Garden Basics - V - Z

"V" is for Vegetables
How can I have thousands of garden related photos and not find an image of a vegetable? This shot of the entrance to a vegetable garden will have to do. If you look close maybe you'll see the runner beans.

"V" of course is for Victory Garden!
Lots of lovely colored lettuce here.

"V" is also for Vines
Mandavilla has become extremely popular in our area (and very expensive too)

"W" is for Water
Water comes in so many forms, natural, man made accents and of course, ways to water your garden. The above photo is my daughter Emily (about 5 years ago) on a garden tour. Who could resist this lovely bridge and natural water feature?

"W" is also for Wildlife
It figures that just as these darn chipmunks create chaos in my garden they have to make a cute movie about them. I don't even dare mention my frustration about them let alone ways to rid my garden of these adorable but destructive creatures.

"X" is for Xeriscape
As the world becomes aware of the need to preserve drinking water, we will find this topic becoming more and more necessary. This is a small example of Xeriscaping.

"X" is for Xeriscape with a medium sized example

"X" is for Xeriscape - the ultimate example
Can you tell how important I think this topic is? This is my dream shed, check that roof out, it's planted entirely in drought resistant plantings. If I could have one dream item in my garden, I think it might have to be this one.

"Y" is for Yard
(The slide I had for my class was so blah that I took a look at it and said "yuck" and forgot what "Y" was for!)

"Y" is for yard (yes again, I still have to wipe that yucky image out of my mind)

"Z" is for Zone
Know what your growing zone really is. Our zone is listed as 6b or 7 depending on what you use as a reference. Yet, look at this photo. We get long deep freezes with no snow cover and then multiple freeze thaw cycles. Be award of what your growing conditions are (by the way that's my husband Don playing hockey on our frozen solid swimming pool).

Hope you had as much fun as I did...

...the end

Garden Basics - P - U

"P" is for Perennials
Plants that will live through our crazy freeze thaw cycle like this lovely Hellebore

"P" is also for Photo

Sometimes we are sucked in by an awesome photo and then realize the camera was an inch away from the bloom. This is Thalictrum aquilifolium. A similar photo had me order this plant immediately but it took a few years of patience (and a good macro lens) before I saw this.

"Q" is for Questions. Questions are important, like how the heck did they get that bicycle on the tree? (Quickly followed by the most popular phrase of "I want that!")


"R" is for Roots - The good, the bad and the downright ugly!

"R" is also for rocks. Here on Long Island we need to import our rocks. With today's fuel costs, they are going to cost quite a bit more bringing us back to "M" for money.


"S" is for Sun - Be honest with yourself about the amount of sunlight a garden gets.

"S" is also for Shade and Semi-shade. Don't fight the shade, there are a host of amazing plants that will grow in your shade beds. (Anybody need some purple Perilla?)

"S" is for Shrubs
Whew, there are many S words! A lovely Hydrangea here, I picked it up at the end of a flower show, it was going in the garbage. It was one of those Hydrangeas that had been forced into bloom for Easter, it was day glow pink when I brought it home. Two years after growing in my acidic soil it is the most glowing white imaginable.

"T" is for Trees (now that was an easy one!) This is the breathtaking blooms and foliage on my Cornus Kousa 'Gold Star'.

"U" is for Under story plants. What an amazing array of plants there are that will gladly grow under taller specimens.

That's it for this part of the alphabet, stay tuned once again as I finish things up tomorrow.

Hopefully everybody enjoyed last night's first gardening class and maybe we'll have some new visitors here :-)

Till later,
Melanie

Garden Basics - G - O

"G" is for Ground cover - (Beware, check under "I" for more information)

"H" is for Herb - Not all are Edible (Ruta graveolens - Rue)

"I" is for Invasive (sometimes called ground covers)

"J" is for Journal - something a gardener should always have.
(These are for my students tonight, I have 15 in total, hope it's enough!)

"J" is also for Junk in the garden
(this planted toaster was spotted in New York Botanical Gardens)

"K" is for Knowledge - Did you know that I wrote chapter 6 in "The Daylily - A Guide for Gardeners" and took the photos in that chapter plus the front cover photo?)

"L" is for Lawn (no more words needed)

"M" is for Money or Moolah (or what ever you call it when you make a budget that you never seem to stick to.)

"N" is for Native or Natural (Rhododendrons are native to our area but covering them with sparkles like these folks did at a flower show is NOT natural)

"N" is also for Nursery - A place where you spend your "M"

"O" is for Organic - Great things like compost tea made from this beautiful pink Symphytum (Comfrey) are organic.

That's it for today folks, I've got to run, and be in 3 places at one time. Will be back tomorrow with more of the alphabet.

Gardening Basics A-F

"A" is for Annual (Cleome)

Tomorrow night I begin teaching an Adult Education program at our local High School. Naturally, the topic is gardening. So far 15 people have signed up for the program, with the possibility for another one or two to walk in tomorrow. That's an excellent turn out for a single program in our district.
"B" is for Birdhouse

Since my new students will have various levels of garden expertise, our first program will be "Gardening Basics". The program I've prepared uses images to explain gardening terms in an ABC format. Yes it's very simple but I hope that by making sure the basics are covered, we can move quickly into some hard core gardening.

"B" is for Biennial (Digitalis)

Tag along and let me know if you thing of a term or word I've missed. I'll continue the alphabet tomorrow and hope to be finished by the weekend. Some letters have more than one applicable word. One note, I did not use the names of plants for any of the letters but I'd love to have more gardening "concepts" to add.

"B" is also for Bulbs

"C" is for Compost


"C" is also for Container

"D" is for Dirt (but in class we'll call it "soil")

"E" is for Edging (this example is "high maintenance)

"E" is for Edging (this example is low maintenance)

"F" is for Foliage

And that's all for today, stay tuned tomorrow for more...