2021 nursery trip

Nurseries are back open. Tag the Greeter Dog is still greeting.

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Petunias and coleus for the front door pot. Marigolds, chives, and basil for the backyard.

oof

Well, COVID-19 has eaten all my traditional spring gardening outings. The Spring Garden Fair is cancelled, and per order of the Governor, all nurseries are closed until at least April 30 (to be re-evaluated then). The garden centers at Big Orange and Big Blue are still open — I may brave Orange to get a few bags of my usual mushroom compost.

Thanks to Jannine Cabossel over at giantveggiegardener for the updates, and leads on alternate plant start sources!

How about some pictures? All the dead growth from last summer in the east bed was bugging me, so I took down the bamboo "fence" and cleaned everything out the other day. What day? Who knows anymore? I've been at home (except for dog walks) since March 22 and working from home full time since March 16. The plants don't care about coronavirus tho. The earth tilts on its axis, days get longer, the plants come back. 💚

Before



During (oh, hi there, Philadelphus!)



After

2019 nursery trip

Took my 4 hours of seasonal admin leave this morning and went to NM Plant Co. Was a bit picked over, especially compared to my extra-early visit last year. It rained last night, and was rainy then sunny on and off.

Greeter dog Tag is still a tank, and very good at his job.
Oh hello! Welcome, person still inside your car!

I am Tag, a noble beast.

This way to the greenhouses!

Mostly geraniums and petunias, but still a good selection.

  
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I ended up getting:

• 3 marigolds (to put next to the tomatoes)
  
• 2 coleus (front pot)
  
• 2 white impatiens (front pot)
  
• 1 sweet potato vine (front pot)
  
• 3 Italian basil
  
• 2 Persian basil (when will I learn?)

Total: $25 even.

It hailed on my way home.

2019 Garden Fair

Oh, hey ... is this thing on? 2019 Garden Fair! Construction is over at the Fairgrounds! Will the Farministas ladies be there? Stay tuned for further developments!

2018 Garden Fair | weekend update

Oh, hi there! This is Taylor, our new dog. She very much enjoys being in the backyard, digging holes in the “lawn” and the east bed, under our bedroom window. The crossed bamboo stick barrier that I put up there last summer to keep Cheyenne out provided zero impediment to her. I've acquired an expandable willow trellis thing to use as edging/fencing in an attempt to keep her out of there.

Also, Taylor had some ... disturbing? poops Saturday morning, so we hot-footed it over to the vet (she is doing well, got a wide-spectrum gut-bug killer and is on a week of colon-soothing pills). I ended up missing prime tomato-buying time at the Garden Fair while waiting at the vet (Bram missed helping set up for Free Comic Book Day at Big Adventure Comics as well). Luckily, my in-laws were there first thing and picked up the requisite Sungold and (lacking any Robesons available for purchase) Black Krim tomato plants for me. They refused to disclose the price, extracting only a promise of tomatoes as repayment. Hopefully the row cover I ordered will thwart any Curly Top Virus-spreading bugs.

I did, however, go over to Waterwise on Saturday to get (in retrospect, probably too many) perennials for the east bed:

• 5 Penstemon pinifolius
• 3 Penstemon "Dark Towers"
• 3 Sedum spurium "Dragon’s Blood"
• 3 Salvia nemorosa "May Night"
• 3 Agastache "Desert Sunrise"
• 3 Agastache rupestris "Glowing Embers"

Why do all these cultivar names sound like they're from a Dungeons and Dragons campaign?



Dug in 2 bags of mushroom compost, and set out the pots. Will attempt to plant them after work sometime this week. Need mulch — gravel, preferably.


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2018 nursery trip

Took today off, met up with Jim and Marsha at San Marcos and caravan-ed over to NM Plant Co. It was my in-laws' first time and they say they'll be back later this week to get more stuff.



Greeter dog is a tank. The guys said "it's all fur," but I dunno. Also: greeter dog's name is Tag. Hi, Tag.



Still good selection, not too busy. I'd say four or five other groups of customers while we were there.


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M+J got some herbs and mostly flowers for the big pots in their courtyard and on their front porch. As always, I'm smitten by the dahlias.





Annuals for the front door pot:

• 1 dahlia
• 2 white impatiens
• 2 multi-colored coleus
• 1 lime-green sweet potato vine

Herb starts:

• 2 Genovese basil
• 2 Italian flat-leaf parsley
• 6 chives
  (because of course all my chives died over the winter, too)

2018 Garden Fair

2017 Garden Fair | weekend update

So, apparently, there was construction going on at the Santa Fe County Fairgrounds that severely impacted the spaces where the Garden Fair is held. There was only one building open (usually there are two, plus various outdoor spaces), so there was only maybe one-quarter the amount of vendors/exhibitors as usual, plus only the main plant sale. The Farminista ladies were not there! No food trucks! Boo! Fortunately, there were tomatoes in the main plant sale. Unfortunately, even though I got there by 9:30 am, they had sold out of Sungolds! Gah! I panicked and grabbed two Robesons ($4 each). It was nutso, and really crowded, with everything crammed into a too-small space. Ran into the ever-fabulous Bev, Kathy, and Paul B.!


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To salve my disappointment, I engaged in some additional retail therapy on my way home. First, I stopped at Plants of the Southwest and got a Littleleaf Mockorange (Philadelphus microphyllus). Earlier this spring we had Coates Tree Service out to do some work, including removing the three-leaf sumac outside our bedroom window — it was seriously encroaching and causing problems. The mockorange will take its place.



I've been reading Nate Downey's PermaDesign blog, and back in April, he posted a piece about David Salman, the founder and former president of Santa Fe Greenhouses. (Even though the Santa Fe Greenhouses retail location has been closed for years, High Country Gardens, their mail-order branch, is still going.) Nate's blog post mentioned that Salman is still growing plants for his wholesale business, Waterwise Gardening. Which has public sales! Which I stopped at, after Plants of the Southwest! It was fairly busy, with one greenhouse full of mostly perennials, including a bunch I had on my list to check out as other plantings to go with the mockorange! Judging by the ID tags in some of the plants, Salman still raises plants for High Country Gardens. So these were the same ones I had been considering mail-ordering, for less money, and no shipping fees! Woohoo! I kinda went a little nuts:

• 3 Husker Red penstemon (Penstemon digitalis Husker Red)
• 1 Blue Fortune agastache
• 2 Sunset agastache (Agastache rupestris)
• 3 Serpentine columbine (Aquilegia eximia)
• 3 Leadwort (Ceratostigma plumbaginoides), for the front door bed
• 1 Rosemary

Plus a bag of Yum Yum Mix.


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The day's haul:



Then, at home, I started the cleanup in front yard, weeding the sidewalk bed and along the other side of the driveway. I also trimmed up the chamisa, deadheaded stuff, and trimmed back the yuccas that were encroaching the sidewalk. Then I took a rake and shook a bunch of apricots off the tree. I'm really worried with the amount of fruit that's set and still seems viable, even after the hard freeze we had the other weekend. Sigh. Two-and-a-half hours. Front yard itself is still in need of some serious weeding, but I was tired and the bin was full. Next weekend, I guess.





Also: Happy Birthday, Mom! 😘

2017 Garden Fair

The 2017 Santa Fe Master Gardeners Garden Fair is Saturday, May 6. Who's going?

2017 nursery trip

So I decided to head out to NM Plant Co this morning (took a couple hours off from work). Turns out their official open date was Saturday. Turns out April 15 has always been their official open date, I've just never tried going that early. But they were open anyway and I wasn't the only customer there. Everything looked great, full inventory, many things not even blooming yet.

This weirdly warm spring has really messed up my sense of when it's time to BUY ALL THE PLANTS.


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Check out these crazy petunias — they're full of stars.



They also had a whole big section of dahlias! I don't remember ever seeing them here before. Either I've forgotten seeing them, they're new this year, or they sell out fast and I've never been early enough to snag any. Anyway, I was seduced — got one for the pot by the front door, even though it's a pretty shady spot. Guess we'll see.







Annuals for the front door pot:

• 1 dahlia
  (I know it's not technically an annual, I can lift the tuber in the fall, I just haven't decided yet if I will)
• 2 dark pink-red impatiens
• 1 multi-colored coleus
• 1 lime-green sweet potato vine

Herb starts:

• 2 Genovese basil
• 2 Persian basil
  (hopefully I won't kill it this year)
• 2 English thyme

Also: 2 geraniums. Total was $30 and change.

Greeter dog looked like he put on a little weight over the winter, but who hasn't?

2016 Garden Fair

Garden Fair! I headed out around 10:00, but it seemed less crowded than usual. Maybe because this spring has been all over the place, weather-wise and not a many people were feeling the urge to garden? Maybe because, although it was sunny and 60° out, it was also super windy, with lots of blowing dust. Either way, parking was quick and the crowds were light.

Picked up tomato plants from the Farministas ladies as usual (same prices as last year: $4 each, or 4 for $15). Only got one Sungold and one Robeson this year. I'm planning on only planting in the raised bed, in hopes of getting the wall/fence fixed this summer? Ran into my neighbor Marcy, her husband Steve was giving a talk! (Duh, it was right there on the Garden Fair graphic!) Also said hi to Douglas, she asked about Jim + Stacy + Bernice.

Headed past the food trucks to check out the vendors in the other building, picked up two flame flowers and three evening primroses for the front yard (along the sidewalk, I think, where it's sunniest). Checked out the vendors and displays in both buildings, then headed out. Quick stop on the way home at Plants of the Southwest for (ever) more grass seed and a packet of Dakota verbena seeds.




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2016 nursery trip

I took off a couple hours this morning before work and went out to NM Plant Co.


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Greeter dog was happy to greet, but was dubious about having his picture taken.





Much better selection than last year, when I waited until after the beginning of May to go. They're kind of picked-over by then.


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Got mostly shade-loving annuals for the pot by the front door (that worked out well last year):

• 1 white sage (thriller?)
• 2 white impatiens (filler)
• 2 multi-colored coleus (filler)
• 2 purple sweet potato vines (spiller?)

Also picked up 2 each starts each of:

• chives
• Genovese basil
• Persian (!) basil
• thyme

Total was $23 and change.