Saturday, December 30, 2017

Winter life

So far, it has been a very dry winter. And the forecast says it is going to stay that way. Which is why I am profoundly grateful for the plants that continue to struggle through all this and keep growing. But here are the six gardeny things this week that are most on my mind.

As always, please do head over to The Propagator's blog. He started the six-on-saturday thing, and now there are several wonderful gardeners that post a weekly update about their gardens. Just stunning..

1. Freesia! My very first freesias. And the very first one of the lot. There are another 17 in there, and I can't wait till they all pop up! I use the phrase 'pop up' optimistically, of course. Waiting for bulbs to show themselves is an excruciating process.


2. The ghosts of malpruners past. We sort of inherited this orchard. The ones who owned it before our friend bought it were true subsistence farmers. Which is another way of saying that their pruning was learned on the ground and very functional. And here I now come with a point of view that reeks of privilege- I want my trees to not only be functional, but also beautiful. So far I have been too meek to interfere with existing trees, but now I have a fancy pruning saw.

See the lopsided way this tree is growing?
 It should never have been planted here, right under the canopy of a larger tree. I took off a branch that overshadowed it. That's the biggest branch I have taken off so far, and I thought I did a good job remembering to undercut it. But clearly the undercut was not deep enough.

I have mainly deadwooded and pruned the smaller fruit trees around the house, but some day I will need to tackle the ficus that overhangs our porch. For decades, it has been lopped for fodder. With a sickle.
Now the lopping has stopped and it has regained a near-natural shape, but the malpruned stumps remain.

 I need to climb into it and prune. But the tree is tall. And to make life more interesting and the drop more deep, it overhangs a terrace. Hmm

3. The ghost of malpruners present: Or rather, non-pruners. I initially tried to train the honeysuckle over the trellis. But the honeysuckle won. And now it has formed a pouf on one corner. I need help and hand-holding. How does one un-entangle this?
4. Wisdom: Meet Gramma. She is the oldest of our hens. When we bought her, she was already a hen of a certain undisclosed age. That was four years ago. These days, she doesn't get around much. I make it a point to see that she gets enough food, and she seems content to spend most of her time under the winter jasmine.
I can't think of a better way to spend an afternoon though. Maybe it is not age, it is wisdom.

5. Blind. I believe that is the term for narcissus plants that refuse to bloom. These lovelies bloom here in November, or are supposed to. They have not flowered for three years. Last year, I got fed up with waiting, and dug them up, separated them, and replanted. This year, I waited eagerly. Still no blooms. What do I do?

6. Sweet peas! I have planted Cupani this year, after falling in love with their fragrance. And here they are, going strong (touch wood) .
 I should nip them so that they will branch out, but that entails dismantling their frost cover.
And then erecting it again.  Maybe next week.

Saturday, December 16, 2017

Structure and mayhem

It is so good to be back in the garden! Going away, even if the travels are good, is becoming increasingly less attractive. But it is a blessing to be back in time for the winter. Because while my 'winter garden' still has a very long way to go, there is still much going on. This is not a time of lush beauty, but one of rest. A time when the silvery minty sheen on a magnolia bud takes on an importance that demands I stop and stroke it several times a day.
And most of my six on saturday this week will be at that scale. As always, do go on over to The Propagator's blog and read about other peoples gardens- such fun times we have there.

1. Kochanie Bhaloo: I said that 'most' of my six will be on a dimunitive, relaxed scale. But that does not mean spectacularly exuberantly interesting things are not going on. Meet exhibit A
His name is Kochanie (pronounced Kohanya) Bhaloo and he is a Bhotiya pup from a small shepherd's village near the Milam glacier. And now he is part of our family. Big Sister Madhu has taken on the responsibility for his care. Here she is grooming him, both as a way to establish dominance and as a very effective and organic way of getting rid of the lice he arrived with.

2. Bare: I know the magic ingredients that make a winter garden- structure, structure, structural evergreens. My friends have gardens that retain life in this winter due to their stone sculptures, their colourful crafts, and well-chosen plantings. On the other hand, much of my garden looks like this:

I am working on it, I may add. Some Agave plant-lings are slowly growing, rosemary and cotoneaster cuttings are struggling to grow into the lovely hedges they already are in my imagination, and every year some structure gets added to the garden.
And who needs stone sculptures when we have posing roosters?


3. Shakkei: Where would we be without it? The Japanese art of incorporating 'outside' elements such as a neighbours house, a distant view or the fleeting clouds into one's garden design is a godsend for me. Whenever I am despondent because of my bare garden, or anxious because of all the undone tasks, all I need to do is look up.

There they stand, the Nepal Himalayas, highlighted with white, each fissure and ridge sharply defined. 'Yep, I did a good job with those" I nod and move on, greatly comforted.

4. Sprouting: Gardeners cannot live on mountain views alone though. It is a good thing they have pots. Here are my phlox seedlings going strong (touchwood). And I should pot them on, but am afraid of jinxing something that is doing well.

The strawberry seedlings alas are another story. Most died, the ones that survived do not seem to grow beyond their hardly-visible status.


5. Growing: And in the garden too, there is growth. and a reminder of why it is a good thing I do not cut back plants. Under the shelter of last-summers stems, there is hope of the next.
Here are chrysanthemum plants.
Here are salvia.


 Here is a buddelia braving the winter:
6. Harvest: Radish and lettuces.
 
 The lettuce is protected from the frost, the radishes encouraged to get frost-kissed and sweet.
And because size does sometimes matter, here is a photo: