Northeast Gardening: Reviewing 2015 Projects and Plants, Challenges and Results, 3 by DonnaMack

DonnaMack wrote:
Wow, perlite is bad too? I used to mix up my own potting mix with vermiculite and perlite but it\'s really messy and I started buying the bagged stuff, which is inexpensive, and I read the warnings about vermiculite. I do take it outdoors to mix, and try to mitigate any dust by using lots of water and adding the mix more slowly, which is a drag.

Rosemary, I do move in my rubber hoses every year, but it\'s easy because they are on hose carts. What is more time consuming is moving in at least twenty five 25 foot long soaker hoses, but I do about five at a time, coil them up and stack them at the back of the garage. I am finding that my yard cleanup is now starting in September!

There are always things I want to do and don\'t get around to doing. One of them is to put some kind of barrier around roses the rabbits like to nibble - that\'s only about six. It makes the difference between blooming in May and June, because the roses don\'t have to grow back to their normal height before blooming. That and a lovely variegated japanese kerria they keep nibbling to the ground! I use hardware cloth (about three feet high) and landscape pins. But I also kept promising myself that I would burlap my hydrangea macrophyllas (3) and oakleafs (3) because at my former home it guaranteed bloom. Since we are having a VERY LATE fall (60 degrees for three days this week!) I actually got them all burlapped and used landscape pins to hold the burlap down.

But the other thing I did was to protect most of my peonies and roses with a product called Scroll Top Border Fence. It\'s only 14 inches high, but the sections are 20 feet long. I picked up some nice wire cutters on sale and went outside, put the fencing around them to protect, cut it to fit and, better yet, this stuff has feet that go right into the ground, so no landscape pins. I have peonies on the parkway and the postal carriers have a tendency to cut through and damage them, and seeing the 14 inch fencing stops it. And then, frankly, there is the fun of watching the neighbors freak out because you are using quite large red wire cutters. I have such fun with this - doing things women aren\'t supposed to do. Some people evidently find it shocking, based on the reactions. But it also makes them think that you are a little scary, walking around with your hedge trimmers and pruning the taxus, digging holes, hauling mulch. What else is she capable of? Watch out for her! Some of my neighbors clearly think I\'m from another planet. Great!

Oh, I thought I\'d pass on a caveat. When a grower says that a rose \"resents\" pruning, don\'t buy it. I bought a beautiful Jacquelyn DuPre rose (Harkness), put it in the ground the first year, and it was stellar. Coming out of winter, it had dead wood, which I of course pruned. It barely bloomed year two, and coming out of spring this year (year three) curled up its little feet and died. After I cursed it out, I pulled it out of the ground. Within three feet are thriving roses getting the same treatment. So now I know what \"resenting\"pruning, even necessary pruning of dead wood, really means!

It\'s a shame, because as you can see, it was lovely, and had a wonderful scent. The first two pics were from June of 2013, and the third picture is actually REBLOOM one month later! A pity.