Week 17- March 18, 2018

Welcome to week 4 of the playoffs.

This will be a somewhat abbreviated post as this weekend we are down in Southwest Missouri visiting my mother. On our trip south we crossed the daffodil line. There is a place on the east side of Highway 61, just north of Hannibal, where we always look to see if the daffodils are blooming.
We saw foliage but no flowers. At least so far we have not seen daffodils north of Springfield. Maybe friends who were in St. Louis this week can report if there daffodils there.

Near the end of the picture contest, winter is over and real time flowers show up. We no longer have to rely on last year's pictures for garden comfort.
So for the moment here is some real time.

The winter aconite in the garden are really getting organized. With the temperatures staying on the cool side, they should last quite a while.

These are such cheerful little flowers. You can understand why garden writers have suggested planting them by the thousands. Since you only have to plant them maybe 2 inches deep, you can plant them almost anywhere. You can also do it easily with a trowel. This is unlike a tulip or daffodil which would like to be put in a hole maybe 5-6 inches deep.
I have found that I can move little clumps of the aconite around. I find a place where they seem to be plenty, and just dig some up and move them, flower and all. The bulb is within a inch or two of the surface.
Move them. Water them. The weather stays cool. They do not even droop.

Here is the first little blue flower. Actually it is still a bud.
That is the first squill or scilla that will make a blue blanket in a few weeks. The bud does announce a new color that will appear in the next week or two.
All those little brown seeds in the picture are the squill seeds from last year. They have been sprouting for the last month. Not only do the seeds survive the 20 degree weather of last week, but so do the sprouts.

Wednesday: Here is the first little purple crocus. I like this version of the picture for two reasons.  It give you an idea of how small the crocus is. It also shows off the great patterns found in all that brown.
This was taken Wednesday afternoon when the weather changed from a brisk 45 at noon, to 62 by 5pm.

I must report that by Thursday this crocus was gone. My theory is that critters, I really mean bunnies, are attracted to more vibrant colors. That is why the earliest flowers are white and yellow. Then again it could just be that the earliest flowers just don't taste good.

In last week's contest

there was another dramatic race, for the early part of the week . The toad lily tool a decent lead after Sunday's vote. Then the bloodroot moved ahead, by two, That lead evaporated. By Wednesday the toad lily had retaken the lead.
The lead grew. In the end the win was a rather solid one.



The winner was

The full voting was
Toad lily 11-13-18
Double Bloodroot 8-14-14
Monkshood 9-10-10
Hoya  4-5-6
total 32-42-48

Week 4 of the playoffs

Here there are 4 more pictures you selected. With 2 Augusts, a May, and an October, I continue to appreciate the fact that pictures from later in the year are well represented.


#1 Pink Lily with butterflies
Week 12
August 12, 2017

Flowers with critters are a great combination. Just this week I noticed that the bees had come around. All the little yellow flowers of the aconite had opened on sunny Monday. The word was out to the local bees.
Lilium are good. I separated quite a few clumps this past fall. I will be interested in seeing how they do after having been moved. I must remember to give them a shot of fertilizer when they just come up.




#2 Orange Iceland Poppy
Week 8
May 13, 2017

Iceland poppies are the best.
There are two in the playoffs.
I have all my little seedlings getting ready in the basement under lights.
This year I think I want to plant them real close together.
They do want plenty of sun.



Blue Morning Glory-Venice Blue
Week 6
August 5, 2018

This is Venice Blue, the Morning Glory.
It is high on my list of keepers.
It was the winner of Week 6, way back at the end of December.
Wow! December really is in our rear view mirror at this point.

Sometime, maybe this year, I would like to try to grow these morning glories up the stalks of the lilium, which can grow to 5 feet. Certainly they could grow in with the Sweet Autumn fall clematis.




#4 Silk Road ascelpias
Week 9
October 7, 2017

This is the annual ascelpias. Ascelpias is the genus that includes the the well known orange "butterfly weed" along with all the milkweeds. I like this annual because it has continuous bloom from June to the fall.
The individual flowers are really different in shape.
I think I first saw this plant at the Reiman gardens in Ames, Iowa. Was it just coincidence that red and yellow were the school colors of Iowa State University that is located in Ames?

I have wintered over cuttings from one of these plants. They are doing well. I decided to plant all the plants in one pot. I will have one big plant to set out in May.
You know May is not really that far away.

Bonus Section

Here is one of the first crocus clumps. The variety is Cream Beauty.

I love the brown patterns in these pictures. Do you see the bee?


Here is a closeup of the aconite.

Here is a lilium slide show. The flowers are from July 1 to August 12.

Julia's recipe

Lentils with spinach

We became acquainted with lentils during the years when there were vegetarians among us, and the bond we formed with lentils remained even though the eating habits of others in our midst changed.  Lentils are easy to prepare, nutritious, relatively inexpensive and taste good. This recipe is from Madhur Jaffrey's World of the East Vegetarian Cooking. She says the recipe is Middle Eastern, and I take her word for it.

Here are the assembled ingredients: regular oil, 1 onion, 2 big bunches of fresh spinach, salt, pepper, ground cumin and French lentils, also sometimes called du Puy lentils. According to Wikipedia, they come from Le Puy in the Auvergne region of France, and only lentils from that place are entitled to be called du Puy lentils. I buy them at the New Pioneer Co-op under the name of French lentils. I bet they do not come from France.  They are dark green-gray and small. They cook fast and hold their shape after cooking (that is, their skins to not come off). I like them in this dish.

I put 3 tablespoons of oil in a large enameled pot, with about 1 cup of onion cut into half-moons. (That is, peeled and cut lengthwise through the middle, then each half cut across.)
I added 2 smushed cloves of garlic, which I put through a garlic press.

After a few minutes, the onions and garlic were limp and then I added 1 cup of French lentils. While the onion was cooking, I put the cup of lentils into a fine mesh strainer and picked out any broken bits. One is always warned to look out for bits of stone in dried lentils. I have never run into a bit of stone in dried lentils, but I rinse and pick over them anyway. There's always a first time.

I added 3 cups of water to the lentil and onion mixture and brought it to a boil. When the mixture came to a boil, I turned down the heat and put the lid on the pot. I checked the lentils after about 15 minutes, and they were done. Depending on what kind of lentils you use, the cooking time may be a bit longer.

While the lentils were cooking, I cut the spinach across into strips about 1 inch wide. The bunches of spinach came tied with twist ties and I left the twist ties in place while I cut the spinach which made the cutting easier. I used all of the spinach, including the stems (except for the very ends). After the spinach was cut up, I rinsed it in a big colander in batches and put the rinsed spinach in a very large bowl. I had about 16 cups of spinach leaf strips. Really.

My spinach was not prepackaged baby spinach, but it had been rinsed before I got it so it was not sandy. If you can find grown-up (as opposed to baby) spinach, that works better.

Before I added the spinach, I added 1-1/2 teaspoon of salt, 1-1/2 teaspoon of ground cumin and
1/4 teaspoon of ground black pepper and stirred them into the lentils.

This picture shows the pot of lentils as I was adding all of that spinach. I stirred the spinach in, and believe it or not, it all fit. Then I put the lid back on the pot and cooked it on low-medium heat for another 10 minutes.

And here it is. Spinach is the most insubstantial vegetable I know. A giant bowl of spinach strips cooked down to such an extent that the final dish was about equal parts lentils and spinach. The dish has a stew-like consistency, thicker than soup but not by any means dry.

This is a very tasty concoction, especially in light of how few ingredients there are. We serve it with rice or with orzo. If you have issues with gluten, use rice. If you have issues with rice, use orzo. As should go without saying, this dish is thoroughly vegan.

Odds and Ends

We have reached 12 hours of daylight. 

Winter, by many measures, is over.

Here is what is odd.

We know that the Spring equinox means 12 hours of daylight and 12 hours of night. But did you know that the day with that equal time this year is Saturday, March 17?  What? That is what the local weather tells me.
I always thought it was March 21.

I find it odd that the garden goes at different speeds throughout the year.
Sometimes when it remains cool, the garden moves slowly.
That will be true for any time of the year.
The same flower will last much longer if the temperatures are lower.
I remember a fall blooming daylily lasted two days one cool year.
If the temperature spikes into the 80's in April, things will almost be too fast.
Right now is also the time when the garden is waking up. The ground is warming. That triggers more plants to emerge. By April you can wander the garden and find something new almost every day.


In Springfield we visited the city's botanical gardens. It was impressive. They had a section that was sort of a bush garden. There were many different bushes, in full sun of course. There was the witch hazel, along with one of the rare conifers that Julia really likes. I will post a picture of Julia with the bush next week.

This is the end of this post.
I will let the daffodils in Missouri know that it is time for the daffodil line to move into Iowa.
Have a safe week.
Baseball starts soon.
Philip