Gertrude's Flower Garden Weekly Diary

5/18/01 - STILL WATERING! As of Wednesday of this week, I was still dragging the hoses around the front and back gardens, trying to water for a half hour a day. As long as I continue to do this, the soil seems to be staying moist, and my new baby plants are doing well. What isn't doing well is my relationship with the hoses--snakes in the Garden of Eden (or at least in Gertrude's Garden). I have never used a hose to water the flower beds, as I am doing during this dry spell, without thinking that hoses, by nature, seemed possessed of a malevolent spirit that prompts them to do as much mischief as they possibly can. I have two long hoses attached to outside connections in the front and rear of the house, and with these can cover all of the flower beds. To do so, however, I must drag the hoses around with me as I water, and this gives them a chance to do their dirty work. One of their tricks is twisting so that as you pull their loops tight you shut off the water until you straighten them out. Their favorite, however, is to drag over the beds, breaking off the flowers planted there. Hoses are helpful in bringing water to plants dying of thirst, but why must they go out of their way to make the poor gardener unhappy?
Another important reason for keeping the flower beds well watered is the "volunteers" that are now popping up daily. As I work along the beds, I am careful not to cultivate more than just around the flowers that I planted this spring and certainly not far into the beds themselves. Seedlings are everywhere: coleus, cleome, celosia, balsam, larkspur, impatiens. Except for the impatiens and some white cleome for the rock garden, these are annuals that I didn't raise in the basement garden, so that it is important not to destroy this year's self-seeded crop. They are too small to move around yet, but in a few weeks I will be digging up those that I want and moving them to where I want them to grow. Not only annuals seed themselves but perennials do too. I have noticed tiny phlox, rudbeckia, coreopsis, bellflower, echinacea, and many other desirable perennials pushing up. They are often in places where I don't want them, the edges of beds, for instance, and must be moved before they get too big.
In explaining the difference between annual and perennial flowers, most folks emphasize that perennials last more than one season. Another important difference, however, is that annuals, once they begin, bloom until the frost cuts them down, whereas perennials bloom only for a part of the growing season. This means, therefore, that the wise gardener tries to plant in his garden varieties of perennials that will ensure flowers for the entire season. The Parade of Perennials in Gertrude's garden begins with snowdrops (I am considering bulbs as perennials) and continues with all of the other spring bulbs. Lilies-of-the-Valley are just ending and the iris and columbines are now front and center. Columbines spread easily; I have only to move them away from where I don't want them to where I think they will do well. There are shades of pink and blue from very light to darker colors. Many of our iris date back to Gertrude's mother's garden and are very old; others I have added more recently, and included are Dutch, Bearded, and Siberian varieties. Pictured below are some very old, early blooming, Bearded iris.

ntgates@worldnet.att.net