Garden Tips May 2013

The Garden Gate

I will never look at a garden gate the same again.  Since I started gardening I have always just gone to work, gotten the job done and went on to the next thing.  But a little while ago I got this Turkish door from my friend Emi and my garden changed into a different world. Suddenly it has a story and that has made all the difference.  This month’s tips will be about finding the story in your garden. Here are the tips.

1. If we look for it, we will find it.  If we don’t, we won’t.  This theme has been repeated over and over from self help books to the movie “Field of Dreams”.  When it comes to a garden story it may very well be true.  Bring a chair into the garden and sit for a while.
2. Make up a fantasy story for your garden.  Most home gardeners are women and women tend to be pretty good story people.  Catch a child someday and have them come into your garden and tell them a story.
3. Plant a story.  Maybe it will be around the Italian herbs you plant or possibly the mint and sweet peas.  Flowering plants of all kinds are great themes for stories.
4. Try writing a poem just for your garden.  It can be a sonnet like ‘but soft what light through yonder garden shines’ or a haiku ‘ah ladybeetle, so carefully you step.  there, an aphid.
5. Name your garden and build on the name.  One friend called her garden ‘The Folly’ when she got to 300 species.
6. Try a little spring romance story.  I will leave this up to you.
7. How about a cottage garden that will feed your family for two or three generations.  Then you can name plants for the people you love.
8. How about naming your cat after your favorite plant in the garden.  I like Pansy, Daphne, Rose and Alstomeria.
9. Make your garden gate the theme entry with a hand painted sign.
10. And what about a healing garden with herbs that help us stay well.  This can be dedicated to one we are especially concerned about or who may have already passed.  There is always a story to be found in a garden.

Good gardening

Jack McKinnon is a Personal Garden Coach and worked for Sunset Magazine in their gardens for 12 years.  He can be reached at 650-455-0687 or visit his website www.jackthegardencoach.com.

Garden Tips March 2013

This column is for kids.  If you are an adult go ahead and check it for safety and credibility and then give it to a kid.  Have you ever thought about growing your own food, flowers and beautiful gardens.  You can and this column will show you how.  It doesn’t matter how old you are, how smart you are or what you look like.  You can grow just about anything you want.  All you need is time which you have because you are young, and the willingness to learn.  Here are tips to get you started and keep you going for a lifetime of gardening.

1. Check your food for seeds.  Try checking tomatoes, apples, oranges, pears, avocados, and just about anything you eat that was once on a plant.
2. The more seeds you gather, the more places you can plant them. Try sprouting them between damp paper towels. Once they sprout, plant them in the ground. Ask your mom where.
3. If none of your seeds grow then ask your parents to buy you a six pack of baby plants (I like lettuce to start) and plant them in your garden.
4. Water your new plants whenever they seem dry to you.  Stick your finger in the soil and feel if it is dry.
5. Look at your plants every day.  Write about them in a notebook.  Draw pictures of them. Write when you planted them, how you planted them and how much you water them.
6. If you have plants in small containers and the top gets as big as the container, move it to a bigger container so it can grow bigger.  If it is already in a big container, put it in the ground somewhere.  Ask your parents where you can plant it.
7. If you are growing lettuce, you can pick off a leaf once in a while and eat it.  If you are growing a lot of lettuce you can make a salad.  If you are growing a whole lot of lettuce you can make salads for your friends.
8. If you are growing flowers, pick some and make a bouquet for your mom.
9. Read books and check websites about the plants you are growing.
10. If you grow more than you can use, share the extra with others.

Good gardening

Jack McKinnon is a Personal Garden Coach and worked for Sunset Magazine in their gardens for 12 years.  He can be reached at 650-455-0687 or visit his website www.jackthegardencoach.com.

Garden Tips December 2012

Gopher Wars Escalating

I’ve got good news and bad news, which do you want first?  I’ll give you the bad news.  The gophers and squirrels are collaborating and it doesn’t look good.  They have finally breeched the language barrier and started classes in GSL and SSl, Gopher as a second language and Squirrel as a second language.  Take note;  if they start sharing recipes we will really be in trouble.   We will be seeing gophers in the trees and squirrels in our gardens.  I mentioned back in August in the initial Gopher Wars column that there was a significant need for a witness protection plan for gophers so they would start turning each other in.  You didn’t listen and look where we are now.  Oh my gosh!  It looks pretty grim.  This month’s tips will be plan B to deal with this situation.  We need to all be on the same page, especially this one. Soon the rats will be getting involved and you know the rat problem here.  Sticking together, collaborating and forming a coalition, just like the presidential candidates were telling us they were going to do is the trick. Here are the tips.

1. Build outdoor sound systems to play music that calms the wild rodent soul.  You will need it to be weather proof so put everything in those non-disposable plastic bags you buy at the market to save paper bags and seal them up with clothes pins.  Then turn on the Bach, Rachmaninov and if the problem is really bad, Wagner.
2. Eat outdoors, it makes them nervous.  We want them nervous, they have been getting way too casual about showing up at all kinds of events.  Once they realize we are watching them, they may re-consider avoiding the negotiating table and start learning English.
3. If you notice a gopher in a tree, show a little compassion.  They know deep in their little hearts that they are not supposed to be up there.  They feel bad enough already.   What we can do is help them realize where they really belong and give them a way to get back down.  After all look how long it has taken cats to learn how to get out of trees.   I recommend a long pipe about four inches in diameter and twenty feet long leaned in such a way as to provide a nice dark opening at the end of a branch that they can sneak into to hide their embarrassment. They will slide down to the ground and hopefully never climb again.
4. I wrote in August about gophers and their cheeks.  Being very functional but a bit gross,  gophers needed respect for having such big cheeks.  Well squirrels need respect too.  Just imagine if you had a tail that was twice as long as you and so bushy that you could barely get through a door way.  I think squirrels could use twelve step programs to help cope with their problem.  After all where else are they going to talk about it?  They have to admit they are powerless and their life is unmanageable.  Just think, what self respecting squirrel would actually talk to a gopher? They must be scraping the bottom of the barrel to do that.
5. The rat situation is getting pretty bad now and it probably won’t be long before they are talking to the gophers and squirrels.  I think there should be weekly showings on outdoor movie screens of “Ratatouille” the movie.  Clearly one of the best movies ever made and what a great gift to the rats of the world.  To see with their own beady eyes the possibilities they have at their disposal for success and recognition.
6. Funding should be made available for Rat owned bistros and restaurants.  Of course culinary academies will need to be started (there are a lot of rats out there) and fitted out with size appropriate tables, stoves, pots, pans and little rat sized French knives.
7. It is December and pruning time.  All plants that lose their leaves should be pruned at least to clean out the dead, dying and diseased branches.  Most need to be pruned quite a bit. This will cause a big expose for the tree climber community.  If when you are pruning your shrubs, trees and vines you note squirrels looking at you like you are a clear cutting snoot, they are right.  You are guilty and a pair of sunglasses will give you some relief.  Remember, if they can’t see your eyes, they can’t stare you down.  Put on those sunglasses and finish your pruning.
8. Remember that the only true way to keep rodents out of your fruit, vegetables and ornamentals is with proper caging techniques.  This is not easy or simple to really make work and the gardener needs to be diligent in their application.  The rodents, birds and other vertebrates, insects, mollusks and children that mess up our gardens need boundaries.  Give em to them.
9. Good predators are worth their weight in recycled gold.  I’m not kidding here.  If you can get a Great Blue Heron to hang out in your yard you are a better person than I.  Owls are coming up in population in the urban forest.  It may help to put up owl boxes.  They need to be at the right elevation with the right sized hole or the owl won’t identify it as a possible nesting place.  Google owl nesting to learn more. Most important is to start sewing camouflage cat suits. Cats are the best predators for the garden you can have.  The trouble is they come in such cute fluffy colors these days the squirrels, gophers and rats can spot them three properties away.  Kitty camies is the solution here. Also cut back on the crunchies, cats work better a little hungry.
10. Gophers and Rats are fair game.  Squirrels are still protected and it is illegal to trap, poison or otherwise hurt them.  No shooting please, besides being illegal it messes with the music you are blasting into your back yard and now that your cat has full camouflage you will probably blast your cat and the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals will have a dark suited guy knocking on your door in minutes (even though they are lethal injecting thousands of cats every year).  No the solution is really down to one thing.  Meditation, it works when nothing else does.  Just sit still and breathe (if you stop breathing your rodent problems are over anyway) for a few minutes.  You will be amazed at how much better you feel.  Money back guarantee.

Good gardening

Jack McKinnon is a Personal Garden Coach and worked for Sunset Magazine in their gardens for 12 years.  He can be reached at 650-455-0687 or visit his website www.jackthegardencoach.com.

I recently spent a week at the Tassahara Zen Mountain Center.  The experience was, as always quite profound.  Tassahara is a teaching monastery in the Ventana wilderness east of big Sur. The food is extraordinary, the people are amazing and the staff is very supportive of the guests doing personal retreats, practicing meditation or taking workshops.  This month’s tips will reflect some of the observations I made there that relate to gardening.

1. Don’t waste time.  Be aware of how you are in your gardening practice.  One can garden to get a task done or to just be in the garden.  If it is to get a task done, don’t waste time in needless actions.