Canadian Gardening: Hi all fellow Canucks!!, 1 by CoolBreeze

CoolBreeze wrote:
Hi there, well I just joined Dave's garden, so thought I'd introduce myself. It's the beginning of January and I'm already itching to get back at it in the yard!! Hopefully the rest of winter will speed by.

I live in Calgary Canada.....zone 3b...but I have no problems growing zone 4 plants and even have a zone 5er which has hung around for 3 years now. I started gardening about 6 years ago.....just started dabbling when I moved into my house and found myself quickly addicted!! I find gardening to be very relaxing...hard work-but enjoyable and so rewarding. It's kind of like a meditation, I'm in my own world, my own thoughts with my own ideas on how to "create" your own unique master piece or just have fun doing it. Yes I do all the "work" myself, with no help from my partner or anyone. I truly prefer it that way. It's me time. To me it's art and science rolled into one big ball which I find can be quite challenging.

Some of my favourite features in my yard is my pond with a running stream down the back yard. My yard naturally slopes so it works quite well. When I built the pond, of course I didn't think of everything, so had a lot of problems with overflowing and cleaning. So came up with an overflow idea which just kept running to the back of the yard. Works well now with a waterfall feature and recycling pump at the end of the stream. However, I'd tear down the pond in a second if I couldn't have my plants!! I love my plants...some of my favourites are Daylilies;lilies;roses;hostas;and a horde of others. I tried dahlia's this year..had great success and am now totally addicted. So have great plans for the spring!! One thing I do too much of is rearranging. I'm always moving plants from one site to another...can't stop myself...but am becoming more controlled. Gardening is learning from your mistakes...makes it interesting. I also put in an arbour this year, planted 2 clematis with sweet peas..looked good, but will be much nicer when the clematis' mature.

Ok a little bit about myself....born and raised on a farm in southern Manitoba..moved to Winnipeg and then to Calgary....16 years ago. I love Calgary, but Manitoba will always be home to me. I travel a lot...my second favourite thing to do besides garden. Through travelling, I've learned how truly fortunate we are to live in Canada...we have so much here and don't really realize. I'm a very proud Canuck..and find it so rewarding to meet people from different countries and how well we are recieved just for being Canadian. Anyways I look forward to being part of this forum and getting to know some of you.

Oh this is a picture of my pond...after the first snow fall last year.

Later all.