Cold, but -that- cold?

It seems like it's cold everywhere right now. That darn Polar Vortex swinging down and turning our mild, late winter into a my-brakes-on-my-truck-are-frozen-and-it-won't-move kind of cold, cold winter.

But is it the kind of cold that will set my bamboos back again? In other words, will they be "dead"?

Putting Musa basjoo to sleep

It's that time of year when I, in 5 minutes, drastically change the look of my back garden.

Sadly, it is time to prepare the hardy bananas (Musa basjoo) for the winter.

Plant migration continues

Although I did bring some plants in before the first frost was forecast a few weeks ago, I left many out there until much colder weather was coming. With the temperature not going above freezing for a couple of days (it's 16ºF / -9ºC this morning) I finally had to act.

With not only dozens of potted plants to get indoors but tropicals to dig and/or prepare for the coming cold there was so much to do. Luckily I looked at the forecast early so I had three days to spread the work over. This unidentified agave was one of the more difficult ones to move into the garage. Looks great out in the leafy yard, doesn't it?

Wednesday Vignette: late

Most plants look their best in spring or summer when their foliage is fresh, when they're in bloom, or something similar. Some plants might not come into their own until autumn, when their foliage puts on a show. This Sasa veitchii bamboo though, it's different.

It only gets the variegated look (from burst margin cells) once the weather turns quite cold. So after most trees have dropped their leaves and everything else has gone dormant or died, this plant is just getting going!

Late November Look

This is the time of year when parts of my garden surprise me. It's as if I don't really see what's there until some of the surrounding greenery fades. Leaves fall and cover the ground in browns, and then suddenly I have something wonderful here.

Of course your opinion may vary, but I like it!

My updated overwintering strategy, part 1

As I've mentioned before, I have a new strategy for overwintering this year. Well, perhaps "attitude" is a better word than "strategy", but it's a change nonetheless. The mild autumn we've had probably has something to do with it too, as does my busy schedule.

I always break up my not cold-hardy plants into two groups each autumn: those that cannot survive the dip below 32ºF (0ºC), and those that won't suffer until the temperature gets below 25ºF (-4ºC) or so. Usually I play it safe with the cactus and other succulents, but this year I'm pushing things.

What a mess -- or is it?

Now that Thanksgiving is in the past, I'm no longer working long, long days at the bakery. It's amazing how many people want pies for that holiday (and how many people show up or call on the 23rd trying to order a pie!), but things are back to normal now. We peeled so many apples, it's crazy. Since the organics bins were filled to the top, I brought home four big boxes of peels on Tuesday (or was it Monday?):

Not wanting to make the trek back to the compost pile in the dark, I just left them on the driveway. I knew I would get to them on the holiday or over the weekend at the latest. Somebody got to them first!

Some Fall Color

Things are so busy right now, writing these blog posts gets a lower priority -- hence the skipped days. It's a bit disappointing as I've been so good with daily posts for so many years (then weekday posts), but it can't be helped.

That being said, here are a few things that have been catching my eye lately in the garden and around town. Starting with those fallen leaves and bamboo. What a great color combo!

Pecans!

Last weekend I visited the small pecan farm that supplies our pecans for the bakery. McGraw Hilltop Pecan Farm is located in St. Charles county, and they grow some of the most delicious pecans that we've ever tasted!

Here's what I saw on this beautiful autumn day, as the nuts went from tree...

Bananas and Beans

One last look before the freezing temps come in at the bananas and beans in my garden this year.

By bananas I mean Musa basjoo, the hardy banana that I mulch each year and which comes back bigger and stronger each growing season.

Wednesday Vignette: Aw nuts!

I don't think there's more I can say today...

...than "Aw nuts!" It actually makes me feel a little better saying that (out loud -- it's kinda fun).

More wondering...

Yesterday I wondered about apple storage, today it's about a plant ID. In downtown St. Louis there are a couple of old churches that we pass while walking to the hockey arena. Both have quite nice little gardens, and this one contains an interesting Alocasia:

Roses, canna, butterfly bushes and more, but this is the plant that caught my eye.

Thinking about apples

One of my tasks at the bakery each morning is peeling apples. I peel between 30 and 100 apples a day depending on needs (usually closer to 30), so I think about apples a lot.

One practical concern is their firmness. Sometimes the apples we get are quite firm, but others are rather soft (almost too soft to use our peeling gadget). The majority of our apples come from Chelan Washington, and usually from the same grower it seems.

New trellises

I've been working on a trio of trellises for a client. Thought you'd like to see what I came up with, even though they're not for my own garden.

The construction was a bit more of a challenge than expected, but luckily there was no pressing deadline and I could take my time to figure things out.  (If you follow @nimblemill on Instagram you will have seen a few of these already)

Your bamboo is telling you something

Most people who plant running bamboos don't realize the extent to which they spread in a single year in the right climate. Here in St. Louis the Phyllostachys species can send a rhizome 15' (4.5m) in one growing season, so rhizome pruning at least once a year is essential!

Luckily there are signs your bamboo gives you that things are happening underground, little reminders to get out the spade and chop some rhizomes.

Monkshood, the last blooms of the year

In my garden the last plant to bloom has one of the prettiest flowers: Aconitum or "monkshood".

I've only been growing this for a few years, and it's in a tough dry spot under the sugar maple, but it blooms reliably.

Castor Bean: a final look

I've been showing you my castor bean plants a lot in the last few months, with good reason -- they're really amazing this year! Today we'll have one final look at these, as I don't see them growing much more.

I've never had this wall of foliage at deck level before, and I have to say that I really love it!

Finally, pond work

It's been a few months since I noticed the tears in the pond liner, keeping the water level so much lower than normal. I've been putting off doing something about it because I knew it was going to be a terrible task not so much because of the repair, but because of the maintenance needed on the pond itself -- the water quality was terrible this summer.

I jumped into the project yesterday.

So before we start, here's a look at the pond as it was in the afternoon yesterday.

Wednesday Vignette: bamboo and fall

Fall is a great time for my garden, as the tree-shed leaves enhance the shorter bamboos that I grow.

I love the combination of the greens and browns, and I didn't have to do any work to get it!

Looking up, things are?

I've been having trouble coming up with post topics lately. I don't want to repeat myself too much, so showing you the bamboo or the castor beans or the bananas or the vines, well, it just doesn't seem right.

Then I thought: why not show you all of them from a different perspective, one that you might get if you were standing here with me? So today's photos are all taken looking straight up! (Or pretty much so.)

Three Mantises and more

Fall is the time for the large insects in the garden: spiders of course, but in my garden mantises are the star attraction. (Carolina mantis, Stagmomantis carolina) Yesterday I photographed a few of them, starting with this odd-colored one in the front garden:

I believe this is a male, and its color was strange... sort of a brown mustard?

WWTT - Grass

My friend Loree over at Danger Garden does a lot of walking, driving, traveling. Well, a lot compared to me. During these excursions she keeps a look out for interesting gardens and landscapes. Some are noteworthy because they are cool or beautiful, but others fall into the "what were they thinking?" category.

These Miscanthus planted near intersections near my house fit into that WWTT bucket. Sure Miscanthus is a fairly wide grass, graceful and arching. Not appropriate for this space? Just prune them!

Pachpodium keeps providing

The Pacypodium lamerei just keeps going. Blooming for months, providing shelter for a growing mantis (since moved on), and now, well...

...more of the same. With a little surprise.

Another flashback to more animals

Things have been busy lately, so not only have I had very little time out in the garden (hence nothing much to write about), there's no time to write.

Luckily I have a pretty extensive backlog of old photos -- don't we all? -- that I can pull from as needed. So no baby turtles today, but how about a coyote?

Hyacinth Bean Vine

Late summer is vine time in my garden, and today I want to show you the hyacinth bean vines (Lablab purpureus). There are two plantings of this vine growing in my garden this year, both near the southeast corner of the house.

The first has climbed the deck (as intended) and is now blooming. Love these fragrant flowers!

Flashback: baby turtle

When I posted about the turtles mating in my garden last week, I was asked if I'd ever seen baby turtles in my garden. My response was "no", but I've found photographic evidence that I was mistaken.

To be clear though, back in July 2000 when these photos were taken I did not have a garden, just a regular suburban yard with lawn, trees, and a couple of shrubs. I still saw turtles even back then -- I suppose it was much easier to spot them without all of the pesky plants getting in the way.

This isn't right!

Yesterday I saw something that disturbed me: a very young fawn running around the front yard! It was probably a week old at most.

I was talking on the phone at the time and when I pulled out the camera it said "card not formatted" -- which is a problem I've been having lately -- so I had to navigate menus to format while talking and also following the fawn from window to window. Since mom was nowhere to be seen I assume the little one was in a panic, probably scared by the work crews.

Wednesday Vignette: Lucky!

I sometimes marvel at how much my garden (and life) are guided by chance -- luck even. A tree falls and somehow misses everything in the yard, a volunteer or two grow in just the right spot to make things amazing, and things like this:

The main electric cable needs to be replaced in your neighborhood but it's located on the other side of the street!

Cuckoo sees stars...

...and it wasn't because he was pining for some chocolatey breakfast cereal either. Walking through the maypop trellis yesterday I was startled by a flapping of wings.

A cuckoo! I've never seen a cuckoo before* but somehow knew immediately what it was. Why was it hanging out down in the corner here?

End of summer lushness

Perhaps it's because I haven't spent much time out in the garden this summer, or maybe it's just been perfect weather for tropicals in St. Louis, but I'm particularly pleased and impressed with things in the back yard this year.

Especially the tropicals and tropical-looking annuals (like castor bean). I know I've show them to you recently but I swear they've put on another foot (30cm) of height since then. I just have to show them again!

Surprising Turtles

Yesterday a spider surprised me. Today, I surprised a pair of turtles.

They were doing private things.

Spider Surprise!

It's the time of year when the orb weavers and other big spiders are very visible in the garden. I've seen the large webs in many places for the last couple of weeks, and have run into those crazy strong support strands that somehow cross paths that span 7' (2m) or more.

I got a surprise when I opened the garage door after dark yesterday though!

Midweek Miscellany

Time again for collected snippets. It's not Autumn now, it's not! At least the weather agrees with me on that, as it will be 90ºF (32ºC) again today, and for the next few days. Humid too -- where's my dry September that I love so much?

Speaking of love, the deer are so comfortable in my garden, they must love it. I have mixed feelings about that as they walk around like they own the place.

Accidental vine duo is perfect

Time for an update on the maypop (Passiflora incarnata) vines that are beautifully taking over the "gate" pergola next to the house:

The point of this post though is that an happy accident has occurred...

Bamboo in pots, then not

When you grow a lot of bamboo like I do (30+ varieties) and most of them are running bamboos, the rhizome pruning that I do to control them results in lots of rhizomes to pot up. Especially if I get lazy for a while and some of the plants shoot in areas that they shouldn't.

The end result is that I have a lot of potted bamboos that I keep in a temporary nursery area. The thing about potted bamboos though...

Two beauties that share a problem

My planned post for today was thwarted by weather, with rain making it impossible to get the final "after" photo needed after a little digging project -- maybe my first of the year? Anyway, I instead noticed that a couple of potted plants have quietly become gorgeous, but they share a problem. First, the beautiful part...

...starting with this "umbrella palm" (Cyperus alternifolius) or at least that's what I think it is. I rescued it a few years back from a friend's compost pile and he didn't know the exact name.

So you like canna in your garden...

I love growing cannas. Their large, mostly upright leaves and bright, towering blooms have such a tropical feel. Here's a shot from a week or two ago that shows the red canna blooms rising above everything, with upright foliage (just below the deck in the photo), and more in the foreground:

In St. Louis cannas are borderline cold-hardy, which means that sometimes they can be left in the ground over the winter. My own experience says that this works best in warmer microclimates -- it won't work everywhere in the garden. Near the bakery in Maplewood there is a garden that seems to have just the right conditions for canna to thrive...

Even more mantis

A higher percentage of my posts recently have been about mantises, but it's unavoidable. Those beneficial insects are my favorites, especially since I raise them from egg to adult in a way.

This is the time of year when they are most visible, on the move looking for mates and egg laying spots -- or at least that's what it seems like to me.

I'm amazed

There are a few things about this year's garden that have surprised or amazed me. For instance, the Pachypodium lamerei...

...has been flowering constantly for almost 60 days. I did not expect this!

Bulbine frutescens

I picked up this "annual" last year (Bulbine frutescens) and it has quietly rewarded me greatly in its pot on the driveway.

All I know is it's almost bulletproof, producing blooms all summer as long as I water it and fertilize a bit. I love these flowers!

Fungus photos

It's been a while since I've photographed any fungus, one of my favorite outdoor subjects. The other day though I noticed that some of the log sections on the driveway have moved from firewood candidate status into future compost and soil contributors.

Some beautiful shelf fungus, most probably Trametes versicolor, was covering at least one of the logs. The drooping bamboo overhead must have made conditions just right!

Finding Ferns

The area underneath my deck was once wasted space, nothing growing there. Over the past few years I've been converting it to a fern bed, and it's been doing well.

Yesterday I discovered something that's got me even more excited about this area. First though, let's take a look at the ferns here.

Late summer small observations

This has to be my favorite time of year in the garden. Everything is full-sized, the humidity drops and the breezes start blowing, the katydids and crickets all start singing -- just wonderful!

Here are just a few things that I've noticed the last couple of days, starting with bamboo canes. They're "canes" after they've been cut, and these have been left leaning for a while. I like them here as they really complement the background colors -- too bad they're blocking a path.

More of the back garden

A couple of days ago I showed you the garden around the patio area, how it's been growing like crazy this summer with very little attention from me. I'll show you more of the back yard now, focusing on the area to the south of the patio.

The house and deck are to the left, and this wall of foliage hides the pergola and patio. There's a lot going on here, and this may not be the best view of it.

Back garden going gangbusters!

We've had a good amount of rain in August here in St. Louis -- not too much, but a bit more than is normal -- and the garden is thriving for it. It's been a month since I showed you the back garden in the patio area, but it's really time for another look.

This is from the driveway looking through the "tropicals bed" -- no longer a good description as I've got tropicals all over now.

Another view of the mantis

I thought the mantis that lived on the Pachypodium all summer was gone. Turns out he was still in the area...

...and yesterday gave me a good look at him from a different view: on the window.

Wednesday Vignette: Texture

One of the things that gardening and spending more time observing Nature up close has done for me is make me appreciate textures and patterns and colors. Not just those found in the garden, but those found everywhere.

Here are a collection of some that I've found over the past few months that are mainly from places other than the garden. For more Wednesday Vignettes visit Anna at Flutter and Hum -- her vignettes are a lot more meaningful than mine ever are!

Another Amphibian Adventure

For the last few years the pond has been the center of amphibian activity in my garden, toads and frogs visible or audible almost from March to September. Then the army of toadlings around the garden... This year although I've heard toads out there every time it rained, no tadpoles or toadlings that I could see. Maybe the low water level took away all of the good spawning zones? This year though, a new development...

...and it involves the water barrel in the front walkway garden.

Magnificent!

I don't like to use words like "magnificent" in reference to my own garden, but sometimes other descriptions just don't fit. Yesterday I had one of those moments where I thought "wow, this is really pretty!".

Perhaps it was the delightfully cool and sunny weather, or the fact that we had just gotten back from a great little hike around a local conservation area and I was in a particularly good mood, but seeing the backlit papyrus and everything else in the front garden, well...

Laziness provides opportunity

You saw yesterday how lazy I had been with the walkway, but that's nothing when compared to my approach to mowing the lawn this year. A dry July meant little lawn growth so no need to mow, but then the rains came so frequently we rarely had good mowing conditions. Then it was too long to easily mow, turtles could be hiding anywhere!

The end result is that the back lawn hasn't been mowed for at least 6 weeks, possibly longer. My bright green garden hose is back here, and you can't see even an inch of it -- it's right in front of you!