Greetings from the Michigan UP!

Hello to all - I've just recently discovered this wonderful site, by accident when I was looking for some information about heating a greenhouse (I've posted a question on that forum). It didn't take me long to realize what a great resource this place is; now my only problem is how to find enough time to explore the wealth of information here! I've been gardening in the upper peninsula of Michigan for about 30 years and have tried lots of different schemes for extending the growing season, but this spring I finally put up an 8-1/2 x 16-1/2 greenhouse, a whole new experience for me! The way things are going so far this year, I should have covered the whole garden - our high daytime temp has yet to hit 70 F. My gardening interests cover everything from the vegetable garden to annual and perennial flowers to fruit trees, flowering shrubs, wild flowers and nature in general! I'm blessed to live in an area where deer eat out of the bird feeder (as well as the garden, of course), eagles routinely fly over our yard, and showy and yellow lady slippers grow on our property. I'm very excited to have found this gardening community and hope to be able to contribute to the knowledge base here. Happy gardening to all!
>>Sandy

Welcome, Weedwhacker, and enjoy this wonderful site. DG is the best garden spot on the web, and it's great to have you with us.

Welcome!! You live in an area I'd love to visit sometime in the winter.

Hello and welcome Weedwhacker. I'm also a new member and have found some really great people here. Warning, Dave's Garden is habit forming. It's the most interesting site on the web.
Bill

Welcome Sandy and looking forward to some of your photos! Sounds just wonderful.

Hello Sandy,

Welcome to Dave's Garden. :)

It sounds like you have a wonderful home. Good luck with that new greenhouse and please post some pictures when you have the time.

I am a pretty new member here too, Sandy. I wish I would of found this site in the Winter or during the rainy season, because I can't seem to leave now that I am here. ha ha...
There's way too much information, many great people and allot of beautiful pictures. I want to see it all!

So much to see and so little time. :(

Welcome again, and I wish you a beautiful weekend,
lauraM

Thanks to everyone for the nice welcome messages; this site is so addictive it's a wonder anyone actually has time to do any gardening once they've found it! ;-)

Sandy....AND LauraM...welcome to our "family"...for that is just what you will find here...extended family! You will love it!

Be sure to go to the Round Up Forum and see if any are near enough for you to attend and meet some of the great people on here......Also we have open chat on Tuesday nights (7 PM EDT) and Tursday morning 7 AM EDT.....come join us....we may even talk about gardening!! LOL Jo

Hi, Sandy! Welcome to DG, even if you are from Michigan. Actually, Notmartha's one of my favorite folks here at DG, and she's from up your way, too.

;) Kimberley in Ohio

HELLO fellow michigander!! Welcome to the best site on the net!!! I followed Dave n Trish here! ;)
I have NO idea how you can handle the cold up there!!! I freeze her in the lower penn.! Im waiting for 80s we have hit 75 so far.

Im having a get together--plant trade here the end of--- june29-it may be warm here by then, maybe hitting mid 70's up there! ;)
im getting out my map to see where you are! hey i cant find you???


Kim thanks for letting me know about our new state rep! ((((((((((GW))))))))))

LOL! Fortunately, I'm in the banana belt of the UP, near the shores of L. Michigan. ;-) Bark River is a little town just South of Escanaba, but actually that's just my post office -- find Escanaba on the map (on L. Mich.) and head towards Menominee on M-35, we're about 8 miles from Esky. I share your dislike of the cold! There must be *some* reason people live in Michigan... (summer comes and we all forget about winter or something) Had frost this morning - hopefully that will be the end of it now!

Oh, Weedwhacker, would I love to visit you! We go through the UP and into Ontario, but we go far North & East. How far across from Traverse Bay are you? Looks like you've got a prime location! Hopefully, we will meet one day :)

brrrrrrrr we didnt get the frost thank goodness!
Ive been all the way to marquett and dang was it cold up there!
Yeah its amazing how we forget about winter for that one month of warmth we have in July!;)
Im glad you are here at davesgarden withall of us! :)

Wowser, I am *so* glad to have found this site! As far as I can tell, everyone here is so positive, supportive, and friendly! (I imagine most of you, like me, have encountered various groups where the nasties overrun the place.)

Morph, I'm assuming you go up through Mich. and over the Mackinac bridge - ? We're about 3 hours from the bridge, part of the highway runs right along L. Michigan and the scenery is beautiful! Lots more beach than there used to be, the lake level is so low right now (where the heck that that amount of water go, anyway?)

NM - I played golf with a group of friends last Saturday and we were about freezing, the wind was just about blowing us off the tee boxes -- we happened to encounter the band "Trick Pony" (I confess I don't really know who they are, but they were playing at our local Indian casino that night) and one of the women I was with went over and said something like "welcome to the UP, how do you like it here?" - their reply was "it's really cold!!" LOL! We *still* haven't hit that 70 mark for a high - this isn't looking like the best gardening summer so far. Must be really boring for people who garden in friendlier climates, where's the challenge?? ;-)

Yep, straight over the Mackinac bridge and then the International bridge further up the road :) I love that part of our country!!!! Maybe some day I can plan a road trip or work it into our yearly trip. If DH were willing, I'd like to find a get-away cabin up there along the 3 hour strip you are talking about :)

Welcome Weedwhacker! We get a lot of immigrants from MI down here in TN for the climate - great long growing season! But I bet the UP is gorgeous in its own way.

Welcome WeedWhacker!Root here,I'm a missplaced Mi. boy,this is my must stop place on the way through the U.P.
Epoupette.

Thanks for the welcome! Root, are you from the UP or "down below" ? (I was raised in Jackson, myself, but have been here since '71 so I consider myself pretty much a Yooper!)

Eanders - it definitely is beautiful up here (even in the winter, as long as you don't have to do the shoveling) - but don't tell anyone or they'll all want to move here! ;-)

I'm from the east side of the lower,Harrisville,below Alpena,I go through the U.P. every chance I get!rode a ten speed to copper harbor one time when I was young,LOL!

Hello and welcome WeedWhacker! We used to drive to Escanaba every year, from the first week in june and stay with the yellow pages crew until the last week in August!! We started out with all our winter clothing, and ended up picking strawberries in our shorts!! We stayed at a little trailer park in Gladstone :)Last year we ice fished on little bay de noc! Beautiful country you have up there :)

Tootsie, you definitely have my area nailed - Escanaba, Gladstone, & Little Bay de Noc! And the weather - one day we're wearing a turtleneck and sweatshirt, the next day shorts and a t-shirt. ROFL - no wonder I never get motivated to buy summer clothes until all the stores just have the fall & winter stuff out!!

Root - you rode a bike to Copper Harbor??? That's definitely an accomplishment!! My niece (no spring chicken anymore herself at 44) rides up through the lower peninsula and over the bridge on Labor Day every year for the last few years; one of these days I may do the bridge walk myself!

Hey There Weedwacker,
I'm an old Michigan Gal, Daddy was a "U-pper" from the Ayotte line...near Escanaba and Hermansville...Love it up there...Nice to meet ya..
Whitewillow

Welcome to DG, you get all your questions answered here and then some LOL
Candee