Gardening in Busted Stick.: Rookie Gardens and Lesson's learned

Welcome to Busted Stick

I actually live in Broken Arrow, Oklahoma, where the winters are usually mild and the summers are brutal. I have, in my 15 years here, killed an untold number of plants. It took me a few years to realize that my gardening knowledge was based on living in Michigan for most of my childhood and what works there, won't work here.

I've long had dreams of having an English Cottage look and feel to my gardens. I gave up that dream and settled for "safe" trees and bushes, and then an ice storm unlike anything we've ever seen hit Tulsa in 2007 and killed almost every bush and tree I own. Leaving me momentarily heartbroken, but totally inspired.

I'm slowly re-developing my yard and painting the landscape I've seen in my inner vision since arriving. It can be done. It just takes patience, time, and a lot of research.

That's what this blog is. The culmination of my learning, my mistakes (and I've made many already) and hopefully in time, you will see my new canvas and my studying, trial and error, pay off with beauty.

I hope you keep coming back and checking on the progress. I'm excited.

What I'm Working on Right Now

This South West corner is the newest room in my yard. I will be working on this space most of the winter to get it ready for Spring planting. It is by far the most unsightly, what with the utility boxes and whatnot. It's also under a "no dig" restriction, so I'm having to build up and be creative with pots and planting locations. This is primarily shaded, I'm researching color and cover options while keeping it usable to as much of an extent as possible.

I've already added the trellis, as well as two bushes to hide the boxes - and I'm building up a brick garden spot just outside of the shade and next to the trellis for my climbing morning glories. I like entrances.

In the back will be large pots of ferns, hostas, and whatever other shade loving things I can find. - My "pots" won't be pots so much as they will be feeding troughs from the local AG store. A trick I learned from a California gardener who wasn't allowed to dig in parts of his yard either because of right of way restrictions.

Friday, February 27, 2009

Rookie Gardens and Lesson's learned

I attacked my garden plans last years with visions of beauty, fullness, and completion. I purchased whole garden packages fully expecting them to fill in the first year. Classic rookie mistake. It actually takes about three years for perennial gardens to fill in. Lesson learned. This year, I will invest in a few more perennials and fill the rest of the spots in with annuals.

I still had some nice flowers though. My newest side garden was filled with carnations, black eyed susans, lilly of the valley, sedem, and coral bells. I was pleasantly surprised by the results.

This is my Beauty of Moscow Lilac. I knew she wouldn't bloom last year, but she held up quite good. I'm looking forward to watching her mature.

My hard drive crashed over the winter and I lost a lot of my garden photos. So, I won't be blogging much about last year after all. I do however still have some of my closeups. The garden did fill in pretty well by fall and should do really well this coming year.

We also added a Japanese Maple to the mix, but he really hated this sunny spot and we had to move it to a more shaded area in front of our porch.

This fall I added my tulips, Rose of Sharon Bushes, Lillies, and more daisies. I'm looking forward to seeing those results come Spring and Summer as well.