May 28
Failure in the tulip garden
Cats: slack woman|What happens when you break the Commandents of Neighbourly Gardening Etiquette? You know the rules
Thou shalt not covet thy neighbour’s tulip bulbs
Thou shalt not copy thy neighbour’s garden plan
Thou shalt not wish evil upon thy neighbour’s tulips
What happens if you break them is that you get punished. And your punishment? Planting 80 tulip bulbs in the fall only to have five of the cursed things turn into tulips the following spring.
Go here for the tale of the broken commandments and the failed tulip bulbs
May 29th, 2007 at 10:53 am
You need a low maintenance hardy perennial garden. Take a walk around the neighborhood, identify those gardens that look the least tended, identify the nicest looking perennials in the unkept gardens and get some.
You will be able to take great pride in your low maintenance and attractive patch. You don’t have to weed because you have attractive weeds occupying the site. You won’t have to water or fertilize or insecticide.
Now instead of wasting your energy coveting the neighbors labour intensive, short lived, boring, water consumptive, chemically enhanced, insecticided, over represented tulip patch, you can make fun of them and their lack of imagination and environmental consciousness…peasants!
May 29th, 2007 at 2:21 pm
Do you have deer in your neighbourhood? Make sure you pick perennials that aren’t deer suppers. I suggest you don’t buy your perennials — beg, borrow and steal them from friends and others who are dividing them.
Hate to disagree Dick since you’re the resident forestry expert, etc. and you’re from gardening heaven BC, and you’re the BIL, (I am, however, the dutch farmer’s daughter…..) I think GT you will have to weed the first couple of years, and you should get a couple of loads of well rotted manure to work into the soil. That’ll get the neighbours talking.
Another suggestion — buy those wooden tole-painted fake tulips, etc. but buy a lot of them. If you’re far enough away and you squint a little bit it actually looks real!
May 30th, 2007 at 5:53 am
Perfect. Wooden tulips. I should have thought of that. I can’t believe I didn’t consult YAM on my tulilp woes, being a Dutch Farmer’s daughter. Is that like a coal miner’s daughter?
May 30th, 2007 at 9:15 am
Sort of I suppose, but can’t sing like Sissy S.
Let me know if the deer like nibbling on the wooden variety, I can’t grow a tulip here in M.L. without it looking like a POW camp.
May 31st, 2007 at 5:57 pm
[…] So I’m outside tonight admiring the Blue Moon tonight, when something strange catches my eye. It’s in the garden. It’s, it’s flowers! A profusion of them them. In MY garden. […]