Saturday, May 3, 2014

A Hole In The Sky


Spring fever is upon us, when otherwise sober people see holes everywhere and feel compelled to stick things in them. Holes in the garden. Most of the time what appears to be a bare spot really isn't. But whatever is in there isn't planning to show up until later, once you've given it something fresh and new to strangle. Sometimes it actually is a bare spot, because something you'd loved for years has been murdered over the winter, but if you're old, you have enough perspective to take that sort of thing in stride, or else you don't remember what the thing was.

I've been doing this a while so I have a good grip on the planting details. They don't necessarily give you all the particulars in the little tag hanging off the plant, so allow me to elucidate. Carefully remove plant from pot. The roots will have gone around and around inside the pot counterclockwise (in the northern hemisphere) until they're as tangled up as a nightie on a restless sleeper. So the whole ball should shlorp right out like canned cranberry sauce. Take a moment to poke at the root ball with your fingers as though you were going to tease out all the little root hairs and give them some air; then, after a minute, just begin ripping at it in a haphazard fashion until it looks a little cowlicky all over.

Now. Prepare a hole at least twice the diameter of the pot, or (in dry, rocky, clay, or annoying soil, or if it's hot out) just big enough to slide the sucker in. Position the plant, attempt to refluff the fudgy dirt you've excavated, and stuff it all back in the hole. Put some dark compost on top so that the neighbors think you did a good job. Water, if you think of it.

When it comes to perennials and shrubs, remember: it's sleep, creep, and leap. The first year it's just barely hanging on. The second year it seems to show some signs of life. The third year it goes nuts and makes you very proud. Fourth and fifth years it gets big and tall and does every damn thing it said it would do on the little tag. It blooms! It smells like shampoo! It dances the merengue in the summer breeze! Hummingbirds drape tinsel on it for Christmas! You have now achieved the coveted Architectural look, characterized by hard-won Vertical Interest. Congratulations!

Year six, look for new growth in spring, look again in late spring, crease the wood with your fingernail
to look for signs of green in June, and dig up the whole lifeless skeleton in late August. You are allowed a day or two to be morose, but do not trouble yourself looking for answers. Horticulturally speaking, your ace plant has succumbed to Just Because. This is gardening. Don't be a sissy.

If you want something you can count on, you need to quit cramming things into the top of the planet and hoping for miracles and grace. Instead, you need to look to the heavens. There's dust and gases and rocks and things up there and most importantly the whole sky is chock full of math. There's so much math up there that we can plot out what to get excited about years in advance. For instance, we can count on total lunar eclipses, such as the one that just popped by on April 14th. That one was, as our local weatherman would have it, "the first of four consecutive lunar eclipses," which is a relief--we hate when they come all out of order.

T - 15 minutes to fog bank
The lunar eclipse happens when the moon is full, which, naturally, it always is, but since it spends most of the month turning a shoulder to us, you have to wait until it quits pouting. Additionally, you have to wait until the moon is completely in the earth's shadow. This circumstance is called "syzygy" and is characterized by the perfect alignment of astrologers, crackpots, and spooky predictions in the social media. They called this one a Blood Moon, which sounds morbid, but all it means is it gets kind of a reddish color to it from all the sunsets and sunrises happening at once and smacking into each other. And count on it--the whole thing, the totally eclipsed Blood Moon, is visible from half the earth, except for a little strip in western Oregon, where a bank of fog is penciled in for that night.

Count on it.

34 comments:

  1. As a Master Gardener I can say that you have gardening down pat! And we gardeners do stair a lot at the moon!

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    1. Especially those nights we can't sleep because all our plants keeled over.

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  2. "when otherwise sober people see holes everywhere and feel compelled to stick things in them."

    This obviously explains the chickadee behavior in your last post.

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  3. Well that was a very instructive post! You pulled our muddy fingers out of the dirt and our eyes up to the sky.

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    1. Now put those fingers right back in the dirt where they belong.

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  4. Wondered about that blood moon---I missed it.
    My best gardening advice, free to all: Don't plant wisteria on an arbor attached to your house. When it gets to the "leap" stage, it will try to take.the.house.down!

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    1. I'm similarly scared of and attracted to the trumpet vine.

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  5. How true all of this is. My ground cover - "grows to 6 inches" - has some branches 10 ft. plus and has climbed the side of the house. It's been cut, pruned, pulled, sliced and diced - but comes back strong each year.
    Here in the "Greater Cincinnati" area can also always count on a cloudy night for any astrological event.
    PS, don't plant gourds using your porch railing as support (see Knittergran's comment above!!!!)

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    1. Well shoot--at least you got a good six inches out of your ground cover! What is it? (Crossing it off the list.)

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  6. "Horticulturally speaking, your ace plant has succumbed to Just Because." Snicker. It's so true.

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    1. Five gorgeous Japanese maples. Dead. Five. Dead.

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    2. Oh no - if I'd known how serious it was, I never would have snickered. I only lose things like rose bushes. Mostly because I'm a poor excuse for a gardener and don't fertilize them. My condolences on your maples.

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    3. My basic gardening process is: stick everything in and then pull out the dead shit.

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  7. 'syzygy' is such a wonderful Scrabble word. I may have to find someone to play with and palm the necessary letters so I can pretend to be clever.
    An emphatic yes on the gardening front too.

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    1. I've been trying to score "axolotl" in Scrabble for years. It's not the best score or anything, I just crave it.

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  8. We were gone for two weeks. The morning glories and the blackberries are now having a furious turf war over the backyard, and I am thinking that my husband's idea of a flame-thrower might be the solution. Or maybe a goat. But if anything astrological is going to happen, I know it will rain that night.

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    1. I finally got control of the morning glories in our yard after 30 years and then we had to buy the house next door to get control of them over there.

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  9. Gardening is such a hit and miss affair I'm surprised anything survives at all. I mean, you live in an area for years, get a feel for the climate and sunshine patterns, plant appropriate plants and*zing*snap* mother nature throws you a ten year drought! Pfft!

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    1. Or another one of those hundred year floods. Humility is one of the great benefits of gardening. And sky watching.

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  10. The previous owners of our little plot of land thought it was a good idea to make a hole and plant a bunch of hideous shit wherever hideous shit would grow. (Apologies to Mr. Lincoln for wreaking havoc on his beautiful homage to flowers.) The garden gods must truly hate us because no matter what we do, we can't kill it even when we dance naked under the glow or the waxing or waning moon because sometime around 3 days before each full moon, fog or clouds blow into the area for 6 long nights.

    I'm heading out to beat the weeds into submission in the 10 little gardens on our .032 acre of land. If you don't hear from me on your next post, you'll know that once again, the weeds won.

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    1. If we don't hear from you we'll send out a posse of Himalayan blackberries to fetch you our.

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  11. I used to be compelled to stick things in holes and was pretty good with a shovel, too. As soon as the ground thaws a little more I'll do my part.

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  12. I would write something but I suddenly remembered that I have overslept and need to check on a tiny dog. It was a longer than normal day yesterday and a third of the backyard was defeated.

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    1. I am happily baffled by your comment. Carry on.

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    2. My son was away for a couple of days so we have been taking care of his tiny dog. His dog and my large dog are incompatible due to the tiny dog's ferociousness. Tomorrow I am planting grass in the backyard.

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    3. Oh, okay. Thanks for elucidating. Tiny dogs can be real dicks.

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  13. I've just really started getting into gardening these past couple of years. Nothing is better than picking one's own fresh broccoli, tomatoes, canteloupe and this year -- red bell peppers. My dwarf orange tree finally has one orange on it about the size of a golf ball now. I'm thrilled! The yellow yarrow and purple that were just little tykes last year, are rowdy adolescents this year. It's all so fun and gratifying to watch it happen.

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    1. Oh god, wait till next year. Do you have a water strategy, or need one?

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  14. I live just on the south edge of Jono's tundra. I am just beginning to feel the need to stuff plants into the ground. I am trying hard to control the urge. Every year it is the same....need to plant, water a while, get bored, watch things go brown, pull them out and repeat. I'd do better by just burying the money directly in the dirt. At least there'd be a chance to find some of it the next season.

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    1. That's a great idea. I was thinking of just planting things that were already dead or bringing home plants and tossing them directly into the compost heap, but the money idea sounds like a real winner.

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  15. After this past winter, I'll be gobsmacked if a single rose made it through. But gardeners are nothing if not hopeful, so I'll slap on the old green hat and get out there to make some more holes with the rest of the cockeyed optimists. The daffs are blooming, bless 'em.

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    1. Ooo. Go out this fall and buy "Baby Moon" daffodils. Then put a big stake where you planted them, because you won't recognize them as daffodils when they come up. You will Love Them. You're welcome.

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