Hi Jeff!

Your stevia flowers should be white, and fairly small.

And the little white flowers with dark centers and glossy leaves sound like periwinkles.

Lavender is easy to grow as long as it has very well-drained soil and is not overwatered, so don't be nervous.

Have you looked at the thyme seeds? They are very, very tiny so they are risky to successfully start outdoors. The smaller the seed, the greater the chance it will wash away, blow away, be covered too deeply or be devoured by small insects before it can sprout. I prefer to start tiny seeds indoors under more controlled conditions. Some people do successfully direct sow it, so it all hinges on whether you want to take the chance on direct sowing.

Your landscape sounds quite lovely. Y'all must be very proud of what you have accomplished with it already.

As far as the unused bed, just a tip to keep in mind as you plan it: be sure to include something that will be of interest in the fall and winter. It is relatively easy to have a good-looking yard in the spring and summer. It requires a lot more thought and planning to have one that has something interesting to look at in the fall and the winter.

Dawn

I was noticing something this morning. I have three basil plants right now. One has almost no leaves left after the cold and will likely not survive. One has some cold-damaged leaves, but looks OK. The other I just planted.

After smelling the one I just planted, I'm noticing a difference between it and the one that went through the cold (but still has leaves).

The new arrival smells strongly of basil, but the other one barely has any scent at all. Is it normal for a stressed-out basil plant to have a more subdued smell?

Anyway, I'll be doing what I can over the next day to start some seeds. I have a lot of seed to work with, so I'll try a few different methods just in case one of them doesn't work.

Jeff
I sure could use some of your youth and energy down here in Ardmore! Could you come on down and lend a hand? LOL...just kidding.
Your yard sounds like it is going to be really pretty. You have some good plants to work with. Let me know if you have sucess in direct sewing the rosemary. They are really tiny seeds. And so far I have not been able to get anything from direct seeding them outdoors.

G.M.

Merryheart,

You mean the thyme? I have rosemary, too, but I plan to baby it a little bit more. It'll be in the fridge for a while along with the lavender seeds. I read they germinate easier if you cut or otherwise score or scrape the hull of the seeds. Anyone tried this?

Anyway, both of these plants will need a very steady temperature as seedlings (70 degrees). I think a window might heat them up too much, but then again there's a lot I don't know about growing from seeds. This will be my first attempt, so don't be shy with the tips.

As for the thyme, I think my best option will be to fill a pot with soil and dust the surface with the seeds. I have plenty of each to work with (about 100 seeds, or 250 of the thyme), so I figure I have room to screw up. I really only want one of each!

Thanks for the compliment on my yard. It will look twice as good when I can get the grass itself looking better. I need to overseed the yard to cover up the bare spots before too long.

Ardmore is a nice place. My mom lived there for a while. For some reason, I always want to add another A in there when I spell the name -- like Aardvark. Heh.

Hi Jeff,

Started to post last night and tell ya what I had done all week-end but I read and was simply exhausted so did not post.

okay Dawn I did not plant 400 tomato plants :)

Put in three for now. Two Better Boys and one is a heritage a friend gave me and I can tell you what kind, just have to wait and see.

Three basils, two Italian parsley, two cilantro (my personal favorite), one flat leaf parsley.

Pepper plants next week-end!

Flowers:

100 new oriental and asian lily bulbs.
100 peacock orchids bulbs.
50 new day lillies.
10 new impatiens.
More petunias.
Some exotic thing without a tag but has interesting foliage and a stock with purple blooms. It is not a standard salvia. (I will do my research)
Moved two beds of cannas which were about 8 ft long by two ft. They were getting invasive last year and I need more space.
One standard tree rose, Cocoa.
One Pink Diamond hydrangea tree.
Five elephant ears.

Now I have had the fence in the back rebuilt and extended to the front of the house. Without thinking this leaves one of my beds with daylilles in almost total shade all day. They will live but the blossoms will not be great, so next week end------move the day lillies from that bed to another I have to build and replant some hydrangea in that area. I have so many along my north wall they are crowded and need a little more space. I crowd everything together at first for instant volume then end up moving things.

Next week-end the shady base of the oak tree, coleus, etc.

Anyway, one of the girls at work asked me if I was going home tonight and work out. I told her I did not have a spot on my body that was not sore. But I can not think of a better way to work out than plant and make everything pretty. Pretty is good!

You sounded like you had a very productive week-end and I bet you can walk and move your arms today. Oh youth how great was it.

Anyway, I would love to see your pixs, before and afters are great.

Steffie

Steffie,

Just reading your list of what you did in your landscape totally and completely wore me out! You know, when I work that hard in the garden, I know I am going to be too sore to sleep well for a couple of days. I hope the aches and pains don't keep you awake. I have noticed as I get older that it takes me longer to recover. :(

I didn't do much this past weekend. I get most of my gardening done during the week when DH and DS are gone.
I will be doing a lot the next few days and I'll tell you what I've accomplished after it is done. All I did today was mow and weed-eat 2 acres. And I broke the lawnmower too.

Tomorrow I need to begin my day cleaning out the tornado shelter, sweeping it, and spraying it with Spider Web Eliminator. How does a tornado shelter that is hardly ever used get so dirty? I guess the dirt and bugs come in through the vent.

The roses are blooming and are so lovely that I can't stand it. The tall verbena is blooming and is about 3' to 4' tall. It is a butterfly magnet. Saw a question mark butterfly today.

I did pull up about a gazillion four o'clock seedlings that are sprouting EVERYWHERE that I have mulch. I wonder if we can blame the birds or the wind for those seedlings?

And the purple martins have babies in their nests and I love to listen to them chirp.

More hummers today than usual. I don't know if they are here to stay or just passing through.

We have a LOT more birds of all kinds this year, including some I've never seen before. I don't know if all of them are staying, or if some of them will be moving on. We do have a large grasshopper population for this early in the year, so maybe the birds are hanging around to help the guineas eat the hoppers.

My fenced-in vegetable garden will be completely full by the end of this week if I get everything done that I have planned. Then I start work on the unfenced 'overflow beds'. I would really like to get those fenced in this year, but doubt I can convince DH it is 'necessary'.

We've had a chance of rain in our forecast the last couple of days, but no rain has fallen here.

Dawn

Steffie:

Yeah, you're right. Please don't hate me. I had a little stiffness in my biceps yesterday, and that was from holding the tray of plants while we shopped at the festival, not from the actual gardening.

The good news is, I think my wife has finally "come around" on the gardening stuff. As you might have noticed, we bought far more flowers than we bought herbs. She's even e-mailing me this morning about work we can do on the yard, the fence, and the other flower beds.

She didn't used to be interested in this, and now she is. I'm enjoying it even though it means I have to spend less time working on my pet project -- the herb garden.

Today I'll be mulching with compost in the herb garden as well as the flower garden. Your herb garden sounds fantastic, Steffie. I need some cilantro/coriander as well as thyme, rosemary, peppers, savory, garlic, aloe vera, spearmint, more chamomile, and more parsley.

Geez. Herb gardening is like Pokemon. I've got to catch them all.

I guess I have kind of a utilitarian style of gardening. I like to have things I can use.

I absolutely love, love, love cilantro! I enjoy using it in cooking, making salsa, but most of all (crazy lady here) I love the smell of it. Since the sense of smell is the most powerful, I must have had some hidden memory of contact with cilantro cause I will just pull a couple of leaves and carry it around with me. When I went to the garden center I had no intention of buying it but when I walked in the green house, I smelled the petunias and then the cilantro and headed right to it.

I am thinking about working on some more herbs this week-end. I just have the small area under the tree to plant and then I will need to fill up the beds with some veggies and herbs. And as I told Dawn, old Southern ladies always grow tomatoes. Shirley MacLaine in Steel Magnolias, always loved that movie.

Speaking of movies and no one was but Pirates 3! That week-end I will be at the movie theater with popcorn and a big diet coke and enjoying,enjoying,enjoying.

Well it is late, my shoulders are still sore from gardening and oh yeah, I remember biceps, been a few years but I do remember what they were like, sigh :)

Enjoy herbing----I have a good time doing it and I know you will love the smell, sight, and the tastes. They are so much better when you can just go cut them rather than settling for "store bought".

Evening, Steffie

I always plant a couple of packets of cilantro seed around the garden, and usually I don't harvest it and use it. Instead, I leave it in place to bloom and to enjoy. The tiny flowers attract tons of beneficial insects, and I like the way it smells when I brush up against it as I walk down a pathway between raised beds. Before the cold spells hit us, I had cilantro that was about 3" tall. It all froze on the last night we hit 32 degrees two weekends back, so I guess I'll plant some more this week. Sometimes it reseeds itself in my garden.

And, Steffie, I don't even buy store-bought fresh herbs anymore because they seem so lacking in flavor. I bought some this winter and they were pitiful. :(

Enjoy your movie this weekend. I'll be down in Fort Worth for son's graduation from the fire academy and hope to squeeze in a few nursery visits. I can't go to Fort Worth without visiting the nurseries I used to frequent when I lived there.

Dawn

Hey guys.

I'm doing my morning coffee and walk through the garden routine. I don't know what happened in the last few days, but my herb garden has really taken off.

My sage is sprouting these long, blade-like leaves as opposed to the little rounded ones they used to have.

My parsley is nice and bushy, with lots of new growth, and is standing tall.

My dill, which used to be floppy and hung over to the side, is now a deep green and standing up on its own.

The chamomile is branching out in every direction and producing lots of flowers.

Even one of the basil plants that survived the cold is looking better than ever and has a great smell to it.

The tomato plants are looking leafier, but not much taller. One of them has a tiny yellow flower. Do I leave the flower where it is, or should I pinch it off? It was quite a surprise because I didn't know tomato plants had flowers.

The only thing not doing anything at all is my pepper plant. I want to uproot it and start over later on with another plant in the same location, but my wife told me to leave it.

Anyway, things are looking good. I don't know what went right. I put some slow-releasing Miracle Grow on it this weekend, but it wouldn't have taken effect yet. I also used some Miracle Grow formula for tomatoes last week.

Maybe it's the rain, or the cow manure, or the compost mulch, but something really helped these plants along. They look great.

My only worry is how big some of them are getting. They're starting to touch one another. I wonder if they'd mind being moved to a location with more room?

Hello all you "old Southern ladies"
(big grin on my face while calling you all that)

Thanks Steffie for the reminder of being old...haha.

I just had to add my two cents on the scents of herbs. For me it is rosemary and sweet basil. I LOVE the scent of both. When I went to the nursery I got a basil leaf to carry around with me to sniff. I actually plant my rosemary in my flower beds so I can hit them with a spray of water and get that lovely scent. Or brush them with my hand while tending the beds.

When we have enough tomatoes I make pasta sauce and our favorite is with the fresh basil.

My DH loves cilantro too...I have a small clump of that also. Tell me..do you all harvest and replant your cilantro? It goes to seed so fast and I have read that you need to replant throughout the growing season. And do you use your own sees from the plant or bought ones?

Another of my scent addictions is mosquito plant...lol. (Citronella plant, lemon scented geranium, Something pelergoniam...whatever you want to call it....lol) I love the scent and it really seems to work in keeping mosquitoes at bay around my patio. I crush leaves and rub them on me if needed. I hate using the mosquito sprays...I am allergic to most of them...ugh that smell.
I have read that mosquitoes do not like anything lemon scented. Have you all ever heard that? I LOVE lemon scents so I will saturate myself in lemon scents this summer and see if it helps. I fear we may have a bad summer with mosquitoes as much rain as we have been getting.

Jeff I am so happy for you that your little wife is getting "into" gardening too. It will be such fun for you both if you do it together. That is just great!

As to Aardmore (spelled like Aardvark..lol)...whatever works for you is okay by me. Ardmore is okay I suppose. It has many nice qualities and some which are not so nice. The not so nice ones being limited shopping. But oh well that is what is fun about getting out of town..having a place to SHOP till I drop. haha

Steffie I admire that you have so many bulb-type things planted. I would dearly love to have more bulb beds. Some of mine seems to be missing this year from my bulb bed. Ranuclulous (spelling?)....it has never appeared at all. They are such pretty little flowers and I had them planted around the outer edges of my bed...but so far no sign of them.

Some of my other flowers have disappeared as well: Dianthus, Mexican petunias, periwinkle which normally reseeds. My hostas disappeared last summer. There may be others. What happens when plants are just suddenly gone? Poof!

There are too many mysteries to gardening!

And Dawn-you just blow me away! I get amazed reading the lists of things that you plant or have growing already. I try to imagine how your place must look. Oh my! It sounds like a little piece of paradise. (If you are doing all the work that is....lol).

You are all so knowledgable and work so hard in your yards and gardens it makes me feel inferior...lol. But I do love hearing about all your adventures!

Ya'll have a great day!
G.M.

Good morning southern ladies and gents!

I have waited all my life to be one of those 'old southern lady gardeners' like the ones I so admired in my youth.

If you are a southern lady, you are pretty much required to grow tomatoes and tons of flowers, right? And herbs too. And you always know the home remedies, like growing certain plants to repel mosquitoes or growing mint to add flavor to your iced tea. And you grow 'heirloom' plants.....only you remember when they weren't really considered heirlooms. lol

Southern ladies often have roses, irises, crape myrtles, lilacs, crinum lilies, cannas and lots of 'pass-along' plants, given to them by beloved relatives and by other southern ladies (and southern gentlemen too).

I could go on forever....I just think that calling a lady (no matter her age!!!) an 'old southern lady' is a huge compliment! It is a title we should all wear proudly!

Jeff, It sounds like what happened in the last few days is that your garden finally got warmth and sunshine and is celebrating with explosive growth. The growth and changes from now until about the third week of June will amaze you.
About the third week of June, summer arrives with its blistering heat and the growth of many plants slows down.

It sounds like your herbs are doing quite well.

Your tomato plants will grow out and get a little bushier first, and then they will began to gain in height also. Once they take off, you will know it as they will be growing at the rate of 1" to 2" taller per day.

Those yellow flowers are your future tomatoes! They are "perfect blossoms", meaning that they pollinate themselves. (Or, at least they are supposed to pollinate themselves.) The flower contain both the male and female reproductive structures. Some insects will visit the tomato flowers and may cross-pollinate a few, but the plants can produce fruit without the insects as long as there is a little wind to make the flowers move.

Some people remove early flowers so the plants can put all their energy into growing roots and new topgrowth early in the season. I don't do that because I want my plants to make fruit as soon as possible before the heat really hits and the pollination problems begin to occur. If I lived and gardened in a cooler location where heat isn't a problem (like in Pennsylvania or New York, for example,) I might remove the early flowers to encourage more plant growth.

Pepper plants are just slower to take off. Just forget about it and ignore it, and then one day you will realize it has begun to grow! Peppers are one of those plants that don't like to be rushed, so let it do its thing.

Most plants transplant well at this time of the year, so move them soon if you want to move them at all. I prefer to move them on a cloudy day as it helps limit the amount of transplant shock. They won't grow much for a couple of weeks after being transplanted because they are recovering from the move and putting out new roots.

And, as far as what is working in your garden.....you are! Your efforts and the soil amending you have done is what is giving you the wonderful growth you're seeing now. Well, that and the sun and the rain. Isn't it great to look at your garden and say to yourself "I did that!!" Oh, what a feeling! And I was delighted to hear that your spouse is getting into gardening also. It is such a wonderful hobby to share....and for many of us it is more than a hobby, it is really a lifestyle.

Merry Heart,

I love the scent of many herbs as well, including rosemary. I interplant herbs all over my flower beds and veggie rows so I can be surrounded with the many lovely scents. Today I will be going back and planting some small basil plants (Italian large leaf, Purple Ruffles, Opal, Lime, Lemon, Spicy Globe and Little Leaf) in between my tomato plants. Will do the same with dill, both mammoth and fernleaf.

When we have enough tomatoes, I make pasta sauce too. During certain parts of the summer, I am able to make it with my own tomatoes, garlic, onions and herbs. We make a lot of our own salsa, too, which is one of the reasons I grow so many kinds of peppers.

I let my cilantro flower and go to see and reseed itself, although it has a little more trouble reseeding itself now that I use so much mulch! I harvest some and use it, but I just like having it around to flower too.

I do think lemon-scented plants repel mosquitoes. Still, living here in the boonies as we do, with all the ponds and creeks and springs (not to mention the river) nearby, we will always have some mosquitoes. I think the bats and purple martins help keep them under control. I use the Bt dunks in my ponds to help control the mosquitoes too.

I hate all the mosquito repellents, but will spray my shoes and socks and pantlegs when I am mowing or otherwise doing something out in the pasture.

As far as disappearing plants and where they go.....I think a lot of it can be blamed on the two years of drought. Some plants may have survived but didn't have the vigor to reseed last fall, or to come back this spring.

Merry heart, don't be too blown away by the list of what's blooming. Don't forget that I have a very large piece of property and my stuff is scattered here and there, so it doesn't make as large of an impact as that much stuff would in a smaller landscape! And, as you well know by now, I spend a disporportionate amount of time in veggie land, so the flowers and other plants don't get enough attention.

And please, do not feel inferior to anyone else on this forum. We are all simply gardeners, doing what we do. Some people are more into lawns, and their lawns would put mine to shame. Some are more into landscapes, and I adore their descriptions and photos, and know mine does not measure up to theirs. Some grow exotic plants I would never tackle, and some have good soil and can grow things I can't. But we are all gardeners and we all do it because we love it. No inferiority complexes allowed!! For me, gardening is all about the journey, and not the destination. If my landscape and garden ever get to where they match the image in my head that I am trying to achieve, will I be satisfied and say, 'there, I have done it'? No, I will create a new dream garden in my head and begin working to achieve that. Gardening is an adventure every single day, and it is one that never ends.

Now, out to the garden to do some work!

Dawn

Jeff and all the other gentlemen on here...

Please excuse my faux pas on not including all the "southern gentlemen" on here in my comment as well.

But I do know we just can't consciously refer you as "old" in any sense...LOL. You are younger than my son....he is 35! so if I ever get "bossy" please just realize it is my "mothering" instincts....lol.

Ya'll have a GREAT day ya hear? (did that sound southern enough for ya'll)? lol

G.M.

Heh. Well, I'm not really a "Southern" anything. I'm an Okie!

If you guys are interested in lemon-scented plants, grow some verbena. I got some at the herb festival, and with a little brush of the fingers, you can smell the lemons. It's a great smell. I'd use it to repel mosquitoes, but I've never been bothered by them. I haven't been bitten by one in years. I can barely remember what it feels like.

I love the smell of rosemary, too. I really wish I'd have planted a transplant instead of buying seeds. For me, the effect is greatest when I put some chopped rosemary in a pot of homemade chicken noodle soup! It adds the most perfect smell and flavor. It fills the whole house!

Back when I had access to fresh rosemary, I'd use it instead of sugar for my Italian sauces. Works great in lasagna -- the dish I do best.

Dawn, thanks for telling me what I can expect in the next few weeks until summer arrives. It's useful information. I like to know what to anticipate.

I'll leave the tomato flower alone because getting a tomato, even a tiny green one, would be encouraging. I'll also leave the pepper plant alone, but he's on probation! And I still plan to get some more before too long.

Another thing I've been wondering about lately is which of my plants I'll have to take inside when it gets cold (see how I like to think ahead?) I'll ask about that later.

Have a great day, ladies.

I know we are all in the same time zone, but your posting times are wigging me out today. It looks like you are posting in the future. I had never noticed before that the posting time is an hour ahead since I usually read them at night, not as they are happening.

I am in Zone 6 so, of course, my garden is considerably behind most of you. I had just finished putting in my tomato plants on Monday and of course they hadn't had time to establish. I had spent Tuesday in the garden adding a few peppers, and cages around my peppers and trying to beat the rain. I came in and took a shower and turned on Tulsa TV station. No programing....just weather...severe weather warnings...you know the kind, high winds up to 70 mph, torrential rainfall, possible large hail, etc. Well I put my dirty gardening clothes back on and headed back out. After putting 53 flower pots on top of tomatoes, peppers, and squash, I came back inside to hear, "This storm isn't producing as much hail as we had anticipated! "Now they tell me!!!

But let me tell you, we did get rain and more rain. So now I had a new problem.....getting 53 black buckets off my plants before they heated up today.....in my MUDDY garden. I walked carefully and tried to step on established pathways, but toward the end where I had just planted peppers yesterday, I stepped in soft dirt, (or an underground tunnel or something, LOL) My foot went down, toe first into the mud.....about a foot down. I had an arm load of pots, my shoe came off in the hole, my bare foot continued into the next step so went straight down into the next muddy spot as I tried to keep my balance. I am standing on one foot, like an overweight crane, with an armload of pots while I try to retrieve my lost shoe from the mud. Not a pretty sight.

I have never been big on growing herbs. I have some mint, basil and oregono but nothing more. I hate cilantro! I hate the way it taste and the way it smells. I refuse to eat in some mexican places because everything taste like cilantro. In my opinion, lots of good food is ruined by adding it. Sorry gardeners, just my opinion.

I have grown rosemary and a few other things, but I usually just forget to buy the seeds. Guess I need to be more adventureous.....and make my garden bigger.

I don't think I will be in the garden much this week as the forecast looks like we can expect a lot more rain. I am trying to arrange things so I can be in OKC for Saturday if that is still on. We will see. Carol

Dawn
I have a question. When you interplant in your gardens with herbs, flowers or whatever, do you crowd them in or do you try to leave all the space they recommend on planting?
I mean like for instance in my tomato bed for example...I have left a good 18 inches to 2 feet between plants...would you now go into that 18 inches of space and plant a flower or herb? I don't know how much to crowd mine up.
Here let me make this easy for you to answer..haha...how much space is between your tomatoes and the flowers you plant with them at the time of planting?
I was having trouble making myself clear on this one...lol.
I am most interested in making my veggie beds sort of like yours sound to be. I get these mental pictures each time I read your posts. They just sound wonderful...like a real sensory experience...with all the lovely flowers and ripe veggies, and the smells of herbs....ah....no wonder you love gardening so much. A thrill for sight, smell and Taste..and no doubt hearing as well.
Thanks for your tips.
G.M.

That's a good question, Merryheart.

I disregarded the tags on most of my plants when it came to planting positions. I'm wishing I would have listened now, though, because they are starting to grow together.

My dill, sage, basil and chamomile were planted very close together (they're all within about a three-foot by two-foot space). I'm thinking of moving some of them.

Lunchtime! And, the weather radio just went off, but that's only because they test it every Wed. at noon, and I always forget it is testing day, and jump out of my skin when the alarm goes off. Every single week. You would think my brain would say, 'don't jump....it's the weekly test". But, no, I jump right out of my skin. lol

You know, I have to eat at my computer so I can see what everyone is saying and doing! We had sunshine this morning and now big old lines of gray clouds are rolling across and the sunshine is gone.

Jeff, Growing up in Fort Worth, I always felt part southern and part western, especially with Fort Worth's serious western heritage. However, by attitude towards life in general and gardening in particular, I consider myself a southerner. Of course, I am an Okie too.

As far as which plants to pot up and take inside in the fall, consider the following:

a) space available and size of plants
b) available light
c) what plants will give you the biggest pay-off
d) what plants will transplant back into the ground most easily in the spring
e) general health of the plants under consideration

If it were me, I would give highest priority to any herbs I wanted to be able to have available for cooking. Fresh herbs in the winter are SO wonderful.

I would give higher priority to plants that need less light. Those that are big light guzzlers are unlikely to be 100% happy so may not produce as well.

Herbs and peppers can be kept going inside and put back out into the ground in the spring. Tomatoes can be treated the same way, but tend not to produce as well since they pretty much use up their energy in one growing season. There are some people in places like California and Florida who manage to keep tomatoes going for many months if not years, but productivity drops as time goes on.

Carol, The time thing really drives me nuts too. And I have been in the same boat you were in yesterday. It is frustrating to spend all that time needlessly covering plants up BUT you know that you MUST cover up the plants when lousy weather is forecast, because you'd be so full of regret if you don't cover them up and the hail bashes them to smithereens!

Your story of removing the black pots in all the mud is priceless, and please know that I am laughing with you, and not at you, because that kind of thing happens to me all the time. Because the land south of us is higher than our land, I garden on a slope, and the water drains UNDERGROUND from the higher land for days and days and days after a good rain. As I descend lower into the garden, each pathway is muddier than the one before, and sometimes the pathways are simply full of standing water. If I didn't have raised beds, I'd have no garden at all, and I am always filthy dirty and/or muddy.

And go ahead and hate cilantro all you want! We all have different tastes. I like a little cilantro in things, but my DH (who is the supreme salsa maker) LOVES the stuff. He has to make 2 types of salsa....a regular one for all the rest of us with just a little cilantro, and his own version for himself with so much cilantro in it that I think all you taste is the cilantro!

I am glad we had a little rain here, maybe just over an inch yesterday, and I hope we don't get anymore today, although the skies are looking pretty rain-filled right now. Most of y'all get more rain than we do, and I can only imagine how frustrating it is in the spring when you can't get into the garden for days.

G.M., I vary the way I plant my garden, doing it one way one year and a different way another year.

This year, I have wide spacing between my tomato plants, about 2.5 feet between rows (most of my raised beds have two rows of tomato plants) with the plants 3 feet apart within the rows. The herbs are generally planted right in between the two plants, so the herb is 1.5 feet from the tomato plant on either side of it. The flowers are used more like an edging. They are generally planted right along the board that edges the bed. On the south side of the tomato plants I plant sun-loving flowers and on the north side I plant flowers that can tolerate a little more shade as the tomato plants will pretty well shade them all summer long.

I plant the tomato plants first. Once they are well established and are between about 18" to 30" tall, then I come back and plant the annual flowers and the herbs. Of course, some herbs, like the lemon balm, come back on their own and I don't have to replant them. By giving the tomato plants a head start, I don't have to worry that the herbs and flowers are going to be competing with the tomatoes as they are establishing themselves. I think it makes sense to interplant different things together. It seems to confuse the bad insects and to attract good insects. And just look at how everything grows in nature....all jumbled together, not in nice little linear rows.

By June my garden is a complete and total jungle. I am forever 'hacking back' something that is getting crazily out of control, and I just love it. And, if it is a really bad year for the veggies, the herbs and flowers help make up for it.

Another reason I love to interplant herbs and flowers with veggies is to get the advantages of companion planting. Sometimes it is hard to remember what plants are good companions with one another, but I usually figure it all out. I consider the herbs and flowers to also serve as a living mulch for the veggies. As they grow, they help shade out any weeds that might be trying to come up and grow in the mulch.

I catch all kinds of flack from my local 'old farmer/old rancher' neighbors who believe the only proper vegetable garden is one with big rows of dirt in between narrow rows of veggies. According to them, I do almost everything "wrong", especially since I won't take their advice and use chemicals. I'll tell you though, that THEY are the ones coming to me to see if I have any tomatoes or melons or whatever in the summer. (They do bring me their extra stuff when they have stuff to share, but my stuff is ALWAYS earlier, and usually produces more per square foot, as well.)

I have a particular old farmer of whom I am quite fond. He is the age my dad would be if he were still living. When this guy stops by to 'chat', he is really stopping by to see what's growing, what's not, what's ripe, etc. He gets so depressed when I have the 'first ripe tomato" that I don't even tell him any more.

I love my veggie garden and wouldn't change it for anything. I like it in early spring when it is neat and orderly and I LOVE it in early summer when it is a massive jungle.

Back outside to plant some more before it rains.

Dawn

Great stories, Dawn. You show those old farmers!

I could listen to you talk all day, and your methods are interesting. I know what you mean about random placement of plants. It does make it look more natural.

I did, however, plant some flowers in rows in the front garden. The effects with the colors and the placement is striking.

I'm thankful for the rain we're getting. The conditions seem to really be helping my plants. I guess nature does know best.

Hi Jeff,

You know, it is not that I am just totally opposed to straight rows, but in my situation, wide raised beds work for me. One reason is that I have to improve every inch of soil, so the improved beds are precious to me and I don't want to waste an inch. The old farmer types who work their fields use tractors and I don't, so they need all that space between rows, and I don't. So, they have wide paths and narrow rows and I have wide rows and narrow paths. I can accept that they do it one way and I do it another. Why can't they???? It drives me nuts. And my way works better, and they know it. That drives them nuts. lol

I think patterned placement in flower beds can look quite striking, and sometimes I plant in rows myself. See, I am not onery all the time. :)

And in case you are wondering, my old farmer pals have almost quit trying to change my ways because, whether they want to admit it or not, my organic methods work. And every now and then one of them will say "what do you do for...." some garden problem, so I think maybe I am making a little progress.

I'm glad the rain is falling, too, but I wish I could 'save' some of it for July and August.

Guess what? I'm about to make dinner and we're having BLT sandwiches, with fresh, home-grown tomatoes from my two Better Bush plants. Know what that means???? It REALLY is spring!

Dawn

Just got home from work--------it is chilly outside! Okay, here we go again? No actually I remember a 4th of July where I wore a light sweater watching fireworks, several years ago. I have my own personal warm fronts so if I wear a sweater it has got to be chilly.

Jeff, Okie? Kid I cry when I am at the football games and the band plays "Oklahoma" But I am a Southern lady when it comes to gardening and lifestyle. Trust me, I have relatives, I married into the pack, from California and Washington state and believe me I would rather consider myself Southern. At least I have some manners and I try to be kind to all people, even though I will tork off occassionally. These people have their gardeners come in and do the "yard work" and pay them nothing. I get all kinds of grief cause I am so Okie.

Okay, enough of that, my tomatoes look wonderful but no blossoms yet. Of course did not get them planted until last week-end.

It is okay not to like cilantro, I hate beets and english peas and wine. I also hate the color orange.

Well, I am going to put on a sweater while dinner is cooking and mulch a bed. Chat more later after my "chores" are done!

Steffie

I like cilantro.

I hate green bell peppers. I don't eat peas, either, but I wouldn't say I hate them.

Dawn You have large beds and mine are not large at all. They are four foot wide and 8 foot long. There are four of those size beds. I have other beds for flowers but those are my veggie beds.

According to how you plant yours I just flat don't have room to plant a lot of stuff in with mine. Not and leave room for anything to grow...haha. They start off each spring looking so empty...but mid summer or later they are so overgrown.

I am going to try to remember to prune the tomatoes this year though like you mentioned a few weeks ago. I had always wondered about doing that.

I would love to have been watching and listening to some of your conversations with the farmers...hahaha. I can just imagine what it must have been like.

It reminds me of a guy I know who thought his ways of growing tomatoes was the only way to grow them. He would tell me that I was this wrong and that wrong. But the last several years his 'maters only bare for a little while then they just stop and he pulls them out. I leave mine even when they are not bearing hardly at all, and I tend them and water them and wait and sure enough when it cools off I am the one with all the green tomatoes for chow chow and such things and he has nothing. lol.

I can well imagine you do just blow their southern Okie minds with all your crops! And they would be as green with envy as i feel right now if they all knew you were eating a tomato from your own garden TONIGHT. The 25th of April!!!
Oh my...you are making my mouth water. lol.
Enjoy! You deserve it!

Steffie my DH comes from Detroit, Michigan area...he didn't even know what okra was when we got married. He thought it was a pepper of some kind. His kids laugh at the way I talk which is what my uncle calls a 'Red River drawl' but I will take the south any day over their winters which last about 9 or 10 months out of the year or so it seems to me....lol. They all tease me about being southern and being an Okie. So does my best friend who lives in Pennsylvania. But I will just happily be an Okie and it suits me fine...lol. They all make me feel like some kind of pioneer or something...haha.

G.M.

Hi Y'all!

Steffie, I remember that cold Fourth of July weekend. It was awful!

G.M., Love the story of your neighbor. My farmer neighbors are like that. Tear out their plants and then come around wanting my tomatoes. The first time I gave one of them some of the Black Krim tomatoes, he thought I was giving him rotten tomatoes. lol Now he asks me all the time "you got any of those black ones" and he got mad at me last year when I gave some of the black tomatoes to someone else! He told me to not give away black ones to anyone but him!!! I assured him I had enough for everyone and he said I shouldn't have let anyone else know about the black ones "cause now they'll want them all". It was hysterical. Now, he won't grow a black one in his own garden because they don't 'look right' but he'll eat every black tomato I give him.

The BLT was delicious, and I'm not bragging. I have waited so long for a tomato that tastes like a tomato. Hoping to have more ripe ones in 4 or 5 days.

My DH was born in Virginia but grew up in Pennsylvania. So, he claims that he is a southerner, but I always tell him he was a 'damn Yankee' when he moved to Texas. His response? I got here as soon as I could. He is very southern, now.

Gotta to watch American Idol and see who gets voted off. I'm thinking it will be Chris.

Talk to y'all later.

Dawn

GM, I'm with you on the basil. I can't seem to get it to grow here, though. At the house in Bartlesville, it grew two feet tall and bushy. Once I brought some in to a co-worker who was going to make tomato sauce and I rode up the elevator with a woman who grew wide-eyed and got off on the next floor. I heard her first sneeze as the door closed. Didn't even think about how some people might be allergic to it. So glad I'm not.

Droogie, have you ever noticed that when you have a lightning storm it seems like everything just shoots up over night? Someone told me lightning puts nitrogen in the air, but I don't know if this is true.

Dawn, lemon balm is a weed at my house. I cannot keep it from spreading, coming up between bricks, crowding out and suffocating things I really didn't want to lose. I really enjoy herbs and planted it for it's nice lemon scent. It is attractive and makes nice tea, too. But is just 'way too prolific. Now if only I could get basil to grow....

I don't think I could pass for a southern belle. Maybe a REDNECK WOMAN....

Oh my gosh Ilene you are a hoot! redneck woman....haha. Oh well I guess that is what a lot of the world thinks of us Okies anyway. I am sure some of the Yankees I have met thought that about me...but I don't keep a spit cup on my ironing board...haha

Your lemon balm sounds like my perilla...rapidly becomes a weed. Susan was it you who figured out what it was I have invading my yard? Not for sure who it was right now but whoever told me what it was, Thank You! Did you know I looked it up today and it is actually used for cooking in some countries? and is used in some natural medicine for certain things? This is just part of the info I found:
Perilla
Perilla frutescens
Other Names: Ao Shiso, Beefsteak plant, Ji Soo, Perilla, Purple Perilla, Shiso, Wild basil, Wild red basil, Chinese basil, Purple mint, Rattlesnake weed, Summer coleus It says...Perilla smells funny, which is no wonder since you will usually find it in cow pastures. Rub leaves on your skin and clothes on hikes to repel ticks. Also a good companion plant for tomatoes. Harvest before seeds form, very invasive if allowed to seed.

I actully think it has a pleasant sort of odor....sort of like licorice is how it smells to me. I guess I will leave a little of it but I have about a thousand babies growing bigger daily and I need to get a ton of it pulled out.

Well it is past my bedtime...haha.
G.M.

Y'all are havin' too much fun here, so I'll pipe in for a short discussion.

The northern half of Oklahoma is considered upper south, and the southern part of Oklahoma is considered middle south.

I just bought the most wonderful book at Borders on Southern Living - Plants Suited to the South. It is marvelous, and even includes wildflowers as well as many ornamentals, and heat zone indices, you name it! I have poured over the pages of that book so much already it is beginning to look doggeared.

I had never heard of cilantro until I lived in Dallas in 1993-1995. A friend of mine, who was actually from Loosiana, turned me on to cilantro, and lots of the Mexican restaurants down there make their salsa dip with lots of cilantro. Even the Dominican restaurant used it in their black bean dip. I loved the food in Dallas, too. No Mexican restaurant in OKC can top this little hole-in-the-wall restaurant we used to eat at, at least twice a week. Decor was horrible, and the place looked like it had been in a western shoot-out. But, people would line up for a block to eat lunch there, even the big suits! They had THE best chicken enchies I've ever eaten, and the best salsa, too. Anyway, I LOVE cilantro now. It's just not salsa without it IMHO.

We make our own guacomole and I've used cilantro in it, too, but my daughter doesn't care for it, so usually it is just avocados, lots of fresh garlic, fresh lemon juice, tomatoes, cumin, chili pepper powder, and a bit of cayenne, and that's about it. Everybody loves it, and it lasts, uh, about one night.

Yes, I ID'd the perilla for you. It is awful stuff IMHO. I don't like the smell of it well enough to use it in cooking, and have you ever noticed what a yucky color purple stuff turns when you cook it? For instance, red onions look like slugs after you cook them. Yuck, yuck, yuck! So, I don't cook red onions, and I've never used perilla to cook with, altho it is a popular Asian herb.

Basil grows fine for me here, and sometimes it will even reseed in a mild winter. My lemon balm doesn't get out of hand because of where it is planted. I am getting ready to plant parsley and fennel, and another lavendar 'Provence' I picked up at HD today for $3. I need to replace my rosemary which I lost over this last winter. Actually, I was surprised it survived this long, because it was not the hardiest cultivar around.

I planted some Mexican mint marigold - anyone have that one? Then, I read that we may not have a long enough season for it to flower well. Oh, well. Maybe some bugs will like it.

Remind me not to take my granddaughter shopping for plants with me again. She wanted everything! She wanted pink flowers, purple flowers, white flowers, red flowers. We came home with a lot of flowers, don't cha know?

Ilene, I've never noticed that about lightening before, but now you've given me food for thought, and I'll keep an eye on things. What fun!

Droogie - I hate green bell peppers, too. In fact, I don't like peppers at all. But, I love peas, tomatoes, okra, summer squashes of all kinds (just not winter), eggplant, broccoli, cauliflower, green beans, corn, pretty much everything else. I will try anything the first time around.

Dawn, Fort Worth is not all totally western. I went to a marvelous art exhibit there years ago (1995) of impressionist art, many original Van Goghs, Renoirs, Degas', Monets, Seurats, and Toulouse-Latrecs. It was quite an exhibit!

SUsan

Hi Y'all!

Ilene, Do you have any idea why basil won't grow for you? Have you tried it from seed and from transplants both?

My lemon balm doesn't reseed, but it is in a very heavily mulched area where even the pathways are mulched. If it drops seeds and they wash downhill, they end up in the wildlife pond, so they don't get a chance to grow. I have been wishing it would reseed, but now that I know how prolifically it could reseed, maybe it is better that it doesn't.

I read an article once in a gardening magazine that said the lighting does release nitrogen into the air and that it is great for the plants.

Susan, I have grown Mexican Mint Marigold here, and it blooms like crazy. Mine got about 3' tall and bloomed from late July on into the fall. It was in full sun and in heavy clay. It came through 2 winters but froze the 3rd winter. I think it is reliably hardy only to zone 8. You will love it.

And, you are right, Susan, Fort Worth is not totally western. It actually has a great many cultural attractions, including the Kimbell Museum, the Museum of Modern Art and the Amon Carter Museum. The exhibit you saw was probably at the Kimbell as the Amon Carter is usually only American art, and especially Western art. But, because it IS Fort Worth after all, it also has these museums too: the Cattle Raisers Museum, the National Cowgirl Museum and Hall of Fame, the Texas Cowboy Hall of Fame and the National Cowboys of Color Museum as well as the Texas Civil War Museum. One of the chamber of commerce's slogans is "Cowboys and Culture". I love Fort Worth but it is becoming too big for me. (The metroplex population is about 6 million now. Six million!!!!)

Dawn

I believe it was the Kimball, Dawn. It was my only trip to FW. I lived in North Dallas off Preston Road Blvd, just north of the big looping interstate, very close to The Gaillaria.

My favorite nursery over there was North Haven, mainly because I was interested in begonias, and Don Miller, who is a big begonia person nationwide, worked there and grew and propagated many hard-to-find begonias. If I ever go back to Dallas, I would definitely make a trip to North Haven.

Oh, great, great, great! Glad to hear about the Mexican Mint Marigold. I hope it does attract lots of butterflies.

Susan

Susan,

North Haven Gardens! Oh, the memories of that place. If there is a better nursery anywhere in the Dallas-Fort Worth metro area, I never found it!!! Even when we are in the metro area we don't usually go that far east, tending to stay in the area near the airport or anywhere west of there. The traffic in all the metro area is insane any more, and east of the airport it seems to be about 3 times as bad as it is west of the airport.

I do miss North Haven. It is very easy to spend serious amounts of money there very quickly as they have everything you could ever want.

And the Mexican Mint Marigold is very popular with the butterflies!

Dawn

Well, I don't mind spending a buck or two for Mexican Mint Marigold every year if it performs well for the butterflies, Dawn! LOL!

You know, I learned the back roads in Dallas so I could actually get around quicker than using the highways. The traffic is just awful there (Houston is just as bad if not worse). Very few people used the back roads, like Forest ?, and I always used those to get to North Haven. I would love to go there again. They have so many herbs it's not funny!

Maybe someday, you and I (and anyone else who wanted to come along) could take a day trip to North Haven in Dallas? Wouldn't that be fun? We could eat at that little Mexican restaurant and have a blast!

Droogie - I just now notice that one of the seeds you were going to plant is sweet peas. It's too late for them to do anything in Oklahoma. They like very cool weather. I usually started mine around February-early March. They die when it starts getting in the high 70's to low 80's, unless you get the perennial sweet peas, which have no fragrance, but are still pretty. The colors are limited in perennials, to just pink and white, I think, unless they've created some newer cultivars with different colors.

My lemon balm reseeds very lightly. Not enough to even consider reseeding really, because the seedlings tend to die out when it gets warm anyway.

Dawn, the two tomatoe plants I bought are some newer hybrid of the sweet 100's, but I don't recall the name. The foliage is gorgeous on them! I'd grow it just for the foliage, yeah, I would!

I can't believe I got another Lavendar 'Provence' for $2 at Home Depot. I'm so excited to get it planted because this plant is just wonderful for butterflies and bees.

Well, we're getting more rain this week. They're predicting 2 1/2 inches for OKC over the next 3 days. Like we need more rain right now. It's so hard to plant things when the soil is constantly mud.

Susan

I sure agree on us not needing any more rain right now. I fear for my garden. It is still has not dried out from our last rain. How on earth can anything thrive with too much rain? Last year we got none and this year is starting to border on too much. If it would come a little shower at night and then clear up so we could all get outside the next day wouldn't that be nice? lol.
More challenges...how fun. I am not into all these challenges but Dawn says she likes them. To each his own I suppose. lol.
G.M.

Well, I planted the peas yesterday in some spare room I had in a side garden -- boy, working THAT soil has me worn out today! If they grow, then good for them. If they don't, then the packet of seeds was like 99 cents anyhow.

I also planted some sunflowers in the same spot. It would be really cool to have some of those! I love the way they look and I just love sunflower seeds. It was kind of surprising to open the packet and seed just that -- sunflower seeds. I don't know what I expected, but I guess I was surprised to see them looking just like the ones you eat!

I'm hoping for a little rain in the middle of the week. It would be nice not to have to worry about dragging the hose around, particularly when the middle of the week is such a busy time for me.

Sorry it seems to be so tough on you guys, though. Watching the radar, it does seem as though the rains have been tough on you guys farther to the south. Don't worry too much! You'll make it through!

I also planted some English ivy around the edges of a large pot along with a larger flowering plant (I forget what it's called because Meg picked it out). I was wondering if this is going to work the way we planned.

We put the pot (it's about 5 gallons) on top of another overturned pot that's exactly the same and placed it all next to our front door, which gets some sun in the mornings, but not much at any other time.

The plan is for the ivy to creep down the sides of the pots, and if it wants to, up the walls around the porch. Does ivy ever climb downward, or does it only climb up?

My ivy either goes up or creeps along the soil. I'd like to get rid of all of it because it's so invasive.

I agree that Dawn can deal with the challenges for now. I have enough challenges, physically and gardenally (is that a word?) to deal with. One of which is getting everything planted that I've purchased.

Some plants do not do well with too much water, even with good drainage. The ones I worry about are my lilies (bulbs rotting). My alocasias are not up yet, and I worry about them rotting, too, because they cannot tolerate as much water as the colocasias. Ditto, the calla lilies.

I've lost two of my hostas from too much water already. They were the smaller hostas - verde and 'Remember Me'. I especially will miss 'Remember Me' since it was bred and named in honor of a breast cancer victim. I purchased it because part of the proceeds went to the Susan B. Komen Foundation, and I am a breast cancer survivor. I will have to replace it now.

The harder rains have caused some leaf damage to many of my plants, too.

Ah, well, we will persevere, huh?

Susan

Good morning all!

My current challenge is poison ivy which has popped up on the western edge of my veggie garden, and is now popping up in splotches on my body. Ouch! Yuck!

It rained a little during the night last night and some chance of rain is in our forecast for every day this week.

Susan, Yes, we use the back roads too, including Forest Lane and Preston Road, but so does everyone else in Dallas any more. The area is just growing too much. My DH tells me that many of the roads down there are becoming toll roads as the area is NOT going to meet emission standards required to receive federal highway money. There is a Whole Foods market there near Preston and Forest somewhere, so I could use that as an excuse to visit that side of town and North Haven Gardens too.

Susan, I know that you would grow the tomatoes just for the foliage! Are they in a sunny enough spot that you might get tomatoes too?

Jeff, Inside that shell, the sunflower seed kernel does look just like the ones you eat.

We've had a lot of rainy days, but I am so far south that most of the rain misses us and heads for Ardmore. We're actually about 2" short in April, compared to our average rainfall. We get a lot of misty light rain that keeps all the foliage wet which causes diseases, and don't get much of the heavy rain that soaks into the ground and also fills up the ponds. Several years ago, TomatoWorm's DH told me we were in 'that dry area' along the Red River that rain often misses, and he wasn't kidding!

I don't know if your ivy will 'climb downward' or spill over the edges of the pot the way you want it to. I think it is a pretty vigorous upward climber. I guess time will tell.

Dawn

My editor tells me I can "train" it to climb downward by pulling it the direction I want it to grow and/or tying it in place. We'll see!

Just hang sinker balls on the stems - you can't possibly damage ivy! LOL!

Oh, Dawn, so sorry about the PI! I think there is some growing over next to my neighbor's driveway, too. I saw it (leaves of 3) and stood wayyyy back.

How did the graduation go?

Hee hee - yes, I am growing it for the foliage, but I am planting out on the sunny strip that the city says they own. Ha! I've attached a photo and info on it from Dave's Garden. It's called Husky Cherry Red. The foliage is very dense for a tomato, IMHO, and quite pretty, too. Notice one comment said they got 450 tomatos from one plant, and it is a smaller variety - only to 4'. Just what I want. Only need one stake for it. Oh, BTW, got them at Home Depot.

Susan

Here is a link that might be useful: Husky Cherry Red

Susan,

Thanks for asking. Our son's graduation from the fire academy was awesome. They showed about a 20 minute video of 'highlights' from their months in the academy and we all really enjoyed seeing that. Then we took a tour of the academy and it was so much bigger and more complex than I had imagined. It was huge! About a dozen of his future co-workers came to graduation and I thought that was really wonderfully supportive.

He worked his first 24-hour shift as a firefighter at D-FW Airport yesterday and came in this morning just as happy and as excited as could be. He said they had one fire call, one automobile accident call and a terrific lunch and dinner. What more does a 22-year-old need?

Husky Red Cherry. I think that you will like it. You know, it really is not a determinate OR an indeterminate and I thought about the husky series yesterday when I was writing Jeff a definition of determinate vs. indeterminate.

Husy Red Cherry is an ISI, which stands for indeterminate short internode. So, technically it is an indeterminate, but a dwarf one. The ISI tomatoes are suppposed to combine the best characteristics of determinate and indeterminate tomatoes in one plant. Thus, it should give you the more controlled growth habit of the determinate and the unlimited productivity potential of the indeterminate. I think that is why it is advertised as a "one-stake" plant.

The first ISIs were introduced in 1990 by Petoseed and I think one of them was an AAS winner a couple of years after that. There is a whole series of them....Husky Red, Husky Pink, Husky Gold, Husky Red Cherry, etc. I have never grown any of the ISIs. Some people who have grown them didn't care much for the flavor. I never worry about those kinds of comments, though, because taste is so subjective and what tastes good or bad to one person may taste just fine to someone else.

I hope it attracts a lot of cats to your yard. Are you growing any of the wild nightshades for them?

Dawn