Re: columbine
- Subject: Re: [SG] columbine
- From: L* K*
- Date: Sun, 3 Jun 2001 02:30:35 -0700
----- Original Message -----
From: Marge Talt <mtalt@CLARK.NET>
To: <shadegardens@MAELSTROM.STJOHNS.EDU>
Sent: Sunday, June 03, 2001 12:13 AM
Subject: Re: [SG] columbine
> Lucy...think your key is "old swamp bottom". Aquilegia require
good
> drainage - do not like to have wet feet. If you've got any
high or
> dry spots, try them there.
>
> Do you mean like pocket gophers - those small ones - or big
ones AKA
> ground hogs? I've had the ground hogs and do not remember them
> eating columbine, but have heard those small pocket gophers
will eat
> most anything. Probably a ground hog would, too, if
sufficiently
> hungry...they are good munchers.
>
We only have the little ones. I talked to a friend who grew up
back east and he said your ground hogs are a lot like the marmots
in the Sierras, but otherwise I've never seen a ground hog. The
gophers do seem to eat everything, including
things that are supposed to be toxic.
I don't know. The soil seems to drain well to about six-twelve
feet,
where the water level is. But maybe that's it. This time of
year I can hardly
keep the soil watered: in the winter it's often too wet to work
for a week or
more at a time, which is one of my Rational Reasons why I don't
garden
in the most verdant time of the year for us.
I've been building berms to take up the slack on the compost and
make the
place more interesting: I wonder if they'll also be better places
for plants
that want dry feet?
I have a couple of
columbines in a window box just now, the crowded kind where you
stick in any pretty plant that catches your eye every time
something comes to the end of its tether. They're poking along
so far,
but we'll see. The window box drains well, the nice fellow made
sure of
it when he built it on.
Lucy Kemnitzer
