Tuesday, April 23, 2013

2013 Growing Season Kickoff



MG Nancy Miller pots up some Iris


Busy day on Monday, April 22.  The Victory Garden had its first day, with introductions, a preview of what we'll be doing, and we then jumped right in and planted potatoes and onions.

The Greenhouse Team started potting up seedlings.

And a whole group of folks joined Laurie Collins in a "Dig, Divide, and Multiply" effort in the pollinator garden - removing some specimens left when the area was used as an ornamental entranceway to the vegetable garden plot, dividing other perennials for the Plant Sale and Herb Garden refurbishment, and doing our best to manage Canada thistle (a life-time project, it seems) and some mugwort that had blown in.

Helianthus - 'Lemon Queen'  - A, native, sterile (won't spread by seed) hybrid cultivar of H. pauciflorus var. subrhomboideus (Stiff Sunflower)  x H. tuberosus (Jerusalem artichoke)
Multiplying!  It may be sterile, in regards to seed production, but Lemon Queen's vegetative growth is still pretty prolific, so should be managed if you have limited space.

MG Paul Luka Digs a Clump for Dividing
Digging.




Digging and Weeding

Dividing





More dividing.

2 comments:

  1. I captured some of the mugwort (Artemisia vulgaris) for the craft bed in the herb garden. It doesn't transplant well but if not, I'm sure to find more later.

    In the same species as Sweet Annie (Artemisia annua- 2014 herb of the year)it's stems and flowers are used in wreath-making and the leaves are good insect repellents - good in sachets and will repel moths.

    Almost every plant has some redeeming quality!

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  2. Yes. My favorite definition of a weed, by Ralph Waldo Emerson, "A plant whose virtues have not yet been discovered." If you need any more mugwort, I have a ton at home :-)

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