Week 16- March 11, 2018

Welcome to Week 3 of the playoffs in the Contest.

Good morning everyone.
It is that sad day when we lose that morning hour of daylight, and all at one time.
It had been such a welcome hour of daylight as we had gradually and naturally gained it back.
I suppose I need to remember that we only lose that hour at the time of the year when winter is mostly over.

Last week I boldly announced that Spring was here.
Well, as is often the case, we had a little setback.  We missed the big snow they had in Maine. (at least ten inches according to Katie), or the six inches in northern Iowa. Iowa City did not get the ice that coated everything 30 miles north of here. But we had hard freezes. (below 20) Four days in a row the highs were in the 30's. It was hat and mitten weather.
So everything in the garden sort of came to pause. That is not so bad. The snowdrops and aconite are just about where they were a week ago. The first little crocus still struggles to barely open, even in mid afternoon.
But yesterday was in the mid 40's. I was able to get outside and do more garden cleanup.
And warm weather is coming.

Last Week's Contest

      For those who wanted drama in the picture contest you got it last week. The vote was by far the closest we have had all year, probably for as long as the contests have been going.
      For the top spot, as of Saturday morning, there was a tie, between the Night Blooming Cereus (NBC) and the Yellow tulip. The pink dogwood was but one vote behind. Then later that day, the last vote came in. It was for the NBC, which made it a dramatic winner.



Here is that great picture.

The tulip picture had taken a lead after the first day. By midweek, when usually the voting is mostly over, the NBC had a two vote lead. The lead seemed at the time to be insurmountable. But along came first one vote and then another vote for the tulips. That gave you the tie.
The draft of this post said it was a tie.
But wait...late on Saturday afternoon, sometime, another vote came in. It was for the NBC. That put it over the top.
I should mention that the pink dogwood made a good effort. Even the purple orchid had good support.
Here is last week's voting, including the first days vote.


Night blooming cereus  7-15
Yellow tulips  10-14
pink dogwood  8-13
purple orchid  4-7
total 29-49

Week 3 of the playoffs

This week we have something of an unusual group of pictures. Three of the four entries were taken after September 1.
I like that.

#1 Hoya

October 14, 2017

Week 7

I mentioned at the time that it is a little strange to write about this plant, with it being in the room with me, as I sit at the computer. It, of course, winters inside. This winter it has lived in the computer room.
It is doing quite well now, starting to put out new growth. It does not bloom in the winter.
I will have to investigate whether I can take cuttings. I will keep an eye out for more hoya plants.

#2 Monkshood

October 14, 2017

Week 13

Blue flowers are so wonderful. This is aconitum, a flower with many names. Wolf's bane. Devil's helmet. Queen of poisons.
The genus is aconitum. I will have to ponder how this plant is related to the winter aconite, which is that little yellow flower, growing from a bulb, that is starting to bloom in the garden right now.

This particular flower is from a plant that seems to be just in the right place. It is in semi shade, as is so much of the garden. It is a mature plant, meaning the clump is about 18 inches wide. The plant gets tall. It might be 30 inches as I think about it. And in the fall it is covered with these wonderful blue flowers, that hold up into the cold weather.
It also grows right there on the main path in the backyard.
A week ago I saw the new growth emerging.

The same plant grows in two other places in the garden. They are more out of the way. That means I tend to forget about them.
Every garden has places like that. I need to pay particular attention to at least several of those places each year.

#3 Toad lily

September 2, 2017

Week 11

Spots.
Wonderful spots.
There are not many flowers in the garden with spots. Think about it. In the contest the were only a few of the pictures with spots. The Michigan lily had spots. The Caladium in Week 12 had splashes of color. The lily with the butterflies has some spots. But mostly flowers are a particular color or two.

And then of course there is the name.
I grow a number of these plants. I will make a point of potting up a few this spring to see how easily they can be shared.

#4 Double Bloodroot

April 13, 2017

Week 1

       This picture just makes me feel good. This was the plant that grew so well for years and then was lost. For some reason 2-3 years ago it just disappeared. It just did not come up in the spring. There was something about the weather pattern that spring that was bad. I had actually moved some of the large clump to a different part of the garden. Neither clump came back. I did not understand what happened. Strangely the double bloodroot was about the only plant where this happened.
        I did find a new source for the plant. I got bareroot plants in March of last year. This picture resulted. This plant certainly got the award for the replacement plant of the year.
Sources are so important. Show me a gardener and I am certain that the gardener will have "sources". I have sources.

Actually thinking about any bloodroot makes be feel good. I so look forward to walking in the woods down by the Fairground. That should be in just 2-3 weeks. All those great spring flowers, will be there in the woods.




There are your pictures for week 3 of the playoffs. Let the voting begin.

Bonus pictures

I thought this week I would find a few types of plants that did not appear in the contest this winter, but really could use the exposure. You should know about them. I need to remember them. I need to remind myself to find  more.

Here are primroses.




Here are corydalis. They are a little spring bulb. They bloom at the same time as the squill, which are the blue flowers in this picture. I keep looking for the first one. Nothing so far.

This is a little purple variety.

Here is a picture of the bloodroot in the woods. This is from last April 9. I so look forward to those walks in the woods.

 I think one reason I like the bloodroot in the woods is that they are surprises when you see them. Garden surprises are the best.

Julia's recipe

Spanish rice

Tasty rice

We eat rice pretty often, with Indian food or as a side dish with baked chicken or fish. Or with chili. I am pretty sure that People With Opinions About Chili do not eat their chili with rice, but I am not from around here (ancestrally speaking) so I feel free to do what I like. I like rice, especially with some additions to make it more flavorful.

I started with 3 tablespoons of regular oil in a saucepan. You could use butter or ghee if you prefer. Or olive oil. Not coconut oil.

I heated the oil up a bit (not until smoking or anything so dramatic as that). Then I added 1 cup chopped onions and 2 cups of medium grain rice. I would not use basmati here as the aromatic quality would be lost in this dish, but long grain white rice or jasmine would be fine.

I cooked the onions and rice over medium-high heat until the onion softened and at least one half of the rice in the pot had turned opaque.

Next I added about 1/2 cup drained diced tomatoes, 1 teaspoon salt, 1/2 teaspoon black pepper and 4 cups of chicken stock. I brought the mixture to a boil, then covered it and reduced the heat to low. After 15 minutes, I turned the heat off and let it continue to cook with the residual heat for another 5 minutes.

Here it is, ready to eat.

If you like, you can add more drained diced tomatoes. And you can use the liquid from the canned tomatoes to replace some of the chicken stock. Or you could add some finely chopped green pepper at the beginning with the onions and rice.

If you use medium grain rice, you can eat the leftovers cold. If you use long grain rice, the leftovers have to be reheated. Cold cooked long grain rice is hard and crunchy. Something about different kinds of starch.

This rice is good with chili, as I said. It is also good with baked chicken or mild fish or pork chops or pork roast.

Odds and ends

It is odd that as we spring ahead with the clock, the garden has essentially stayed put for the entire week.
Garden cleanup continues.
Snowdrops are all over. Little yellow aconite blooms in the back yard.

That brings me to something else that is actually a little odd.
There is a big patch of aconite in the front yard. Not a single one has appeared. This is not some mysterious bulbs-kill, like with the bloodroot a few years ago.
There is no winter aconite because the ground is still mostly frozen.
I have these plant labels around the garden. Sometimes, particularly after the trees have been trimmed, the labels are knocked over. I have to put them back into the ground. I can't do that in the front yard at the moment.
The front and back yards at the moment illustrate how there are micro climates within any garden. The backyard is on the south side of the house. It gets a lot more sun, and is protected from the little snow we had.
The front yard is on the north side. It is shaded by the house. The snow melts later there. It will be sometimes 2 weeks behind the backyard, even with the same plants.

I started  some lupine seed last Sunday. By Friday, several had already spouted. Lupine are special. I add new ones each year. The new ones are suppose to replace the ones that do not come back for a third or fourth year.

The winter aconite plant is not in the genus aconitum. It is called winter aconite apparently because the foliage resembles the foliage of the genus aconitum. It is in the genus eranthis.
Both monkhood and winter aconite are both in the family ranunculacea. (Family is the grouping above genus.) Apparently some part of the winter aconite would be poisonous.
I was thinking that the foliage looked like the foliage in the De Caen anemone, which is already in the finals. Guess what? It is also in the family ranunculacea.

Here are some more snowdrops.

Here is a video of some of the aconite and snowdrops. I am still working on this video thing. There is a zoom feature. I am still learning how to use that.
I realize that there is also sound. Who knows what the future will bring.

That is it for this week.
Warmer times are coming.
We were able to watch the Cubs on TV yesterday afternoon.
It was only a spring training game.
But...
Philip