Healthy Yards, Healthy Lives

Russ Henry April 22, 2009

We need only look around us to see the world out of balance. We can see the air we breathe, as it’s laden with chemicals. We can taste bleach and metal in the water we drink. Our rivers and lakes are overgrown with invasive species and toxic run off. Our food travels thousands of miles in petroleum burning vehicles only to arrive to our dinner tables laced with carcinogens and bacterial diseases. These problems are only a drop of water next to the ocean of trouble this planet is facing. Enough Is Enough! It’s time we clean up our act!

In a time of need like this the world has only one place to turn. Gardeners, I’m talking to you! It’s time we put our heads and hearts together to keep this planet from self-destructing.

Healthy Yards, Healthy Lives, 7 Steps for Growing Personal and Global Health in Your Own Back Yard!

Step 1: Capture Rain Water

Water is the source of life and that’s nowhere more apparent then the home garden. Not only

are we letting this most valuable food production resource run away from us, but water rushing from streets to sewers to rivers causes pollution and aquatic ecosystem destruction! We can’t afford to let our water go to waste any longer. Rain gardens are one very clever way to capture the rainwater that falls on your property. Planted with native species ready to survive and create a seasonal wetland, rain gardens not only hold and filter the rain they are also a source of habitat for birds, bees, butterflies, and more. So whether you just plop a rain barrel under your rain spout and water your tomatoes for free this summer, or you go all out and decide to install a rain garden, you’ll be doing yourself and the rest of the world a favor by placing a high value on that free falling food of life, rain water.

Step 2: Compost

We create mountains of garbage together daily! Composting is one great way to cut down on the amount of garbage your hauling out to the curb. Composting is easy, and beneficial. The old proverb about one persons garbage being another persons treasure surely applies here. Turning your kitchen and yard scraps into garden gold will bring abundance to your yard and cut down on your own personal contribution to Mt. Garbage!

Step 3: Create Habitat

Those of us lucky enough to have a yard to work in are charged with the responsibility of choosing what plants will grow in this space. Our decisions will either positively or negatively affect ourselves, and our fellow earthlings. Growing green grass lawns in your yard will give no edible benefit to you or anyone else. Instead of turf grass, try mixing your favorite edible plants with some pretty flowering annuals, native perennials, and fruit bearing trees and shrubs. The birds will thank you for the trees and shrubs, the butterflies will thank you for the flowers and native perennials, and you will thank yourself for being so smart as to grow your own food in a beauty filled environment teeming with life. Variety is truly the spice of life! The greater the diversity of plant species in your yard, the more beauty and health you will have at your fingertips.

Step 4: Source Responsibly

Think Globally, Act Locally! This is your opportunity to turn this smart slogan into a reality.

When we purchase goods produced close to or in the communities that we live, we benefit ourselves and the rest of the world. Think for a moment about the number of miles each food item you have has traveled to reach your kitchen shelves. When you purchase food and goods produced close to home, you boost your local economy, while at the same time reducing the amount of gasoline burned in order to stock your shelves. While your cutting back on fossil fuel consumption, you might as well cut out a few more petrochemicals used in food production and do your body good at the same time. Organically grown foods are much more nutritious and better tasting then their chemically grown cousins.

The closest to home that you can get is your own back yard. This step shows us that the more we give to our communities, the more benefits we share with the whole world.

Step 5: Harvest Responsibly

Now that you’ve got a garden full of goodies, you’ll want to make sure to not waste your bounty. Drying, canning, freezing, tincturing, and fermenting are some of my favorite ways to store goods. I

love this step because this is where I get to start giving out some of my homemade favorites. Think about what goods you can produce for yourself and your community. If you’ve got a cucumber vine that’s grown out of control, maybe you could be the pickle producer for your block that summer. I like to plant berries and tomatoes close to the street and alley so folks walking by can grab a bite to eat.

Step 6: Make It Beautiful

We can all learn from each others talents, and expressions, so we need to be willing to share our own. When we make garden spaces that we ourselves enjoy, it’s pretty likely that at least some of our friends and neighbors will delight in them as well. Creating an attractive home garden can be as simple as an annual flower patch, or as complex and integrated as a professional landscape design. Your imagination is your only limit

Step 7: Garden With Friends

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We can’t fix this whole place by ourselves, we’re gonna need a little help. Join a garden club, hook up with local youth gardening programs, talk with your neighbors and family, or just invite your friends over for a homegrown meal. Connecting with others through gardening encourages a lifelong hobby that can grow community, family, health, and beauty.

Mile High Gardens

Russ Henry April 22, 2009

Wherever I travel I visit gardens. I’ve visited fancy Parisian topiary gardens, I drank coconut milk fresh from the machete sliced hull in tropical Jamaican gardens, I’ve admired the proud overflowing window boxes of cottages in the German alps, and I’ve wondered at the selections found in Costa Rican garden stores. It seems everywhere I go I can connect with the space and the people easily through my love of gardens and plants. In many of the gardens that I’ve visited I’ve found gardeners hard at work planting, preparing the soil, or maintaining their precious little piece of earth.

Gardeners seem to be an easy lot to connect with in general, and when I’m visiting with gardeners in places new to me, I just love asking folks about the local methods, climate, seasons, soils and plant selections. This month I had an opportunity to connect with gardeners in mile high, Denver Colorado as I visited the city and explored the famous Denver Botanic Gardens.

Lucky for myself, and anyone else Denver bound, the locals are a friendly and helpful lot. I found plenty of gardeners to chat with throughout Denver and enjoyed myself thoroughly walking through the amazing garden displays at the Denver Botanic Gardens, and visiting with the gardeners who shape them.

When talking with gardeners from other areas I’m always looking out for the similarities and differences between my gardens at home, and those that I’m learning about. The range of possibilities seems to expand when I learn what folks in different parts of the world are up to. Below is a little of what I learned while visiting the Denver Botanic Gardens.

Water is life.

Coming from the land of ten thousand lakes, the most striking contrast that is readily apparent when talking gardens with folks in Denver, is the focus on xeriscaping, or gardening with plants that require no irrigation or watering to survive. I had guessed that this may be an emerging trend here as I noticed the billboards on my way from the airport exclaiming, Denver Water, Use Only What You Need! When you compare Denver’s average annual rainfall of almost 16 inches, to the nearly 30 inches that fall every year in Minneapolis it becomes easy to see why xeriscaping is so much more prominent in Denver. The Denver Botanic Gardens offered excellent examples of this style of gardening implemented to varying degrees, from alpine gardens and dryland mesa that required no additional watering to the slightly more lush, plains gardens.

These high altitude gardens were filled with plants that were unfamiliar to this river valley gardener. I found several types of agave, many different species of grass that I’d not seen before, cactus that grew in forms both strange and elegant, and giant wisened yucca plants with foliage as sharp as the mountain sun.

Perhaps the most striking thing I learned about the water in Denver is that it is against the law for citizens of Denver to collect their rainwater. While I was assured that many of the gardeners here stealthily collect rainwater in their back yards, no one that I talked with about it could offer any explanation as to why gathering rainwater was made illegal here in Denver. I can easily imagine city hall being overrun with angry shovel and hoe wielding protesters if politicians in Minneapolis officialdom tried to interfere in such a way with our water gathering ways.

Garden Highlights

Plants are but one form of media used to decorate a garden. Visiting the Denver Botanic Gardens I was reminded of the fact that a gardeners pallet is limited only by their imagination. Land forms, sculptures, boulders, pathways made of various materials, and even paintings were found decorating these showy gardens. I was fortunate enough to visit during an ongoing exhibition titled Urban Nature, which highlights the paintings of various urban artists juxtaposed with the verdant growth of the gardens. Some of the paintings seemed to take on extra meaning due to their placement. In one particularly striking contrast an image of a sleeping woman painted to look as though light was being reflected off a body of water and onto her is placed behind a dry border of bristle cone pine. Seeing such a flowing, lovely image displayed in this harsh context reminded me that the horrible and the beautiful of this world are two sides of the same coin, inextricably linked.

Inside and Out

No visit to Denver’s botanical gardens could be complete with out a visit to the tropical conservatory. The 300 days a year of sunshine found in the mile high city provide ample light to fill this conservatory with verdant growth. Walking into this room, I suddenly found myself surrounded by the jungle. I wasn’t too surprised to see chubby gold and white koi swimming through the stream inside the conservatory, but when a green gecko popped his head out in front of me, I began to hope there weren’t any snakes eyeing me hungrily from the treetops. The little gecko seemed to be just as surprised to find me wandering through his jungle home and he wasted no time scampering off. The building housing the conservatory was home to several other features of the Denver Botanic Gardens, including an impressive and very misty cloud forest room, a newly installed rooftop garden, and an amazing library stocked with thousands of books dealing with botany, gardening, landscape, and horticulture. I even heard from more then one source that the botanic garden is planning a green wall on this same building.

So Many Gardens, So Little Time

Visiting the Denver Botanic Gardens turned me into the proverbial kid in the candy shop. To be sure, my eyes twinkled at the beauty I found, and I was completely overwhelmed trying to take it all in. I can say with certainty that any future trip to Denver for me will include a lengthy visit to these botanic gardens. Finding this oasis of garden pleasure in the middle of the city was as pleasant a surprise as I could’ve asked for while traveling. Seeing the new and different combined so readily with what’s familiar, and finding the folks of this town so easy to talk with showed me that though I don’t live here, in some ways Denver is my home.

Garden Design Basics

Russ Henry April 22, 2009

After a few years experience designing gardens, I found that there’s an important learning process behind every successful design. It should come as no surprise that the first learning curve in any garden design involves plants. Take a moment to consider the space you wish to garden. Is it sunny, or shady, or a little bit of both? Is your space wet or dry? Now take this simple checklist to the garden store and begin to open the doors to your imagination. Have your

friendly neighborhood garden store

clerk show you around to the plants that fit your site. Before buying anything make a checklist of what you find. Start with the plants that catch your eye. Mark their shapes, sizes, textures, bloom times, and leaf and bloom colors. Look for plants that contrast with each other in color and texture. Choose plants in a variety of height ranges. Have a look at trees, shrubs, perennials and annuals. The more plants you consider for your landscape, the more informed you can feel about your choices.

Once you’ve made a complete checklist of all the plants that catch your eye, sit with your list for a while in the space to be gardened. Take in everything that surrounds the space. You’re going to want to choose plants that work well with their visual environment so determine what it is that defines the edges of the space. Is it up against a house or fence? You wouldn’t for instance want to place a large shrub in front of a window, as that may block the view, but you may want to use some plants for blocking the sight of utility meters or a compost pile. Consider whether you’ve got a canopy to tie into visually through the use of large shrubs.

Next imagine the plants on your list at their full size and start by placing these imaginary creatures in the new garden. I like to build from the back of a space toward the front starting in back with the tallest plants. At this point it may be helpful to get out some sticks or marking tools to poke into the ground wherever you think the plants could go.

Once you have found potential homes for the largest of your selections, begin to place markers for the mid-sized and smaller plants as well. With some smaller plants you may want to plan for groupings to be planted instead of individuals. I love for my gardens to draw my eye up and in, so I like to have very short plants in the front, and create a sort of asymmetrical stair step effect by building upward in height till my eyes find the tallest plants in back. For the health of your gardens it’s important to plan the space so that it’s covered in green. Too often I see gardens that are mostly wood mulch with plants scattered throughout.

Plan for ground covering plants in and around the larger plants. After you’ve found a place for all of your plant selections step back and imagine them all together. While imagining the new garden notice if there are any empty spots. Ask yourself if there is enough variation in height, and texture. Determine whether there is enough collaboration of textures as well, do some of the plants shapes or textures get repeated throughout the garden thus pulling the eye along? Make sure your list will create a garden in bloom from the time the ground thaws in the spring till the hard freezes of fall hit.

Consider the winter season. Ornamental grasses can be a beautiful accompaniment for the garden as their slim textures will still be present throughout winters as well. Many plants will act as snow catches through the cold months giving us gardeners a reminder of the glorious growing season past, while providing us hope for the warmth and growth to come.

It is now be time to fill in any weak spots on your plant list and then head back to the garden store to fill up your family truckster with all of your green selections. After you’ve prepared the soil with compost you’re going to be ready to place your plants in their potential homes. Remember the key word here is potential as building any garden is a sculpting process, and your plant placement may need adjusting once you see the plants in the spot that you’d imagined them. Move the plants around until your satisfied with their placement and…. You’re ready to plant!

If you thought that up until now you’ve been very patient with this process, you may be surprised at how much more patience is required to enjoy watching your garden fill in and become itself. Just like with our children, we may have hopes and desires for what they will become, we may even spend our lives guiding them along, but ultimately our children and our gardens are a reflection of so much more then our desires and hopes. The things we love have a life of their own, and the best any gardener can hope for is to be available to offer guidance throughout the growing process.

Beneficial Organisms

Russ Henry April 22, 2009

No Plant is an Island

The garden is a truly magical place. For every gift of the garden that we can see, taste, or feel there’s a million hidden gifts that we may never be able to perceive except in our imaginations. Imagine the micro-cosmic universe of the soil. Tiny soil fungi called Mycorrhizae live partially in the soil, and partially in the root hairs of the plants. These soil fungi aren’t free loaders though as they live symbiotically feeding and watering the plant roots in return for carbohydrates given by the grateful host. These fascinating fungi are only the final step in a process of turning nitrogen in our atmosphere into nitrates that our garden plants can easily absorb to help them grow. This nitrogen fixing process is a story involving a host of characters from the friendly mycorrhizae, to the soil detrivores like worms and millipedes, to the nitrogen fixing roots of legumes like beans and peas. This incredible, complex tale of converting nitrogen in the air into food for the creatures of this planet is just one of the hidden, magical stories our gardens can tell if only we learn to listen.

I’ve heard it said that all of the problems on earth could be solved in the garden. Yep… I think that’s pretty well put. I see that much magic and potential in gardens, but I also believe that the inverse is equally true. Most of the problems in the garden can be solved by looking to the earth. After all the beauty of a garden is but a small reflection of the magic of the whole earth. In this newsletter we’ll explore a few of the magic solutions that wise old Mother Earth has presented for all gardeners to learn from.

Lady Bugs

Ever so lovely and helpful in the garden is the friendly little ladybug. To the ladybug a garden infested with aphids, mealybugs, leafhoppers, or other similar leaf chewing and sucking bugs is a buffet of sweet delight. These little ladies seem to love eating what we hate seeing. Find ladybugs and other beneficial organisms at your local organic gardening store. Ladybugs can be kept in a mesh bag in the fridge for up to a couple of weeks. I take them out of the fridge and give them water every couple of days, but I don’t give them any water for one day prior to release. You’ll want to release the bugs in the evening after rain or a quick garden watering. One way to keep them from flying off right away is to spray their wings with a little diluted sugar water. This makes their wings sticky for a few days, but causes no lasting harm. Be careful to release them at a rate of about one per square foot, as these little spotted beauties are quite territorial about their garden space.

Praying Mantis

Now this is one bug that strikes the imagination. If I was the size of an aphid I’d think this thing was Godzilla. Praying Mantis are exclusively carnivorous. These bugs pray on aphids, wasps, flies, and other common garden pests. Mantises are sold in brown walnut sized egg cases, usually containing 50 to 400 eggs per case. These cases will hatch out after about 4 days of consistently seventy degree heat. If the night time temps outside are falling below the seventies then hatch them in a jar or container with air holes on top of the fridge. Watch the egg cases very closely when you hatch them indoors because the baby bugs will be so small that they’ll fit through any containers air holes. Place them right in the garden as soon as they hatch and they’ll find their way to your buggy buffet.

Beneficial Nematodes

You may want to set your salad down for this one. Nematodes are one of our most tricky garden defenders. These microscopic creatures can actually eat aphids from the inside out. If applied to the soil these creatures will wait for pupating garden pests to come along. Once they’ve found their host the nematodes just crawl on inside them and begin wreaking havoc and making babies (I had neighbors like this once). Sold in damp sponges sealed in plastic these tiny terrors are completely safe for humans, and other garden visitors. Keep the sponge in the fridge until you’re ready to use them. Once you’re ready just put the little nematode laden sponge in a gallon of water and squeeze it out. Apply the nematode water to the garden with a hose end mixer / sprayer set at about six tablespoons per gallon, then sit back and imagine the gruesome fate about to befall your garden pests.

Mycorrhizae

We’ve worked our way through progressively more aggressive, nasty seeming beneficial organisms, to end up with a very friendly garden helper. This beneficial garden fungus is literally what ties the plants to the soil. Mycorrhizea work themselves into the roots of plants and thereby increase the plants capacity for getting at soil moisture while the plants send the mychorrhizae plenty of carbohydrates to keep them going. These plant boosters are sold pre packaged in many garden stores, and on line, but you can make your own at home just by composting. That’s right, compost is full of mycorrhizae ready to live in harmony with your garden plants. Just like any natural environment, leaves fall to the ground and are decomposed into plant foods containing a variety of beneficial organisms including mycorrhizae. Natures model is truly the best here as decomposing leaves and garden waste will add beneficial organisms to your garden soil just like it would in any prairie, meadow, or forest. The biggest threat to the health of beneficial organisms in your soil are commonly sold garden chemicals. All of the pesticides and chemical fertilizers alike have the same effect of killing off beneficial organisms in order to make your garden reliant on the costly voodoo of chemical companies instead of the free magic of mother nature. So set the spray bottle down, and take a moment to listen to your gardens stories, you just might learn something magical.

A Season to Begin Again

Russ Henry April 22, 2009

Long chill spring times like this one afford gardeners plenty of time to split and divide perennials. Some folks take advantage of the extra cool weather, using this time to re-vamp tired soils in existing garden beds. I’ve already consulted this season with quite a few folks who just wish to make their current garden beds look a little more healthy, vibrant, diverse, and full. I’ve been telling these folks it must be their lucky year.

In years like this we have plenty of time to lift out the newly emerging perennial plants, re-work the garden soils where they came from with a healthy amount of compost, and replant the original plants together with some exciting new selections. In past extended cool seasons I’ve had impressive results from this very practice.

A friend went through this process a few years back and he referred to the farm-compost that we worked into his soil as “super-poo” by the end of the growing season. I always tell folks the same thing, once the bed is empty of plants or grass, just turn in 6 inches of compost with a shovel or garden fork, leaving large chunks of existing soil where it’s possible. Once the soil and compost is turned together use a couple more inches of compost as a mulch layer. Plant, water, and Stand Back!

Transplanting existing iris, coneflower, sedum, and a host of other perennials in this manner leads to such abundance that you may just have to back up after you water in your new gardens so you’re not shoved aside by the rapid growth! If your replacing sod and you haven’t got any transplants to fill the space then starting with baby plants in a temperate season like this is also an excellent idea, as the cool weather helps reduce the shock of transplanting seedlings or starter plants. In the St. Paul yard show to the left you can see how we’ve reworked the soil, and replaced the struggling sod with a garden of baby plants that are already showing signs they’re enjoying their new home.

As this garden fills in the roots will penetrate the earth sending water deeper then grass could ever thereby feeding the trees in the yard and the water tables below. The diversity of plant life in this garden will be a home to birds, bees, butterflies, and a menagerie of other native wildlife, yet another task that a sod lawn could never perform. It may just be this gardener’s opinion, but the new garden should surely be more delightful for the passing neighbors then even a perfectly healthy grass lawn could ever be.

We’ll be sure to check back in with this young garden later in the season to see what our fresh start has produced. Sometimes in life we wish we could just start over. If your compost bin is half empty then maybe you’ll be thinking how much work all this sounds like, but if your compost bin is half full then maybe you’ll see how lucky we are to be given the rare opportunity to begin again.

Waking Up With Spring

Russ Henry April 22, 2009

My first act of gardening this spring was to prune an apple tree. Late in the month of March before the snow and slush made it’s last hurrah, I visited my friend Valerie’s back yard to get her apple tree cleaned up in time for the growing season. Valerie and I paced back and forth around the tree spying branches to cut back. We worked for about a half hour to remove any branches that were rubbing each other, as well as any branches that were crisscrossing the canopy of the tree, or too tall for us to reach with a ladder. By the time we were done the tree had a shape that could be likened to a wine glass, which should make the fruits on this producing creature even more accessible for Valerie and her grandkids.

Even before this early gardening trip, I was noticing the first signs of spring pushing out of the gardens, yards, and parks in the city. Plantings along the South sides of buildings are among the first to wake up in the urban environment. After that comes the forming maple buds that mark the clear blue sky with thousands of tiny red and yellow dots, and with them a flurry of winged activity in the tree tops. Vibrant male cardinals, as loud visually as they are vocally are easy to pick out on the bare branches of neighborhood trees. Mallard ducks can be seen flying overhead in pairs throughout the day. The colorful world seems to be stretching and yawning, waking itself from the long white dream called winter.

Now that the snow is gone, I’ve been a busy gardener. It feels therapeutic to peel back the layer of hay that protected the plants from the drying winter air, winds, and sun. This layer of winter mulch caught all the garbage, salt, and leaves that was thrown or blew on it throughout the cold months. As I pull off the spent dirty hay to bring it to compost I think of how it can be helpful for all kinds of creatures, to peel off the protective layers that they build around themselves in this stressful world. The farm compost that I layer on top of the freshly raked gardens dress them up just as much as it promises to re-invigorate their soils for another season of growth. I love a good metaphor and there’s nothing like spreading a healthy layer of shit around a garden to remind me that if we allow it to compost and change, all the shit that we create together will eventually settle in to make us healthier and stronger then before we made it. At least I really hope this concept applies to gardeners as much as to gardens.

While I’ve been out in the backyard or over at the Co-op gardening I've had plenty of breaks in the raking and shoveling due to all the folks that stop by to visit. You’ll get no complaints from me about these welcome interruptions. Talking with passing friends and neighbors I can see moments of vibrancy that remind me of the cardinals and maple buds in the tree tops. Like the bulbs and perennials slowly pushing out of the ground until you can hardly even imagine a world where they didn’t cast a proud shadow, the folks in this city emerge in the spring warmth from beneath thick winter layers to show the world their own vibrant colors.

Sue's Garden

Russ Henry April 22, 2009

Sue Hensel is about as cool a neighbor as a person could ask for. I first met Sue when we worked together on a neighborhood committee. One of the goals of our group of neighbors was to foster a greater sense of safety in our neighborhood. I remember one meeting in particular when Sue invited all the neighbors over to her art gallery to have a neighborhood art night. Sue opened the doors to her gallery and her heart as she welcomed all us neighbors into her creative space. I remember thinking how lucky the neighborhood is to have someone so dynamic and giving. Sue and I easily became friends, so when she asked me to come up with some ideas for her landscape I was more than happy to help. Together we thought up a plan and soon Giving Tree Gardens was hard at work turning Sue’s yard, which at the time she deemed “the dead zone”, into a functional, beautiful space. As Sue and I worked together to drastically transform her landscape, I realized that a transformation was also occurring within me. Working close with such an accomplished and openhearted artist as Sue gave me the opportunity to discover and express the artist within myself.

R: We really changed what’s going on out in your yard, why was it that you were originally thinking you wanted to get some work done out there, and what goals did you have for the landscape?

S: That side yard was a dead zone, as you know. It was unusable, it was ugly, and basically it was just really bad. There was hardly anything growing out there, the highlight was the lilacs, they would grow out there, but nothing else would. Dust would blow in the door. It was just yucky. Previously I’ve always lived with rather nice gardens around me. I’m not much of a gardener myself, I don’t dig a lot in the dirt any more, but most of my live I’ve lived with a park like environment. Living close to gardens like this has always has allowed me to breathe deeply and with a certain sense of peace. I need to have a green environment around me, I need to smell healthy dirt, it’s the dirt really even more than the flowers, it’s that spring loam smell. I need that

R: In considering the space for your use professionally what kind of a space were you looking to have created out there?

S: In terms of this being not only my home, but also being a gallery I wanted an environment where people could meet, and where art could happen. We did have one performance out there in the dead zone, believe it or not we managed it, but since I put in the gardens I’ve had two art installations and a performance and we only had the gardens in for two months before winter. I’ve already had potlucks out there, and I’ve had meetings out there. I’m already lining up meetings and installations for this summer. The first installation’s going to be in May. I knew I wanted a lot of hardscaping, and even though it was an expensive part of the project I don’t regret at all putting down the natural stone because I really needed hardscape and I wasn’t about to pour concrete. I have a soul relationship with stone, maybe you didn’t know that about me, I grew up in upstate New York where you can see the sedimentary process in action because the gorges are so deep and it’s all limestone and shale. Seeing the process of time and the layers is very meaningful to me and it gets me excited, still does, I’ll walk down the gorge with my nieces saying “Look at that! Look at that!” and they’ll say “What? Aunt Sue, what?” and I’ll say, “That’s thousands of years ago, do you understand that you’re seeing time?” That means a lot to me. We put some time down in that patio and in those retaining walls and when I’m surrounded by them I’m sitting in a little microcosm of time. That stone was compressed thousands of years ago. It’s like I’m sitting in a little time zone, a time before the busses and motorcycles going by, even though I’m just in a few feet from the street I feel like the street is in a whole other place when I’m out there. Professionally I needed hardscape for people to stand around on but I also needed sturdy perennials that would fill in. I needed places where the dog could walk in, and that people could walk in if necessary, places where we could set up chairs if we needed to. For me it had to be sturdy Minnesota happy shade plants and as much native as we could do because it just makes sense. Perennials make sense because I don’t like to have a lot of maintenance, and I certainly don’t wanna have any chemical maintenance. I want to step pretty lightly on the earth if I can. That’s important because this is a community gallery and on some levels this is a community center. So it has to be a welcoming space.

R: “You mentioned a sense of peace that gardens can instill in you. Do your new gardens here feel peaceful?”

S: “ Oh gosh, it’s an astounding space. We’ve probably had a good hundred people go through there now, and every person who’s walked out there just relaxes and their shoulders go down, many folks remark on the peace they feel. “It’s so nice out here”, they might say. Voices come down, people start talking more slowly and gently. It’s a magical space now. That’s what happens when you bring nature back where it’s supposed to be, and of course we also brought the good Karma of our working relationship. I have been very well served by my strategy of choosing artists and allowing them to do what they’re supposed to do. That’s exactly what I did with you. I knew that you were an artist with plants and I knew you were a smart guy, and I knew what landscaping cost, I’d done it before. So even though I had to gulp a bit at the price, I knew it was what I wanted to do. I’d seen your work at the Seward Co-Op and I knew you through various neighborhood committee meetings. I just said okay, this guy’s got some stuff going on. So I put you in the back of my brain thinking, ‘when I’m ready for landscaping this is what I’m doing’.”

R: “When you called to talk landscape with me I thought ‘Yey, I might get to work with Sue!!’ Then I remember coming in to your studio to help make banners for a neighborhood event and I just thought, ‘Wow, this lady is so cool!’

S: “That night is when I made my decision. I had so much fun getting to know you that night, and that’s when I began to understand that you worked as an artist.. You weren’t doing landscaping because you didn’t know what else to do, you were doing landscaping because you truly loved it. I didn’t even think that I’d be able to do the landscape last year, but I came back from out of state and I stepped into the yard, and I said “I can’t stand it one more minute”.”

R: “I get called a lot of things from landscaper to dirt gardener, but it’s new for me to be called an artist.”

S: “Well think about when you’re gathering the plants, you’re doing it pretty instinctively. With you the creativity happens on site. When you’re placing the plants in the yard you’re not worried or confused about where the plants should go, no you’re pretty instinctive out there. Those plants are like an extension of your body. Since you know those plants so well, in a way you’re able to take the ego out of it and just create. That’s art! When you’re really in that creative zone it’s almost like you’re channeling. It’s as though the ego leaves and you’re just dealing with whatever your materials are. Just recently I was out at an artist residency and I wound up doing drawings that were twelve feet wide! Me five foot Sue making huge 6 feet tall by twelve feet wide drawings! I’d get to the end of the day and it was kind of like I’d come back into myself, and I’d say “Damn I did that!?!”

R: I had some of that same feeling in your garden

S: That’s when you’re in that zone, which only comes when you are so familiar with your media that you’re able to work absolutely directly with them, they don’t get in the way. My compressed charcoal and pastel didn’t get in the way at all, they were just a vehicle for what was coming through me. Your knowledge of all those plants is so deep and the connection is so strong that you don’t have to think ‘Oh, that’s a clover it should go there.’ No instead it’s that the clover was in your hand and it went there.

R: I love the way you put that. So all that earth we moved in your yard, and all the tools and labor and the process…..

S: That’s preparing the canvas in a way!

R: And the artist as well I suppose, because in addition to getting the space ready to have the garden, that preparation got me ready to plant it.

S: Absolutely! During all that time it took you to prepare that space, in your subconscious all this work is going on as your body got used to being in the space and the shape that the space took, and the way that the light worked when you were out there and the way that the heat worked. You were there morning to night so that even if your weren’t being conscious of it you saw the sun move through the yard, you saw the deep shade, you knew where it was going to be real hot and where it was going to be just sunny enough. You didn’t take notes, your body just knew because you were with the space. We knew that you didn’t have to do the excavation by hand, you could have taken the fence out and brought in some kind of tractor to dig up the space. As I look back on it though, I think “Ya know that time was really well spent”. That time allowed the yard to become part of you so that you could operate that way. If you had brought in a tractor and done the digging with that I’d still have a nice yard, there’s no doubt about it, but it probably wouldn’t have had that magic, that feeling. It is magical out there and I’m not the only person saying that about it. Part of what we’re talking about here is just mindfulness. Even the name of your business, Giving Tree, you may not have thought about it when you were doing it, but that’s a very mindful name, it’s part of who you are. You’re giving back to the earth. You’re also giving to your clients, your sweat, your strong back and your expertise, but something else happened out there. My yard is your yard, I mean that. I mean not only does it benefit me to have folks coming and going from the gallery, but also, let’s spread the peace! If I am open, hospitable, and accommodating, those ideas get planted and maybe somebody else will be too. It’s all part of that whole grass roots thing, create the peace that you want to see. That’s the kind of peace that I want to see. I want to see neighborhood and community strength. I want to see people feel safe to invite one another into their yards and homes, or to say hello over the fence to somebody new, somebody that they might just know the rest of their life.

Margaret's Garden

Russ Henry April 22, 2009

Acomplished gardener Margaret Wilke graciously invited Russ Henry, owner of Giving Tree Gardens, into her home for tea, cookies, and a plate full of garden talk early this January. Here are some excerpts from that garden chat.

Russ-

“ I remember when we began working together you were a bit nervous about certain aspects of this project, what was it that made you nervous and how have things turned out?”

Margaret-

“Well it was quite a big space and I wondered if it might be too much work. Could I make it look nice? It was just a bigger project than I had ever tackled before. I still have aesthetic concerns about how to balance things out, but I feel more comfortable now that I won’t make too many big mistakes.

If I do, . . . Oh, well.”

R-Well, we’ve still got shovels!!

-“Yes, that’s right! The front yard was a bit of a surprise to me. I didn’t realize how different gardening in the front yard is from gardening in the back yard! In the back yard you’re kind of doing your own thing. You don’t worry if your hair’s looking crazy. In the front yard it’s a whole different deal! The whole world is out there having a good time watching you! I remember one guy in a pick-up truck who rolled down his window and said, “Hey I like your garden, but I don’t like where that plant is over there.”

-“Drive by criticism? Well that’s one way to meet a neighbor.... Did gardening in the front yard help you connect with other gardeners in the neighborhood, aside from the drive by type?"

M-

“There are two other front yard gardens just half a block down. One fellow has quite a few native plants in his front garden. This was my first year out there in the front. I think next year we’ll probably end up sharing plants. That would be fun!"

R-

"Can you gage what kind of effect your new garden has had on the neighborhood as a whole?"

M-

“Oh my goodness! It’s fun! … People really raved about it! The neighborhood is very enthusiastic about it, which is just great…. I had a whole contingent of people from the annual neighborhood picnic that wanted a tour and they came over right then!"

R- "We used a whole lot of compost in this garden, and at first you wondered if we needed as much as we were using, how did that turn out?"

M-

“Well, as I’ve told you before, the compost saved the day, especially since we had such a hot dry summer. We ended up using 11 yards of compost in the front yard! We are on what’s called the Anoka Sandplain here. We have about two inches of topsoil, and then sand, sand, sand as far as you down as you can dig. Water, of course, just runs right through it. When it did finally rain, the compost just soaked it up like a sponge, which was great! Then it held the moisture so that even though it might seem dry on the surface, if I got down into it, [the soil] would still be moist underneath. I did break down and water occasionally during the hot dry spells, but not nearly as much as I would have to if we had just put a little bit of compost on the surface of all that sand. I also used quite a bit of my own compost when I planted things.

My family considers me a little bit over the top about my compost. When you make your own compost it has eggshells, coffee grounds, broccoli stems, plus all the spent flower stems and other green material from the garden in it. There’s more variety of nutrients in it than in the bulk-produced compost that’s mostly leaves and manure. When I plant something, particularly perennials, I always put some of my own compost in with it. I never have enough! It’s amazing how fast it goes. My family knows that if anybody’s caught dropping a banana peel in the trashcan instead of into the compost bucket, they’re in REAL trouble!! My husband will attest to that.”

R-

“Any big plans for next season? What’s going to happen out there?”

M-

“I want to make the new garden bigger. I still think there’s too much grass! I would like to figure out how to create more of a framework of evergreen material around which I plant annuals and perennials. The challenge with such a big public prominent garden is how to get it to look like something in the winter. It needs more structure, more architectural pieces. Figuring that out will be my next challenge.”

R-

“What words of garden wisdom could you share with a less experienced gardener such as myself?”

M-

“Don’t be afraid of making mistakes. They are just part of learning. Even with experience there are always surprises. Sometimes a plant that has done well for years will “croak” for no explainable reason. The one right next to it might be fine. Then a plant you thought was a “goner” suddenly flourishes. It’s just that there are so many variables. Light, moisture, bugs, timing of the heat or cold. There are a lot more things going on than we know about. The mystery of it is wonderful, if you just accept that there’s going to be a lot that is unexplainable. It’s not fully predictable. If you want fully predictable, then . . .”

R-

“Rock mulch?”

M-

“Yeah, that or the standard fare. But that’s not for me . . .

I need surprises.”

Variety is the Spice of Life

Russ Henry April 22, 2009

We’ve all had one of

those

jobs. One of those same-thing-every-day-carpal-tunnel-for- the-soul kind of jobs. You've probably endured through weeks and months that left your brain throbbing like George Jetson’s finger after a hard day of button pushing. In fact any monotonous, dull, or unvaried interaction we have with the world around us leaves us feeling drained. How would your body feel if it had to eat the same food every day? What if you had to hear the same song every time you wanted to listen to music? Life would quickly begin to get a bit humdrum if all your choices could be counted on one finger. That draining sensation that accompanies a lack of variety in our lives is ultimately unhealthy because our bodies, minds, and spirits are biologically required to draw inspiration from a multitude of the earth’s gifts. Man can not live on bread alone, Right? ...In this way the life that is created on earth is born interdependent with a wide variety of the creatures already here. Yep, you know what I’m talking about here, the whole “web of life” idea. It’s not just a cute Disney movie theme. Actually it’s the way life works on this planet to create a healthy vibrant ecosystem, an ecosystem that is capable of covering this planet with teeming life from the driest desert to the depths of the ocean.

So if all the space from the hot Sahara to the bottom of the Pacific is practically frolicking with a smorgasbord of life, why shouldn’t we enjoy that same luxurious richness in our own space at home?

Variation On A Theme

When you look out the window onto the yard how much variety do you see? Is your yard practically a mini-wild life park? Do you see an array of beautiful plants supporting the birds, bugs, and animals that want to call your yard home? Well why not? Luckily, there are a few easy ways to add a little delightful diversity to your outdoor display.

Get Down With Your Dirt

Compost my friends is not just a good idea, it’s the law (of nature). Compost is the natural process by which the earth turns garbage into gold. Nothing is wasted in a perfect system, and nature knows this best. When the leaves fall from the trees the forest doesn’t wish for rakers and baggers to come clean it up. The forest frolics in this mess as insects, and bacteria turn yesterday’s crop into tomorrow’s meal. As above, so it is below. If the ground beneath us is full of life, then the earth above will be as well. Start your own compost pile and let the magic begin!

Get Off The Grass

Sorry, but the green grass lawn is a thing of the past! What could be more boring then only using one type of plant to cover a large swath of land. Can anyone say mono-cropping? Farmers around the world are learning quickly that growing any one type of plant repeatedly to the exclusion of other plants is a big drain on soil health. Why repeat this horrible experiment at home. Sod has short roots, which make it an ineffective ground cover as most of the water that falls on it is drained away too fast to penetrate into the ground. Replace sod with hardy perennials, and while you’re at it add a little color to the landscape pallet. Look for perennials that bloom at different times of year. Fall color, edible value, and visual texture are three more distinctive features to search for while plant hunting. Get a head start on spring blooms by planting bulbs in the fall. Nothing sings spring like a tiny crocus or scilla flower pushing through the cold earth.

Bring Us a Shrubbery

This is not only the demand of the most intimidating Knights Who Say Nee, but this is also the humble request of our avian allies. Birds love to find a yard with a variety of trees and shrubs. Many woody plants will produce an abundance of small fruits or nuts that will provide sustenance for winged visitors. Nothing can start a birdy party like a crabapple who’s apple stems are strong enough to keep it’s fruit on the tree through much of the winter. The freeze / thaw cycles that occur break the sugars in the crabapples down into alcohol by spring time when the birds visit and drink their little hearts content with as much free cider ale as their beaks can sip! Yes, I’m advocating for letting the birds get drunk, live and let fly! Choose trees and shrubs in a range of heights so the birds have several layers of canopy to hide in. Native trees such as the butternut, and white pine can create an attractive top layer of canopy in your yard. This top layer when under planted with shrubs such as grey dogwood, fragrant sumac, or bush honeysuckle will form an unbroken habitat from the ground to the sky.

Reduce Your Ecological Footprint

Russ Henry April 22, 2009

Fear not brave gardeners, I’m not suggesting that you go out and get a smaller pair of garden clogs to squeeze into. Instead I’d ask folks everywhere to examine the impact of our lawns, landscapes, and lifestyles on the local ecosystem. Think of your yard as a type of footprint that falls on the earth. Now ask yourself if that footfall is delicate and well placed, or are you just plodding along squishing whatever’s in your path? I know I’m preaching to the eco-friendly choir here, but I figure even a free range organic choir could use some good hymns when they go rambling into the world singing their big green ideas. The big idea here is that perhaps with a little honest examination we can find ways at home to reduce the size of our own footprint on the environment.

Whenever I encounter a mass of folks blindly harming themselves with their own philosophies, customs, or beliefs I sit and wonder who might be profiting from these seemingly self-inflicted wounds, but then that’s just silly, who could possibly profit from millions of people pouring unneeded dangerous chemicals on their lawns every year??? Certainly not we organic gardeners, I can’t make a dime trying to sell my happy healthy clients on new-fangled, out-there, fringe ideas like better life through chemistry!

How do you rate???

In order to find out how big of an impact your yard’s footprint is creating in the local ecosystem answer the questions below. When you are done answering the questions add up your points to see how eco friendly your landscape really is!

Rainwater

Does your property contain and filter all the rainwater that falls on its’ surface through the use of rain gardens, French drains, or wells?

A veritable mote of rain gardens surrounds our house, not a drop goes down the sewer.

(0 points)

We have a rain garden that captures more than half of the rain that falls, but we’re still watching water pour down the drain. (5 points)
Our landscape is a giant slip and slide for all the little raindrops; we make regular contributions to the local rivers and waterways. (10 points)

Wildlife

Does your property have native plantings to attract wild life?

We can’t see the house for the butterflies and birds in the way! No turf, just native plants.

(0 points)

We have some native plants incorporated into the landscape and a bit of lawn. Birds and butterflies visit more often than in-laws, but less then the mailman.

(5 points)

We like it when birds land in the yard, if we can get a clear shot at them. All turf lawn and no native plants. (10 points)
Property is theft, I live the wonderers life and the birds watch me. (Your eco-footprint wears moccasins not shoes.) (You win)

Home Grown Food

Do you grow your own food?

The yard is my oyster I shall not shop. We grow enough for the neighbors too! (-5 points)
We grow some awesome tomatoes! But we’re shopping for groceries more often then organizing harvests. (5 points)
What, you can grow food at home? I thought it grew in factories? (10 points)

Compost

Do you compost your yard and kitchen waste?

Waste? We don’t have no stinking waste! It’s all just compost waiting to happen. (0 points)
The black plastic bin special is sitting in the back yard with something kind of scary growing in it. (5 points)

C. Oh man I wouldn’t put scraps in the yard, that’s gross!

(Dumps are gross, compost is golden, 15 points)

Chemical Dependency

Do you use chemical fertilizers or pesticides on your lawn?
1. I don’t even walk down the chemical isle at the hardware store, no way. (-5 points)
2. I’ve used some chemicals, but I’m looking for a way out before I’m in too deep.

(5 points, don’t worry, there’s help out there)

C. I don’t have a problem with lawn chemicals, unless I run out!

(Sounds like denial to me, 20 points)

HOW BIG IS YOUR LANDSCAPE’S ECOLOGICAL FOOTPRINT ????

Add up your points to see what size shoes we need to fit on the ecological impact of your yard. The higher the numbers go, the bigger the footprint. Now what size shoes does your eco-impact wear?

0-10 points: Your yard has bare feet and walks softly. Teach your neighbors, their children will thank you.

10-30 points: Your yard wears small smart shoes and walks quickly but carefully.

30-45 points: Please try to keep your landscape on the path to health. I’m afraid it’s jumping around leaving footprints all over the ecosystem!

45-65 points: WATCH OUT! Your lawn is trying to kill us all! DO SOMETHING!

Put Your Garden To Bed

Russ Henry April 22, 2009

A heavy frost has laid itself down on your garden bed. The leaves have wilted and turned color. Now before you go off to cover you gardens with a warm blanket of hay, you may find yourself wondering exactly what to cut back and what to leave standing in the garden.

The Minnesota wintertime landscape can be a bit stark. Usually by December most of what we see is covered in snow. At this point of the year, since your landscape is essentially a field of white it can be aesthetically important to have some texture in the garden to break up the white monotony. Choose what to cut back in your garden based first on whether the plant in question will stand tall enough to catch snow and look pretty in the winter. Any herbaceous* perennial that stands shorter than about 12 inches is probably not going to be seen over the accumulated winter snow. Many of these shorter plants end up a soggy brown mush in the spring, and so it will just be easier to cut them back in the fall. Hostas are in this category. It can be challenging to make a garden bed look tidy in the spring with squishy rotted hosta leaves all over it. I like to leave standing, coneflower, persicaria, astilbe, mullien, milkweeds, and most grasses. Any tall plant that will catch some snow and cause a little texture to pop out of the white winter garden should be left to stand proud.

Be careful!

There are a couple of common mistakes to avoid while performing cutbacks. First, there are a few plants that are deceptively evergreen. The first fall that I worked in gardens, I got myself into a bit of trouble with “the boss” for cutting yucca back. Yucca, hens and chicks, pachysandra, and some low sedum are all types of evergreens that at a glance appear as though they may be herbaceous. Some plants, such as St. Johns wort and Russian sage can be thought of as being categorized somewhere between an herbaceous plant and a shrub. These plants have partially woody stems. Plants like these will not fully die back to the ground, and if left standing they will sprout greenery in the spring from the dormant soft wood of their stems. Perhaps worse than cutting back an evergreen plant, would be cutting into the green thumb of a gardener. God know's I've gawked at many a galling gory gash gouged in good gardeners gloves after gripping greenery for cutting without regard or guidance. That is to say, please don’t cut your fingers off, at least not in the garden.

When a hard frost comes along you must snip it. When there’s dead leaves in your palm you must snip it. Unless of course it looks good through the winter, then wait till spring and snip it into shape! Let the evergreens alone, and for goodness sake, snip the gardens, not the gardener! It’s not to late to snip it. Snip it good**.

*Herbaceous: A plant that does not have a woody stem, and dies back to the ground every year.

**Snip it good: An explanation for all those who are too young, too old, or for those like me whose parents didn’t let you listen to rock music in 1980. This is a play on the 80’s new wave song called Whip it. Thank you Devo!

To Mulch or Not To Mulch

Russ Henry April 22, 2009

Mystery Mulch Unmasked!

Mulch is any material you use to cover a garden bed in order to preserve moisture, moderate the soil temperature, and suppress weed growth. All types of mulch are grouped into two basic categories, organic and inorganic. Types of organic mulch include compost, hay, leaves, wood chips, bark, peanut hulls, pine needles, animal manure, ground corncobs, and even recycled materials such as recycled wood or paper. Perhaps the most commonly used form of inorganic mulch is crushed stone. Plastic or fabric sheeting is often also used, sometimes in conjunction with other organic mulch such as wood chips. Both organic and inorganic mulches sold in retail stores are commonly little more than reclaimed industrial waste, as is the case with wood chips, which land developers must pay to get rid of before retailers bag it and sell it to us. Some of the newer post industrial waste products available for adventurous gardeners include shredded tires, aluminum foil, and my personal least favorite sewer sludge. For our gardening purposes here we will make one more distinction amongst mulches as we separate them into the categories of summer and winter mulch. Summer mulches are most of the above listed items such as wood and animal manure, while winter mulches are those temporary mulches such as leaves or hay, which we use to insulate our northern gardens from the drying winter wind and sun. Now that we know what we’re dealing with here let’s have a closer look at some of the more commonly used mulches.

COMPOST

Okay so I’m starting with my obvious favorite. As anyone who has read any of my previous Seed articles can tell you compost is a garden necessity. Well-balanced compost will have microbes, which form large underground fungi that feed and protect garden plants. At the same time compost offers the perfect fluffy soil texture that roots need to easily grow. When applied to the garden in the spring time the rich color of compost will catch the warmth of the sun and awaken the plants so that the garden is quickly covered in green before the summer heat gets a chance to bake the moisture out of the soil. Compost can be made at home or purchased through retailers. My favorite compost for large garden projects is a product called Farmpost which is a mixture of animal manure, hay, leaves, and a little bit of wood chips.

WOOD CHIPS

Wood chips, shredded wood, and chunks of bark are all different types of wood mulch that are available through any local gas station, hardware store, or big box retailer. These products are sold in a veritable smorgasbord of colors, with a few companies out there willing to dye your mulch to match your trim and shutters. But unfortunately for so many of us who’ve bought into the idea of smothering the ground in shredded tree, wood mulch can be quite problematic. For starters many types of wood mulch have a high carbon to nitrogen ratio, so that while they sit on your garden bed and naturally decay they rob the soil of nitrogen that the plants rely on for growth. Decaying wood will carry with it a host of organisms with undesirable traits or O.U.T.’s, as I like to call them. Some of these O.U.T.’s include; slime molds and other detrimental fungi which are poisonous to plants and can be rather nasty looking, termites (who invited them to the party?), and rodents who find traveling just beneath the wood mulch a convenient way to get to that yummy tender bark around your new trees and shrubs. With any finely shredded wood mulch too little oxygen and water enter the ground, and with more coarsely ground mulch too much water can be retained. From my point of view wood mulch is best kept out of the garden, and onto the path where it makes a nice soft walking surface in which weeds don’t like to grow.

CRUSHED STONE

Next time you’re at the gas station, have a look at whatever landscaping is there and I’ll bet you will be looking at crushed stone. Stone mulch is commonly used in applications where the landowner desires a very “low maintenance” landscape. Unfortunately however it would seem that by replacing the sales tag “low maintenance” with “replant your trees and shrubs every three years” the folks who sell rock mulch would be giving us a little more accurate perception. For this example we only need look to the woods or the prairie or the jungle. In none of these lush, verdant environs is found a ground covered in stone. Yes forests did grow upon the Rocky Mountains, but those took a while to establish, perhaps a few thousand more years than you’ll have to invest in your landscape. In fact when we look around to find a natural environment covered in crushed stone it would seem the barren desert is as close as we come to that. Crushed rock will bake the water out of your soil, overheat the plant roots, and over time compact soil. But then, nobody really expected that gas stations would be a good source of landscaping inspiration did they?

PLASTIC AND CLOTH SHEETING

Skip it. It’s that simple. Both of the fabrics stifle airflow in the soil. Both of these products run water away from the soil. Both of these products block new nutrients from entering the soil. Just skip it. If you didn’t already skip it, then pull it up and skip it next time.

GROUND TIRES, ALUMINUM FOIL, SEWER SLUDGE

When people start covering their gardens, lawns, and play areas with dangerous chemically laden post consumer industrial waste, and paying for it as though it were a privilege I feel there must be some smirking marketing executive somewhere who really needs to have their creative license revoked.

As it turns out the road to answering the question “To mulch or not to mulch?” can be really quite tumultuous. One must avoid clever marketing executives and other types of slime molds. You may have thought your garden was covered only to find your nitrogen was being stolen for years. After reading this you may even feel as if your gardens are lost in the desert, and that a good mulch is nothing but a mirage, but rest assured your oasis awaits if only you’ll think globally and compost locally.

Beat the Heat

Russ Henry April 22, 2009

Hot enough for you? This is the perennial question that millions of Minnesotans seed their greetings with every year late in the month of July. Just like clockwork hardy northerners get to experience a touch of the tropics from the middle of July through the middle of August when the temperatures and humidity levels soar into the 90’s. It is at this sweltering time of year when many of the fruits of our gardening labors begin to pay off, and the legacy of our gardening mistakes are made clear. Fresh tomatoes, summer squash, and visiting Monarch butterflies are among the riches being touted in some of my friends gardens while other friends of mine it would seem have nothing to talk about but the terrible heat and drought. Why are some of us enjoying the heat like a party in a sauna, while others treat this weather as though it were a plague? Do the gods just like some of us better? Or do we have any say in the outcome of this gardening riddle?In this months newsletter we’ll explore a few ways to “beat the heat”, and along the way we’ll see if we can turn one man’s plague into another man’s party.

Gardens That Withstand Drought

Water! Water! Water! This is the chant I can almost hear echoed off each patch of dry dieing lawn that I pass at this time of year. Lawn grass is the most intensively irrigated crop in the United. States. That’s right; our simple green lawns require more water to stay alive than any other crop grown here today, and why is that? Simply put, grass leads a shallow life. Turf grass will only grow roots 8 to 10 inches deep in ideal soil conditions, and usually we’re working with highly compacted soils in our newly constructed urban lots which allows for even less root depth. Since turf grass will only grow roots a few inches deep the moisture that falls on the grass can only penetrate the soil this few inches. The short lawn grass fails to provide any canopy for itself so when the sun shines down moisture trapped in the top of the soil is evaporated out quickly. I’m bothering to mention all of this about the shortcomings of turf grass so that we can have a good example of what to avoid when planning a drought tolerant garden. Logic would follow that if shallow roots, compacted soil, and poor plant choice lead to an over consumption of water, then deep roots, loose soil, and a wise plant selection should lead us back toward a garden that can withstand a drought.

As with many gardening riddles, the answer to ours is largely involving compost. Whenever I find that the soil I’m working with is compacted so that roots and water can’t penetrate it easily I will spread out a layer of compost 4 to 6 inches deep. Then I will turn the compost into the soil with a wide tined garden fork. My garden fork allows me to break the soil up while leaving it in large enough chunks so that re-compaction doesn’t occur as it would if I were to break the soil up into smaller particles. When the soil and compost are mixed in this manner water penetrates evenly and deeply thus allowing my plants roots to easily grow. After the soil and compost are turned together I will again cover the entire garden with 2 to 3 inches of compost. This top layer of compost acts as a summer mulch that helps to retain moisture as it provides essential microbes and nutrients for the plants that it surrounds. If you’re soil is very sandy you may want to attempt to add clay soil to your earth. Clumps of clay soil spread throughout the garden will dissolve into your sandy soil over time and help with water retention.

Just as dazzling stage light will illuminate any particular performers strengths and weaknesses so does the sunlight brighten up our garden stage to highlight the talents and failings of the actors therein. We want to make sure here that our “stage” is staffed with the appropriate “actors”, each one chosen to best perform in their distinct role. As we learned with grass we don’t want to have the sunlight shining so close to the ground over large areas. Creating different layers of canopy in your yard by planting trees, large and small shrubs and then perennials of various sizes will help ensure that the sunlight is not baking any one area of ground at the same time that it naturally invites wild birds and insects. Native plants are often stars of the garden stage in the summer heat. Plants that are originally from this region are as hardy as you can find, and will often be more adept at dealing with heat and lack of rain than their cultivar cousins. Remember to plan for seasonal change when choosing your plants. Your spring bleeding hearts and columbine will shine during act one, but come the hot sunny second act of the growing season they will need to be upstaged and rest in the shade of larger perennials. As we already mentioned the less sunlight that is allowed to penetrate through to the ground, the more water your soil will retain. This means that covering every part of the available earth with green will be advantageous for preserving water. Just think of the forest or prairie everywhere that plants can possibly grow they do. This natural model of plant co-operation is ours to borrow from freely. Finally make sure to employ the help of a plant talent agency or two. When choosing your plant pallet check with the staff of your local nursery to see what selections they can recommend for drought tolerance. Any good nursery or garden store will have at least one staff member who can confidently answer this inquiry. If you get a blank look from your helper at the garden store you can safely assume that they don’t know what they’re doing, and the “talent” at their “agency” is probably not in the best of spirits.

A first-rate garden performance requires a respectable earthen stage. Work with your soil and compost in order to create a theatre worthy of an astounding performance. Keep yourself and the rest of the audience entertained by inviting only the best performers onstage. Timing is everything, so let each plant play its own seasonal role, and don’t be discouraged if good help is hard to find! Above all, always remember whether in the garden or onstage, let nature be your compass and your direction will be true.

the seed magazine

Healthy Yards, Healthy Lives

Mile High Gardens

Garden Design Basics

Beneficial Organisms

A Season to Begin Again

Waking Up With Spring

Sue's Garden

Margaret's Garden

Variety is the Spice of Life

Reduce Your Ecological Footprint

Put Your Garden To Bed

To Mulch or Not To Mulch

Beat the Heat

Telephone

An interview with Russ

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