going the extra chamo-mile

Late-spring and early-summer flowers have finally given up the ghost and are going to seed.  Alas, I don't have great luck with catching seeds before they fall.  Sometimes the seeds are so tiny that they're hard to find on the plant...sometimes the seed pods "pop" when they're ripe, so you have to time it just right...and sometimes I scatter seeds just by trying to remove the pods.  This year I read about a new method - the organza bag.

I ordered 100 of these on Amazon for around $7.  They're the little pull-tie bags that people sometimes use for wedding favors, and they're perfect for this.  Just invert them over the seed head and pull the drawstrings.  No need to tie!  The seed head will eventually die and drop the seeds into the top of the bag.  Just clip off the stem and you've got a bag full of seeds.

It's a miracle!  For the first time, I've successfully gathered Jacob's Ladder, Euphorbia, and Wild Geranium seeds.  Lots of Columbine, too, which can be tricky.  You've got to catch them while they're still a bit green and juuu-uuu-uuust starting to split at the top.

Some flower spikes are too large for bags, like these foxgloves that are going to seed.

Those little green balls are immature pods.  They will turn brown as they ripen, then they'll split and drop the seeds. I've got to catch them just before this happens! 

Getting better at seed collection has been an education, and so has learning about how to prune things the right way.  I enjoy deadheading, which is popping off a spent flower head or spike once it's finished its bloom.  But proper pruning has taken a little bit of study.  For example, salvia.  I have a lot of salvia, and it produces a fantastic bloom.  But the flowers die after a couple of weeks.  I used to just take shears to the plant and chop it down to the leaves, which you can technically do.  But a little bit of reading, and I discovered that I was delaying new growth by a couple of weeks.  If I just cut off the dead spike, right above the main set of leaves below the flower, new buds would grow out of that leaf set, which I have always sheared off.

Now I'm getting new blooms in a few days, instead of a few weeks!  Victory!

We're progressing quickly through summer, and new things are blooming.  Coneflowers!  From just a couple of small plants last year, I'm going to have quite a crop soon.

Black-eyed susans are opening up...

Sedum is blooming!

Bee balm is finally blooming, too.  I'm not too crazy about red and yellow together, but I'm too garden work-exhausted to do anything about it now!

I love the coreopsis.  It's so sunny and cheerful, and just requires regular deadheading to keep going all summer long!

I've got several large patches of german chamomile.  I love it!  I don't use it for tea.  I enjoy the ferny foliage and the delightful, bobbing flowers.

These, too, need to be cut back in a few days. If I, ahem, go the extra chamo-mile now,  I should get another nice flush of flowers in a week or so...same with these delphiniums, which are growing like crazy!  A quick snip once these flower spikes start to die and I should get new, healthy spikes again.

You can see from the front that many of my 'old faithfuls' are still plugging along...the yarrow, balloon flower, golden loosestrife, etc.  We just added the frost-free pump in front to make watering easier.  A planted disguises it nicely.

The side beds are doing well.  I've cut back the catmint, salvia, euphorbia, and penstemon.  Yarrow and coneflowers are just getting ready to open up.

You can see a bit of a green haze over the new back garden, but I remain a bit ambivalent about it.  I just don't think it's going to look much different until next year.

I'm deeply watering every day to help the transplants become established, because we haven't had rain in about 2 weeks, and it's been very hot and dry.  I can see flower buds forming, but on plants that are about 6"...that are supposed to be a couple of feet tall.  At least I can collect the seeds!

So far, rabbits haven't bothered this space, which will be fenced in soon...

Of course, Claudia is working hard to keep the local rabbit population down!

(This rabbit was only stunned and was able to escape while Claudia was distracted!)

We're soon going to be into my least-favorite time of the year - the hot, dry, humid stretch of July and August.  The weather has been great so far, so I think these hot months will be a lot easier to tolerate this year...I hope!  I can ease off a bit on gardening and concentrate on other hobbies that have fallen by the wayside. 

Have a great week!

Dough Re Mi...

I've learned some valuable lessons this week! Lesson #1: be very cautious about pruning hydrangea bushes. I didn't realize that the blooms grow on the old wood...so if you prune too aggressively, you might end up with one solitary blossom...like me. Thankfully, it should be back to normal next year.

Lesson #2: some plants just aren't 'meant to be.' I've tried to grow creeping jenny for three years, and I kill it every year. This year it took a record two days to shrivel up. Oh, well!

Lesson #3: always keep an eye out for rogue mantises. They're coming out of the woodwork...literally!

All mishaps aside, the garden is blooming nicely now. I'm just waiting on my marigolds and my rose of sharon bush.

The bees are out and about. Little honey bees...

...and larger carpenter bees are frantically gathering up pollen!

Other little creatures, like this grasshopper, are glimpsed from time to time.

In this hot weather, we like to get out in the early mornings for a relaxing walk in the park.

I love the butterfly garden there. Especially I love this spiky purple plant called a blazing star. They bloom all summer long and are really beautiful en masse.

Bees and butterflies love to delve into this little filaments!

Speedwell is also good for bees and butterflies, and so beautiful...

...and, of course, coneflowers.

They look so nice against the purple blazing stars.

Less showy but just as nice, an oak leaf hydrangea flowers in the shade nearby. The bushes can get quite large, but they're beautiful plants that are a nice change from hostas if you've got a large shady area to fill.

Acorns are ripening on oak trees...

...and the bees are taking advantage of the flowers! This hive died out over the winter, but was replaced this spring with a new, healthy colony. It looks like they're thriving!

This impressively-named Tawny Emperor butterfly (asterocampa clyton) lit briefly on this tree as we walked by. They don't hold still for long, though!

Despite the heat, I've been doing a fair amount of baking. One thing that used to intimidate me was pies, but really, they aren't hard at all! A homemade crust doesn't take much time and tastes so much better than store-bought. Here's my recipe and a quick tutorial!

All-Butter Pie Crust
Smitten Kitchen
One double- or two single-crust pies

2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 tablespoon sugar
1 teaspoon salt
2 sticks butter, cold

Before starting, place several ice cubes into a cup of water. Go ahead and mix together your flour, sugar, and salt. Make sure your butter is VERY cold and dice it into small pieces. Use a fork or pastry cutter and cut your butter into the flour until the butter is pea-sized. Be sure not to overwork!

Now, take your ice water and slowly drizzle it over your flour mixture. You'll probably use about 3/4 cup total. Add 1/2 right away and gently mix. Add the additional 1/4 cup a tablespoon at a time.

Once you can mound your dough together, wrap it in plastic wrap and refrigerate it for an hour or so. See? That's not so bad! It takes less than 10 minutes to mix this up!

After the dough has rested, take it out and cut it in half. The key is to work with cold dough, so put one dough ball back in the refrigerator and just work with one at a time. Be very generous with your flour and roll out the dough until you've got a 12-inch circle. I use a 10-inch bowl and tack on an extra two inches, just cutting around with a knife. I was an inch short in this example but it worked just fine for me. Don't throw away those dough scraps! I've got a great recipe for using them up next week.

Place your dough in the pie pan...

...and crimp the edges with your fingers.

Stab the bottom with a fork a few times and bake at 325 for 15 - 20 minutes, until firm. Look at the flaky layers!

I chose to fill this particular pie with strawberries...

...and make a simple strawberry pie. No additional baking needed and it's delish!


I hope you take some time out to bake this week. Enjoy!