gardenthoughts

my camera isn’t working at the moment .. well, it’s working, but there’s something going on with the zoom and it doesn’t focus properly .. now, i say it’s the camera, although it could just as easily be my ignorance of its workings .. at any rate, i’m in the process of finding out .. and in the meantime, this break from readily available visuals for a post may be a perfect opportunity to hone my descriptive writing skills .. we’ll see how clear a picture i can give you with words .. here goes ..

both frank and i have been down with some kind of cold over the past number of days .. so it’s been pretty much stay hunkered around the woodstove .. resting, reading and relaxing into being ‘sick’ .. not my favourite place to be, inside .. and, in fact, i have to get up and go outside at least once a day, and when it’s not raining, more than that .. just to peer .. there is so much going on right now in our yard .. and in all gardens, everywhere, i suspect .. here, at home, though is where i do my best peering .. it’s so interesting to me that here it is january, and so much growth is occurring right under my nose ..

for instance .. the fall rye is brilliant, fresh green .. and recovering nicely from its deer encounter a few weeks ago .. and the spikes of new green coming in the garlic beds are so heartwarming, somehow .. it worked! .. they are growing .. did i ever doubt they would? .. not really .. i’ve planted enough garlic, and watched it grow many times over many years, so i know it will simply do what it is destined to, once i put it in the ground .. however, it’s the moment when i go out to the garden and see the sturdy spikes of green reaching up through the straw that thrills me .. the veggie garden is growing .. we have garlic .. and we have rhubarb .. curled up, wrinkled up, shoots of brilliant red making their appearance through the darkness of the manure mulch that’s been protecting the bed over the months .. wonderfull ..

from the veggie garden i make my way past the cedar garden box that holds the helleborus  argutifolius (which i believe is also called corsicus) .. the hellebore  spills over with large, strong, tooth-edged grey green leaves .. tough, like leather .. and delightfull, light greenish-white flower buds, lined with pinks and reds just about to pop .. oh, i wish i had my camera .. the flowers hang, like large lily of the valley flowers, sort of .. in clusters of bell shapes .. round and sturdy, like the plant itself ..

once past that box, i see there are two different peonies starting to make an appearance .. tips of deep, dark red in one pot, and spikes of pinky green coming up in another .. must plant those soon .. that’s the thing with having a garden in progress .. one must be patient and wait for the right time to come .. (sounds like a good life lesson .. don’t force .. be patient) .. i have a few pots that are patiently waiting for their time of planting ..

in the circular bed, around the big fir there are bulbs coming up amongst the perennials .. crocus .. dark green, thick, grass-like leaves with lines of startling white.. buds of the ‘cream beauty’ coming first .. snowdrops .. tall (well, 4″ or so .. it’s relative) light blue grey green stalks, sporting brilliant white buds .. waiting for their time to bloom .. one  in the front yard has already opened its buds into flowers .. (ill have to look up the variety) .. more green, green wider leaves, and brilliant white tear drops, hanging down .. and grape hyacinths (muscari) pushing up through the soil .. small crowns of growth eager to show themselves when it’s time .. and mystery bulbs that i know i planted, and which will be surprises ..

the daffodils are coming .. some standing six and seven inches out of the ground .. and quite a few that, so far, are coming up blind .. mystifies me .. i wait, year after year, thinking that this year they will flower .. not so .. well, not yet, anyway .. a bit of a let down, really .. i’m thinking i will move out of the king alfred and larger varieties and into more of the species daffs and narcissus .. perhaps more suited to this environment .. it’s always, for me, a matter of what’s working .. and if some plant just isn’t working, i’ll first make an attempt to move it to, possibly, a more suitable site, and then when that doesn’t work, out to someone else’s garden .. i put it down to hours of sunshine, here .. again, reminded that there really isn’t as much sunlight in this garden as i dream there is .. so, back to this reality and the joys of working with shade gardens .. that said, i see the green spikes of narcissus ‘jetfire’ coming through the surface .. a smaller variety of narcissus .. strikingly dark yellow with a bright, true orange trumpet ..

and then, my eye is drawn to the cyclamen coum, which has been blooming for a couple of weeks now .. with more to come .. sharp, bright, crisp whorls of magenta flowers .. there is a picture of a cyclamen coum in ‘exciting times’ from february 2009′s winter garden posts .. just stunning little beings .. one of my favourites, in fact .. from my days with phil in his garden .. he had a  eye for stunning ..

so there we have it for now ..  i’m not so sure how well i did with my word crafting .. always appreciate the time to practice, though .. and perhaps, i have put across a bit of my own excitement for january in the garden .. if you are at all interested in winter flowering shade plants there are other,  more visually appealing, posts to be found from october through march of last year which i invite you to visit .. until my next inspiration, happy peering .. hopefully, i’ll have my camera up and running by then .. after all, a picture’s worth a thousand words ..

from time to time, during the autumn and winter months, we have stormy days and nights .. being in the midst of a rainforest, these storms are perfectly natural occurrences .. inhabitants simply snuggle a little deeper into the coziness of their homes .. on our little island, during such storms, we are on alert to sounds ..  a crack here .. or a crash there .. and, when the crashing is close enough to draw our attention, we speculate as to where a tree, or branch, might have come down .. for a branch from a large fir can do considerable damage (as a few islanders can attest) .. in the calm of the day after any storm, we move about and among one another hearing stories of someone down the road who had a close call ..

not a terribly dramatic story forthcoming here .. nonetheless, here’s a tale of a branch and a garden ..

just before the new year, i was out for my usual peer at the garden .. can’t help myself .. i know there is growing going on there .. i need to see it .. watch it .. observe the changes .. my mom used to say she was “watching the world go by” .. peering is a lot like that, i think .. i watch the world around me  grow .. i see peering as being a prerequisite for maintenance gardening .. anyway .. on this day i was making my way back towards the composter .. it’s right beside the veggie garden, so it’s usually like a two purposes in one kind of excursion .. to drop any little bits i’ve picked up along my way into the compost .. then, to admire the veggie garden .. however, this morning, i didn’t make it to the composter as usual, because a relatively large  fir branch was across my path .. and, not only across my path but across the garden fence .. and over top of the rhubarb patch .. sometime, during the storm the night before, this branch had let go from the fir above the garden and smashed through the fence ..

little damage, really .. the amazing thing about the placement of the branch (and it seems there is always something to be amazed by in such stories) was that it had fallen from way up in the fir (perhaps straight down) and landed across only one section of fence .. it broke through two crossbars, and none of the uprights .. a simple break .. nothing much to fix .. no new uprights to cut .. we’ve got posts to split into rails .. just screw’em on .. brad nail the uprights .. easy peasy .. as i turn to walk away, brushing my hands together as if i’d already done the job, i glance toward the veggie garden .. the lush, beautifull green of the fall rye draws my eye .. and then, that it’s been browsed by mr buck ..

naturally, he took complete advantage of the opportunity life set out before him, and chomped the rye .. lovely being that he is .. well, how else would he be able to taste the sweetness of our rye which, up until the branch fell, was just on the other side of the fence .. i can’t blame him, really .. and the rye will grow back ..

in the meantime, the fence is propped up, such that it  will keep mr buck out until it’s fixed properly .. we’ll do that when the rain stops .. when we have our tools here .. when it’s time .. and, as no doubt our dear deer would agree, timing is everything ..  ..

this is the first day of the new year .. whatever that means .. i suppose we’ll see, as we move along .. life changing .. abundant growth .. in a myriad of ways .. is what i look forward to .. and so, we go ..

this photo was taken a couple of days ago .. a few days before that the pond was frozen from crisp, clear and chilly days .. and freezing nights .. today it’s raining .. change comes so quickly .. sometimes .. other times, it seems to move more slowly .. at its own pace, i suspect .. certainly not at any pace that i have even been able to pin on it ..

over the past couple of weeks i  haven’t been gardening .. this time of year both frank and i stop .. about a week before christmas until the beginning of the new year, we rest .. we relax .. we walk .. we read .. i think of it as rejuvenating our selves for the coming season .. perhaps, metaphorically speaking, our dormant time  .. it’s great ..

each day i take time to spend time out walking .. listening to music on my shuffle .. sometimes dancing in the woods .. always peering ..

peering downwards ..

peering upwards ..

peering forward ..

into the unknown ..

of this new year ..

the weather is changing now .. patches of blue are showing through the clouds and rain .. the trees down the road are swaying with the breeze that brings this change .. it would appear to be my cue to go out walking .. to see what comes to me to be seen ..

moving gently into the new season ..

happy new year ..