by much. Change isn’t always pleasant, but it’s beneficial at least as often as it is harmful, which cannot be said about the see-saw.

The search for a term that is both scientifically defensible and sufficiently horrifying is ongoing. As is the phenomenon the term will describe. Here’s an on-the-ground look at one early shape of the agriculture to come, and following that, links to a few recipes. Maple syrup shortages and price hikes are probably inevitable, but they’re not likely to be crippling, especially given that our local, sustainable sweetener is not only delicious but also, for what it is, inexpensive.

2012 Preliminary Crop Report

By Arnold Coombs  (edited and condensed by me)

Following a huge crop like 2011, the 2012 crop had a tough act to follow.  The winter weather was most unusual with temperatures well above average. In southern VT and NH we had only two significant snow storms with the biggest being in October.

Because of the warmth and the lack of snow, getting around in the woods was much easier. Most sugar makers were ready to start producing early, but then in the week of March 19th, temperatures hit the 70s for four days in a row and ended our season prematurely.

This year, half of last year’s record amount seems to be normal, which translates into about 70% of an average crop for some, less for others.  We estimate the final US production at 18,000,000 lbs. compared to over 30,000,000 lbs. last year. Canadian production looks to be similar. What does that mean for prices? They will be going up. How much? That is still to be determined…

The farmers’ union in Quebec increased the base of syrup price 3% and with other costs rising (what isn’t going up?) we see a minimum increase of 5%…. pricing usually settles down by Late May or early June.

Due to the warmer weather, this year’s crop is running darker than usual, (last year the crop was 30% Grade A Light Amber and this year it is 5%) but the flavor is still quite good and we have plenty.

Personally, I’m delighted. As long it isn’t “buddy” (off-flavored because the tree has started to leaf out) I like the darker grade B better anyway.

Recipes:

Yes, it's dessert. (Carrot cake for pie-preferrers, albeit without raisins.)

Assorted maple tarts (carrot, apple and wild rice), and Downeast Company Coleslaw are here.

Crisp Crust Maple-Walnut Pie is here.

Les Grandperes (French Canadian cottage pudding, aka biscuits on syrup) is – or I suppose are – here.

This picture (taken at Adams, in Poughkeepsie, NY) is actually a bit of a cheat - I buy almost all of my seeds online, from too many favorite suppliers.* But it does say "time to think about starting seeds” in an unmistakable way.

This year’s gigantic assortment of seeds has finally arrived, bringing with it the usual gigantic dose of buyer’s remorse. I had firmly decided against bulbing onions, for instance, having concluded that purchased plants  -  also available mail order, in convenient bunches of 50 to 75 -  do much better than the plants I start myself.

Yet somehow, mysteriously, here is a packet of heirloom Australian Brown storage onion seeds, roughly 700 incipient plants. Here also are 8 kinds of peas, most of them the kinds that require poles. We cut way back last year and they were sorely missed, but this does not explain where the hell I’m going to put them all. As usual, too many tomatoes, but on the other hand I’m not going to start any eggplants.

I had no intention of getting into cardoons again, either, but then there was this nice packet of Gobbo di Nizza in one of those racks (well, you have to at least look), and a facebook friend had just assured me they really could be delicious and before I knew it, two dozen little green sprouts, each capable of becomming a bush 4 feet tall and almost as wide.

Even if you don’t eat them, cardoons are great in bouquets, especially in late fall when most other home grown beauties are no more. This Thanksgiving arrangement also includes Redbor kale and Bright Lights chard.

I’ve given individual pots to only 6 of the strongest-looking, but even that modest number will be eating too much precious seed starting space by the time it’s time to start the tomatoes.

And thus we arrive at When Is the Right Time to Start the Seeds? The chart at the end of the post provides some guidance and many seed packets have suggestions too, but the truth is it all depends.

SOME THINGS SEED STARTING TIME DEPENDS ON

* First and foremost, LIGHT. Outdoor plants do not cope well with the restricted light of indoors. A greenhouse helps, obviously, and grow lights can be almost as good. But if all you have is a windowsill it’s best to start only a very few things and to do it only a few weeks before they can start spending at least some time outside.

Tomatoes, for instance, are typically started 8 to 10 weeks before the last frost, but windowsill seedlings will be stronger if started no more than 6 weeks in advance. They’ll be small, but they’ll catch up, and they’ll catch up more rapidly than they would if they’d been stressed by two more weeks of low light.

* How dependable is the weather? All timing for seeds started indoors is calculated on the basis of distance to last frost. You can use a calculator like this one from NOAA to get a probable last frost date, but “probable” is the best that predictions can do. In places where there’s enough frost to worry about in the first place, spring weather is often unsettled. Balmy days can be followed by cold ones so blustery it is below freezing if you count the wind chill; and sometimes it’s just plain below freezing – late cold snaps can never be completely counted out.

On top of that, most tender plants prefer genuine warmth, in the air and in the soil. Forty five degrees is far from freezing, but if you’re a tomato it’s also far from warm. Short version: even though I have a greenhouse that lets me start early, I count as though “last frost” will be ten days later than predicted. If warm weather comes promptly, the seedlings will be a little smaller than planned, but that’s better than having them too big. (Seedlings that outgrow their pots get root bound, which sets them way back. )

*What’s the weather like indoors? A tomato seed may germinate in anywhere from 5 days to 2 weeks, depending on the temperature of the soil. (75 – 80 is ideal, but anything over 60 or so will work, eventually). This obviously affects how much of the allotted time the seedling is actually growing.

* How crucial is it that the vegetable, fruit or flower get a big head start? Plants that must make good growth in cool weather (delphiniums) and plants that are ruled by day length (onions) must be about 12 weeks old when planted out in early spring, no matter how long the growing season may be. Plants that just need three or four months of warmth after they hit the garden (tomatoes, peppers, daturas) have a lot more leeway – at least in places where the first fall frost doesn’t come until mid October or later.

* Some favorite sources for seeds , with a brief excursion into heirlooms and hybrids

More on seeds and seed starting:

Is seed starting really essential?

Organic seeds, starting off on the right foot

A Seed-Starting Timetable

(slightly adapted from one provided by  Kitchen Garden Seeds)

Counting back from last frost:

Vegetables

Four Weeks: Winter Squash, Melons, Cucumbers, Nasturtiums

Six Weeks:  Fennel,  Shallots, Tomatillos, Basil, Echinacea  and St. John’s Wort.

Eight Weeks: Eggplant, Tomatoes, Chiles, Sweet and Bell Peppers, Chives, Sage, Stevia and Thyme.

Nine Weeks: Broccoli, Cabbage and Kohlrabi (transplant out four weeks before the last frost date).

Ten Weeks: Celery, Celeriac.

Eleven Weeks: Leeks and Cauliflower (transplant out four weeks before the last frost date).

Twelve Weeks: Artichokes, Cardoons and Brussels Sprouts.

Flowers

Five Weeks: Alyssum, Calendula, Marigold, Zinnia.

Six Weeks: Balsam, Cutting Ageratum, China Asters, Celosia, Cleome, Coleus, Catmint Nepeta, Echinacea, Euphorbia, Forget-Me-Nots, Dahlia, Nicotiana, Scabiosa, Snapdragons, Stock, Thunbergia.

Eight Weeks: Baby’s Breath, Black-Eyed Susans, Milkweed, Coreopsis, Gaillardia, Globe Amaranth, Helichrysum, Hibiscus, Hollyhock, Heuchera, Nigella, Phlox, Platycodon, Statice, Yarrow.

Ten Weeks: Dianthus, Digitalis, Lobelia, Heliotrope.

Twelve Weeks: Datura, Salvia, Verbena, Viola.

A classic bouquet of violets, tightly bound stems, galax leaf frame (no doily, however)

If that sounds more than a little old fashioned, that’s because it is. The song is only in my head because my father used to croon it to my mother and whether he ever bought her any I do not know. They did court in New York City in the late ‘30s, when nosegays of fragrant violets were still a staple of winter romance. But by the time I grew up the whole tradition – along with the violets – was long gone.

Or make that almost gone.

Sweet violets (Viola odorata) grow in my garden; I could force them in winter if I wanted to. And if we were almost anywhere else, I probably would.

But as we are in the mid Hudson Valley, I don’t need to go to the trouble. Just up the road in Rhinebeck there is still a tiny fragment of the now vanished industry that once made the town “The Violet Capital of The World.”

Big claim, possibly not true. But maybe. When violet mania was at its height in the early 20th century, there were over 400 violet houses in the area, bringing close to a million dollars to the local economy (almost 23 million if you adjust for inflation).

The story of this floral rise and fall  is recounted, briefly, in The Violets of Dutchess County, and there is a new documentary about it, Sweet Violets, that I’m beyond eager to see and will try to report on shortly.

Meanwhile, hankering for the real thing, I bought the nosegay in the picture from Battenfeld’s, formerly a major player in the Rhinebeck violet biz. Its greenhouses are now devoted to anemones, with some ranunculus and lilies thrown in to keep things interesting.

They don't mention the violets because there are so very few

The last violets are over against one wall of one greenhouse, in a bed that’s 100 feet long but only one foot wide.

It looks like hell… as it needs to for maximum flower production. All will be restored to health when the cutting season is over.

Depriving mature violet plants of food and water scares them into producing flowers as a survival strategy. Plants that fear death put maximum energy into blossoms as a last ditch attempt to make seeds.

Come early spring, these unhappy creatures will be divided and moved outdoors for regeneration. By the time they must come in again next fall, they’ll look like these

Violet plants that landed in clover (aka an anemone bed), happily watered and fertilized, responding to their cushy situation by making a ton of leaves and very few flowers.

The plants giving flowers today are directly linked to the past. They’ve been going in and out, divided and divided and divided again for well over 40 years, said the company’s fourth generation owner, Fred Battenfeld, who welcomed us and showed us around  — on of all days February 13th.

I bought only three bunches of violets, which was probably a good thing. There were just two left in stock and he picked the third one as we talked, perhaps not inadvertently illustrating why this labor intensive flower may have trouble making a commercial comeback.

The hands of Fred Battenfeld, in front of the last strip of Rhinebeck’s greenhouse violets. (Go visit or get the film to see the rest of him; we didn't bug him for a portrait and the candid ones didn't come out.)

GROWING FRAGRANT VIOLETS

The sweet violet (Viola odorata) likes cool, moist, slightly acid to neutral soil in partial or dappled shade. It’s fairly tough, but not as cold hardy as the common or wild blue violet (V. papilionacia). Most authorities rate it ok to southern zone 6, though mine have been doing fine for years in zone 5b.

What mine are not doing is spreading, though V. odorata is normally willing to multiply freely. That’s probably at least in part because they’re at the end of their range, but I’m sure the intense competition isn’t helping. Unlike the common kind, fragrant violets aren’t particularly pushy.

In my experience, they aren’t particularly fragrant, either, unless your nose is in the immediate neighborhood. Bouquets on a side table waft perfume as far as an adjacent chair and a boutonniere rewards its wearer with a steady, subtle sweetness. But outdoors the scent doesn’t travel far.

Maybe it’s different in England, where V. odorata is a native ground cover frequently praised for warranting its species name. Here I’m thinking the best place for them would be up closer to to the passer-by: on an embankment beside a walkway, or carpeting the surface of a big planter that housed a small tree or vine draped tuteur. Or maybe in a giant pot on a pedestal…

But then the giant pot would probably have to be brought in  for the winter and then there we would be again with things that must be brought in about which I have sworn several vows. Also, if I’ve got to bring it in (to the unheated but brightly sunlit barn, for instance), I think I’ll go whole hog and plant a few Parmas.

GROWING PARMA VIOLETS

The Parmas are the prima donnas, most fragrant, most double, most finicky of scented violets. Although opinions differ on their region of origin and their correct species affinities, everyone seems to be in agreement that they came from someplace warm and were introduced to Europe through Italy, sometime around the 16th century.

They need more or less the same conditions as odoratas, but slightly more fertility and quite a bit less cold. Plan to bring them in if you’re anywhere north of zone 9.

Sources include

Select Seeds and Bluestone Perennials

More on Parma violets: Matt Mattus’s What’s Old is New Again Maybe.

Listen to Frank Sinatra sing I Bought Your Violets For Your Furs

Zone 6 zone denial tip: standard hybrid gladioli are reliably hardy only to zone 9 - or 8b, maybe - but if you have well drained soil, plant them 5 or 6 inches deep and mulch heavily in fall (in this case before the ground freezes), there’s a good chance they’ll come back.

By now you’ve probably gotten the word: the long awaited, massively updated USDA Climate Zone map, the first revision since 1990, has finally arrived. And  – insert giant snarky “this is news?” – it shows large swaths of the country have moved up at least a half zone.

In 1991, when I got together with Bill and began gardening in the Hudson Valley, I could joke that my new life didn’t net me a single climate zone, even though the NY garden is about 300 miles southwest of the one in Maine. Until a couple of weeks ago, they were both in zone 5b. Now, while New York remains 5b – by the skin of its teeth, from the looks of things – Maine has been promoted to 6a.

Of course the difference between the two may well be less than the full 5 degrees between half zones. Same with the big chunk of Nebraska that’s now 5a instead of 4b. It’s also possible that Chicago, a heat island, may have remained exactly the same while getting a higher zone assignment because of better measurement.

But whatever the physical changes, most of the numbers did go up. The USDA, however, refuses to draw what appear to be obvious conclusions.

Perhaps not surprisingly, there has been a lot of flapdoodle* about how the zone changes are strong proof of global warming and the USDA is simply stonewalling. There has also been a fair amount of wishful thinking along the lines of “I thought it wouldn’t be hardy here, but now I know I can grow it. Yay!”

Well, yes and no. USDA representative Kim Kaplan doth perhaps protest too much when insisting that the new map differs so fundamentally from the old that the two cannot be compared. Given the unanimity of projections of increasing warmth in future, it could be quibbling to maintain that the 30 years of data behind the new map is weather, not climate, because climate measures brackets of at least 50 years. And when it comes to wishful thinking, no one with any gardening knowledge would deny that plant hardiness is indeed an increasingly mobile target.

But all that said, I don’t think it would hurt to calm down a little and stop making the poor map carry far more weight than it should. On the first count, there are a lot more robust proofs of global warming (check out this government sanctioned analysis of trends in the Southeast, for instance, if you really want to have your pants scared off.) On the second count, it pays to remember that average winter lows – the only thing measured on the map – are by no means the single factor influencing plant survival; and when it comes to climate change the challenges far outweigh the benefits, even at the home garden level.

Some Factors Other Than the Thermometer That Influence Winter Survival of Plants

Time to harden off. When cold comes gradually, plants have a chance to toughen up in preparation for winter. When cold comes suddenly, plants may be killed by temperatures they could otherwise sail through unscathed.

Duration of the coldest temperatures. A plant rated hardy to -10 is more likely to survive a few hours of -15 than ten straight days of -5.

Winter soil moisture. Dry climate plants from lavender to cactus care a lot more about drainage than they do about air temperature.

Yearly rainfall. Seattle and Tucson have the same zone number but are not otherwise similar. Moisture needers and drought needers alike will go into winter deeply stressed if grown in the wrong place, and that weakness can finish them off when deep cold is added.

Late summer and fall care. Nitrogen fertilizer spurs tender growth that’s vulnerable to winter kill. Late pruning does the same thing.

Snow cover. A deep fluffy blanket of snow that lasts all winter will protect plants (especially perennials) from cold that would kill them if the ground were bare.

Some Gardeners’ Problems Headed This Way As a Result of Climate Change

Rapid temperature swings. A long mild fall followed by a plunge into the deep freeze, and/or a very early spring, followed by a plunge into the deep freeze.

Extreme weather events. Extended droughts, torrential rains, hurricane force winds.

Shorter winters. Plants like apples, peonies and lilacs that must have a long winter sleep can languish with too little rest. Insects and diseases once kept in check by extended cold will have higher rates of survival.

Less reliable snow cover, more frequent ice storms. Snow protects; ice kills.

Hotter summers. Northerners will have better luck with heat-loving annuals from tomatoes to moonflowers. Southerners may well have less; too much heat prevents fruit set and pushes annual flowers into early graves. The region of happiness for plants that must have cool nights even in summer (peas, delphiniums, rhododendrons, sugar maples) is headed toward Canada.

A Few Coping Strategies may be found here.

* Some back story on the flap.

Whatever its limitations, the USDA hardiness zone map has long been a widely recognized metric. Breeders and nurseries use it to rate and label plants. Scientists use it (along with a lot else) when investigating things like the spread of invasive weeds. The USDA itself uses the map to set some crop insurance standards.

Not chopped liver; and by the time the century turned, it was clear to all that the 1990 map was both insufficient and inaccurate. The USDA commissioned a new one from the American Horticultural Society, which had produced zone maps before. Projected appearance date was 2003.

But then the map didn’t show up – or rather it didn’t show up for long. As I remember it, there was a new version on the AHS website, but only very briefly. The curious were told it went away because it was just a draft; the USDA was not satisfied, and revisions were under way.

This was the party line for quite a while. During this while, we were enjoying the G.W. Bush administration, increasingly notorious for its disinclination to confront man made climate change. People began to think dark thoughts.

These thoughts were not brightened when, in 2006,  the Arbor Day Foundation published an updated zone map of its own, using some (but not all) of the same data as the rejected AHS draft. The ADF website provides an animation of the old map morphing into the (ADF) new one. It is not reassuring.

More grumbling. More Bush administration. More delays, now routinely attributed to the difficulty of producing a sufficiently sophisticated, web friendly interactive map.

Not so fast forward to January 25th, 2012. The new map is introduced at the National Arboretum. Distant journalists are invited to attend via webinar. I attend.

Neato! The thing is terrific. It really IS a great leap forward – for doing what it’s supposed to do, anyway. One need only enter a zip code to get the corresponding zone assignment, and there is a lot of other information there for the drilling down.

The introduction ceremony concludes with a question period. Various reporters ask questions. The most vocal questioners do not appear to be gardeners and what they really, really want to know is why the long suffering Ms. Kaplan, who has been fielding these enquiries ever since the flap began, will not knuckle under and admit that the map proves global warming is undoubtedly here. She won’t do it. (Her reasons are detailed on the map site, under “what’s new?”)

So, official word is still that the map was not delayed  - perhaps by underfunding? –  during the previous administration, which may or may not be true. But in fairness, nobody’s trumpeting its appearance as the return of sanity, either. So at the very least the USDA is an equal opportunity sphinx.

Our holiday tree, 2011, aka the top of the former arborvitae. There’s a bucket of water inside the pedestal.

Putting it up was extremely easy; taking it down wasn’t much  harder and now we have the same pile of long branches anyone with a regular tree will have as soon as they saw them from the trunk, first step in successful home recycling.

Some will argue deconstruction is unnecessary; you can simply recycle the tree by setting it up outdoors, replacing the human-centric ornaments with items of interest to birds: cut oranges, a feeder or two, that cute bell made from suet and encrusted with seeds you got from the office gift-swap.

Well, yes, but myself I’d rather use cut boughs to mulch the perennial beds, evergreen boughs being just about ideal for this purpose: They hold in the cold without matting down and they’re quick and easy to remove in spring without harming tender emerging shoots.

That’s right, hold in the cold. There are some instances where the object is to hold in warmth – such as when you’re trying to protect the fig tree.

Wrapped fig tree surrounded by bagged leaves, further insulated by a large pile of hemlock boughs

But most of the time what the mulch is doing is keeping the surface frozen, so you don’t get repeated thaws and freezes between January and April. “Frost heave” doesn’t just happen to roadbeds. Even when plants stay put, delicate feeder roots right near the surface are often damaged by soil that expands and contracts like an accordion.

The beds in Maine take a lot of boughs, so each year Kristi goes scavenging right about now, looking for raw material. Being well out in the country, she has to work at it. But in towns that offer municipal pick up there’s a bounty of useful material conveniently located right next to the curb.

Alternate use for evergreen branches: back door decor. Former “tree” makes a good anchor; saved up shrub and hedge prunings add variety.

Beds already all cozy – or non-existent? Consider the outdoor arrangement. In cold climates cut evergreens will stay fresh looking right through the entire Carnival season (Epiphany to Mardi Gras).

Added benefit of tree-in-tall pot: this is actually the first tree we’ve had in several years, feline depredations having finally discouraged me from even trying. But it looks like a combination of cat maturity and – comparative – tree inaccessibility is a winning one.

It's not that he COULDN'T jump; even fat as he is that's an easy distance. But as long as nothing moves he's not that interested.

And almost everything deciduous is down to the bare branches, many of them in need of shaping. What all this is reminding me is that I definitely need some snazzy new material for the string of garden beds that will (next spring) finally be unified into a single sweep of Things That Look Good From Inside The House When Inside Is Where We Are Most Of The Time.

Enter Eric’s excellent suggestion:

Corylopsis pauciflora – earlier than forsythia, far more delicate and FAR more fragrant, to say nothing of better behaved.

Buttercup winter hazel (Corylopsis pauciflora)

By Eric Larson

The winterhazels (Corylopsis species) are in the witchhazel family (Hamamelidaceae) and have many of the witchhazels’ virtues: fragrant flowers on bare branches, wide adaptability and ease of care. But unlike most of its siblings and cousins, Buttercup winter hazel is on the short side. It tops out at six or seven feet, ideal for the home landscape where space is at a premium. And it grows at a modest rate to its eventual manageable size, leaving little need for corrective or size pruning

In mid- to late April, this dainty shrub pops into bloom with a display of buttercup yellow flower clusters. The fragrance is delicate yet quite noticeable, making it perfect for end of the shrub border nearest the breakfast terrace (if you are lucky enough to have such an architectural element). New leaves show red edges before darkening to rich green, then (with luck) turn a rich gold-bronze before falling to reveal the slender but sturdy branches.

Witchhazels (Hamamelis species) bloom at different times: North American mostly in fall, the Chinese and other Asian species and many of their crosses generally in the late winter to early spring, much earlier than our Corylopsis. If you plant as many of the Hamamelidaceae as you can find – and fit in – you can enjoy their flowers for a good part of the year, but if you only have room for one this may be the one for you.

Like most of the Hamamelidaceae, C. pauciflora has very few insect or disease problems to worry about. This combines with its modest pruning needs to make it especially suitable as part of the ‘sustainable’ (was there ever a word so overused?) home landscape. Plant either in spring or fall, in good humus-rich acid soil, being sure to choose a nice partly shady spot.

Our winter hazel here at the garden gets lots of reflected light but no direct sunlight, and it seems to provide plenty of bloom and plenty of fall color, too.

If you can avoid windy exposed locations, you will have better luck with keeping this plant from flagging during the hotter months. In fact, if sited properly, it will need supplemental water only during severe summer drought. Mulch it well, and then let nature take its course.

This is a good addition to the shrub border, but it can also be used as a specimen and as forest underplanting. Planted in front of evergreens, the flowers, spring foliage and fall colors will show up with more contrast. A famous combination at Winterthur Gardens in Delaware includes C. pauciflora and Rhododendron mucronulatum, the soft buttery yellow of the Winterhazel providing perfect counterpoint to the rich almost electric purple of the Azalea, and of course they flower at the exact same time.  I would also look for good combinations with bulbs and other spring flowering perennials.

C. pauciflora can be hard to find, but well stocked independent nurseries sometimes carry it, usually in pots, occasionally  balled-and-burlapped. Spring bloom is fairly consistent and your best chance of finding the plant is in spring. But fall color is highly variable, so if you’re willing to shop around it pays to check out your purchase in fall.

In general, witchhazels have better fall color than winterhazels, but our winterhazel here at the garden has a rich gold color. In addition, the darker coloration along the leaf edges in the close up shows a nice reddish tint in spring after the flowers have dropped and the leaves emerge. Eventually turning green as the leaves mature, that nice touch of color in May and early June is a good foil for other colors provided by bulbs or herbaceous plants. For instance, there are several Tulips that have the same red tints and tones, so that repeating elements from ground to mid-level can be achieved.

Allium christophii, aka A. albopilosum, aka Star of Persia. A prolific self-sower, among its other virtues, though succeeding generations are smaller than the originals. Also a bit less intensely purple than my camera wants you to believe.

Pop Quiz

1) How many spring-blooming bulbs is too many?

2) How many spring-blooming bulbs is there room for?

3) How many spring-blooming bulbs must be planted before there are enough to cut for the house without diminishing the outdoor show?

Around here, the answer to all three questions is “Who knows?” Several hundred into it I’m not there yet, and that’s not counting the little guys (crocus, muscarii, scilla and the like don’t even show up until there are thousands – unless you force them, which I heartily recommend).

Reason for mentioning it now, when even procrastinators – no names please – have usually gotten all of them in: CLEARANCE SALES!!

Two of my favorite Mail-order Sources are in final get rid of ‘em mode:

Brent and Becky’s, home of gazilllions of nifty narcissi as well as a wide selection of less-usual crocus and other things. Half-price while they last or until 12/05, whichever comes first.

Van Engelen, wholesale quantities and no slouch in the choice department either. Minimum order $50.00, a distressingly easy target. Forty percent off until they run out. Quantity bulbs can be “estate size,” which is to say on the small side; don’t forget to check sizes when ordering.

It being after Thanksgiving, most garden centers have already gone All Christmas All the Time, but every once in a while there’s a bin or two of orphans. And every once in a while they’re worth buying.  But not alas all that often. I’m disappointed almost every time I start inspecting them carefully for shrinkage, mold, etc.

Storage in the warm drought of sales rooms is just about the opposite of ideal, and of course anything in open bins could indeed be anything. (People who just toss their rejects into any old bin are not rare, unfortunately.)

This lily flowered mystery been coming back for years, as sturdy as the astilbe I probably planted later.

In our gardens, lily flowered tulips are among the more reliable returners. Catalogs don’t seem to list this among their virtues, so our situation may be unique. But it’s something to think about. A few other Tulip Tips are here.

This is recent experience talking,

We got 22 inches of snow in the infamous October storm. Note that the maple not only has leaves; they haven’t even started to turn.

The loss list keeps expanding as falling leaves expose broken branches we missed earlier, but the general shape of the disaster has been clear for long enough to prompt a bit of family discussion on the subject of remedial pruning.

Casualties:

Somewhere between a third and a half of the magnolia, seen here in happier days.

It’s not too clear through the snow, but you can see it’s the middle that went.

Barely visible in back on the left: a bird's eye view of the top of one of the ancient plum trees. You don’t have to be a bird because the tree has snapped at the base and is now horizontal.

Also a 15 foot arbor vitae and most of the treasured oak leaf hydrangea it fell on

Arbor vitae and oak leaf hydrangea are a lovely combination – until they’re not.

and a great deal more.

A lot of the clean up was pretty much cut and dried – or cut, anyway  (saturated ground left by repeated heavy rains is one reason so many things went over)

But after we cleared away the broken branches, cut the stubs clean to prevent disease and removed unsafe imbalances, we were left with several trees that had – still have, actually – severe aesthetic problems, primarily in the form of  major branches that cry out for shortening or outright removal.

In spite of being perfectly healthy and unlikely to cause any trouble, they’re visual offenses: out of proportion, badly spaced, no longer harmonious with their surroundings.

Bill, who prunes the fruit trees and does all of the chain saw work, kept occupied at first

The other plum tree was also recumbent, but not otherwise damaged, so he borrowed a neighbor’s come-along, pulled it back up

and braced it for the winter with a chunk of the recently-deceased arbor vitae.

But after that, having done a lot of pruning that was pure maintenance, he’s quite eager to keep going and address the art part. I, on the other hand, feel strongly that we should hide and wait at least until late winter. Two reasons:

1. Unless you’re cutting something to the ground for total regeneration, the standard rule for shrub and tree pruning is to remove no more than a third of the healthy wood each year. The storm has already done that and more.

2. I’m afraid to do anything that might further stimulate new growth. In theory, it’s so late in the season plants are already going dormant and won’t start trying to make fresh leaves until next spring. In practice, this here is being one warm November, no matter how inexorably the nights are getting longer. I see what looks a lot like swelling buds and would rather be safe than sorry.

Fortunately for the trees and for domestic harmony, just when he was about out of tasks the fishing started picking up. With luck he’ll be well occupied until it’s almost time to prune the trees that weren’t damaged.

snow photos by Bill Bakaitis

late autumn color, late autumn flavor: winter squash, chestnuts and wild mushrooms

Must say I do love a soup that tastes rich and creamy without being heavy – or containing cream. Also nice if it doesn’t require an arsenal of seasonings and is easy and quick to make.

The quick part does assume the squash is already baked, and that you know speedy ways to peel chestnuts, but why not? *

As usual, the ingredient list is pretty much the whole recipe, but given that the beauty shot of the main ingredients promised something a bit more extensive, here’s a rough outline, based on the most recent iteration.

“Rough” and “most recent” are definitely the words for it; this is one of those home style soups that’s infinitely variable.

In other words, almost impossible to screw up.

If we’ve eaten most of  the squash, I just use more mushroom and chestnut. When I have the help of chestnut peelers, I shamelessly take advantage. Don’t have these particular mushrooms ? No problem, there are plenty of alternatives.

That’s “alternative,” as in “it’ll be good, but in a different way.” Recipes that call simply  for wild mushrooms or mixed wild mushrooms drive me nuts.

As though there were no differences! Granted, all of them taste like mushrooms, but anyone who thinks Boletus edulis and Cantharellus cibarius can be interchanged willy-nilly should have their head examined simply isn’t paying attention.

I am tempted to rant at length. Instead will just mildly point out that this soup can be made with almost any pair of mushrooms, wild or domestic, but one of them should be an intensely flavored low moisture variety like hen of the woods or shiitake and the other should be a firm, meaty but tender variety like lactarius or cremini.

AUTUMN SOUP

as measured out in midcoast Maine in Late October 2011

3 tbl. butter

3.5 oz. Lactarius thyinos, cut into half-inch chunks

A large onion in roughly 1/3 inch dice

5 oz Grifola frondosa coarsely chopped

12 chestnuts, roasted, peeled, and coarsely chopped

5 c. light chicken stock

6 oz. baked winter squash, roughly cut into walnut sized chunks

4 good sized springs of fresh thyme – enough to add a hint but not a shout

3 scrapings of nutmeg

1. Melt the butter in a soup pot over medium heat. Add the lactarius chunks and cook, stirring occasionally, until they are lightly browned and completely cooked through. Remove and set aside.

2. Add the onion, cook until golden, then add the frondosus. Keep cooking and stirring until the vegetables are brown and there is no free liquid in the pan. Stir in the chestnuts, add the broth, cover, and simmer over very low heat until everything is falling-apart soft, about an hour, maybe more.

3. Stir in the squash and seasonings, cover and cook until the squash is more or less dissolved, about 20 minutes.

4. Fish out the thyme and puree the soup. Depending on the toughness of the mushrooms, it will come out somewhere between fine applesauce and French Restaurant. This batch was the former and perfectly tasty, but I did put it thorough a strainer to achieve F.R. for its portrait.

5. Reheat, salt to taste and portion out, topping each bowl with a sprinkle of the reserved lactarius. An herb garnish doesn’t help, tastewise, so I resisted the temptation to pretty it up with something green. If you feel you must, a sprig of chervil wouldn’t do much harm.

BAKED WINTER SQUASH

Is more flavorful and less watery than squash that has been boiled, steamed or microwaved. All the same like baked potatoes, including stabbing here and there to prevent explosions. Unlike potatoes, squash leaks sweet juice, so you do have to put it on a pan. At 375 degrees, it’ll take anywhere from one hour to two, depending on the squash variety, size and age. (They cook more quickly after they’ve been stored for a while.)

That’s my preferred method, but when I’m in a hurry I halve the squash, remove the seeds, rub the cut surfaces with olive oil and roast the halves face down. Seed removal is a bit more of a chore, but you do get those delicious caramelized cut surfaces.

* Frozen partially cooked peeled chestnuts are quite tasty and an enormous time-saver, as I learned some years ago when a chef friend sent me some. Being as they’re not a money saver (unless you’re a chef with labor costs) and are not sold at any stores nearby, I have never bought any. But they are available retail, from Chestnut Growers Inc., a Michigan farmer’s co-op, among others. If you decide to go for it, please come back and let us all know how it worked out.