the black parrot tulips brought to me from Amsterdam are in the ground!
thank you meriko

Is my bane. It's killed the last several begonias I've brought home, and now it has infested my black-stemmed hydrangea. The Sunset bible recommends chemical agents I can't identify, and the option for organic growers is to spray affected leaves with strong jets of water early in the day. The water spraying didn't work with the begonias...

Damnit

Sunday...6 hours of repotting. This is the inevitable backlash of being a nutter, container gardenging out of necessity, and being a size queen when it comes to foliage. And I'm only 1/2 done. *thud* At least it was far cooler yesterday than Saturday. The bees, wasps, and hummingbirds were pissy at me all day because I'd upset the balance of the deck. But those in the know already know how I deal with insects that get in my face. After the "glare" they usually settle nearby and look suitably chastised. The hummingbirds...well, they're birds, and we all know they just bitch for fun, like my pasta-stuffed gem.

Repotted:
Black-stemmed Hydrangea into a 20 gallon tub
Wisteria into 15 gallon tubs (one white, one purple)
Angel's Trumpet vine into a 15 gallon tub
Tibouchina (tee-boo-kye-nuh) into a 15 gallon tub

Used:
4 cubic feet of pricey water-retentive soil
1 cubic foot of shredded bark mulch
1 quart of root stimulator
25 gallons of sweat

This may only sound like the repotting of 4 plants, but heft large plants in 15 gallon tubs of wet soil once or twice. Now lift them about 4 feet off the ground. That's the ticket. But I'm proud of myself cuz the deck is fully swept down, I made some hard decisions about what to keep, and what to toss, and I finally got around to doing all of this fer chrissake. Last weekend I was barfing after all.

What I wanna do piece by piece for the rest of the week (cuz I don't wanna lose another full weekend day to this psychosis called GARDENING):
--rehang wind chime
--relocated hummingbird feeder
--train Wisteria vine shoots securely
--repot Lilac vine
--repot French Lavendar
--repot Spanish (rabbit ear) Lavendar
--repot Rosemary
--repot Dusty Miller
--repot Norolk Pine (gots to keep the Xmas tree a-growin)
--repot Lantana

Back in February 2004 I ordered some plants online due to be shipped in early Spring: ornamental oregano called Origanum Barbara Tingey. I never saw them, never heard from Goowin Creek Nurseries, decided not to follow up on it as my oringal idea had been to give one each to friends. I put them out of my mind, forgot about them. The week before my birthday, I started planning to spend the actual day working in my garden repotting, reorganizing, building an outdoor altar. I came home midweek to find the plants had been shipped and were on my doorstep waiting for me. What strikes me...they show up just 2 days before I want to celebrate my birthday by working in my garden?...I love the Universe and how it works ;) There really are no coincidences...