Tricia — Page 2 — Organic Gardening Tips

The first flush of rose blooms

My garden is just growing beautifully this season. The warm winter we had seemed to put my garden several weeks ahead of itself so my roses and other plants started leafing out and growing literally months earlier than they normally do.

Remember – I’m in a cold climate. I have a zone 5b garden here in Toronto. That’s not the coldest gardening climate, but it’s not southern gardening either. LOL A warm winter was a nice change.

My roses are just finishing their first flush of blooms. They were absolutely gorgeous this year. Just walking into my backyard was a treat. Looking at all the roses in bloom was lovely as was the scent of the roses. It was warm for most of May – warm enough mid month that we had the air conditioning running 24 hours a day, but towards the end of the month and even now it’s been cooler and we’ve had the windows open and the scent of the roses and the honeysuckle has been wafting indoors and it’s beautiful. I wish all of my roses were in bloom all of the time and that all of them gave off scent.

I still have some work to do in my garden to fully prepare it for summer. I have to plant some annual flowers and put a bit more mulch down but I think I’m otherwise prepared. How is your garden? Do you have flowers blooming?

The butterflies early arrival in Toronto

by Tricia

In the last week I’ve noticed quite a few butterflies in my garden and around the neighborhood. Normally I don’t notice butterflies until at least May and certainly not in these numbers but there are so many that they’re even talking about it on the news!

Red Admiral Butterfly by Luc Viatour / www.Lucnix.be

All over Southern and Eastern Ontario butterflies like the Red Admiral and the Monarch are being seen in large numbers.

It’s thought that the warmer than normal temperatures in the Northern US combined with the high winds that we’ve experienced in the last week or so has contributed to the early mass migration.

As I said in my last post it was a warm winter and an early spring so there’s quite a bit of growth already, but I hope there’s enough food for the butterflies to eat considering they’re here so early.

Have you noticed butterflies in your area earlier than normal as well too? Isn’t it a little strange?

Warm Winter, Early Spring

by Tricia

We had an amazingly warm winter here in Toronto this year. It’s said to be one of the warmest winters we’ve ever had.

I suppose I shouldn’t be all that surprised then that my crocuses were popping up out of the ground by the 10th of March and that I had Daffodils and Hellebores in full bloom before March was over, let alone most of my roses fully leafed out!

Looking at photos that I’ve taken of the garden in previous years it looks like my garden is about a month and a half to two months ahead of itself. The only year that it was close to having this much growth in March and April was in 2010. That was another warm winter, one which was also said to be one of our warmest ever.

Everyday I go out and see what new plant is blooming or growing and I really should cut the grass. Normally we don’t have to cut the grass until mid May or so. The only thing missing this spring is the rain. I’m sure most wouldn’t complain about that, but as a gardener I need it for my plants to grow. I’ve actually watered a couple of times already. The first was at the end of March. Believe me, I’ve never watered the garden at the end of March before – well if I have it was in an effort to melt the ice off it, not to actually water it! LOL

How is your garden this Spring? Was it warmer in your area than usual as well? Is your garden well ahead of itself this year too?

Here’s a peek at how green my garden looked on March 28th of this year. See how many of the roses had tiny leaves forming?

The lavender was growing, the Honeysuckle was fully leafed out and even the clematis vines were starting to get leaves. These are all things that normally don’t happen until mid-April onward.

My garden loving dog

by Tricia

My dog is my garden companion. Just about every time I go out into my garden my dog accompanies me. I suppose it’s a good thing that I trained her from day one to stay out of the garden beds, isn’t it? I don’t know how I managed it, but she only stands on the stones surrounding the raised garden beds and she doesn’t go into the actually garden beds – well … she does in the winter, but I don’t mind then.

Now, seeing as my dog is so good in the garden I do give her a few treats to show her how much I appreciate her good behavior. I grow strawberries and raspberries in my garden and when I discover ripe fruit I share some of it with my dog – right then and there in my garden. She loves it when I do that. She also loves cherry tomatoes and even full sized tomatoes! I think she might even have purposely knocked a ripe tomato or two off one of my tomato plants this past summer!

My Lab is four years old now and shes been fed premium dog food ever since we got her as a puppy. She was a sickly puppy and she really needed a lot of TLC to get healthy back then. Once she did get healthy – and it took some time – I was sure to continue feeding her the best diet that I could and to give her the best care possible. As a result I have a very well behaved loving Labrador Retriever who has the shiniest black fur in the neighborhood. Everyone comments on how lovely her coat looks.

Do you have a pet that you dote on? How do you pamper your dog or cat? Or do you perhaps have an exotic pet that you spoil?

Having trouble with my Gladiolas this year

by Tricia

I haven’t grown Gladiolas for a few years, but this spring when I saw packages of lovely coral and chartreuse colored corms I thought it was time to plant some Gladiolas in the garden again. Plus, it didn’t hurt that I’d had a few plants die off in the last few years so I had some small bare spots in my garden beds that would be suitable for some lovely Gladiolas.

The Gladiolas started growing in June and sometime in mid-July I noticed that the stalks were really growing, indicating that they were going to flower soon. Unfortunately, just before the first flower stalk began to flower it literally fell over. I’ve never had that happen with any of my Gladiolas before.

Slowly as my Gladiolas began to bloom the flower stalks started to fall over. I’d go over to my plants and try to stand them up again. I even put flower rings around my two clumps of Gladiolas in my garden beds to help them stand better but I’m still having problems.

I’d originally thought that it was the drought that we were going through in July that was causing the problems with the Gladiolas, but I picked a lovely blooming stalk toward the end of July for my husbands uncle and several earwigs fell off as I was carrying the stalk toward the house.

Now I’m starting to think that my Gladiolas might be infested with earwigs! I’ve seen a few earwigs on the Gladiolas since that time, but without giving the plants a good shake they could be hiding deep within the plants. I think it’s quite possible that they’re eating the stalk from the inside out and that’s why the stalks are falling over.

I’ve read on other gardening sites that the best way to control earwigs is to pick them off the plants and crush them and or to go out after dark armed with a flashlight and look at your plants and if you find a plant infested with lots of earwigs spray them with a mixture of soap and water. The soap (just a little dish soap) will kill the earwigs.

A few earwigs in the garden can be beneficial as they will eat pest bugs and garden debris, but if they begin to multiply they will literally destroy nice plants and become pests themselves.

Do you have an organic way to get rid of earwigs?

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