rain and mud and shopping

The threat of frost is finally over and it's planting time!  I have been driving all over Northeast Pennsylvania and New Jersey looking for the best product I can find for my gardens.   It's tedious but worth it.  Although I confess I do buy from Home Depot now and then, I buy 90% of my plants and flowers from local green houses.  I find the people who own them are wonderful to work with.  They know and stand behind their product, are eager to share their information with you and have a vested interest in your progress.  Because they are local, your success is their success.

(Tammy Clucas, owner of Clucas Farms on Rt 521 in Harmony, NJ has been a terrific source for me.  Not only does she know a lot, her product is wonderful; I have never purchased something from her that did not completely satisfy me.  I often ask for plants or flowers she doesn't have or doesn't have a lot of.  Each time I do this ((she probably groans when she sees me pull in)), she does all she can to find it for me somewhere else.  You won't get that kind of service at Home Depot.)

Today I woke up all fresh and eager for my day in the garden.  Even though it was raining (a soft rain), I was undaunted in my fervor to dig, plant and prune.  It wasn't so bad in the beginning, but the soft rain became a steady rain and the steady rain became a hard rain and the hard rain broke me.  My pants were so wet they were sticking to my legs, my gloves were soaked through and it was so cold I could see my breath!!!  That was where I drew the line!  I packed up my stuff, called Bentley to follow and headed home where a hot bath was awaiting me.

Now I am warm, dry and ready to go at it again tomorrow.

(Get ready Tammy.  I need a few more baskets of bacopa)

ps  the lady in the picture isn't me, but isn't she hilarious? That was my expression at the end of the day too.

just say no

I know what you're doing.  You're frothing at the mouth at all the beautiful flowers being sold everywhere you turn.  'It's warm outside', you say, 'I bet it's safe to plant now; they wouldn't sell the flowers if it weren't safe to plant'.  DON'T DO IT!   A few warm days does not mean it's safe to plant your annuals.  It could still frost and wipe them out.  I know...I've done it.

Did you know that Mother's Day weekend is the biggest gardening retail weekend of the year?  We just go crazy buying flowers...and don't even tell me it's all for your mom!  Grocery stores, Mega Hardware stores, roadside tents and even gas stations are selling us flowers right now.  That doesn't make it time to plant, it makes it time to sell (where I live, Northeast PA, there is a chance of frost until May 15 this year).  Let me qualify that, though.  You can still plant perennials and hardy annuals, but leave the impatiens and other tender annuals alone for a bit.  What I usually do is plant my containers now (because I can easily move or cover them if there is a chance of frost) and hold off on the rest until after threat of frost.

Many of  you may have early planting success stories; if so, you were lucky.  My advice is to wait.  Just say no.