Pretty snowbells in the back garden today. The white against the dark foliage, and the tiny green dots on the white flowers look so amazing.
A quick iPhone photo of the first daffodils to appear in the garden this year. I noticed them coming up about a week ago, but just saw these as I stepped outside to take some video of the street resurfacing that is happening on our street.
Adding the bloom date to my Google Calendar-based gardening journal. I put in an all-day event that then repeats yearly, forever, so that I can see what happens when at a glance.
You can try this yourself. Add a secondary calendar to Google Calendar (or whatever electronic calendar you use) and then add in events as they happen. If you have historical data, you can go back and add some of that in, too.
I don’t remember ever seeing the Azaleas in bloom so early in the year, but the large, mature bush right outside the front door is showing some lovely flowers already. I am guessing the heavy rains we had in December (and continue to have) have convinced them that it is time to wake up and get back to work. (SMILE)
- Event: Tomatomania 2010
- Repairing a damaged drip irrigation line
- Review: TB57 Lithium Ion Battery Cordless String Trimmer / Weed Trimmer
- Casting concrete leaves from/for the garden
- Freebies = Free Bees!
- Product Review: The Troy-Bilt TB154 Electric Cultivator
- RHS Chelsea Flower Show 2010
- Gardening books are friendly, supportive and stimulating companions
- Your Urban Garden
- The garden is going to the birds!
This post from LAist.com, How To Trash Your Tree reminded me that I hadn’t made plans to gather up Christmas Trees this year. Here in LA we usually end up with dozens of Christmas trees simply thrown out on lawns and dumped in empty lots. Despite info like this, a lot of people still take the easy way out.
In past years, I had thought about driving around the neighborhood and gathering up any tree we might see. While we now have a big chipper/shredder, but we no longer have a pickup truck. Perhaps I will talk with our closest neighbors and friends and let them know they can drop off their tree here instead of taking the time to chop it up and put it in their green garden bin.
I have been looking to create a large amount of mulch in order to replace the pea gravel on our garden paths. The gravel is difficult to keep in place and makes it difficult to clean up the leaf litter from all our mature trees. It also makes it troublesome to shred those leaves as there is always the danger of gravel among the leaves that will dull the blades.
Make use of your Christmas Tree this year, or take it where someone else can put it to use.
- A collection of career items I found interesting this week.
- How To Trash Your Tree – December 26, 2010 – Please share this info so we don’t end up with the usual Christmas Tree “litter” over the next week or so. I now have a chipper/shredder so I might gather up a few to make mulch for my garden paths.
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A Christmas Gift from A Gardener’s Notebook!
Sunday marked our 5th Annual LIVE Reading of Charles Dicken’s A Christmas Carol. We had some new voices this year and had a great time as usual. You can listen to the entire show using the link below.
Consider having your own reading of A Christmas Carol, or other favorite story, as a way to gather friends together and share a unique experience. You don’t have to broadcast it like we do, but why not share it with the world!
This year’s show was sponsored by WelchWrite.com, Eclipse-1 Media and New Media Interchange.
Listen to 5th Annual Live Reading of A Christmas Carol
Happy Holidays, Merry Christmas to all and to all a good night!
Enjoy more Christmas Carol in your own home!
Free download of “A Christmas Carol” – Text/ePub/HTML/Kindle versions available
Free download of our reading script of “A Christmas Carol” – PDF format
The audio CD of Patrick Stewart’s one man version of A Christmas Carol is absolutely amazing. We saw the show several times here in LA and met Patrick one evening. His version of “A Christmas Carol” was the driving factor in starting our own yearly reading of the story.
- A collection of career items I found interesting this week.
- Building a Native Bee Box – December 19, 2010
My friend, Keri, has created an excellent “Bee Box” for her garden. Read the entire article at her site.
“I’ve been wanting to do this for over a year, build a nesting box for native bees and other insects. My friend Doug Welch from A Gardener’s Notebook had sent me various plans and ideas. I had a wooden wine box with a sliding lid and it seemed perfect.”
Read Building a Native Bee Box via AnimalBytes
From the gardenersnotebk Twitter account: A reminder to me by way of a reminder to you. 🙂 – Pop the top on your composter when it rains to give it a good soaking and keep it perking.
If you use an enclosed composter like I do, the next time rain is forecast, pop the top on the composter and let it get a good soaking. Here in Los Angeles it is usually so dry that the compost doesn’t work as quickly as you might like. Rather than wasting water from the standpipe, I let nature do its thing at this time of year. Rain is predicted for the next 4-5 days here so there should be plenty of opportunity.
Here are the composters I have in my back garden…
Garden Gourmet Composter on Amazon.com
