Under the name of Cailin Sanders: 2024

General projects

NEVER-ENDING Weed ground elder

FALL Anywhere I'm planting bulbs - bone meal/bulb fertilizer

FALL After bulb planting - cover everything with critter repellant

There is what I *hope* might be a peony inside the cage. There's lots of anemones planted around it, and of course the damn ground cover keeps coming up. My upstairs neighbor replants the lemon balm in the pot when needed and morning glories are slowly getting started on the trellis.

I'm going to just give up this corner spot and move the bricks.

This is strawberries, ground elder, chives, and a few other things meandering through. There are tulips in there as well. The bulk of the soil is very clay-heavy - I've added a lot of compost but it just seems to mysteriously wash away. Strawberries do not do well here - there's not enough sun and they just send out lots of shoots and leaves. My long-term plan is dig out the cheap clay soil filler and replace it with good soil - then I can put dahlias and a mix of flowers in here. Meanwhile, I will slowly transplant the strawberries to the other side of the house.

ONGOING transplant strawberries
FALL Remove wire cage
SPRING random seeds?

This had tulips in it and then I tried to get four o'clocks and nasturtium going, but the ground elder was very persistent. Also I think a lot of the tulip bulbs got eaten. I plan to move the wire cage here, fill in around the raised bed with daffodils, and plant more tulips in the bed itself and cover with wire. After the tulips are done, I'll keep trying to get four o'clocks and nasturtiums going.

FALL Plant more tulips inside and daffodils outside raised bed
FALL Cover with wire and leaves for ground cover
SPRING four o'clock seeds, nasturtium seeds

This area is pots raised on cement bricks. They produced a lot of johnny-jump-ups this year and I usually plant some calla lilies, but the nasturtiums were kind of meh and I couldn't get anything else going. I think the dirt in the pots is very tired and they're vulnerable to the chipmunk's excavations. I'd like to kill off the ground elder in front and put down mulch, but I'm not willing to pay for that much mulch. I did remove the daffodils that I had here before, in the hopes that I could get the landscapers to mow the ground elder down. I want to continue replacing the pot covers with fitted wire, but they also should be mixed in well with some fertilizer.

FALL Mix fertilizer into the pots
FALL Fit wire to tops
Calla lilies for spring (do not order from Burpee)
SPRING pansy seeds, nasturtium seeds - these pots could also use some more chives (I don't know that it really keeps the aphids out, but I like to imagine that it does).

I know everyone says mint is evil, but so far it has not proved invasive enough to invade the ground elder so really, how invasive can it be? Hmph. There are tulip bulbs - mostly smaller, early tulips, in the raised bed but I think a lot of them got eaten. There's a columbine back by the hose, but it's gotten a bit overwhelmed by mint. There's a pot hidden back there, which I've tried to plant columbine seeds in, but so far it produces nothing but johnny-jump-ups.

FALL Plant tulips
SPRING Columbine seed, nasturtium seed

Morning glory kind of took over this area, but it has daffodils in the spring. Yes, the one raised bed is at an angle and it drives me insane, but I have not managed to get it down correctly. Also there's a lot of clay soil here (it was the dirt I could afford). I am going to get that bed level or die! There's only a little ground elder to weed here, but if I don't get after it, there will be more. Sometimes there's bindweed.

FALL Level bed
FALL Plant daffodils
FALL/SPRING I'll add some dirt if I can afford it, but probably just going to go with leaf ground cover and hope it eventually composts.

The Four o'clocks came through this year! When they've died off I'll plant more daffodils here. The bed could use some more dirt, but it's likely to just get some fertilizer.

FALL Plant more daffodils. Maybe some tulips?
FALL cover with leaves and flag to hopefully get landscapers to leave it alone.

The dahlias were pretty sad this year as far as foliage goes. I can't believe I'm doing this, but I'm going to move the pots and bricks. Why? Why do I do this to myself??

SUMMER/FALL Shift three pots and bricks
Add red bricks to make up a complete border
FALL Plant misc. bulbs including hyacinths here
FALL cover with leaves and flag to hopefully get landscapers to leave it alone.
SPRING four o'clocks

This was supposed to have snapdragons but I have trouble getting them to grow here, plus whenever it rains the runoff from the gutters pounds it. Dahlias did ok this year, but I've never managed to eradicate the ground elder.

2-3 dahlia tubers
I might try sweet peas here, but a mix seems to do best

This was completely coated in ground elder and I have no idea why it suddenly died out in that one patch. There are a bunch of cicada holes there, but I don't see how they could have affected it. It's weird! I'm going to continue to put cardboard down and plant dahlias and alyssum in the pots.

Add cardboard
4-6 dahlia tubers

This is where I'm moving the three dahlia pots from around the corner. I might trade some of these pots out for the broken ones in the parking lot.

Add cardboard
shift pots - I am working on getting all brown pots as the other colors fade.
4-6 dahlia tubers

These pots have herbs - basil and thyme. I have some iris on order to add.

FALL plant iris tubers
FALL cover herb pots for overwintering (burlap? straw?)
SPRING better stakes for gladiolas

I am reluctant to admit it, but the landscapers chopping down my agastache maaaaayy have been a good thing. There's a little bush of dianthus hidden back in there, from a hanging pot, but you... can't really see it.

I will cut down the agastache but on MY terms and I will keep it when it's cut down!
SPRING better stakes? Although I don't see why it can't go over the ugly lawn if it wants to.

Snapdragons decided to grow in the ground and not the pots. Fine. Whatever. I think I will possibly switch out some of these pots with the broken/old ones in the driveway and look into getting some more covers for the strawberries, although that's more long-term. I put the bricks from the maybe-peony section here.

My amaryllis are here, I'll bring them inside after the first frost, although one behind the pots might be dead. I don't know. The smaller pot isn't ideal for strawberries and should probably go out to the parking lot. I moved furniture around inside, so I'm not sure where to put the amaryllis indoors now. Maybe I'll take them to work.

This got... messy. I really wanted poppies to grow here and threw in lots of seeds, but no luck yet. I need better stakes/cages for the squash and tomatoes as they've gotten rather out of hand. I think I won't do squash next year and I will put the tomato somewhere else and put cosmos here. I pulled all the squash.

Eventually I'll add more bricks here and arc it out. Probably will cover the raspberry heavily for the winter - the plan is for it to grow into the bush, which has thorns anyways.

This is my mom's little garden - gladiolas and iris. I'm hoping the landscapers won't chop everything down and scrape it off this year - the soil is pretty hard and bare and I'd like to grow some portulaca or something around the bulbs. Better stakes in the spring too. There's a pot of parsley to the left.

Parking lot pots. These are the ones I want to switch out. The smaller ones dry out too quickly and the bigger ones have gotten a bit smashed from snow plowing/parking.

These pots do better because they're where I park. I really want to grow gazania, but the squirrels eat the plants completely, foliage and blossoms. I'm going to try blood meal next year.

Main projects are the ongoing pulling of ground elder, planting bulbs this fall, and changing out pots in the spring. Also hoping to get mulch inexpensively and possibly pour gravel along the back of the gardens where the ground elder keeps popping through the cardboard. There's a raised bed with cosmos that did not do well - going to put tomatoes there next year.

It was not a great year for dahlias.

This one is about 12 inches high. No sign of buds.

This one has flowered fairly vigorously, but it's companion (I plant two tubers per pot) never grew at all and it's pretty spindly.

One very spindly, one stunted.

Flower from the tall one - these are being eaten by.... something as soon as they try to bud

One tuber didn't grow at all. One has been pretty successful.

Close-up - these are palm-sized flowers, which is pretty good!

This one is about 6 inches high.

This one is still thinking about whether or not it is actually going to flower. I have hopes. The one behind it grew fairly well - flowers below.

Opening...

Fully open, fading to peach.

This one is always droopy. Is something eating its tuber? Does it feel too dry? Not enough sun? I don't know. It's got some buds, and it had a few rather buggy blooms, but I don't expect anything more from it.