The wonderful aroma of... bamboo?

This past Christmas we received a nice gift of some scented candles. I'm not a candle fanatic like some people, but I really do love some of these "flavors" -- and I have to call them "flavors" because they're usually so strong they fill my entire head.

I don't know if the "bamboo" scent was chosen specifically for me (the person who gifted me has never visited my garden) or if it was a happy coincidence. I was eager to find out what they thought bamboo smells like.

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Checking in on the cuttings

You already know I overwinter cuttings indoors under lights. You've also recently read about me taking more cuttings for fun and to get more plants.

It's time to take a look at some of these cuttings to see how they're doing, don't you think?

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Lesson learned

When overwintering plants, I often try experiments. Take cuttings instead of overwintering the whole plant, keep some plants dormant, others actively growing. The idea is to reduce the amount of work and/or storage space required to get these not cold-hardy plants through the winter.

This year's big experiment was with purple fountain grass, Pennisetum setaceum 'Rubrum'. In previous years I would take small divisions in the fall or early winter and keep the new plants growing under lights all winter. This worked great but the plants eventually got quite rootbound before spring arrived, so this year I was looking for a way to delay this process a bit.

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Rock

Actually, "rock" is probably not the most descriptive title for this post.

It's just that "weathered garden rocks covered in fascinating patterns of mosses, lichen, and algae" doesn't make a very catchy title.

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Three-year anniversary: Best of INWIG 2012

According to Blogger I made my first blog post on March 5, 2010 which means today is my three-year anniversary! Three years of daily posts? Yep. Since I think about gardening every day, why not post about it every day too? One of the main reasons for creating this blog was so I'd document everything I did in the garden, and I have to admit I've done a pretty good job of that. Did I list every detail of every task I did? No, certainly not. I missed lots of stuff, including some important details such as what exact varieties of veggies I planted, spacings, fertilization schedules, etc. but I also shared a lot of things that I would normally have just observed and enjoyed for myself, and have hopefully given some entertainment and knowledge to my readers.

Today I'm going to take a look back over the past year and list my favorite posts in chronological order. If you haven't seen them before please take a look. If you have seen them already, then take another look -- it's still fun! I did this type of post on my previous two anniversaries too, and I really like the way they turned out. Expect it every year.

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Winter's last gasp?

It's been quite wintery in St. Louis the past few weeks -- as it has been over large parts of this country. Temperatures have been much lower than normal (except for a few days here and there), and we've had a bit of snow.

Our normal high temperatures for this time of year are 50ºF (10ºC) with normal lows around freezing. Instead we've been lucky if the high temps made it to 40ºF (4ºC), with lows in the low 20's or even teens (F). That will be changing later this week though, as the forecast looks like it will get back to "normal".

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Another problem, no solution

I've been writing about little problems that I've been fixing lately. Today I have another problem to show you, but I admit I don't have a solution to this one.

It's plumbago (or leadwort), Ceratostigma plumbaginoides. This is one of the first perennials I planted back in 2002, and it's been a care-free performer for me. There's a problem though...

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Another simple fix

The other day I wrote about a little project to level part of my parkway turf, then I wrote about removing vinca from the bed in front of the house. There was another little project I tackled on that same busy weekend.

I had been thinking about this last summer, and probably the summer before too: the Japanese forest grass (Hakonechloa macra) that's growing between these three rocks.

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Imagine: bark

One of my favorite things about the garden is tree bark. I love its texture, its color.

I also love the way it hosts mosses, algae, and lichen. It's like a garden itself, in miniature. A landscape all its own.

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