A noun. A verb. A blog.
Do garden sneaks arrive in the night wearing slippers? You could have sworn it was there when you went to bed last night. A beautiful—and pricey—metal obelisk for a clematis to scramble up. This morning: only a empty space where the garden designer installed it. Obelisk? Gone, baby, gone. You had planned on watering the […]
I live in an apartment in the city most of the time, but I have a place in the country, where my big garden is. Oh, the joys of having a Place in the Country! The fresh air, the space, the moon, the stars, the wildlife….the…wildlife that actually lives in your house, with you. Strike […]
Me: Oh, it’s you again. Squirrel: Oh, hey, hi! If it isn’t Lady Bountiful! Thanks for putting out this amaaazing spread! I LOVE what you’re doing here! (Nom nom nom-like scarfing noises) Me: Yeah. Really, um, about that. The spread. I actually….hmm, how do I put this….the spread, It’s really meant for…you know…the birds. Like […]
Drat this vacation. The maniacal rush to get things done before taking a break is screwing up my garden. Next spring, I’ll probably regret not having deadheaded those tarda tulips. Hopefully, all their energies didn’t go into making seed. Just popped out now and sprinkled the seeds over some new ground. Don’t know if this […]
For some years now, Toronto’s meadows, ravines, valleys and now, it seems, gardens have been increasingly blighted with a green pestilence: Dog-strangling vine (Vincetoxicum rossicum). You can see it growing in eerie symmetry on the slopes by the Don Valley Parkway, to about a foot in height. Then, it starts to twine; with each other, […]
Ah, the anticipation of springtime. Waiting for the blooms to unfold after a long and trying winter. I look out over my domain at the sea of green and notice the garden is punctuated… by spikes; yes, once again, spiky stems of snapped-off tulips. Alas, lopped in their prime, before the buds burst into bloom. […]
Sarah launched our blog way back in Ought-Six with a wonderful rant about leaves. It remains true that not everyone has our passion for dead leaves. Every spring, Canadians… urban Canadians… continue to spend a great deal of time and energy raking up leaves and giving them away. Then they go to the garden centre […]
In our neighbourhood this week we all took a collective gulp when these massive recycling bins appeared out of the blue sky on our lawns. They’re BIG. They’re HUUUUUGE. I immediately thought of the opening scene in 2001 A Space Odyssey, when the apes confronted the Big Black Monolith. “What IS it? Why is it […]