Aaaagh!

The unbelievable gardening accident that ended well.

I hope.

I spent some time weeding one of my flower beds yesterday. It’s finally gotten cool enough that a person can stand being outside more than absolutely necessary. So, I’ve been catching up on my weeding, a little at a time, over the past week.

I have these flower beds—although why I’m calling them flower beds when only 2 of them have actual flowers is something we can examine later. Anyway, I have these flower beds. There are about 7 of them. Two feet wide or so. Running along the length of various portions of the house, with concrete borders.

A while back, we bought some large river rock to use as—what?—a sort of ground cover. In lieu of mulch. I’ll say this for the river rock. It makes it easy to see what’s a weed and what isn’t. Because there’s not much else planted in these beds.

We have some larger, shrub-like plants, a vinca, a ton of canna lilies, a couple of spider lilies and a hydrangea. In the back, there’s a begonia, in a pot, sitting on top of the rocks, and a flowering shade plant whose name I cannot remember and which has yet to grow more than an inch or show any sign of flowering. Anything else green that pokes its head up through the rocks is a weed.

I like that. Knowledge is not required. See a green thing. Pull it up.

But yesterday, this lack of knowledge could have had some disastrous consequences for a baby lizard.

What happened is this.

I was weeding. Specifically, I was pulling up dollar weed. This is something of a losing battle. In a defined area, however, it is possible to eliminate visible signs for a while. If you are careful, you can also pull up a fair length of the subterranean runners. They are tubular and white.

So, when I found a small round white ball, I thought it had something to do with the dollar weed. I picked it up. And then I dropped it. By accident.

Imagine my surprise at seeing a wet and slimy baby lizard clinging to a rock after the round white ball—otherwise known as an egg—broke open.

Imagine my horror at realizing I had just played midwife to a lizard—and caused a premature delivery.

Imagine my relief when the slimy little thing dried out and scuttled away.

I’m not enamored of lizards, but they are harmless and amusing, and I don’t want to kill them if they can manage to stay outside—which, so far, most of them have. Even if they come inside, I try to have the MotH catch and release. (Haven’t quite gotten there myself. Maybe someday.)

So, I’m thankful that the lizard seemed okay after our mutual shocking experience.

Next time I see one of those small white balls, I’m leaving it strictly alone.

Transplants

A 50/50 chance.

I re-potted some plants yesterday.

It was kind of a mass promotion. With less mayhem than in the days when the British army would toast “to bloody wars and dread diseases.” I’ve also heard that it was the British Navy and the toast was “to bloody wars and sickly seasons.” It meant, of course, that the officers had no hope of promotion unless there was an opening above them. Since superior officers retiring, by definition, required years, the fastest route to higher rank would be someone else’s death.

Fortunately—and somewhat astonishingly—none of my plants had to die in order for several of them to move up in pot size.

Oh! Wait! That’s not true. The tomato plant!

The tomato plant did yeoman service throughout the summer. But it went the way of all tomato plants—or, at least, any that I’ve ever owned. Yield tapered off. The leaves turned yellow. The stalks dried out.

I dug it up.

Which left me with a very large pot.

I never planted the tomato plant in the ground because I have the illusion that container gardening will require fewer insect encounters than in-ground gardening.

For a while, I left the pot empty. I did set my chrysanthemum on it—the one that became such a baroque resting place for the lizard—but I left it in the small container in which it came and just set it on top of the dirt in the larger pot.

I had a vague plan that, eventually, I would either plant the chrysanthemum in the large pot or transplant the Northern Lights grass into it. This is the kind of vague plan that can evaporate due to lack of initiative and an unwillingness to murder defenseless flora. (I’m not good with plants.)

However, I was weeding one of my flower beds the day before yesterday (I’m good with weeds), and I found several shoots of vinca in places where I did not want them. The vinca has proven to be very hardy—by which I mean I haven’t killed it yet. So, it seemed like careful extraction of these shoots and re-potting them might be a good idea.

Ergo, everybody moved up. It was a game of musical chairs—without the music and without the chairs. The Northern Lights went into the very large pot. The chrysanthemum went into the medium pot. And the vinca shoots went into smaller pots.

Sounds a little like Goldilocks and the Three Bears, doesn’t it? I wonder which pot will prove to be “just right.” Odds are against all three of them making it.

I’m a transplant myself, you know. Putting down new roots is hard.

Well, that’s not gonna happen

Another one bites the dust.*

Another brilliant idea, that is.

See, the Winn-Dixie had a sale last week on cashews. Two cans for $5. Pretty good price, huh? So, we bought two cans. And we ate two cans.

And I thought, “I wonder if you could grow your own cashews.”

Google!

You can! You can grow your own cashews.

It’s not even that hard, supposedly.

First and most importantly, they are a tropical tree. It probably gets a little too cold for them here. They like temperatures above 50°, but there are ways around that.

Secondly, they like sandy soil. Got that covered.

Third, unlike some trees, they seem to be easy to grow from seeds.

Fourth, not only do they provide cashew nuts, they also grow something called a cashew apple–which is also edible and sounds interesting.

But then. . .

You read a little further. And you find out why cashew nuts are usually so expensive in the stores.

That tasty little seed has a double shell full of a caustic liquid. As in dangerous. As in potentially life-threatening.

It’s related to urushiol, the toxin found in poison ivy.

Processing cashew nuts is arduous and dangerous. Roasting them properly destroys the toxin, but that requires gloves, long sleeves, safety goggles–and I don’t know what all. The smoke contains droplets of the stuff and is extremely irritating to the lungs.

Yikes!

I’m thinking–best to just keep an eye out for those sales at Winn-Dixie. $5 for two cans–definitely a good price!

* Song by Queen band member John Deacon

Southern Style

Myrtles and Turtles

(Actually, there are no turtles in this post. Just stretching for a sub-headline. Sorry. We might talk about turtles in a future post, though, so don’t give up hope.)

Today, on this Thankful Thursday, I am thankful for Crepe Myrtles. And generous neighbors.

When we bought Casa Lagarto, there were already six Crepe Myrtle trees in the yard. Now we have ten! (Generous neighbors.) Two of them have white flowers, four are various shades of pink and red, and four of them are mysteries.

The mystery myrtles haven’t bloomed yet, but the others have flowered, and two of them are flat-out gorgeous. Those last four–well, they could be anything. I can’t wait to find out!

There are two things I love about crepe myrtles:

They are easy.
You don’t have to do much besides leave them alone. Some people prune them drastically every year. Others call that “crepe murder,” and–needless to say with a name like that–frown on it. Being a Libra, always seeking balance, I, once again, walk the middle ground. A little pruning for shaping, but not scalping. So far, they have weathered both drought and deluge, the grasshoppers (and other pests) seem to leave them alone, and they haven’t needed any fertilizer or other intervention.
They are Southern.
I think they actually come from southeast Asia, but the sight of a crepe myrtle always says “the South” to me–by which I mean the southern United States. In other words…home. Sure, palm trees are more recognizably Florida, perhaps–but a crepe myrtle is Southern style. Delicate, lacy flowers. Thriving in warmth. Blooming anywhere from Virginia to Miami. Nowadays, there are some cold-hardy varieties, I think. And maybe they grow in California and other western areas. But you tend to stick with what you learned as a child. Driving down I-95, it was the sight of the first blooming crepe myrtles that meant we were headed south. To me, it still does.

Easy. I like that, because I am the world’s worst gardener. And it’s nice to have the epitome of Southern Style on the property.

I’ve got a palm tree, you know. but it’s the crepe myrtles that I love.

Elaine Smith Writes

Anything She Wants

Tag Archives: Gardening

Aaaagh!

Transplants

Well, that’s not gonna happen

Southern Style