Imposterous!

I don't know what chronic gardening issues exist in anyone else's particulars, but one repeated Spring chore in my garden is the search for spys, mimics, or imposters that attempt to escape my wrath by camouflage within a beloved plant.  There are, in my landscape, certain weedy vines who attempt to hide out for awhile here and there, but it is the Rough-Leafed Dogwood (Cornus drummondii) that is the bane of my roses and other shrubs.

The Rough-Leaf Dogwood is ubiquitous in the Flint Hills, sometimes forming large thickets sufficient to keep people out and provide shelter for lots of different fauna.  Spread everywhere by birds, it seems to take a particular liking to sprouting in the shade of a large shrub, as you can see at the right.  It then grows happily up through that shrub, to become visible during the growing season only as it reaches eye level and only then to a very discerning eye that is examining the foliage instead of the roses. 

I've found, instead of looking for it during the growing season, that the time to search and destroy this interloper is right now, early Spring before the Time of Leafing Out, when the stems can be discerned by the light grey color and different texture from the shrubs around it. You can see, on the left in the closeup, that the reddish stems of  'Carefree Beauty' are clearly different than the dogwood stems on the right hand side, allowing me the chance to then search out and nip the marauder at its base.  Usually that close cut suffices to kill the dogwood without resorting to herbicide on the cut stump, but if the latter nuclear option becomes necessary, I follow the example of President Harry Truman and use those ultimate weapons judiciously.

The only real difficulty in this exercise is finding the unauthorized growth in other shrubs with stems that resemble more closely the Rough-Leaf Dogwood.  I once had a clump grow in a Mockorange bush for what I estimated was three years before I surgically excised it.

Anyway, take it from me and look now, in this lull time of warming weather and bashful foliage and weed out the weedy shrubs before they get a foothold.  Your roses will thank you come Summer.

      



Told Ya!

I tried to tell them, didn't I?  But, no, up those crocuses popped, unable to restrain themselves in the sunlight and warm wind, heedless of the cold weather surely yet to come.

And here they are, one mere day later, twenty-four hours older and a phloem's death wiser, shivering in the hail and snow remnants of last night.  The cold rains started at 11:00 p.m. yesterday and intermittently spent themselves until 1:00 a.m., leaving a different world to view this morning.  Our dog barked continually from midnight to 1:00, probably telling the crocus, in dog language, that they were getting just deserts. Gelato Crocus, anyone?

I wish they'd waited, like the daffodils.  I saw the first hint of color on a daffodil bud this morning, but those little yellow fluffs seem to be staying tight in their beds so far.  Proving once again that, Kansas daffodils have a higher survival IQ than most of the other Spring flowers.

Too Early

During the start of spring cleaning my garden, I wandered around with a camera on Saturday and took note of the first of the 2012 blooms.  Plants are sprouting everywhere, popping up here and opening tender leaves there.  And it is far too early to consider we've seen the last of Winter.

I know, my Darlings (speaking to the daffodils now), that you're far past ready to stick up your heads and get growing. Like the early worm for the migrating birds, however, you're just going to get yourselves hurt.  Yes, we've seen a lot of days in the 60's and 70's, and I know it was above 60 and sunny for the last trio of days, but the weatherperson tells us it will then get cold again.  Highs in the 50's, lows in the 30's for the rest of the week.      



Wasting my breath, aren't I?  I've got about as good a chance of the bulbs listening to me as I do getting Mrs. ProfessorRoush and her diminutive clone to follow my lead.  Look at the first beautiful blooms that are out already.  I found my first Siberian Squill (Scilla siberica) up and starting to bloom this weekend, glorious in its breathtaking blue reflection of the Kansas sky. 





And, popping up among the roses, a bright cheerful Iris reticulata to contrast its dark blue and yellow against the brown grass mulch.















Worst of all, for me, is the fact that a number of roses are beginning to leaf out, just like the 'Ballerina' at the right.  Too fast.  Too fast, my dancing beauty, because your thin canes and tender leaves are just going to be left shivering in the wind.


A prayer, please, for those who are about to get slammed with a late freeze.  You know it's coming.  I know it's coming.  We can forecast it.  The plants can only carry the history of climate in their genes.  So many cold days followed by so many warming days and they think it's time to bloom.  Well, my Loves, not this year do the old patterns work.  Be slow this year.  Be patient this year.  Listen not to the warm sunlight.  Listen not to the warming southern winds. This is Kansas, not Florida.  Hell's demons spend their Spring Break on our prairies. 

My Cheatin' Hands

I almost didn't.  Despite a predicted temperature of 63F, the wind was howling cold from the North all day yesterday, and inside the house it was warm and cozy.  The wind may howl like the dickens outside my doors, but the clamor only serves to comfort me since it can't reach indoors.  And, if you're wondering where I've been from blogging, I was deep inside the third book of The Hunger Games series, engrossed in the struggle for independence of the rebels led by Katniss, the Mockingjay.  For those who haven't yet indulged, I can only say that my daughter recommended them to me approximately 12 days ago and I've been nose deep in the drama ever since.  If you're going to start them, read fast, because the movie comes out in a couple of weeks.

So, I almost didn't go outside to work in the garden this weekend.  Mind you, I'm aching for the opportunity, embittered for lack of exercise and lack of green surroundings, but it took everything I had to leave the cozy confines of hearth and couch and attempt to stand upright against a 40 mph wind.  Guilt finally won out over sloth and so I closed the book and bundled up in multiple layers of clothing, planning to shed them as I warmed.  After some consideration, I decided to work first clearing the South bed, behind the house, where I'd have some shelter from the worst of the gale. 

And it was there, clearing the crackly remnants of Brown-eyed Susans and the limp dead daylily leaves, that I learned to harness, rather than fight, the power of the wind in my garden.  I realized quite quickly that all I had to do was pull up the dead leaves, toss them up a few feet into the air, and they were gone evermore, whisked away by the brisk wind into the next county. Well, at least they disappeared into the taller prairie grass of my pasture, sure to add their rotting remains over time to the richness of the prairie.  I never got out my Sheetbarrow, nor even a basket, just some trimming tools and thick gloves and the ground was cleared of debris faster than it took to think about it.  I did spend a few minutes looking to the West and wondering if we were going to get a sprinkle or a little snow, as you can see by the picture above.  But, a few snips here and there on the shrub roses, and my back patio bed was ready for the Spring. 

Some of you, I know, will consider this a clear act of garden cheating.  I didn't sweat, I didn't get sore from lugging heavy piles of debris around the yard, and I accomplished the job in about 1/3rd the normal time. I would venture to argue, on my lazy behalf, that I executed a brilliant display of defiance, laughing in the face of the wind, harnessing it to do my bidding.  The only people who could possible differ with that conclusion might be my neighbors, who, I suppose, could have a clump or two of dead daylily leaves resting around their shrubs this morning. More likely, all that debris is somewhere in Missouri by now.

And anyway, as the country songs say, it ain't cheatin' till you're caught.