The Best of Times, The Worst of Times

There's nothing going on in the garden at this point -- except Mr. Mulch attempting to coax the remaining fallen leaves into loosening their grip on the foliage where they're hiding. It's an odious task that I help him with until we're deep enough into the cold season so that long underwear is required while raking.  That's my signal to retreat indoors.  I'm at peace with being called a lightweight.

It's also a good time to take a moment and review the triumphs and defeats of this year's garden.  That way, maybe I'll be able to avoid repeating the latter, although it does seem there are some lessons I will never learn.  For example, that the ideal spot for that gorgeous new plant will always involve digging a hole where there are the most -- and largest -- stones.

Or this one:  The minute you leave on vacation, the critters who've been coveting your veggies will descend upon the garden, waging a battle of wits with your unfortunate house-sitter, in this case, our oldest daughter.  She did a masterful job of preserving some of the tomatoes, but not without suffering serious losses.

Or this: I should make a note somewhere of every plant I add to the garden during the course of the season so that I don't wind up scratching my head in puzzlement when, in the early spring, we get corn-like stalks of some unknown vegetation where I know I planted something but can't remember what.  I am urged by Mr. Mulch to rip it out, since the alium-like fronds have yellowed without flowering.  I resist, and you can see them in the lower left of the photo below.

It wasn't until the following September that I discovered... er, remembered what these were: Colchicum!  One of the few plants whose leaves and flowers grow at different times during the season.  The early spring leaves soak up the sun that nourishes fall flowers.  And thankfully, I didn't pull them out and was instead rewarded with a carpet of pink blooms in mid-September when most everything else has faded.

There were some great triumphs.  

For one, I didn't ruin the hydrangea this year, and we had a glorious display for most of the summer.

 
Both pinks and blues, as well as bushes and standards.  For the first time in many years, I had bouquets of these indoors all season long.




This season, we also had some interesting visitors in the garden.  We had ducks who nested, mantises that prayed, bugs that noshed, and chipmunks that cavorted.  Perhaps our biggest victory was the wildlife we kept out.  For the first time in years, we had no deer incursions; no defenses were breached.  I can live with giving a few tomatoes to a raccoon as long as we did without the scorched earth impact of a deer getting into the raised beds, trampling anything uneaten, leaving only footprints and piles of raisinettes behind.

We had some losses too, courtesy of a rather vicious mother nature.  The tall weeping cherry tree which flowered so beautifully outside my younger daughter's window in early spring...

... took a direct hit from a freak early October blizzard.  The 14" snowfall totally flattened it...

And though it was resilient enough to return to an upright position once the snow melted, sadly it was without about 2/3 of its branches.  We're hoping it survives to bloom again next year.

We also lost most of the two standard lilacs that flank the entrance to the front garden.  I'm pretty sure those are goners.  But I'm also grateful that Mr. Mulch and I are not -- goners, that is.  We narrowly escaped the top half of an oak tree that literally stabbed itself into the macadam of our driveway moments after we came inside.  Our cars also escaped a premature demise, since we uncharacteristically had the foresight to move them into the garage.

But back to happier recollections...


There was the Hosta.  In fact, there will always be the Hosta, since it seems to survive just about every depradation.  It's usually the first target of any deer that does find its way into our gardens.  And though every single plant has been gnawed to the ground at least once (and several more vulnerably located, repeatedly) by hooved trespassers, the hosta always come back.  I'm not sure when you're supposed to divide them, but inevitably, you must.  Particularly if you have the poor judgment to plant some Sum and Substance or Blue Mammoth (gee, why do you suppose it's called "Mammoth") in a narrow border.  They may look cute and delicate in year 1, but by year 3, they're roughly the size of a large beach umbrella, and if you don't divide them, they hire real estate agents to find them a roomier home.


So late in the Fall of 2010, we hacked a bunch of them apart, and I do mean "hacked."  We were quite ruthless about uprooting them and slicing their impressive roots apart with a serrated-edged shovel.  We found them a nice home in the middle of a grove of hemlocks, and threw them in there, figuring we'd either have a hosta nursery or we'd simply have made more room for the one or two remaining hosta down below.


To my amazement, every single one emerged in early spring, working hard to breach the dense layer of mulch left by you-know-who...

By mid-summer, we had a jungle-like carpet of yellow- and blue-green...

... plus the assurance that we'll never have to buy a hosta plant ever again since we can now raid the nursery if we have any more shady spots to cover.


Then there was the surprise starburst tulip variety, which I of course can no longer identify.  But happily, I planted them at the edge of our lowest terrace, so I got to look at them daily during the entire time of their bloom.

And finally, the tomatoes.  We fought off blight and critters and found an ally in the wasp world (who knew?!), and even though our crop was diminished, we ate our own tomatoes far into the fall.  We harvested all the green ones before the first frost, and put them in paper bags with a couple of apples to ripen -- and it worked.  We ate the last of our very own fruit on November 7th.  They may not have been the best tomatoes we had all season, but they were ours.  And on a bed of our own arugula with a few drops of fresh lemon juice, a dash of truffle salt, and a dollop of good olive oil, they were more than just fine.

As we hunker down for the winter, we're not entirely finished with taming the fruits of nature.  I'm helping Mr. Mulch's with his winter project -- (Which he's pursuing in partnership with his good friend Andy) -- making wine.  So right now, we have some peach wine and several different kinds of raspberry wine happily fermenting in our basement.  

The first batch has been bottled and is a deliciously beautiful clear, rich red...

It's still a bit young and raw -- as is this new year.  But we have high hopes for both.  

So while I put this blog to bed for the deepest, darkest part of winter, I do so with the hope and optimism that I believe characterizes all gardeners.  Even in the bleakest, grayest parts of February, we know that those green shoots are coiled just below the surface, waiting for the warm kiss of the early Spring sun.  So we organize the kitchen cabinets and clean closets for a while, but our eyes are really on the calendar, waiting for the right moment to start those seeds indoors and get a jump on the next season.  And when we do, I'll also get this blog started again.

Now, if I could only remember where I stacked all those seed catalogs...