Category Archives: gardening

Victory!(?)

By | | , ,
10 Comments

In other news…

It’s a long story. You should refer to last year’s start of The Troubles, starting with the Great Tomato Atrocity. This year it began with the lovely tomato on the right…tomato_gift (click for a larger view).

At first I thought it was an early attack by Fluffy (in the 3.x series, presumably – I did battle with series 1 and 2 last Summer – especially since I’d deployed the first level of countermeasures already this season, the shields around the main tomato area of the garden. Had Fluffy found a way past those? Would I have to fortify them? I was very annoyed since I wanted to make a gift of that tomato and had been admiring it every day since it began to ripen, waiting for the moment to pick it. Evidently mine were not the only admiring eyes. And my paws were not the first to get to it. So I decided to launch more level one of the offensive countermeasures, to test the possibility that something other than Fluffy was a work here. Perhaps one of Fluffy’s allies. The Fluffy series with less good PR: Slinky. I might need to be fighting a war on two fronts. […] Click to continue reading this post →

Greetings!

By | | , ,
2 Comments

passion_flower_pairGreetings of the birthday sort to my younger nephew.

I made a card for him out of these lovely passion flowers (click for larger view) from my garden, and I posted it, but apparently there are postal delays due to volcano ash and so forth, so it might not get there in time.

So this blog post is to serve as a card and wish him Happy Birthday.

Happy Birthday!

-cvj Click to continue reading this post →

New Beginnings

By | | , , ,
5 Comments

It has been a wonderful Spring for me so far, I must say. On many fronts. For example, work is trundling along steadily, with small but regular landmarks in my project being set and met, and the garden is planted with lots of new vegetable plants that carry promise for tasty treats in the months to come. In the mornings the garden has a cacophony of sounds from all sorts of birds, all determinedly busy with whatever it is they think needs to get done that morning. It is good to start that day hearing all that activity. mourning_doves_2(Fully half of that sound comes from a remarkably energetic Northern Mockingbird that manages to run through several distinct birdsong choruses at high volume while flying from tree to tree in the neighbourhood. It is almost as though it is trying to create the illusion that there are several mockingbirds in residence…) In the photo you can see a pair of mourning doves (the same pair I think I spoke about earlier), surveying the activity in the air and on the ground below.

There’s a feeling of promise, hope, and growth all around at this time of year. It’s everywhere. A nice surprise waited for me early last week. I was filling the kettle at the sink for my first cup of tea of the day one morning and noticed something green […] Click to continue reading this post →

Happy Mother’s Day!

By | | , , ,
6 Comments

It is Mother’s Day in the USA. The UK version was earlier, in March, but since my mother is there, she usually gets two greetings from me, one for each version of the holiday.

oleander_flowersMother’s Day for me means flowers, at least in part. I often (although not this year) make and send her a card featuring a flower from my garden. Roses are usually the ones that make it to the card (my mum loves them) but as I stood in the garden this morning and looked around, the Oleander caught my eye. The bushes are covered in pink flowers (click the image on the right for a larger view), with many more to come, and I was suddenly put in mind of the years I lived in the Caribbean. Oleander plants were very common, and I recall many of them (in a selection of colours, I think) in the grounds of St. Augustine’s where my family went to […] Click to continue reading this post →

Aloe Earth

By | | , , , , ,
5 Comments

aloe_flowers_2It is Earth day today, the 40th anniversary, in fact. Have you had it in mind at all? I was pleased, in following the leadership debate that took place today over in the UK, to hear very interesting and serious content in the answers about what the various party leaders were doing on environmental both personally and in terms of policy. Over the years we’ve rapidly come to a point where it’s no longer a trendy or fringy issue in front line politics, but a mainstream one with impact in all aspects of policy.

On the left (click for larger view) is the rather elegant flower (two of them) of one of my several aloe vera plants. They’re quite unexpected and rather lovely I’d say. Several different types of bird have been attracted to them and it is a pleasure to look over at them (and others) and see what birds are settling on […] Click to continue reading this post →

A Short Cut to Mushrooms

By | | ,
4 Comments

My title for the last post reminded me of a discovery I made the other day (and gave me an excuse to steal a favourite title for this post – know its origin?). I was watering a plant that I’d not tended to properly for a while since I was away on Walkabout, and I noticed, upon looking closely, that it has been under attack by mushrooms!! Wow!

Click on each of the thumbnails below for a larger view: […] Click to continue reading this post →

A Return

By | | , , , , , , , , ,
2 Comments

gladioliI find myself back in Los Angeles for a bit, putting Walkabout mode on pause. Perhaps to do my laundry, perhaps to chair the committee of the upcoming Ph.D. defense of my student, Tameem, perhaps to be able to sit outside in the early morning sun in a T-shirt and blog over breakfast.

The garden is full of weeds and flowers, and all is well with the world, albeit a bit blurry due to my jetlag.

Anyway, a few random things to note:

* * *

mourning_dovesAnother Spring is here, in full force. I once again snort in exasperated laughter at the bizarre claim so very many people make about Los Angeles (Southern California more generally) not having seasons, as I marvel at all the many signs of it screaming for attention. As a random example, I’m observing some mourning doves eyeing me up from nearby as they try to decide whether I’m a threat to their potential nesting sites that they are checking out. Seems that at least one pair is rather impressed with my cluster of strelitzia nicolai and want to move in. I want to tell them that I’m not the problem, but the fact that they’d be in plain sight of the crows/rooks/ravens/winged-Nazgul that pass by here a lot will be. I’ve seen them strike nests in those trees from previous years and scoop up a tasty warm meal.

* * *

Eight hours of jetlag means only one thing: […] Click to continue reading this post →

Red, Gold, and Green

By | | , , ,
9 Comments

tomato_red_gold_green

Harvest time. Seriously depleted crop due to the Great Tomato Atrocity, but the countermeasures have allowed me to claw back a little satisfaction. Now time to see about making some nice chutneys or other preserves. By the way, have you noticed all the stories in the press about the sudden rise of interest in gardening to grow food at home? See/hear an interesting NPR one here. (Many claim it has much to do with the Obamas’ White House garden, but you and I know it is all because of my blogging about it here over the years, right? …Right? ;))

Aaaaanyway… here are some other shots of the harvest/harvesting: […] Click to continue reading this post →

Gold

By | | , ,
3 Comments

small_tomatoes_2Since I launched the campaign against Fluffy, I’ve actually been able to eat from my garden. Last week at my film premiere I was able to serve prosciutto-wrapped figs as one of the early courses, for example. (That was aided by also wrapping nets around the fig trees against the birds.)

Very satisfying, it must be said, is the crop of tomatoes of various types that have returned. After the Great Tomato Atrocity, this is very good to see.
[…] Click to continue reading this post →

The War Continues…

By | | , ,
13 Comments

early_figsWith about ten figs taken over a day and a half, the Great Tomato Atrocity still fresh in my mind, several chases and confrontations with yelling on both sides… It is clear. There is no other conclusion:

Fluffy must go.

After some experiments with small stealth items over the last few days, which, after some near misses (the Force is strong with Fluffy), Fluffy now routinely evades, I am deploying some heavy battlefield equipment:

[…] Click to continue reading this post →

The Battle is Joined

By | | , ,
11 Comments

patty_pan_squashWhen I’m feeling muddled or somewhat low, one of the things that reliably helps me find my foundation is going out into the garden and doing some work here and there, or simply checking on how various plants or fruits and vegetables are coming along. The work, the sounds and smells, the surroundings, and the cycles of renewal that are all over the garden are wonderfully uplifting to me.

So imagine how I felt yesterday when, feeling down for one reason or another, I went out into the garden and discovered that the six or seven wonderful tomatoes (of various types) – that I was giving just another day or two to become perfect – had all been taken! […] Click to continue reading this post →