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Virtual Garden Party

The SQ. FOOT garden party yesterday was great.  For those of you who
couldn't make it, here's a recap.  About 80 people converged on the gardens
and brought food.  The boards were GROANING!!!  I had so many tomatoes from
my 14 plants that I heaped them in bowls and used them as centerpieces on
all the patio tables.  Then I insisted (under penalty
of pelting with rotten tomatoes) that everyone take some home.  We're SICK
of them!!  The mycorrhizal fungi I used caused every blossom to set fruit on
7-foot high plants. We are mid-harvest, so the extras from now on go to the
local food pantry.

We toured the SQ FT. veggies beds that I constructed in January with cinder
blocks.  I have three 4 X 28 feet beds.  I have planted all the holes in the
blocks with herbs, marigolds, lobelia (from color contrast) and
strawberries.  The berries LOVE the holes, because they sit high and dry in
my wet climate (rainfall since Jan. 1 has exceeded 40 inches).  Also, we had
a cool spring and the concrete surrounding the plants added heat that made
flowers and berries galore.  Plus the stink bugs hate concrete!  There were
many people who said they were going immediately to Lowe's on the way home
and buy cinder blocks.  Other crops that were prolifically bearing included
Triumphe de Farcy haricot verts (bush beans), Waltham butternut squash,
Lavender and Chocolate Beauty bell
peppers and Suyo cucumbers.  The eggplant, hot peppers and three types of
melons have not set fruit yet, because of cool nights.  The tomatoes in the
garden (and in bags that went home!) are: Purple Smudge-Orange Flesh,
Schimmerg Stoo & Green, Texas Wild, Gurnsey Island, Garden Peach, Carnival,
White Bush, Silvery Fir Tree, Wonder Lite, Green Zebra, Black Plum, Odoriko,
Striped German and Southern Nights.

Next we toured the heirloom flower-antique rose border I put in this spring.
Along the side there is also a small bed of Moon & Stars watermelons (Amish
heirloom) that is trellised up a chainlink fence.  The flower border
includes: Phaleonopsis, Green, Paul Neyron, Seven Sisters and The Fairy
roses.  Purple hyacinth beans (dolchas lablab) and
French (or Summer) hollyhocks are from Thomas Jefferson's Monticello.
German heirloom, Elephant's Head Amaranth makes a huge cerise spash,
tempered with Nicotiana sylvestris, Confederate rose, Pavonia (rock rose),
Brazilian verbena, Sea Thrift, German white statice, Autumn Joy sedum,
pineapple sage, Costa Rican salvia, gold coreopsis, agapanthus, yellow
daisies, powder blue plumbago, double purple & white daturas,
foxgloves, Lime daylilies and plenty of white marigolds.  I'm sure I've
forgot a few things, because there are so many plants in the bed, and they
bloom at different times.  There is always something in bloom.

Then it was on to our newly constructed courtyard.  The house makes a  U in
the back, due to two wings that protrude.  When we bought the house six
years ago, there was a large deck that filled the U.  It needed replacing,
because even treated wood does not stand up to 72 inches of annual rainfall,
plus I don't like the idea of wood leaching arsenic
and other heavy metals into the soil.  After a trip to New Orleans last
December, I knew I had to have a French Quarter-type courtyard!!  Out came
the deck, and we laid a flagstone patio and steps leading from the house.
We left 30-inch wide flower beds on all perimeters.  We put a 3-tiered
fountain in the center and planted creeping fig to climb the
north-facing wall of brick.  These were the basic bones.

Then my fun started with choosing the plants.  I scoured catalogs, surfed
the web and visited many exotic nurseries.  We live in Zone 9B, where the
lowest temperature we get is roughly 24 degrees.  This may happen only once
in a season.  The courtyard area, due to its exposure and brick walls, adds
10 degrees to the ambient temperature.  I've used it
to save many plants.  So I knew I could go tropical with my selections.
Here's what's there: Dinnerplate crimson hibsicus, hot pink hibiscus tree,
double pink hibiscus, orange and pink zonal hibiscus, bougainvillieas
(white, hot pink, orange and gold), Leopard plants, Penguin vines from
Brazil, Blue Pea vines, Fingernail bromeliads, Pink Quill tillansias,
staghorm ferns, Monster fern (like a Boston, but fronds are 6-ft. long),
Button fern, Japanese holly fern, Maidenhair fern, various coleus, various
wax-leaf begonia, Angel-wing begonia, various impatiens, hypotes (white and
pink) various caladiums, Angel Trumpets, two kinds of Voodoo lilies,
mandevilla, 5 kinds of geraniums, Chenille
plants, Himalayian Indigo, hoya (Hindu Rope) and a white shefflera.

Sorry this was so long, but some of you asked for a virtual tour.  For those
of you who were here in spirit--we tossed tomatoes skyward about 8 p.m. CDT
for Janet in D.C., Dave in Tehachapi, Noel in Kiwiland and Melissa on the
mighty Missisip.

Doreen Howard
Zone 9b, 50 miles south of Houston, along the Gulf of Mexico

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