Do you feel it? It’s happening here. True, it almost hit 80 today as I wrote this, but only for an hour or two. Blankets, fires, cuddles are coming! And coming inside? Plants. I have been dipping, scrubbing, inspecting, finding the right sized saucers, and my glass porch is beginning to take on a lovely jungly smell with all the tenders I am bringing inside.
The ones that I am most interested in making it through the winter under my care—and that’s scarier than any Halloween movie—are the Rex begonias.
I mean. How fun is this foliage? I collected some tiny specimens from Milmont Greenhouses last spring, mainly for a client at that time who had a charming shaded courtyard full of containers, and what do you know? Some ended up in my containers.
I love this plant with its fleshy stems full of promise and with foliage that has so many patterns and shapes. Even a snail shape!
Now it’s just a matter of getting them all inside, and though I said on the pod that I would have it done by Thursday night, that was, indeed, magical garden thinking. Some of my tropicals and tenders will have to get through a few more nights outside. But no matter! The problem with my procrastination would normally result in a lovely looking plant having to stress out and adjust to indoor temperatures once we flick on the furnace. But my plants, most of them, anyway, end up on my glass porch, which is just above outdoor temps. So the stress of going from the 50’s to the 70’s won’t happen for me. If it will happen for you, you may want to try to avoid it.
Guest
Marianne Wilburn—in her second of what I hope are many visits because she is so fun to talk to—gives us the low-down on bringing plants in for winter. As the author of the book Tropical Plants and How to Love Them, Marianne is well-versed on all of her multitude of charges, and she has a ton of them! In the pod, she quickly walks us through what we did last spring: getting them outside. I’m a tough love slacker on that too, and sort of just say “get out, good luck.” Then, we drill down on the strategies of getting them ready to come back into your house. Avoiding the hitchhiker beasties that also want to come in, making it easier on yourself in terms of care (making sure you can SEE the mister, that way you may actually USE the mister), and understanding how some plants may not even want to be a part of your life over the winter, but would instead rather be forced into dormancy and checked on a couple of times. These are all things Marianne helps us to know more about.
Marianne Wilburn in her tropical paradise
The Play List
Got a cute photo from Mary Wright Baylor of the DC area. She liked the tips that Steph Green provided in Week 32 so much that she sent in a photo with a fall refresh that she had done on one of her containers. Look at the wonderful arrows! (Below). She used ‘the c-word’, chrysanthemum, very well indeed. Charming—the arrangement and the feedback! She made my day and Steph’s too, as of course, I passed it along.
I used some of those tips on a couple of mine too, but there is still more to do. Hard to know (when it is still in the 80s), whether I should jump right to pansies and cabbages or fill in with all those coleus I have rooted recently. Probably a bit of both is the way to go.
Next Step for the Kitchen Compost
In last week’s Play List, I told you how I collect the garbage and am usually successful in getting all the kitchen scraps out the door before we get the eewww factor going too strongly and before ‘pets’, i.e. fruit flies, come join us. Then where does it go? Those little sealable half gallon containers end up in the garage, waiting until they get to about 8 or 10 in number, and then they are emptied into my tumbler. I used to just settle for the anaerobic fetid mess in the tumbler knowing that I would later add that to my regular pile and the N and C would even out. But since I started adding some brown, in my case the WSJ, it has really helped the smell as you are walking by the tumbler and the outdoor ‘pet’ population, too.
Nothing really wrong with those critters outside, but if you don’t have a lot of space and you are not loving them, adding the brown layer really does the trick!
Eeewww don’t get too close. But it actually doesn’t smell bad.
Enjoy your garden while this glorious weather lasts
Make a note of pruning jobs wood on shrubs and trees— the work should wait now until the plant is dormant. A few snips are fine anytime.
Order or BUY your seeds. A bird in the hand—I stopped by Stranges in Richmond after speaking to the Ford’s Colony Garden Club in Richmond and came away with about 3/4 of my heart’s desires at their generous seed racks.
Listen
I recommend leaves falling again this week, but here’s a recommendation of a different type: my favorite tools. Let’s start with the soil knife, which is a trowel, weeder, bulb depth measurer, and if you wear it on your belt like I do, a badass accessory, too! The bright orange plastic helps you find it more easily, and I added the green tape to keep mine straight from the crew’s—back when I had a crew.
Sister Sue Ann often gets alarmed when I wave it too close to Ginny while filming a Tuesday Tip. But Ginny doesn’t seem to mind.