Welcome Back to the Garden, 2020 Edition

Well, here we are again.  Another spring, another shot at my gardening blog.  I predict that I will do a few posts in April and May, and then peter our once again as I run out of new things to say.  But in the meantime, let's talk about plants!

It was a mild winter and it's been a rainy April, and my garden is really, really happy.  I thought I'd walk you through the garden, section by section, as I did last year, so you can see what's coming up.

Here's Pot 1:

 That's the Japanese Pieris.  All the red leaves are new growth.  As you can see, it's practically on fire with new growth.  Why?  I'm guessing it's partly because of the warm winter, and partly because I moved most of the astilbes out of this pot.  Their enthusiastic growth was probably inhibiting the Pieris.

Pot 1A has three hostas that are off to a late start.

I'll admit they don't look like much yet, but I'll try to give you a better photo later in the season.

Pot 2: the Blue Mouse Ears hostas.

They've been in my garden since 2015 and always do well.  Again, I'll do a photo later in the season so you can see them in their full growth.  There was supposed to be a Cherry Berry hosta in here as well, but it was looking pretty weak last summer and has not come back this year.  I may move another Blue Mouse Ears into this pot.

Pot 3:

That's the Laceleaf Japanese Maple Orangeola, which starts the spring with those reddish-orange edges to the leaves.  It's very leafy indeed this year!  I'm guessing it will never be tall, but I love its fluffiness.

Another shot of Pot 3, which shows the other plants that are in there with Orangeola: the Bergenia Pink Dragonfly on the right, the Cherry Berry Hosta in the center, and some green fluffy thing on the left.  I'll need to go outside to identify that (as you can see, there's a tag from the nursery stuck in the pot), but it's dark and I'm in my pajamas, so let's let it be a mystery for now.

Pot 3A:

That's the Garden Glory Fullmoon Maple and a hosta that I purchased as a bare root from Walmart in 2018.  I don't know its name, but it's definitely thriving!  On the left, you can see a tiny shoot - that's another hosta, the Lakeside Paisley Print, which is taking its time about coming up.


Pot 4:

Two heucheras: Happy Hour Lime and Obsidian, both purchased in 2018.  Both survived the winter, which is good.  Also, another Blue Mouse Ears hosta, which you can see sneaking up down at the bottom of the photo.

More tomorrow, or maybe the next day!

I'm back!

Hello, Grey to Green fans, and happy spring!  I've been mostly ignoring my blog for the last eight months or so, but now with the arrival of warm weather, things are beginning to happen in the garden again.

The Japanese Maple has timed its budding just right this year - it missed the March frosts completely. 

Apparently if I wanted it to be a tall, straight, vertical tree, I should have pruned the bottom branches last year so that it could concentrate on growing its upper branches - but I just didn't have the heart.  So I think this tree will always be a semi-horizontal bushy thing.  No matter.  It's a beautiful tree no matter what.

You may recall that this was supposed to be an Orange Dream Japanese Maple, with a hint of orange when the leaves came in and bright orange in the fall.  That was a lie.  This is a plain ol' green Japanese Maple, and in the fall the leaves turn brown.  Again, no matter.  But I will not be buying trees from random guys on Amazon.com again.

The Upright Japanese Yew continues to be one of the stars of my garden.

  

It did very nicely over the winter (it is, after all, an evergreen) and it just thrives in the light-deprived conditions of my garden.  This was a purchase from ForestFarm of Williams, Oregon, and it was the best $35 I spent last year.  

Also from ForestFarm is one of my problem children, the "Mr. Bowling Ball" Arborvitae.  Arborvitae means "tree of life" in Latin, and someone should definitely mention that to Mr. Bowling Ball.

He's an evergreen too, but he looks like he's having a bad hair day.  I suspect he needs more sunlight than I can provide him.  If anyone is interesting in rescuing him from me, please let me know.

The winterberry hollies did well over the winter.  Since I stopped blogging in July, you never got to see that Red Sprite had four berries.  But here are a couple of photos from September showing them.  Aren't they lovely?

Jim Dandy and Red Sprite are just starting to bud for this year, and I'll be adding another female winterberry holly, called "Berry Heavy," to Jim Dandy's harem this year.  He can pollinate five female plants, maybe more.

Among the other plants that are doing well are the ligularia that Alice brought me, the helleborus that Jenn brought me, and the lamium that Liz brought me.  Thanks, all!

Meanwhile, in Hosta-land, there are little sprouts everywhere.

That last photo might be upside-down...  I think I can split that one with four sprouts.  I'm not positive which one it is because the pot got turned around, but I think it might be the Touch of Class hosta.

The heucheras are coming back to life too:

As for the rest, the hens and chicks plant looks pretty much dead, and there's no sign yet of the Bleeding Heart or the New Guinea impatiens or most of the astilbes, but I'm not giving up hope yet.  

There will be much to blog about in the coming weeks as new plants arrive.  Stay tuned!

Turning an Ugly Back Alley into a Garden... I Hope!

I grew up in the suburbs.  We had a nice yard with plenty of garden space, and as a kid I grew things like tomatoes, pole beans, and snapdragons.  I enjoyed making things grow, and it was pretty easy - all the things I needed (dirt, sun, rain) were right there.

But now I live in New York City, where gardening is trickier.  For starters, most of us don't have outdoor space.  And for those of us who do, it isn't always very gardenlike.

I am very lucky to have outdoor space behind my apartment.  Technically, I only own 10 x 10 square feet of it, but there's a lot more space than that and no one else can access it easily, so I consider it all mine.

When I show my backyard to friends from out of town, though, they seem unimpressed.  Maybe that's because it's . . . gray.  And hard.  And pretty dark.

So that's the view looking left from my back door, as of today.  I thought it might make a nice mini-golf course, but I suspect the neighbors would complain.

The view looking right is marginally more attractive because I've added some outdoor furniture.

It makes a nice extra room in summer, for reading or eating a meal under the stars.  Somewhat lacking in greenery, though, isn't it?  My dream when I moved in was to grow fruits and vegetables and herbs in pots and containers, so that I could cook with my own produce.  But I only get an hour or two of sun per day, and the herbs I tried to grow from seed got to an inch or two high and just... stopped.  So farewell, fruits and veggies.  I am now determined to grow only things that do well in the shade.  Hello, foliage.

Those of you with sharp eyes will have spotted the two varieties of plants I'm growing already.  There's a Japanese Maple that I purchased last year and planted in a self-watering container purchased from Gardener's Supply Company.

OK, perhaps it looks kind of pathetic now.  But it's an Orange Dream Japanese Maple, and will someday have beautiful foliage.  This past weekend, I refreshed its soil, fertilized it with a bit of Osmocote, and mulched it with last fall's leaves and twigs.  (At the top of that big ugly concrete wall is an apartment building with a landscaped back garden, and its trees drop leaves right into my yard in the fall.)

The Japanese Maple is beginning to bud, so I'm hoping to achieve some attractive color even if it is little more than a twig right now.  I also expect to surround it with something prettier than dead leaves.  Hostas, maybe?

My second planting is some pink polka dot plants that were on sale at Home Depot for $1.50 each this past weekend.

They're sitting in their own pot on the table right now, but I think they will eventually end up in one of the bigger pots with a tree or bush at the center.

Five shrubs will arrive in April, chosen primarily for shade tolerance.  I will keep you posted as I try to turn my gray garden green.  And pink.  And orange.

Please respond in the comments with any advice or questions.  And welcome to my gardening project!