Tuesday, 10 September 2019
The mini-birdbath that Debbie W. gave me on garden tour day looks cute filled with rain.
Boreas Inn
We got fifteen bags of Gardner and Bloome Harvest Supreme to mulch the west beds at the Boreas…first ten, and then Allan went to get five more. We made them go further by mixing in the last of the spring mulch pile, a bulk delivery than had been extra sandy and grey looking. The beds had looked discouragingly grey all summer. We should have just added the bagged mulch last spring but…we hadn’t. I am too budget minded and have an ongoing problem with spending other people’s money, even when I should.
Allan took all the photos of the project.
The bulk mulch had been kept on and under tarps.
I kept telling Allan “Don’t make it too grey!”
I was able to erase “mulch Boreas” from the work board, although I noticed later in the week that I had written “pull phormiums” rather than crocosmia. Thank goodness our target will be the much easier crocosmia. I have eliminated almost all phormiums from gardens that we care for.
In the evening, we treated Our Kathleen to an early birthday dinner at
The Depot Restaurant.
summer salad
Duck Shanghai for Kathleen, with orange blackberry sauce and ginger and five spice sticky rice
Prawns Bangkok for Allan
I could eat a soup bowl full of the Steak Killian’s scallion sauce.
a birthday brownie
and blackberry trifleWe had a leisurely two hour feast. For once, we were not the last table to leave because all the mulching work suddenly caught up with me and so we were the second to last.
Wednesday, 11 September 2019
Allan put on a trailer side because we had mulching plans today.
Before work, we checked on a house out of our usual routine, to make sure that there were no big pruning issues (like leaning trees). It had a lovely secret garden feel.
The Depot Restaurant
Chef Michael had asked us to prune along the edge of the side yard of the house that serves as the restaurant office.
before
during
after (Allan’s photos)While Allan loaded the last of the debris, I checked on the Depot garden.
We had intended to take the debris home for chipping, but there was so much, and some was thorny salmonberry, so we took it to the dump.
On the way out, we scored a great little dustbin for a planter, for only $5.00
Diane’s Garden
We did such a quick check of the Red Barn garden that I did not count it as work, and spent an hour at Diane’s tidying her garden. Some of the sweet peas are still floriferous enough to leave for one more week. All Allan’s photos here.
The roadside garden:
The septic vault garden:
cosmos
cosmosIt was 70 degrees, rather hot for us, and time for wee break.
The Basket Case Greenhouse
I had to see what was new and found a Panicum ‘Blood Brothers’ that was irresistible. We encountered Todd there and had an amusing chat, all fun and leisurely and off the clock of any job.
Peninsula Landscape Supply
We got a yard of the new kind of mulch…
Allan’s photo…and took it to
The Port of Ilwaco
…to fluff up some of the beds that had been walked and sat upon during Slow Drag.
weedingI have made a place for some new plants, when the steady autumn rains come.
Allan’s photo
Allan’s photo, nicely fluffed formerly trampled areaI checked on the south port office garden while Allan put the last of the mulch on nearby curbside beds.
Cosmos ‘Cupcake’The temperature had mercifully dropped to make for a beautiful evening.
All out of mulch, we checked on the curbside bed at At the Helm Hotel, where Allan noticed the dogwood berries.
My favourite bed by the Ilwaco pavilion:
On the way home, we saw that of the two Sunflowers of Mystery in the Ilwaco planters, one had been cut (not broken) off. I was again mildly disappointed in human behavior…and reflected that the planters will soon be Not Our Problem.
A day later, two friends informed me that they had each (separately) seen a woman picking herself a big bouquet of flowers at the boatyard. One of them pointed out to her the several do not pick signs. The woman’s response: “I ain’t hurtin’ nothin’.”
I have toyed with the idea of making a public cutting garden somewhere else in town for people who need a bouquet so badly and who have no money for flowers and nowhere to grow them. I just think it would end in tears, probably mine.
The workboard got a little shorter.
David Jensen office, before and after:
Removing some weedy catmint from a bed by the Don Nisbett art gallery; I put some small, clean pieces back in:
The good mulch (Gardner and Bloome Soil Conditioner and/or Harvest Supreme) that we added to the Time Enough Books curbside garden has been well worthwhile. The garden is full of poppy seedlings, and the plants are now much more vigorous than before.
