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I first noticed it when I walked out to my car yesterday morning. Among the grass that usually invades my flower beds I saw a small seedling. The lighter green of its delicate stem and leaves was enough contrast to draw my eye. The California poppies I had broadcast weeks ago were starting to sprout.

"Let’s see what happens"

As regular readers know, I am not a gardener prone to dramatic expressions of plant propagation. I don’t have a greenhouse and rarely try to cultivate plants from seed. I might divide a plant now and then or re-pot them, but I never seem to find the time to start my vegetables early or sprout new bedding plants in a host of black plastic flats. On occasion I will broadcast some seeds in appropriate garden beds and see what happens.

This low-key approach to gardening yielded a respectable circle of wildflowers in the front garden this year. It appears that they are re-seeding as we speak so, hopefully, next year I will get an even better crop. In an attempt to fill in this wildflower area and add a bit more color to the bed that fronts the street, I simply spread out the poppy seeds and lightly raked then into the soil. It was very heartening to see this first sprout as I can only guess what will happen in my garden from one moment to the next.

I had expected our usual rains to arrive by now, but, of course, they are not cooperating. The jet stream is carrying everything up to the Pacific Northwest and leaving us with nothing but fog. It is only in the irrigated beds that I am seeing any action at all. It is a good sign to see the germination of these seeds as it means that they were viable when I put them in the ground. When the rains come the others should jump up to join this early scout.

Harvest Time

While December it isn’t what you might consider a normal harvest time, I am doing just that. In my case, though, I am harvesting pine boughs to make wreaths and swags for the holiday season. I started this tradition the one and only time I tried to have a live tree for the holidays. I had to trim a number of the lower branches to fit it into the stand, so I used these branches to fashion a simple wreath for the front door. My success there led me to actually harvest limbs from my own trees the next season. I usually build these decorations right before our annual cookie open house (where I bake 70-80 dozen cookies to share with friends and family) so that the house smells like Christmas even though we have an artificial tree. I find that this is an easier and safer method of bringing the outdoors inside during the holidays. It is also much easier to remove the pine swags than trying to wrestle a large, tinder dry tree out the front door.

Keep digging!

Douglas