Fall Foliage

I looked out the window today and noticed a few of the trees in my landscape aglow with color, and this is the beginning of November! We have had beautiful fall foliage colors this season. The foliage on many trees have changed colors later than usual for our area and the leaves held on many trees longer than other years. This could be attributed to the amount of moisture and the pleasant temperatures we have enjoyed this year.

Two of my landscape trees in full fall glory this morning were my American Hornbeam and Japanese Maples. I didn't think my hornbeam would produce good fall foliage colors this year - it didn't appear to be changing much and the hornbeams at the nursery didn't have much color when I walked the nursery yesterday. The tree seemed to have changed colors overnight.

I hope you enjoy the photo I took today of the hornbeam. If you have the chance today, take a walk outside and enjoy what is left of the fall colors. We are expecting rain and cooler temps and the beauty of the fall colors will soon be gone leading us into the upcoming Thanksgiving and Christmas holidays! Enjoy!

Until next time,

Happy Gardening

BAS

A Perfect Fall Day

Good morning gardeners!  It is a beautiful fall day.  Fall officially arrived in September, but nothing makes me think of fall more than pumpkins and gourds.  We had a wonderful surprise this year when the seeds from pumpkins I composted last November sprouted in our compost pile this summer.  My husband gathered some of the most beautiful pumpkins from a vine he let grow and clamour over the compost bin.  I have also been busy doing many fall chores in the garden - ridding the beds of weeds, moving plants and trimming back overgrown areas.  Hope you enjoy some photos from pumpkins the nursery staff grew at the photo.

Until later!  Enjoy this beautiful weather.  Happy Gardening!

BAS

Fall Chores

Fall has arrived with warm days and cooler nights. If you moved your houseplants outside over the summer, now is the time to begin moving plants back inside your house.

Inspect plants for insects and wash off the foliage before moving inside. You may also want to re pot plants into new potting mix to make sure you are not carrying any insects from the soil into your home. Plants may have outgrown their pots over the summer and may need to be replanted in a pot one size larger than the previous pot.

Many of my plants have grown over the summer and I am pondering where I am going to keep these larger specimens. One of my favorite pots I planted this summer was of a group of succulents I was not familiar with or had not grown before. It was so exciting to see how well the plants have performed through the season. I'm planning on wintering these in our patio room. Hope you enjoy the photos of the "before" planted in May and the "after" view of the summer growth.

Happy Gardening

Until Later

BAS

Another Beautiful Fall Day

The weather was beautiful again today. The recent rains have kept the weeds growing and I spent time ridding my flower beds of an abundance of weeds.

Now is a great time for over seeding your turf and preparing it for the winter.

I will leave that chore to my husband.

I am posting a photo of my paw paw tree. It has been in the ground 2 years and I saw several inches of growth on the tree this year, in addition to much larger leaves than last year. I was amazed to see the flowers this year and captured this photo when the tree was in flower earlier in the season. If you want a closer look at the paw paw tree, visit the Missouri Botanical Gardens and walk through the children's garden.

I did encounter an insect problem on my paw paw tree this year - I looked out one day and saw the leaves turning brown and curled up and upon closer inspection saw insects and webbing. From my research it was a leaf crumpler or leaf roller. I pruned off the damaged areas and I have not seen any more problems.

Happy Gardening,

Until next time

BAS

Back to Blogging

It has been quite some time since I have posted to my blog. I have gotten some photos loaded to my computer from summer events and hope to post at a more regular schedule.

The fall weather has been great in our area, except for the fallout from Ike. Sunday, September 14, we received over 3 inches of rain and heavy winds. A group of ducks visited our backyard yesterday afternoon - I think they thought we had a lake in our yard with all the rain that saturated our lawn. At the nursery, it totaled 4 inches of rain in the gauge. Many locations in the St. Louis area had heavy flooding.

On the bright side, this rain is great for fall planting and things should be ahead of schedule.

The temperatures were in the sixties today. I love sweatshirt weather!

Tomatoes are still growing in the garden, but the fall lettuce is slow to get going with all the overcast days recently. We have a great patch of pumpkins! And we didn't even plant pumpkins! I always deposit my pumpkins in the compost pile after Thanksgiving and the seeds sprouted up this summer. My husband let the vines go and they traveled over the compost bin, around the wood pile and into the garden. At this time, we have about 10-12 nice size pumpkins for Halloween and Thanksgiving. What a pleasant surprise. I will try to post photos at a later time.

For now I am including a picture of a bird that showed up in our landscape this summer, actually 2 of them appeared for a day or two. I think they are indigo buntings - I see these birds along wooded areas and fields on my way to work, but we usually don't see them show up in our yard in town. Hope you enjoy my photo - the birds were a delight to watch in the landscape; only wish they would have stayed longer.

Happy gardening! That's all for now.

BAS

Azaleas

The weather has been cool and wet for May. Temperatures are averaging about 10 degrees below normal for this time of year. However, the weather forecast is for temps in the 80' s at the beginning of next week. With all the moisture in the soil it will be hot and humid. It has been a great year for flowering plants. Our azaleas are in full bloom and it is the middle of May. Seems a little later than usual. Lilacs are also in full bloom. We have had over 4 inches of rain in the last week. The moisture in the ground makes it easy to pull weeds - now is a great time to keep up on all the weeding chores in the yard, garden, and flower beds. I have pulled out small tree sprouts and dandelions with roots over 12 inches in length with just a little tug on the plants. Among my other garden chores, I have been dividing plants for our local garden club sale tomorrow. That's all for now. Check out my photos of our azaleas.

BAS

April Showers Bring May Flowers

Well it is May - I don't know where the time goes! Spring is busy at the nursery, and I can't believe how long it has been since I have posted to my blog. The plants benefited from all the April showers and this was one of the most beautiful springs I can ever remember. The cherries, redbuds, and crabapples are finished blooming. The dogwoods are in full bloom along with some of the perennials and lilacs. My tree peony is in full bloom. Tree peonies are easy to care for and mine this year has an abundance of blooms on the plant. Take time to walk through your yard or landscape to appreciate all that is happening - something new seems to be blooming every time I take a walk through my yard.

Until next time.

Happy Gardening!

BAS

April Showers Photo

Trying again to post photos - seems it was a problem everyone was having with posting pictures.

April Showers Photo

Well, sorry about the photo. I am having trouble uploading photo tonight. Will post as soon as I remedy problem.

BAS

April Showers

I can't believe it has been almost 3 weeks since I have posted to my blog. Spring has arrived and I have been busy at the nursery and in my own landscape. About a week ago we had a downpour that flooded our streets and yards. You can see from the photo it appears I have a lake in my backyard. I may have to work on some system to move the water out of the landscape. I have been researching rain barrels, rain gardens, dry wells, and a dry rock bed to move and hold the water when we have these downpours. Everyone says we don't have these large fast rains often, but heavy rains in a short period of time are becoming a common occurrence and it wrecks havoc on the yard and landscape when they come. Suggestions anyone?

Home Again

The drive home was full of beautiful blooming plants. The pears had just about completed blooming, and the yoshino cherries, redbuds, and dogwoods dotted the landscapes with splashes of color. It has been a busy week. We arrived home from our Florida trip late Sunday night and I spent the week catching up on mail, phone calls, email and work. It is Saturday and the sun is shining for the first time in a few days and the temperature here in he Midwest is 59 degrees. Seeing all the beautiful plant material in Florida made me anxious to get out into my own landscape to inspect plant material. I just came in from a walk through my landscape. One of my favorite perennials is Hellebores. The hellebores are one of the earliest flowering perennials - slow to take off and multiply but well worth the wait. Mine are in full bloom. The daffodils are blooming; my ornamental pear is beginning to flower, and the flowering cherry, stewartia, weeping redbud, and magnolia have buds pushing forth.

Florida Update

Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday we spent at Cardinal Spring Training Games. Today we headed out to Butterfly World, located in Coconut Creek, to explore the aviaries filled with butterflies and hummingbirds, Lorikeets, Macaws, and botanical gardens.

This photo was taken with our Olympus E500 Digital SLR. In addition to our digital photos, I shot 2 rolls of 35MM film with our 20+ year old Cannon. I was reluctant to switch to digital because of the great photos we would get with our Cannon, but trying to go back and shoot with the 35MM was a chore after having used a digital camera for almost 2 years. I kept trying to look to see if the photo had turned out, only to realize I was using the our old camera. I'll keep you posted on how the film photos turn out when we get them developed once we get home.

Later from on-the-road

BAS

Marinelife from Florida

Today we visited Loggerhead Marinelife Center in Jupiter. The center is for rehabilitation and research of rescued sea turtles, and educating the public about the turtles. Five species of turtles are found in the Juno Beach area - Loggerhead, Hawksbill, Leatherback, Kemp's ridley, and Green. Meet Jonah and read his story above.

Just spoke to my parents and brother, who were with us and headed for home today - they ran into snow flurries in Georgia.

Later from on-the-road.

BAS

Florida Landscapes

Sending this post Monday morning - another cloudy day in Florida, but from what I hear, the weather is much warmer than back home in the Midwest. When we called home over the weekend we heard it was snowing. Friday we went back to Roger Dean Stadium for another Cardinal game. On Saturday, my daughter and her husband arrived and the entire family headed out to the baseball game.

Sunday we spent sightseeing and I took a couple of photographs of the Florida landscape. I think the attached photos are great examples of good landscape design - using simplicity, balance, and massing of plant material. Similar types of plant materials are grouped in masses to create movement and rhythm in the landscape. You can use those same principles in your own yard to design a beautiful landscape for your property.

Until later, from on-the-road.

BAS

Banyon Trees

From what I could find out, this tree is a type of Banyon tree. This tree was growing on the property located near the Jupiter Inlet Lighthouse. Photo of tree and lighthouse taken by my son Matt - who after many hours and much work fixed our E500 Olympus. Thanks Matt!

Photos from On-the-Road

Jupiter Inlet Lighthouse

Wednesday we toured the lighthouse and some of us walked the 105 stairs up to the top. The view of the ocean and surrounding area was beautiful. The lighthouse was built in 1860 and was recently restored.

Not-so-Sunny Florida

On Tuesday it was overcast and windy in Jupiter so we headed out to Sawgrass Mills Mall.
It was a short visit at the mall and we were back late afternoon to sit by the pool.
Next we headed out to the Castaway. The Castaway is a favorite spot of locals and visitors. It is an outdoor eating place and bar - more bar than food - but once you visit you just want to go back again and again. It's located on the inlet, and the tables are set on a sand beach. You sit among the palm trees and watch the pelicans fly over swooping down to get a fish, the boats or I should say yachts pull up to the dock, and across the inlet is the most scenic view with an old red lighthouse.

We hope to tour the lighthouse Wednesday.

The plant material and landscaping here is amazing. Our pool is surrounded by a ficus or fig tree hedge - something we can only grow as houseplants in Illinois. Palm trees are everywhere. A small ornamental tree with yellow flowers is found dotting the landscapes - haven't figured out what it is yet and a medium size shrub with pink-red-purple flowers is in bloom now.

Haven't been to the beach yet, but hope to go there Wednesday too.

Later from on-the-road.
BAS
P.S. To Bob, thanks for the camera repair tip, we'll give it a try and maybe I'll get some plant and landscape photos posted.

Happy St. Patrick's Day

No luck-of-the-Irish for us. My parents were joining us on this trip. They headed out about 4:00 a.m. on Sunday. They got caught in bumper-to-bumper traffic twice. It seems everyone is heading to Florida for spring break and the upcoming Easter Holiday. Someone "bumped" into their car while in the bumper-to-bumper traffic. After inspecting the vehicle it appeared everything was OK and they were back on their way. It was after midnight when they finally arrived. We helped them unpack and get settled in for the night. They were glad to finally arrive and "Bertha" was glad to get out of the car. Bert is their dog. Everyone slept in the next morning. Around 11:00 we all headed out to the Cardinal ballgame. The crowd was dotted with fans dressed in Cardinal red and fans dressed in green for St. Patrick's Day. I had planned on posting lots of photos in my blog from our trip, but as our luck goes on this St. Patrick's day, our E-500 Olympus is not working. We used the camera on day 2 of our trip, but now it won't take photos. Everything comes out black. My techno son researched on-line and it seems the mirror/shutter is not moving - it appears it might be a mechanical problem, because we tried all the other problem shooting regarding the memory card/batteries etc. Anyone know of any camera repair shops in Jupiter Florida?
Later from on-the-road.
BAS

On-the-Road Day 2

After our car was fixed and we had a bite to eat, we were back on the road. It was late night when we were driving thru Atlanta, Georgia. As we were driving I could see large masses of white along the roadside. Trees were in full bloom in Georgia - from the size and shape of the trees, I would suspect they were ornamental pears. Like I said, it was dark out, but it was amazing how these trees stood out among the streetlights.

We arrived in Jupiter mid-morning, and the first thing we did was stop at Roger Dean Stadium to get tickets to see the Cardinals play on Monday, St. Patrick's Day. Our rental house wasn't ready yet, so we had to find things to occupy our time for the better part of the afternoon. We drove around - something you don't want to do alot of when gas is $3.47 a gallon, ate lunch, and finally pulled into a city park - parked the car and took a nap. Everyone was exhausted after traveling for almost 22 hours without sleep. Finally the cell phone rang, it was a call from the property owner and we could check into our rental house.

We pulled into the drive, unloaded suitcases, and collapsed on the couch.

Later from on-the-road.
BAS

Vacation Day 1 Continued

The news on the car wasn't good. We thought the belt had just come off, but the rep at the auto repair shop knew better - many times something else causes the belt to come off. Well our water pump went out, due to some worn bearings. Apparently this make and model has problems with the water pump because the mechanic predicted right away what the problem was. I had just had the vehicle in for complete service and checkup before we headed out on our trip. The good news was - they had a pump in stock, he volunteered to stay after hours to get it fixed and by 8:00 p.m. we were back on the road.

When we first pulled off the road we didn't know where we were - we were in Clarksville, Tennessee. If you ever have to get stuck with car problems - Clarksville is the place to be. We met the nicest people who went out of their way to get us back on the road. And I learn something new everyday - Clarksville is a military town, home to one of the largest army bases.

Thanks to everyone in Clarksville who helped us out - the Speed Lube or Jiffy Lube Technician, our tow truck drive, and the crew at Firestone.

More later from on the-road.
BAS

Vacation!

Saturday, March 15, our family headed to Florida for vacation. My posts for the next 2 weeks will be coming from warm, sunny, Jupiter, Florida.

We headed out around 1:00 p.m. and planned to drive straight thru to Jupiter. Our vacation started with a bang. About 3 hours into our trip I heard a funny noise coming from the car - of course my husband thinks I hear things with the car all the time, until he noticed a reading stating battery loosing power. Then he started loosing the power steering. We were going to pull off for gas and were close to a town - we got off just in time and pulled into a parking lot as the car coolant was gurgling, and smoke was coming from underneath the hood.
I called AAA right away for a tow truck - it was late Saturday afternoon and we knew our chances of getting the car fixed before Monday were slim. My first problem was trying to tell the AAA representative where we were. My husband walked around the parking lot to ask someone what city we were in.
We had a wonderful tow truck driver and he recommended we be towed to the Firestone Center because they stayed open later on a Saturday. He was so kind to recommend hotels for the night - He knew our chances of getting back on the road Saturday night were slim.

Until later.
BAS

Spring Break

When I began this blog, my goal was to add daily posts. Between work, home, and personal and community committments, I haven't lived up to that goal yet, but I am working on it. This is an update.

On Friday, March 14, I walked through the nursery at work, checking and tagging plants. The crew is harvesting plants daily. Check our nursery website for updates on what types of plants are being brought in from the field.

While on my walk, the Cornelian Cherry Dogwood were just beginning to bloom. It won't be long and other plants will be in flower.

On Saturday, my family headed out for Florida for spring break!!! I will be posting some of our trip adventures.

To Linnie - I researched what variety of Japanese Maple you may have from the link to the photo you sent me. It looks like one of the small dissectum varieties - and the most popular ones in the market are Tamukeyama, Red Select, and another small red leaf variety.

That's all for now.
BAS

Spring is on its way!

The sunshine finally appeared today! Though it was deceiving, it was not as warm as I thought when I ventured outside. I walked the nursery today, tagging trees and updating signs, but the wind was still crisp. The plants appear to be hibernating, but with a little warmer weather that is expected later this week it won't be long before the buds are opening and we see life again.

To the nursery customer who found the blog through the farm's website - I spoke with our Japanese Maple supplier today and we have approximately 60 nice size balled and burlapped Jap Maples coming in sometime the beginning of April. The freeze last year damaged so many of the Japanese Maples it was difficult to locate trees from suppliers - many places sold out early. We usually try to carry some of the more unusual or collector varieties; we do have about 6-8 different types coming in April.

And as for the request for pictures of the farm, I will try to post some photos soon.

For all the gardeners - its time to cut back the ornamental grasses and start on general spring clean-up as the weather permits. I have begun trimming back my own ornamental grasses, some perennials, and my liriope along with cleaning out the leaves that have blown into my flower beds through the winter. When I pulled the leaves away from my Hellebores I noticed blooms are starting to spring forth! Yes, spring is on its way!

Scenic Drive Home

I walked the nursery in the afternoon and by that time most of the snow had melted from the trees. However, when I left work today, the nursery still had a few inches of snow on the ground. Traveling just a few miles down the road the scenery was quite different; most of the snow within about 5 miles of the farm had melted and only traces remained in the fields. I travel on a country road past a small plot of land and the tame geese were out near the road - the resident of this property raises geese, chickens, a few sheep, a donkey or two and horses. Farther along on my journey the field was filled with turkeys. I grabbed my cell phone to take a picture, but the birds were too fast for me and were too far in the distance to get a good photo by the time I snapped the picture. I'll have to begin carrying my camera with me in the car.

Until next time
BAS

Day One

Good afternoon!  This is the first day of my blog.  Watch for more information to come!

Thanks for your help Bob :)