Love that meme. :-)
New Year, New Garden: 7 Resolutions for 2024
The best laid plans for the garden are usually made in the dead of winter, when short days give us long, cozy evenings to dream up a new project or pore over seed catalogues in anticipation of next summer’s borders. In a similar way, it’s a good time to make some resolutions and to implement changes to not only what you’ll plant but how you’ll maintain it all, too. Here then are some of my garden resolutions for 2024.
1. Keep a garden notebook.
How many times do you make a mental note and then very swiftly forget all about it? In the garden it’s all too easy to forget six months later, say, the exact position where you wanted to plant a swathe of spring bulbs, or the spot you were hoping to relocate a plant, or the name of the shrub you wanted to buy. A notebook is arguably the most underestimated tool for the gardener; making notes, lists, and sketches through the gardening year, both in your own garden and when visiting others, will keep plant names and plans all in one place.
2. Ditch the impulsive plant shopping.
In my garden there is always a table through the growing season of plants that have not yet found their spot—a collection of impulse purchases, bought during over-excited, under-planned visits to the plant nursery, that are then neglected there was never a set plan for them. As the season comes and goes, those plants stay on the table, an embarrassing reminder of my failure to properly plan. So this year I’m vowing to eradicate this habit and buy only the plants I already have a spot for.
3. Make more space for messiness.
As my garden margins have become messier—with nettles, brambles, wildflowers and weeds—the insect and bird life has boomed. It doesn’t take much to create habitats for wildlife: Undisturbed corners, dead hedges, log piles, fallen wood, leaf mounds will all provide useful hiding places and habitats for the creatures that are fundamental to the health and life of your garden. By leaving a variety of weeds to grow, you will also boost biodiversity too.
4. Boost the soil.
I can get a bit lazy in my approach to the annual mulch, but this past summer, while comparing my borders to pictures taken a few years ago, it became clear that it needed a significant boost come winter. I expect a lot from my garden, which features borders planted successionally so that there is something always in flower from late winter right through until November, and a rich mulch with organic matter will give it much needed nutrients for the growing season ahead. As I have very sandy, free draining soil in my garden, I prefer a rich mulch, either manure or Dalefoot’s Double Strength compost; both, of course, are peat-free.
5. Invest in naturalizing bulbs.
Of all the purchases we make as gardeners, there’s nothing quite like the sweet-shop frenzy of the spring bulb catalogues—the colors, the variety, the delicious smorgasbord of flowers that usher in spring. But tulips, perhaps the most popular of the spring bulbs, are one-hit wonders for most of us, even when planted in the garden. After years of one-season relationships with them, I’ve vowed to be more sustainable in my bulb choices, favoring naturalizing bulbs like narcissi and crocus (which are great for early pollinators) that will not only flower year after year but will also naturalize too, multiplying over time.
6. Maintain tools.
The best laid plans for the garden are usually made in the dead of winter, when short days give us long, cozy evenings to dream up a new project or pore over seed catalogues in anticipation of next summer’s borders. In a similar way, it’s a good time to make some resolutions and to implement changes to not only what you’ll plant but how you’ll maintain it all, too. Here then are some of my garden resolutions for 2024.
7. Take time to sit and stare.
Looking after a garden is hard work and it can become a tough task-master in the peak of summer when, despite all the beauty, there is always something to be weeded or watered, dead-headed or pruned. But make a restful corner to sit and take it all in. The weeds can wait but those moments are fleeting.
https://www.gardenista.com/posts/new-year-new-garden-resolutions-2024/
Boston only recorded 7 completely dry weekends since June 1st.
aside from all of the rain. You might remember June being one of the cloudiest Junes on record and we couldn’t get a break from the humidity either. But in the rare event we didn’t have clouds or we didn’t have rain or we didn’t have humidity, then it was the smoke! Coming along with a record setting wildfire season in Canada, t
In calendar year 2023, Boston picked up less than a foot of snow, making it the 4th least on record!
The hottest year, however, doesn’t mean there was NO cold. In fact, one of the notable events was the arctic blast in early February! Temperatures fell to -13° in Worcester and -10° in Boston. Wind chills were in the -30s! For Boston it was the coldest low temperature since 1957!
On average, Massachusetts gets 2 tornadoes every year. This year gave us 8! They were lower end on the EF scale,- https://whdh.com/weather-blog/top-7-weather-stories-of-2023/
Now:
- https://whdh.com/weather-blog/storm-brings-snow-mix-and-wind-saturday-evening-through-sunday/
But glory be God, for His mercy endureth.
I am looking for flowers that attract pollinators...I want BEES, and plenty of them. Zone 6B-7. Any GOOD suggestions?
The first week of 2024 was cool and damp here in Central Missouri. Drizzly rain, some snow, not really cold but cold enough to be very unpleasant. It’s snowing again now and from the looks of the weather radar we may get enough of the nasty stuff over the next 24 hours to be a serious nuisance.
Nothing going on in the garden except for thinking about it. And mud. Lots of mud.
So I spent some time over the weekend puttering in my workshop. Did some cleaning and rearranging, built a small-ish portable work table, removed the bodywork from my generator and used the shop crane to hoist the generator onto the new work table. It conked out when we were camping at the racetrack back in September. The engine will start and run, but it won’t throttle up and it won’t make electricity. Odds are the invertor board has failed. If it proves true I’ll likely have to replace the whole machine because I’m not having any luck finding a company that has one in stock.