Help! Valley-strangling vine!

Spotted during the Toronto Women's Half Marathon in the Don Valley this morning (with my 15-year-old daughter; her first race) -- masses, and masses, and masses, and masses of dog-strangling vine or swallowwort (Vincetoxicum rossicum, syn. Cynanchum spp., from the Greek meaning "to choke a dog")

I've written warnings about this pernicious weed before: here and here. To see it taking over such huge expanses is scary.



This is a field of dog-strangling vine, almost as far as the eye can see. The next meadow over, it's dog-strangling vine growing neck in strangly neck with garlic mustard. In another field, it's wall-to-wall dame's rocket (Hesperis) commonly called wild phlox. Somehow, this doesn't seem as bad. However, as I read on another blog, WiseAcre Gardens, just this morning, dame's rocket is also putting the squeeze on native plants.


Dog-strangling vine's capable of lusty growth in sun or shade. It isn't only open fields that are being over-run. It's like the Badtimes virus warning, only unfunny: we should be very, very afraid.

UPDATE****If you have this plant in your garden, do not simply toss in your compost pile. Tougher measures are needed. More information about safe disposal of this non-native, invasive plant can be found here.

UPDATE*****Blog visitor Susan alerted us to a volunteer movement, Toronto's Community Stewardship Program, whose aim is to adopt green spaces to help preserve natural species and fight green predators like this one. Toronto blogger Native Plant Girl wrote more about it in this post. And you can link to City of Toronto efforts and get involved at this site.

One of the upcoming events is this Saturday:

Saturday, June 6
East Don Parkland Wildflower Planting
Join us to plant wildflowers in a recently restored
wetland in the East Don River valley. Enter the trail at
Cummer Avenue and follow the signs south to the
planting site.
Partner: East Don Parkland Partners

For more info, call (416) 392- LEAF or email greentoronto@toronto.ca

Peep into an Open Garden

On a rainy Thursday this week, I popped over to one of the local open gardens, part of Open Gardens Toronto that Sarah wrote about back in April. These are pretty close to "real gardens by real people" all over the city. Check out the link for a garden near you.

The one I visited was created by Paul Geary, of Petal Pushers. Paul calls himself a Garden Therapist. An admitted plantsman, he isn't one for names or varieties, like the unknown Preston lilac (Syringa prestoniae) above. But he has an amazing eye for design, as his small corner lot – and heavenly "hellstrip" – demonstrate.

I had to rush off to a dance concert, so couldn't take shots that evening. So you'll have to make do with what my nosy camera captured in his garden last year.

The picture above is what a "hellstrip" could look like, lavished with love, attention, and many bags of manure and woodchips – which really amount to the same thing, don't they? Take my word, it looks even better this year. Paul gives it the much more civilized name of boulevard, and had just finished adding 50 dozen (I believe he said) more tulips and daffodils for next year.

In front, the neighbour's Japanese maple contrasts nicely against the Laburnum tree in flower. This year is one of his off-years for laburnum, which Paul says tend to flower heavily, every other year, like old-fashioned apple trees.

The Wisteria was just as good this year. This runs along his west-facing fence and is absolutely laden with flower. His neighbour across the lane behind has the same wisteria planted at right angles to his, and from inside Paul's tiny courtyard it carries the eye beyond his boundaries. A space-expanding trick for small quarters.

This hosta is just as electrically yellow-chartreuse in person. It lights up like a lightbulb at the foot of the shrubs.

Paul's 9-year-old garden will be open at least twice more, in June and September, along with 23 other private gardens. It's a great way to see what gardeners in your area have created.

Such a great deal: $4 per garden, or a season's passport for $25. The money raised supports a good cause, the Canadian Women's Foundation.

Take it from me, though, and give yourself more time to see the gardens than half an hour on the way to somewhere else.

Why gardeners say: Off with their heads!

Make like a squirrel now and lop off your tulip heads – or deadhead them – after they finish blooming and before they put their energy into seed-making. Instead, we want the tulip to fatten the bulb for next year.

For tulips, daffs and other spring bulbs, pinch off the seed pod, but leave as much of the stem as possible, and let the leaves ripen and turn yellow. It's messy, but unless you treat your bulbs as one-shot deals, or have a nursery bed somewhere on your estate, that's what's what.

Irises and, later in the season, daylilies and lilies, which also make large seed pods at the top of long stems, can be treated in the same fashion, though their foliage will stay green for longer.

Often you deadhead to extend the period of bloom. Most annuals fall into this category. With mindful deadheading, even your earliest spring purchase, the perky little viola, will keep going if you stymie Mother Nature and prevent the plants from making seed pods like the one above.

(As an aside: Violas are cool-weather plants. So move them to a shady spot, keep them deadheaded and cut the main stems back by half around mid-summer. As long as you don't let them bake over summer, they might come back for you when the cool weather returns in late August.)

Deadheading works for perennials, too. The columbines (Aquilegia) in bloom now are also good candidates. Columbines have tougher stems, so you can sometimes pull off more than you mean to if deadheading by hand. Use scissors instead. They also make aphid-sized flower buds lower on the stem which you should take care not to cut off. Left to set seed, columbines quickly do the job most creatures on earth were meant to do: pass their genes on to the next generation. Then they shut down the flower factory. Not what we want.

Sometimes you deadhead to prevent plants from self-seeding. Anything that gets a bit runaway in your garden can be kept more closely in check this way. In my sister-in-law's garden, it was opium poppies (Papaver somniferum). Removing their pepper-pot seed heads would have helped do the trick. Not everyone would consider this problem a problem. However, as I know from experience: one gardener's pest is another one's morning glory.

Peanut fur: Or why I grow milkweed

This week, Nova Scotia garden blogger Jodi of bloomingwriter wrote about her experience freeing a hummingbird trapped in her barn. It reminded me of a similar thrill of mine.

One summer at our place on Ile d'Orléans, in the St. Lawrence River just outside Québec City, the (francophone) kids next door were collecting Monarch caterpillars to watch them pupate. (I have 35 mm slides of caterpillars shedding skins and turning into chrysalides that I really must scan.)

One day, while checking on the caterpillars in the garage, I discovered a hatched butterfly trying to escape through the closed window, becoming tangled in spider webs. I reached out to free it, and it clung to my hand as if it had known me forever. Fortunately, my camera was in the other hand. I captured the shot above before reaching the door. As soon as we were outside, it spread its wings and flew. I felt like a proud parent! Couldn't wait to see the kids and tell my story.

Now, my husband and kids are fluently bilingual. I, on the other hand, speak French assez bien pour faire le marché (well enough to do the shopping). I won't explain why here. Let me just say, my language ability has bearing on my story.

When I saw the neighbours, I rushed over, bubbling with excitement, and began my tale. The butterflies were trapped in the spider web, I said. Or, at least, I meant to say. What came out was not toile d'araignée, but poile d'arachide.

The butterflies were trapped in the peanut fur! did not cause quite the stir I'd intended. Except at my expense.

One chrysalis was now left in our adopted family. For all our waiting and watching, I hadn't seen a butterfly hatch. Realizing that it was the warmth of the first sun that triggered hatching, for my last chance I got up before sunrise.

As the sun rose over the St. Lawrence, I sat with that last butterfly as it broke slowly but slowly from its shell, puffy with the effort of its own childbirth, and slowly unfurled its beautiful wings. It was, like all births, miraculous.

That's why I allow milkweed (technically a noxious weed in Ontario) to spring up in my garden. Milkweed is the preferred grub for Monarch butterflies. I always inspect the undersides of the leaves for the tiny white eggs, like miniature grains of rice. The green-and-black striped caterpillars show up for lunch occasionally. Yet, they always seem to sneak off when it's chrysalis time. I haven't been able to relive my Québec experience.

However, you can be sure my family has never let me forget "peanut fur."

Doors Open: Toronto Beekeepers' Co-op at the Don Valley Brickworks

I dropped into the Don Valley Brickworks for Doors Open this week and met with a group of bee-keepers who were there with their bee hive display -- It's an odd feeling to be standing near several people wearing blinding white bee-keeper outfits! You certainly can't miss them in a crowd.

They showed a 2 sided glass box with bees working on the hive inside, so kids and adults alike could see bees doing what bees do - which is buzz around busily amongst their honeycombs. I spoke with Shane Hodge, pictured above, a member of the Toronto Beekeeper's Co-op. The Co-op keeps bees on one of the roofs of the buildings at the Brickworks, and also some on the roof of the Fairmont Royal York hotel downtown. Read about the posh Royal York bees here.

Shane filled me in on some bee info: the fact that bees do, in fact drink, but they need shallow edges to get close to the water without falling in. Their glass bee contraption had an ingenious method of keeping the bees properly hydrated: an upside down jar, with a few holes poked in the lid, which let out enough water (drip by drip) to keep the glass container air just the right amount of moist for the bees.

Shane also told me that bees stay buzzing and moving in their hives all winter. (I was suprised. I somehow thought they hibernated, like animals. Not sure what I thought: suspended animation?) To make sure the bees survive our Canadian winters, the hives on the roofs are well insulated before winter freeze-up.


A group of beekeepers from TorontoBees, the beekeeping co-op. Note to self: get one of these outfits to keep black flies at bay!

Honey from the co-op hives goes to the members and some is also donated to Foodshare. The combination of the roof garden and the hives on the roof of the Park Plaza apparently gave them a bumper crop of honey last year.

www.TorontoBees.ca will be the url for their new website, which is coming soon. We will keep you posted.

Quick tip: Roses love bananas... or do they?

Here's what I was going to write: Don't toss your banana peels into the Green Bin (or even the compost pile). Instead, chop them up and sprinkle them around your roses, to give the roses a good, organic snack of potassium. I cut mine into bite-sized pieces and apply directly to the soil. The peels soon turn black, as banana peels do, and become invisible.

And here's the reason I was going to write it: I was taught – and it seems to be the common wisdom – that potassium (along with phosphorus) promotes flowering. However...

When Googling for a link to provide more scientific detail, I came across this article, The Potassium Myth, on Adam Dimech's website The Story of Flowers. Dimech, with a PhD in Horticultural Science from the University of Melbourne, nixes everything I've understood about the relationship of potassium to flowering.

While it is an essential micronutrient [oops, that should be macronutrient] for all vegetative beings (it's the K in the N-P-K ratio of most balanced fertilizers), according to Dimech, "Potassium has an important role regulating water and nutrient movement in plant cells," but has nothing to do with flowering.

Live and learn. Still, banana peels are an excellent source of potassium, which is essential for plant health. And when sprinkled around the plants, they lend that nutrient directly to the soil, along with their organic matter. So I'll probably continue to feed my roses bananas. Besides, sometimes the tales told by those proverbial old wives can confound the logic of science.

Yikes: Boxwood psyllids and the new pesticides ban

As it's growing in challenging conditions, the round boxwood (Buxus) planted by my front door has always been plagued by boxwood psyllids (Psylla buxi). They're the tiny sucking insects that cause the tips of boxwood leaves to deform into cups. Unless you looked closely at your box foliage, you might not even realize that this cupping is a deformity. It is.

Right now, these little bug-ers are visible, disguised by the fluffy white threads you can see in this picture. Now's the time to spray, before the nymphs take refuge in those cupped hideouts.

Yet, as of Earth Day, April 22, 2009, the Ontario government has put into place some tough new regulations about what you can, or cannot, use to do this (or to control any pest) for cosmetic reasons in the home garden. You should be aware of these new rules. And they're somewhat confusing.

For instance: Psyllids can be controlled by spraying with insecticidal soap about now when the buglets first emerge from the eggs. However, some insecticidal soaps contain pyrethrins, an organic and previously "green" compound that is now on the banned substances list. That means, if it contains pyrethrins, don't try this at home.

Just because you can still buy a product on store shelves, don't assume it's okay to use on your home garden. Products with banned substances may be available for sale, for use by certain professionals (such as farmers or golf turf pros) OR for use by you but for non-cosmetic purposes. That means, you might be able to use a certain bug spray inside your home, to control carpenter ants, but not the same spray to control ants outdoors.

Best to be informed. Check out the Ontario Ministry of the Environment website to download the PDF factsheets for home gardeners.

By the way, you are also not allowed to use up any banned products you might still have on hand. They must be safely disposed of at one of the City's hazardous waste depots.

So, I'll be using plain old insecticidal soap on my psyllids, without pyrethrins (or horticultural oils -- another new no no). Hopefully, I'll catch the bugs in time to zap them, legally.

If only I had something to help my boxwood fight that other dread disorder: death by flyer guy.

The return of the Compost Queen

My name is Helen, and I am a composter. In fact, I was once the Compost Queen, the kind of girl who stole grass clippings -- that had been bagged and left on curbs for the garbage truck. Few things heat up and speed up a compost pile quite like a layer of grass clippings. But the twice yearly haircuts of my microscopic "lawn" never produced enough.

Leaves and weeds and vegetable kitchen scraps all went into my compost. Eggshells and picked-clean bones, too. In the deep of winter, a growing green ice cube gathered in a garbage can on my back deck, to be turned into the pot come melt. I turned, I aerated. I bent double harvesting the black gold through the composter's too-small door. It all went into the garden.

Then Toronto introduced its Green Bin organic waste recycling program, and laziness threw my composting ways into a handcart, on its way to hell. My garden has been the worse for it.

Our dad taught me how compost. His method wasn't fancy, but it was tried and true: the three-pile composting system. To do it, you need an area about 3' by 9' -- 2' by 6' will work if space is tight. Sun or shade.

Pile 1:) Begin by digging Hole A, a shallow depression (3'x3' or 2'x2'), in the earth. Bung in a few inches of green matter (veggie scraps, weed tops, freshly fallen leaves, &c.), and sprinkle some of the dug earth on top. Soil introduces microorganisms to aid decomposition. Add a little water when things are dry, but don't let the pile become soggy. Add a layer of green matter as it accumulates and, when you have a few inches, a layer of earth on top.

When your first layers of compost have begun to decompose, turn the pile with a fork and mix it all up to introduce air into the mix. Air is essential for this type of aerobic composting, to make it work and keep your pile smelling fresh. Keep adding layers on top, sprinkling soil and turning.

Pile 2:) When the stuff in A starts to look brown, dig Hole B beside it. Move the compost from A into B. Hole A again becomes the place to put your new compost, layering it with the soil from Hole B.

Whenever you turn the compost in A, turn B as well, adding the chunkier, less-composted bits or brown matter from B back into A. Don't put anything new into B. Use a garden fork rather than a spade so that the smaller bits or finished compost falls back into the pile.

Pile 3:) When the stuff from A looks like it's getting brown, dig a third hole beside B. Move everything from B into Hole C; stuff from A goes into B. Start piling your new compost into A again.

Abracadabra:) You now have three rotating piles: A is always newest and tallest; B is always "cooking"; and pretty soon, the compost from Hole C is ready to add to your garden. Anything that looks unfinished in C goes back into A or B. By this time, the unfinished compost itself contains the microorganisms you originally gained from the soil you dug.

If my description sounds complicated, I apologize. In practice, the three-pile method is, as our dad would have said, dead simple. It's sort of like that kids' song, Roll Over, Roll Over. They all rolled over and one fell out: that's what happens to your compost.

I first composted using this method, then changed to a plastic composter, for cosmetic reasons. However, I believe it [edit to clarify: by "it," I mean a plastic compost bin] makes compost awkward to turn, slowing the process. It's also a pain in the back to harvest. Invariably, I ended up yanking the bin off the pile anyway to get at the good stuff. Those spinning barrel composters (like the contraptions lottery numbers are tumbled in) seem smart in principle. In practice, I doubt there'd be enough room for me... or, should I say, for my compost.

After (fruitless) hints to my ingenious husband that a three-bin composter would be a lovely garden project, I have decided to just plunge back in. To quote Voltaire on perfectionism: Le mieux est l'ennemi du bien. The "better" is the enemy of the "good." (Or, as I have quoted our dad before: Anything worth doing is worth doing badly.) Therefore, I have now created what I will call Pile A, without even bothering to dig a hole! We'll see what my wantonness gets me.

Once more, vegetable kitchen scraps will be saved for my home compost pile, but meats and fats and yucky plate scraps will go into the Green Bin to be anaerobically composted by the city.

Unsure whether this decision moves me up or down in the royal hierarchy of composters. My crown feels strangely light, though.

Mystery iris, who are you?

[Edited update: Mystery solved. According to someone who grows this, accosted as I passed their garden while I was out on a walk, this is 'Rare Edition.' Thanks to everyone who contributed their guess. Helen]

For the iris experts out there: What is the name of this lovely little plicata iris growing on a neighbour's slope?

Once you get past Iris or, maybe if you want to get fancy, Iris germanica or Iris florentina or (and I've killed this one) Iris pallida 'Variegata' you've pretty much exhausted my irisology. Purple is all I grow.

Thought it might be easy to identify with a picture as reference. But, gee, did you know you can Google a google iris varieties out there. Any ideas for this one?

Eye am a camera: garden closeups

The miracle of digital SLR photography isn't only that it helps me become a better photographer, through a 1,001 disposable mistakes. It is helping me become a better gardener, acting as a zoom lens for the mind, as well as the eye.

The camera lets you get intimate with flowers and foliage and bark and bugs as you rarely do with the naked eye. Or rarely take time to do. Or as you've forgotten how to do since you were a child. How else would you gain such acute awareness of how the pollen develops on a tulip stamen, or how many working parts there are in an iris.

My viewfinder makes me curious again; then, later, the image splayed across my computer screen fills me with awe at the astounding complexity of everything the sensor has captured. When I'm back in the garden, that consciousness never quite leaves me.

Beyond the flowers themselves, the viewfinder puts into sharp relief the importance of foreground and background. Purple is beautiful. Purple placed against a backdrop of yellow and chartreuse takes on a new richness.

The camera also lives on light. It shows me what changes with perspective; with backlighting, sidelighting, silhouette and shadow. On a purely pragmatic level, date- and time-stamped, photographs offer a lasting record of just how much sun that half-sun corner really gets.

Inspired by what I shoot, my garden plans are gaining more integrity. They consider the sum rather than its parts. The best garden pictures you create are the ones that live in the garden.

Be water wise: Thirteen going on 30 (degrees)

Okay, the picture exaggerates. But today we'll get a taste of it, and tomorrow's forecast is 30˚C and full sunshine.

Sudden summer, indeed. Expect your new plants to go into mild to moderate shock till they acclimatize. Bye bye, last of the tulips. Oops, there go the apple blossoms. Many spring flowers will move into acceleration mode. Some will get a sunburn.

On hot days like tomorrow, it's smart to get a jump on watering -- particularly anything planted in containers, which heat up and dry out quickly, especially in sunny locations. Here are some tips for tomorrow and all those welcome sunny days ahead.

Water early in the morning. This protects plants from the drying sun, and gives leaves time to dry off. Lingering damp can foster fungus or mildew.

Deep, infrequent watering is better than frequent light sprinkles. It encourages deep root growth, which makes your plants hardier. Shallow watering keeps the roots near the soil surface where they are most likely to dry out.

Water selectively. For example, just carry a bucket of water over to the newly planted rose bush once a week, if everything else is drought-resistant. If you don't have a rainbarrel yet, this is the time to be thinking of one.

Water from below the foliage if you can. A soaker hose, for instance, snakes permanently around your garden beds and slowly trickles water into the soil at root level. This reduces wasted water, such as from fan sprinklers, and sends the water down deep. However, and this is a big however, you must remember to turn it off. Out of sight can be out of mind. A timer for your soaker hose is a good investment.

Mulch to conserve moisture. Mulching helps keep the root zone cooler and moister. It also introduces organic matter into the soil to add nutrients and improve soil tilth or composition. There are many choices. Compost. Wood chips. (I like the finely shredded black cedar, which looks like natural soil.) Shredded leaves. Whatever works in your garden. Even pea gravel -- although this won't do much to improve the soil.

If you use cocoa bean husks, be careful if your cat or dog is the kind to eat large quantities of this (briefly) chocolate-scented by-product of chocolate making. This has been linked to illness and, in very rare cases, death due to residual theobromine in the husks. This article from the American Veterinary Medical Association puts it into perspective, however. The AVMA bottom line: the risk is low, but be cautious if your pet is the uncontrollably munchy kind. (I have used this mulch many times with no ill effects to my cat. I stopped because it can be more expensive and harder to find than other mulches, and can develop a surface mold in hot, humid weather.)

The best advice, though maybe too late for many of us, is to choose drought-resistant plants. This practice, called xeriscaping, is and probably will continue to be, a growing trend.

I xeriscape in a benign way under the maples in my front garden, as I usually neglect to water it, simply letting the plants duke it out. Anything that survives gets to stay. This strategy has produced a number of successes and, of course, many failures.

I'll tell you about my burning bush "sculpture" another time.

May's 15 minutes of flame: Flowering crabapples

Some people get 15 minutes of fame. Some trees get what feels like 15 minutes of flower. In early May, it was the Magnolias. Now, it's the flowering crabapples (Malus sp.).

No May in Toronto would be complete without their fleeting blaze of glory. Certain areas of the city are positively bowered with their white and every shade of pink blossoms. As you walk by, some cultivars sweep you off your feet with their fragrance.

Crabapples, especially some of the older varieties, can be susceptible to diseases, including fireblight, rusk (well, of course not "rusk" but rust), apple scab and canker. Michael Dirr's Manual of Woody Landscape Plants lists more than 26 pages of different varieties, with notes on their disease resistance. I recommend you do your research before buying.

One of my favourites is 'Royalty' with its double whammy of red leaves and deep pink flowers. Unfortunately, Dirr rates it as "severely susceptible to scab and fireblight." Another of my picks, the compact Sargent Crabapple, Malus sargentii, with its bright red, cherrylike fruits that birds love, while "slightly susceptible," is a better choice.

However, if I had the sunlight and good air circulation that crabapples require, I'd look out for Malus 'Sea Foam' -- which appears on the same page as the two above. Deep red buds open to pure white flowers, followed by small, bright red fruits in this weeping 5-footer that's "highly resistant" to diseases.

If you don't have Dirr's book, look for it in the library. Or hie ye to the Weston Family Library at the Toronto Botanical Garden. You might see a few crabapples in bloom in the gardens there, if you hurry.

My long, sad, happy affair with Clematis

Clematis and I have a thing. It isn't always good. It isn't always long. But, you know, I just can't quit them.

This time of year, the love affair begins, when the garden arch in the back is decked with the blue wings of Clematis alpina 'Pamela Jackman'. It's a lovely little clematis that will take some shade and has been faithful to me for over a decade.

Last year, I was thrilled to have enough new growth to be able to train it through the branches of the Rosa 'New Dawn'. Great, I thought. Wonderful! This year, however, the blooms seem lost in the rose foliage. Is it trying to tell me something?

I have many clematis trained up the fence that divides me from my neighbour M. We're friendly types, so the fence is open weave. I have lots: 'Hagley Hybrid' (aka 'Pink Chiffon'), 'The President', and one of my faves C. viticella 'Venosa Violacea' (to name just a few). They bloom beautifully. Trouble is, it's mostly on his side of the fence.

After years of this, in 2003 I finally got wise and purchased a pyramid-shaped obelisk, plunked in the middle of my tiny garden bed. Three clematis went in, including a pink 'Dawn' (to go with my New Dawn rose; see it pictured at right, with friend), blue 'Daniel Deronda' and barred 'Dr. Ruppel'. In 2009, Dawn remains a winner, but t'other two seem to be no-shows. TBD.

Everyone should have a C. macropetala 'Maidwell Hall.' I used to. It was an exquisitely blue and white multi-petalled, nodding variety that bloomed in May – and it was paired with a pure white C. macropetala 'The Swan' . You'll note the collective use of the past tense.

Had a lovely 'Lady Betty Balfour' -- once or thrice. Nope. A 'Nelly Moser' and 'Bee's Jubilee' -- nuh uh. 'Anna Louise' -- my hopes are still up for this one. Perhaps second time's the charm? The death roll is too lengthy and depressing to continue.

You can see that I exist as a one-woman subsidy for the clematis industry. Hey, I even met clematis breeder extraordinaire Ray Evison once at Canada Blooms (in the "good old days" of the Loblaws extravaganza gardens). The split second before I'd recognized who he was, I asked him to identify... a nearby shrub. Do you think he jinxed me?

Finally, there's, Clematis fargesoides 'Summer Snow.' It's a delicate white flower with serious, thug-like tendencies. Rooted in the driest, north-most corner of my house, it still manages to put out ten or fifteen feet of new growth in a season, all of it absolutely covered with small white stars for more than a month, followed by fluffy seed heads.

And thank heavens for that.

Remember to protect yourself, too

Gardeners might not think twice about running out in their pyjamas (as I did last night) to protect their tender annuals from a possible frost. But would they take the same degree of precaution for their own safety – when it comes to sun exposure? I know I didn't, until recently.

This year, I noticed a small growth on my forearm, and it was getting larger. My doctor diagnosed it as an actinic keratosis, and burned it off. The keratosis in itself is not life-threatening but, if unattended, might evolve into squamous skin cancer. It was a rude awakening for me.

Besides gardening and photography, another of my hobbies is power-walking. Between the three, I can spend extended periods outdoors. Despite my Nordic complexion, I never wore sunscreen. You can bet I'll be wearing it now.

A friend passed along this information on broad-spectrum sunscreen protection, gleaned from a dermatologist at Sunnybrook Health Sciences Centre. Here it is, for your information.

To get protection against both UVB rays and UVA rays, look for a product that contains mexoryl, helioplex, or parsol 1786. If you blank out when it comes to remembering chemical names, any product that carries the seal of the Canadian Dermatology Association will provide good broad spectrum protection. There is a list at the web site below.

http://www.dermatology.ca/patients_public/info_patients/sun_safety/recognized_sunscreens.html

The dermatologist's particular recommendations were:
La Roche Anthelios
Vichy
Neutrogena Ultra Sheer

However, these recommendations are based on finding a product that feels nice on your skin, so that you won’t mind using it. The most important thing is to find something you like, so that you’ll use it.

Yesterday, out on a walk, I saw a parent on a bike with his two little kids. Both of the little ones were wearing helmets, but dad didn't have one on. I always ask myself: If Jack fell down and broke his crown when out riding, who would take care of his children?

Please be as careful with yourself as you would be with those more delicate, whether they're children or plants. No one ever expects "it" will happen to them.

By the way, I'll probably have to protect my tender annuals from the cold again tonight. Hopefully, not in my PJs.

Mirror, mirror on the wall... or is it ball?

Looks like I'm talking magic again. No smoke, just mirrors. Mirrors are a way to fool the eye, making a small space seem larger, even outdoors.

Here is my latest. Not some expensive glass globe. It's an oversized plastic Christmas ornament snagged last season at Canadian Tire for $1.99. I've been saving it for the garden, where it's now tucked happily into this pot of ivy.

Putting mirrors around your garden doesn't have to make you feel like you're in the funhouse scene in Lady from Shanghai. Mirrors work best when they don't really look like mirrors.

For example, I purchased a semicircular, commercial fish-eye mirror -- the kind they have in stores -- when the Don Mills Centre was being torn down. Set at ground level behind the foliage planted by the house, the mirror makes the narrow garden bed seem deeper.

Another old mirror hangs from my back fence in a dark corner, nearly concealed by the shed. Looking through that narrow pathway toward the hanging mirror reflects my own garden, and all the sunlight in it, right back at me, and seems to be a magical doorway into the neighbour's yard.

And there I am, back to the magic again.

Garden Bloggers Bloom Day: May 2009

I'm new to this "tradition" (if the term applies to something so young) initiated by Indiana blogger Carol of May Dreams Gardens. On the 15th of every month, she asks all bloggers to show what's growing in their gardens. Here's what's happening in (and around) my Zone 6 Toronto garden, starting with the top picture, the spidery mature look of my 'West Point' tulips.

The 'Angelique' tulips have been open for a few days. I had half a dozen of these originally. It's interesting to see that the squirrels have planted some of them in gardens down the street.

These white Tulipa viridiflora are in my neighbour M's garden. But since he and I (well, mostly he) removed the privet hedge dividing our two front lawns, the garden lines have blurred and we share the tending of one big front garden. The 'viridiflora' are named for the green striping in the flower, and come in other colours. He put these with deep red peony-flowered tulips. Nice.

Lathyrus vernus or vernal sweet pea is on the wane. This excellent performer should be planted more often. It grows about a foot tall in my dry garden, and for at least a month is covered in blooms that gradually change colour as they age. The bees love it.

Galium odorata or sweet woodruff gets its starry white flowers now above its whorled leaves. You can see, it's a, what shall we call it, enthusiastic? groundcover. In a wetter position, it might be called invasive, but it's relatively welcome in dry shade. This little plant has a long and interesting history, which you can read about at Paghat's Garden.

This purple form of periwinkle, Vinca minor 'Atropurpurea' was planted only a couple of years ago, and it's doing very well. It's in the sunnier area at the front, and is blooming along with the sulphur yellow Euphorbia polychroma or cushion spurge. Beside them, my old purple intermediate bearded iris is in bud and readying to pop over the next week. This iris came with the house, and I've spread it in a neighbourly way up and down the street.

A number of natives are also pushing up blooms. Tiarella cordifolia or foamflower is one of the dainty, low-growing flowers that I wouldn't want the sweet woodruff to get too close to. I've seen foamflower planted in masses very effectively elsewhere. In my garden, it's more like a "light froth" flower. But it always delights me to see it in bloom.

This is one whose height allows it to compete a bit better, the Jack-in-the-pulpit or Arisaema triphylla [oops, I mean, triphyllum]. Again, it belongs to M, but is right at our property lines. M has this striped one, and a greenish white one, both having been in bloom for a couple of weeks.

And here's an old reliable in Sarah's garden, Aquilegia canadensis, the native columbine. It's blooming here in the hellstrip between her sidewalk and the next -- under Norway maples and in shade. Delicate, but tough. That's the way we like 'em.

Happy blooms day!

Good in a pinch: Technique tip

If your garden is small, here's a technique to keep certain plants from overgrowing it. If your garden is shady, it keeps plants from becoming leggy and floppy as they reach for the light. If your garden is both, listen up. And, by the way, this technique also increases the number of flowers and can delay bloom times.

All you need are two very sophisticated garden tools: your thumb and your index finger using a technique called pinching out. That's the act of pinching to remove the top cluster of leaves at growing tips of each stem.

It's useful for fall-blooming members of the Compositae family -- which have daisy-like flowers such as the chrysanthemum in this example. It works really well on asters, and I have also used it on Helenium.

All you do is pinch to remove the tips of each flowering stem on these multi-stemmed plants. Do it first when the plants are a few inches from the ground (in April in the GTA), and continue to pinch out the new stems every couple of weeks until mid-June. Then stop to let the plant set flowers.

I find that using my hands, rather than a pair of scissors, helps me feel my way around so that only the fewest number of leaves are removed. However, if you've left it a little late the first time, you can pinch back the earliest or particularly leggy growth by as much as half, as long as you leave some leaves on the stem. Even doing it once will help create a more compact specimen.

Pinching causes each stem to branch out at the leaf axil (where the leaf meets the stem) with new flowering tips. The result is more numerous flowers on a plant that's more compact and bushy. So there you go: a good trick, at your fingertips.

Garden magic tricks: Lady in a bathtub

Gather round, kids. Now you too can amaze your friends with this simple garden sleight of hand: turn a flower into Dutchman's breeches or Lady in the Bathtub.

Just watch...

Nothing up my sleeve. Lookee here: in this hand, one blossom of Dicentra spectabilis, or bleeding heart.

Yes, kid, the white works just like the pink.

Now, turn the blossom upside down. Gently pry apart the two halves of the heart.

Presto-changeo! There she is -- in the bathtub, or in bloomers, but very much the lady.

And, I guess, she could also be Dutch.

Thank you, thank you. No applause. Just pay the monkey on the way out.

Poetry: Morning Inglorious

The first of the year's bazillion morning glory seedlings have just popped up in my garden. To celebrate my love-hate relationship with this weed in my garden, I'm posting my little ode to the odious. Enjoy.

morning inglorious
by Helen Battersby

The gate-crashing has begun.
They’re prying cloven-footed
through the gaps, glad-handing all
invited guests, twining them
with drunken arms. Roses try
to shy away, cone flowers glare.
Impervious to snubs, they
trumpet their party horns and
rollick to the highest station.
Only the sun can shut them up.
But not without a final round,
twisting their lips into a damp,
defiant choir of raspberries.

What Not To Wear (For Gardens)

You probably know of What Not To Wear, where some poor schmuck has her (or his) wardrobe made over from scratch. I just realized that one of WNTW's tenets applies to gardening. More on that in a sec.

My revelation came about because Sarah and I recently joined Blotanical, a great online directory of garden bloggers from around the world. If you're looking for a blog about gardens in your area (Toronto Gardens, for example), Blotanical will help you track them down. Plus, with hundreds of bloggers to choose from, you can find ideas that work anywhere. For bloggers like us, it's a way to learn from other gardeners' insights and expertise.

My idea was sparked by a post from Blotanical founder and webmaster Stuart Robinson of Brusselton, Western Australia. In his blog Gardening Tips 'n' Ideas, he writes: Don't plan your garden at the nursery. Stuart sagely warns that you shouldn't step into a nursery without a garden plan. He compares it to a hungry person grocery shopping without a list. You're sure to glut on the garden equivalent of premium chips and chocolate.

I've been there. As a matter of fact, I think I was gorging there just last Sunday.

Yet, some of us are too inexperienced or our dreams too fluid to have something so logical as a plan. So here's my thought, straight out of What Not To Wear: Think outfits not pieces.

• If you're overwhelmed by the big picture, break your plan into smaller units: let's call them outfits.

• Each outfit would have elements of threes or fives – classic flower arranging numbers. See, less overwhelming now.

• Before you buy that plant you've fallen for, think how it will work with other pieces in your garden, old or new. Consider the shape, colour, texture and size of plant, flower and foliage, as well as the bloom times, and of course (horti)cultural compatibility.

• The goal is to create individual garden pictures using these elements. Focus on one picture or outfit at a time. Once it's working, move on to another, keeping in mind how it will work with what you already have.

• Think about a main focus and accessories. It doesn't always have to be plant material.

The photo of a neighbour's garden that heads this post is a lovely example. The flaming orange tulips and purple irises provide great simultaneous contrast, softened by the variegated euonymus foliage. Anchoring the picture with something big or strong, perhaps an upright form to accent the many horizontal lines, might have created an even stronger outfit.

That's a garden tip also gleaned from Blotanical; this time from Gardening Gone Wild contributing blogger Steve Silk in his post Design Lines: One Big Thing. Great reading.

An overall garden plan is certainly the wise way to go. But, failing that, you can start one step at a time. Create effective garden outfits, and eventually you'll have a whole, coordinated wardrobe. One that suits you, and your garden.

Tulips in the garden, tulips in the park

Two of the tulips I like best (besides two lips in the dark) are late-bloomers making a show right now.

The Tulipa above is in the fringed group of tulips. I wish I knew its name. Squirrels and their guillotine tendencies aside, these were reliable performers in my garden for many years, increasing happily and even providing their own light scent.

Reliable, that is, until I foolishly moved them so their ripening foliage would be less of a blot on my tiny landscape. Mistake, mistake! Although half a dozen have survived, they were really set back. The offsets I gave away look fab in my neighbours' gardens, though.

I was luckier moving these lily-flowered tulips, Tulipa 'West Point', from languishing in a too-shady corner to a sunny spot. Now, they glow like candles in the morning, and open like stars in the afternoon. Their maturing petals become increasingly recurved, so when they close for the evening they seem to do some impossibly twisty yoga position.

These two bloom with another lily-flowered favorite, Tulipa 'White Triumphator.' Together, they provide sculptural interest, colour, light, and fascinating changes over a long period in May.

I could kiss them for that.