More Bulbs

These paperwhites are almost ready to bloom. A few days ago spring seemed near. Now I am comforted by my bulbs.

I love this hyacinth vase. It has been blooming for about a week, perfuming the air.

At the base of the stalk is another flower and...

another flower stalk. 2nd flower stalks are generally smaller and strangely shaped but they are still a bonus.

Houseplants

It is snowy out. I have changed to a mac instead of PC and everything looks different. I wonder if my old computer was dim. Anyway, this is the green in my life right now.

This goblet has Thalia narcissus. I forced these last year too. I actually forced a lot of them last year. This winter I didn't go as crazy with it.

Here's one of the garden plants, lemongrass, I am wintering indoors. Some are out while others are in the basement in the cold room.

This is a narcissus, unknown variety and a hyacinth. I really like this hyacinth vase. And this bulb has cooperated by rooting nicely. We'll see how well it blooms. I'm always on the look out for hyacinth vases at thrift stores. This one is unusual.

Wintry Things

1. Cat with freshly spun true black alpaca.

2. Faded hyacinth blooms in flourescent light packaging

3. Frozen soap bubble; hard to make in this climate

4. Forced bulbs; hyacinths and thalia narcissus, image slightly doctored by oversaturation.

Indoor Things

When you move things inside, you've got to look them over. I moved this small bay laurel tree inside a month or so ago and noticed just a couple weeks ago that it was just coated with scale.

Scale is the leech of the plant world. They attach themselves anywhere that they can suck the life out of your plant. In this instance they were on the stems and leaves.

If it is feasible, a q-tip dipped in rubbing alcohol is effective at removing them. The photo here shows my partially de-scaled bay laurel. This was a couple weeks ago.
Yesterday I found MORE scale on it, not as bad as the last time but I needed to descale it again. I am glad at this point that my tree is still quite small. I think I'm going to find a few more in a couple weeks. I sorta like KILLING these nasty creatures.

Next we have Abe the cat hanging out in his spot. I geririgged a shelf over a radiator so he could sit by the window in a warm spot. The plant hanger next to him has catnip growing in it, but it's always been anemic. The vines climbing up it are he shou wu. Behind him is some wheatgrass. I planted that because he had been eating my lemongrass and he does now seem to prefer the wheat. I do however need to trim it every once in a while, thus the dish there with freshly trimmed grass on top of various dead leaves I've pulled from other plants.

And finally my forced hyacinths. I just took them out of the refrigerator and after a week in the dark of the basement, I'll hang them in a window. I understand that it's a good idea to make a gradual transition from cold and dark to warm and light with hyacinths. Sometimes the blooms bust out of the bulb, splitting it, before the leaves come out. I've never had this experience, but I hear it's not pretty.

I found a picture of a prematurely blooming forced hyacinth. It's lovely but preferable to have the blooms a few inches above the bulb with well formed leaves below. Actually last year I did have one or 2 hyacyinths that did this. I was less careful last year to do a gradual transition. Maybe I won't have this problem this year.

Bulbs, bulbs, bulbs

In a previous post (see lightbulbs) I showed my idea using hyacinths, here you see the same concept with paperwhite narcissus. It is again, the plastic packaging used for fluorescent lightbulbs. I discovered that there is a tiny vent hole that should but plugged up if you do this. I used a waterproof clear glue.

Paperwhites require no chill time so perhaps I should have experi- mented with them 1st but anyway, here's one. I intend to add a new bulb each week so that in theory they will bloom over a more extended time period.

In the background is a burning bush shedding it's leaves.

Next is my right foot and left hand. I'm wearing lime green gardening gloves that I got at Tuesday Morning for 6 bucks. I guess that they are some remaindered brand.

My preferred gloves are actually Atlas Nitrile Gloves which retail for about 7 dollars as I am typing this. There are currently very few places locally that sell them. Michaels Bros Nursery does. I have seen nitrile gloves sold at auto parts stores, but only in men's sizes. I personally have small hands. Online they are available at Nichols Garden Nursery.

Why are they THE gardening glove? They just are.

On my right foot is a gardening clog I got at Target or pretty cheap. They aren't my favorite. My favorite are Muck Boots. Muck Boots are nice because they are breathable and waterproof which is important especially when it's hot but they aren't cheap. I bought a few pairs of cheap clogs just so I can rotate them and also for just working in my own yard.

I decided to plant some bulbs because they are deeply discounted now. I have a small strip of green on the street which I have for the past year been encouraging with any low growing plant other than grass and annoying weeds. The result is mostly clover with a little yarrow(I think). I think my neighbors will enjoy seeing flowers poking out there next spring so I planted crocuses in small clumps and because I love danger, there's also some ice follies narcissus. Hopefully they won't get trampled.

lightbulb

This is an idea I had. These are hyacinth bulbs. below are bulbs in traditional hyacinth glasses.