POTTING

 

BOWER

 

THE KING OF THE GARDEN

 

LILAC

 Did you know that Lilac trees have a female and a male and if you plant one and there is not one of the opposite sex fairly close by, they will never bloom?! 

SALATA

 

LETTUCE

 

A BEAUTIFUL SPRING DAY WITHOUT AIR POLLUTION MAKES US WISH IT WERE ALWAYS LIKE THIS : IF ONLY IT WERE NOT THE VIRUS

It's just been glorious outside these last few days.  Skies seem especially blue and clouds more lofty and bright because there is a lot less traffic and air pollution, not just from cars but other shut downs.  So while so many loose their lives unable to breath, the breathing is especially good for the rest of us, here in Southern California.

People are impatient and raring to go, get outside, get exercise, get back to work, back to earning income, back to having their lives as they remember it; more physical, more movement.  We try to balance that desire with our concern for others.  And so some states and some places within states, generally those that are not very populated, begin to open. While we here in Southern California feel we must not be too hasty because we do not want to die or contribute to the deaths of others.

All around us are people who refuse to wear masks or cannot obtain them or make them.  One friend is wearing something that looks like what an old fashioned diver would wear under water, except this contraption is on his face in the daylight, sun, and moving air.  I myself found swatches of fabric that I never used for other projects and have been busy hand sewing masks.  One of them features big sunflowers.  Another has a design that's mod from the 1960's.  These masks don't coordinate with anything I wear but they are bright and fun and I wish to project that in wearing them.  If the trend continues out of necessity, I anticipate there will become fashions that coordinate hats, scarves, and other objects with masks.

My senior citizen friend, one of the most active and vital women in her 80's I've ever known, finally, with mask and hand sanitizer ready, entered the local grocery store where she had been sending her son-in-law, who somehow got to be the designated shopper, for the last six weeks.  Younger and able to stand in lines to get into stores, he has been so good to do the shopping for their somewhat organic household.  However, he would forget what he bought last, resulting in  too many bags of apples and too many cans of beans.

At the same time people began to share the fruits on their trees that they seldom actually think of as crops. She has dozens of lemons, oranges, some grapefruit, as well as loquat (which tastes a bit like apricot) and is trying to preserve some of these.  Her lemon cake is exquisite.

This past weekend a small beach nearest me was supposed to be cordoned off.
A friend who lives on a boat at the marina tells me that people are coming down there with their families, bringing bicycles, and biking around for exercise, rather than at the beach area, and it's making all those that live on their boats concerned.  Mostly my friends who are able to travel the world have had to avoid planning their next trips.

Will all the dogs have anxiety when their homebound owners finally head back out the door as they used to?

I know I've had sleep disturbances and unusual and symbolic dreams.  Reading around this subject, I discovered an article over at Daily Mail Uk today that said that thousands of people are sleeping and dreaming the same.  Yet when the dawn arrives, I'm up and out of bed, making my morning tea, taking my dog out for her morning stroll, and thinking about how best to use my day.

I hope you are well!


C 2020

SPRING - PLANS FOR A GARDEN - YOU TOO CAN MAKE SEED BALLS and PROVIDE BUTTERFLY and BEE FRIENDLY FLOWERS

MY GARDEN is starting to spout,

 including some plants that made it through the winter

that were only doing so so last year, including

YELLOW CALENDULA, PALE PINK PERFUMED SNAPDRAGONS, RED GERANIUM,

a single SUNFLOWER, and, the secret of whatever seeds I put into a SEED BALLS.

Since I posted on the heat wave, we finally got hit by a few rain showers locally. We will still attempt to conserve water. 

I attended a SEED BALL MAKING WORKSHOPS for ADULTS at a local LIBRARY here in Southern California a couple weeks ago.  The idea is to make these seed studded clay balls, then drop these them here, there, and everywhere there is a need for plants that butterflies and bees love .  (Try not to waste them by planting them where gardeners wack down anything they don't recognize as a weed!  But consider old graveyards, along certain road sides or crossings, between buildings... places were there is some land where they can grow as nature allows.)

You need to buy water based modeling clay such as the Crayola Air Dry Clay brand, which is the dough kids use to make little sculptures and comes in quart sized plastic buckets.  It turns out that this clay, water based, can harden but also resoften in the rain, or when you water it and the ball provides a good seed sprouting environment. 

You will also need some peat moss and some seeds.  We used Calfornia poppy seeds as well as a package of bird and butterfly mix.

Take about a quarter cup of this clay, roll it around into a ball, then flatten it like a pancake.  Sprinkle a generous amount of peat moss on it, and then a few seeds.  Roll this again into a ball, and roll the ball in more peat moss.  Viola!  You have a seed ball.

One thing California and Hungary have in common is POPPIES.  Our native poppies, a brilliant gold color, are our state flower, and one of the reasons that California is called The Golden State.   (The other reason is that by summer much of the once-green landscape is covered with golden dried out vegetation.)  We had some rain, finally, and the desert, including various succulents and cactus,  should be blooming brilliantly very soon. 

I made eight balls in fifteen minutes.  You do not need to dig deep to plant these balls.  Just a little scoop out or simply place them on furrowed ground.  Four of them I planted along an old abandoned rail road track that has a path past it.  So far, I have not seen anything sprouting when I walk past this area, but you never know.  Because of the rains there are the native California mustard plant (short, unlike the Spanish mustard the Spanish explorers are responsible for, as they claimed the country for Spain by throwing their own mustard seeds), as well as native wild geranium (rarely do these survive long enough to bloom out due to all those wackers!), mint, and a number of small yellow flowered and purple flowered ground covers that seem to hibernate for years just waiting for enough rain to sprout.

The four balls I left in a bag to be planted later all sprouted in the bag and have been transferred into a large pot.  I cannot wait for one or all of them to grow into beautiful plants that I can try to identify!

I found this link that will explain more about seed balls PERMA CULTURE - ANCIENT METHOD OF NO TILL AGRICULTURE



MY BUTTERFLY GARDEN IS NOT GROWING!

Over the last couple weeks I've had to accept it.  My butterfly garden that I blogged about a few weeks ago is simply not growing!  I ordered the seeds from a MONARCH BUTTERFLY CONSERVANCY PROJECT, set the seeds out in new soil and in my window and watered them carefully but just a couple of them took.  I carefully planted those seeds out of doors a couple weeks later, and I even put the ones that hadn't sprouted in soil outdoors as well.  I thought if the watering or light or heat was wrong in the house they would have a second chance, but no.

I GUESS I GOT SOME DUD SEEDS!

What now?

One day when I was walking down the street I came across some marigolds that had gone to seed, pulled some of the dry buds, and planted some of those.  THEY SPROUTED RIGHT UP!

So right now I have six giant marigolds that are growing.

All the tiny seeds that immediately sprouted indoors died once transplanted!

What happened to my "GREEN THUMB?"

or did I do everything right in the wrong weather?