Amendments! What is your personal favorite?

ldvogt,
I would ask those people why they are warning about the use of that poo in gardens. Maybe it is just to keep from being sued or maybe there really is something wrong with it. I would sure ask.
With a little effort, one can usually find someone with horses who is thrilled if you take away their horse poop. Otherwise they would have to do it themselves. I have had numerous people try to lure me to their stable arguing that their horses are organically fed, etc. etc. In time you will have your pick of horse poo!

Kenton,
Yes, I think my stone and yours could have come fromt he same quarry. I think it is lovely and it is tougher than a lot of the flagstone we get around here.
Gravel is a tall order to get rid of! I will be doing that for years. Luckily, many plants do fine in gravelly soil. My onions and eggplants are growin in only about 50% compost and 50% gravel, but they do very well anyhow. But I figure if they were in 100% compost they would do better.
Betty aka paja

This message was edited Aug 9, 2006 5:26 PM

Well Betty Paaahaaaa.
I get a pile at a home-business horse-boarding place. No seeds, too. I supply the gent with veg and an occasional bottle of wine, so I own his pile.
I like your creed of compost.

A new, more betraying look at my little garden spot. Sandstone comes in different shades and is spread all over this state/region.

Your garden is beautiful! I am terribly jealous of your banana trees. I could use the leaves to cook fish! I could use them to make South American style tamales. What is the vine in the foreground. It clearly isn't beans.
I hope my garden will be as lush one of these days. If I could find a spot where a banana tree would survive, I would be in heaven.

Humulus lupulus, AKA houseeating Hop.
There is no reason you can't grow yourself some musa leaves for tamales a la hoja de banano. Southern, decidous aspect. near the house. Compost-rich soil. Water and water and more water. A pile of leaves a foot tall or so in winter.
Thanks for the compliments, this is the first time I am beginning to like my garden.
I hereby declare this thread can accomodate folk's personal flwoer pictures they are shamelessly proud of.

And the Musa basjoo. Not as toweringly triumphant as I'd like, but they are growing at least one or two leaves per week right now.

Thanks for giving us the rights to post flowers of which we are inordinately proud. I have quite a few saved up, but later..... Where did you get that banana tree and do you seriously keep it over the winter. A leaf or two per week would be wonderful because one leaf can make many wrappers for tamales or barbecued fish.
Having grown up in New Orleans, banana trees feel like home to me.

I am amazed you didn't like your garden before. I thought the smaller pictures you posted earlier were lovely. I can't wait for mine -- the one near the Colorado Gold walk to be as lush.
Anyhow, your lily is wonderful. What kind is it? I am a lily fan as well.
Actually letting each other what grows in the rockies is a major service. I was told tomatoes would not ripen in Los Alamos ( wrong), eggplants won't grow ( wrong) and okra won't grow ( so far right, but I am working on it.) I now have tiny watermelons in my vacant lot. Don't' know if they will mature or not but they sure don't know they can't grow here.
The banana was fabulous news for me. Any thoughts on figs? BTW, a friend of mine has hops but she planted them far from the house.
Just bought georgeous ornamental oregano at Trader Joes. It doesn't look even related to oregano. Beautiful stuff.

I have a nice clump of Greek Oregano by my back door. Meant to cut some of it to use on my wonderful tomato sandwich this eve. but forgot and ate the sand. with only a sprinkle of Red Rubin basil, isn't that sad. ha. This evening for dinner or whatever you want to call it I had an ear of very freshly picked corn, tomato sandwich, sliced Orient Express cuke with special seasoning and fresh strawberries with yogurt. Now that is great summer living. And the outside temp. is/was perfect, mid 80s.

Donna

Some ornamental oregano is (in my opinion) prettier than lavender. And easier to keep alive. From last weekend: Hopley's Oregano

Don't know what kind of ornamental oregano I bought but it is lovely. Doesn't really look like oregano. I wonder if mine will grow up to look like yours! It is georgeous. Mine is purple on the ends like yours but a paler purple. The leaves range from the purple on the ends to pale green to a slightly darker green. I will have to photograph it and post it tomorrow.
rutholive,
Your lunch sounds heavenly and will probably add years to your lifetime. Strawberries and yougurt! Yum!

Paja and Kenton, I LOVE both your gardens. Kenton, I'd love to have a banana, but I don't think I could do that on a shady balcony six floors up. I DO admire yours, though. And Paja, your pathway is gorgeous!

More pictures, everybody!

Here is an early spring picture of an area that I did some rearrranging a little later on. Planted two Tea Roses, the first ones for this garden. I am not much of rose grower. Have 2 shrub type roses, 7 or 8 miniature type and this summer the two Tea roses, but was too hot for them and me.

Here are a couple more photos of same area, too early in morning, the flash went off. There is an on the ground bird bath the I use for butterfly station, just has moist mud and sand in it. A path leads to the butterfly station, going between the spring planted roses.

Donna

And here is the second photo to try to put in perspective as to bench and the Pinus koraiensis Silveray tree in very first photo, Hope I haven't confused everyone. Donna

Lovely pictures. The idea of a butterfly feeder is wonderful. Is the tree next to the white chair in the first pictue a ponderosa pine? It will soon provide shade for your chair if it is . I also liked your use of stone in the first picture. Did you have to haul them in or did you find them on the property.
I don't grow roses at all. I will eventually add some, but they need a lot of care at first, so when I have finished the basic structure of the yard, I will add a couple of rose bushes. They will be the icing on the cake.

This message was edited Aug 10, 2006 7:58 AM

Kenton i have never seen that paticular aspect of your garden. Looks great. What is that big round patch of ground cover called. I didn't think you used that stuff. Beautiful arrangement of exotics.
Donna i can sit in your chair in the last photo and look up in the future to the branch of the pine (what is it?) to the right in the picture. I need to do what you are doing to place setting areas in all of my garden areas. I just need to learn to sit. LOL
green jay how long has that oregano been in the ground? Certainly a xeriscape plant? and how long does the plant flower?

Betty:
Musa basjoo is no joke. Hardy with drainage. mulch, water, and good soil. B&B bulbs had them for $10 or something. You could store yours, Judith. -They are very attractive pot plants.
Figs are possible. Old plants tend to be able to get the fruit ripened in time better. They are a zone7a, 6b or so. I use dot think figs were horrid until I had a fresh one from a friend's garden. Post away you flower pictures!
Lilium 'Lady Alice.'

Greenjay, I've never seen a more... more... "explosive?.. Oregano. Huge.

Donna, there are no words sufficient to comment on your garden. You have an amzing talent to get things to fit so well together. Brilliatn butterfly watering hole, too.

Steve, that round patch is for the dogs! (6' diameter) Otherwise, I wouldn't have any of that horrible domestic weed!

Kenton

That oregano plant is at Denver Botanic Garden. I have been "visiting" it for several years now, but I would guess < 5 years since that is when they last revised that area of the herb garden. BTW, it was so full of bees and other insects you could hardly get close enough for a picture.

The tree is Pinus koraiensis Silveray, Korean White Pine.

Part of the rocks came from around the house, and part from just down the road about a quarter mile , where people have been dumping rocks right beside the highway. To get them here to the house i borrowed back my old tractor, that I sold to my neighbor when I bought this acreage.

If I can locate another picture of a bench beside my chicken house, that is my secret hideaway, I will send along.

Donna

Sorry couldn't find the photo I wanted, A whole folder has just disappeared. I tried to locate it once before as it is a folder of garden scenes in my yard, probably a 100 or so shots. Don't know what I did to make it just go away.

this is one I took of the beautiful garden kaliedescope that my daughter gave me a couple of years ago for my birthday. It was delivered here to my house from Calif. the man placed it in my garden where I wanted it. The problem I have encountered with where I thought was a good place is that it is in full sun and I haven't found the right plants for it. Just too hot. I could put semperveriens in it but I wanted something colorful. And I guess another solution would be to find a different location.

Thankyou all for your kind comments. Donna

What a great kaliedescope! Maybe you need to place a small tree near it so you can grow brighter stuff in the bowl -- at least I think that is how it must work. Your garden does look like a really great place to have one or more secret hideaways. A good thing to have.
I have a bench made of large flagstones in a clump of scrub oak that I will have to send you a picture of. It is cool and shady and completely hidden from house and phone. Only trouble is the oak keeps growing around it and I have to prune it frequently. Will send picture later. Currently I need to prune the oak back.
As for the lost folder, I can tell you what I do. I am always moving folders accidentally into other completely unrelated folders. Try checking out a few folders you haven't looked at in a long time.
Ah, your garden inspires me to keep working on mine. Some day ......

Another thing you can try donna is to open your documents window and then click on folders and they all will be listed on the left. On each folder heading click on it to display what is in it. I want one of those swing things with a canopy over but I want one long enough to sleep on. nothing like a night under the stars. I guess I'll have to build one cause they are all manufactured to be love seat size. Nice hide out Donna.

I have a question for the Compost Gurus:

Can I compost shredded juniper bushes? Will it harm the critters that help break up the other composting material?

I wouldn't think so, as long as you shred them. As long as they are not artificial junipers. I can't think of much organic matter that can't be composted, if any.

I'd mix them with other material to dilute the waxy stuff on them and speed up decomposition.

If you boiled the shredded juniper and then cooled it and them mixed the boiled juniper and juniper water, might that aid in breaking it down, too? Just wondering out loud. Seems like it would help and maybe help break down the waxy stuff. (Not sure I would make a fire just for juniper boiling, but in the event that you were going to have a fire for something else...)

That's a lot of work for a stinking juniper... It would surely help! It would also "break down" quickly if you treated it with a liberal doze of gasoline and a pinch of match-flame...

Just shred it and mix it into this fall's leaf drop, plus some grass clippings. That should do it nicely. Or mix it into your existing compost. Or topdress an established area with it...
K

A word of caution on the shredding and chipping of aromatic woods like juniper, pine, cedar, eucalyptus, camphor laurel etc - they release a lot of their volatile oils when they are freshly chipped, much more so that one is usually exposed to in a "whole" plant. These volatile oils are known to cause irritations of the skin, nasal passages and lungs with high exposure to the oils. You may want to take some precautions while you are moving the stuff around. Once they've been composted for a couple of years they are less volatile. We had a problem with a batch of junniper-eucalyptus wood chips that were dropped off at our community garden. The chips were fresh and intended for use on garden pathways. Quite a few people reacted to it and were on inhalers to be able to enter the garden to work their plots. We finally convinced the garden administrators to move the bulk of it away from the gardens.

Wow. Great info, GM.

Yeah, good to know. I will be sure to bury it under several inches of fine horse manure, so the aromatic oils aren't so overwhelming....

...after all, the essence d' horse is quite auspicious.

or at least better than juniper.

You must remember that all compost materials do not have to compost before being used. Just most of them. The uncomposted juniper will compost in the soil it is placed in and will provide long term soil structure. I always use slow to compost material in my compost pile and usually shred it so it is easy to fork and spread.

Followup on the Hunter's Hill Stealth Compost Saga --

My neighbor delivered on her offer of several tons of composted horse ( + other horse companion critter) manure. This has been weathering for several years, and she has a MOUNTAIN of it to get rid of.

Jackie (another neighbor) is 5.5 feet tall, for scale:

That's just one trailer load. My neighbor says she can provide at least 5 more, just like that. Well of course, we can't just leave it piled like that, and as you can see from the texture it has already been "composted" enough to mix into flower beds. So I used it to begin creating the planting terraces in the new wildflower garden. There is a serious "dip" in the hill, which we were able to almost completely correct today with that one load of stuff.

Unfortunately the garages adjacent to the garden are in the middle of being painted, so we have to leave a 10' space between the garages and the flower beds until they are done. From this angle you can see how I piled it up to correct the slope. The trench you see in the foreground, in front of the flower bed is what the english call a "ha ha", actually a footing for a dry laid rock wall that will hopefully be installed in the next weeks:

All gone! May I please have some more?

Wow! I am green with envy! Your friend is a true friend indeed. I had two piles of compost, not as large as the one you displayed. I have almost used them up planting all my loot from DBG and stuff I bought locally beforehand. Speaking of green, I expect to see lots of it on your grounds next spring! Your plants will be in heaven.
Me, I had better get started building more compost piles and hauling more manure.

My plants will be in heaven if a) all of our Winter sowing schemes work out as planned, and b) I can institute instant and harsh punishments for vandalism. We had another serious attack of vandalism, this time in the rose garden, last night. The fact that it happened right outside the home of one of the board members may help us "fix" the problem once and for all.