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days are longer, days are longer

March 20, 2009

may-4thI KNOW IT IS NOT MAY 4 YET, but rummaging here this winter in my closets I found this notebook, an early example of my prose. I couldn’t wait one more moment to show you. (And the days ARE getting longer, aren’t they?) Happy first day of spring from No Spring Chicken.

Related posts:

  1. salamander days
  2. doodle by andre: shelter in a storm
  3. yee-hah! we moved to texas
  4. ‘we saw the man go up in space today’
  5. my life in a cabinet of curiosities

{ 11 Comments }

Comments

  1. Johanna says:
    March 20, 2009 at 7:46 am

    Well, speaking from direct personal experience with my chickens in spring, everything is cheering up! My hen, Eartha Chick, went on an adventure the other day. Apparently the grass truly was greener on the other side — the dog yard side! No worries, all came out ok in the end, but it provided a good story for my blog.

    Here on the human side of spring, I started the first batch of vegetable seeds (the ones for “oh, I think May 1 is safe for putting tomatoes in the ground, even though ‘they’ say May 15″) and will set up the cold frame this weekend for a bit of season-extending experimenting. Lots of daffs and tulips pushing up now — I know it’s too soon to pull back the mulch, but I’m desperate to see them all!!!

    And I see that A Way to Garden has ramped up to the growing season — what a joy to have more frequent articles and lots of photos!

  2. boodely says:
    March 20, 2009 at 8:50 am

    I love it! I will chant it like a mantra, “Days are longer, days are longer…”

  3. chigal says:
    March 20, 2009 at 9:11 am

    Happy vernal equinox, yourself! And thanks for all the gardening advice. I’ve found several tips here that will help me, this year, even though I don’t have a big plot with room for trees and things.

  4. chris says:
    March 20, 2009 at 10:50 am

    do you still have your baseball cards too?

  5. Rob (ourfrenchgarden) says:
    March 20, 2009 at 1:02 pm

    They are indeed. Daylight is increasing by about 3 minutes on each day previous here near Bergerac at roughly 45 degrees north.

    A crucial fact heh?

    Rob

  6. andre says:
    March 22, 2009 at 12:00 pm

    I love this

  7. margaret says:
    March 22, 2009 at 1:01 pm

    Thanks, Andre. In my early days, I was quite the snappy writer. :)

  8. Claudia says:
    March 26, 2009 at 5:19 pm

    I love your blog and website. So different and beautiful from my Zone 10.

  9. margaret says:
    March 26, 2009 at 7:48 pm

    Welcome, Claudia. Zone 10? Did you say Zone 10? I’ll be right over…send me the MapQuest coordinates. It just refuses to really be spring here (let alone Zone 10), and I am desperate. Happy to have you as a voyeur; please come back soon.

  10. Peggy says:
    March 28, 2009 at 1:56 pm

    “Days are longer” is fun prose for a gardening blog. Perhaps more interesting, however, is the May 5, 1961 prose you can read behind your May 4 journal entry: “We saw the man go up in space.” Nasa’s web site confirms your journal entry(http://www.nasa.gov/multimedia/imagegallery/image_feature_171.html) with a suborbital flight of Mercury Astronaut Alan B. Shepard, Jr. as the first American in space.

  11. margaret says:
    March 28, 2009 at 4:29 pm

    Welcome, Peggy, and don’t WE have sharp eyes, missy?! Yes, the next entry in my notebook marks the Mercury launch. I have never shown that page to anyone except my friend Andre Jordan, who has a thing for astronauts. I sent Andre a jpg months back, when I found the notebook. It’s a really previous possession now, though for all these years (like 20 or 30) I didn’t even know I had it. See you soon again, I hope.

Speak Your Mind

The Sister Project

The Confessional

Some stuff really gets A Way to Garden-ers going. Weigh in, or just lurk while everyone else shares about these hot buttons:

Compost, Compost, Compost

I am as proud of my compost heap as I am of any part of my garden. It is the archaeological record of my garden past; it is the stuff from which future gardens will arise. I read a lot about, from sources like these: Garden Organic, a 50-year-old British charity; Journey to Forever (don’t worry, not some into-the-bunker survivalist cult); and the vast Cornell Composting archive. Dig in.

Juicy Bits

375 VISITORS, 1 BIG RHODIE: spring garden open day, in a virtual visit. How it looked, and also what they all asked about

keeping deer out DEER FENCE: I tried every potion and anti-deer trick till I finally got real and fenced. Strategies for every garden situation.

secrets to great tomatoes TOMATO TIPS, seed to harvest: Dozens of tricks for a better crop.

yes, even in dry shade MY 4 TOUGHEST GROUNDCOVERS perform even in the worst spots, like dry shade. Maybe these tough perennials will serve you as well?

5 great small trees GARDEN-SIZED TREES can’t just be the right scale; they need to have multi-season interest, too, to earn a spot here. Maybe you have room for one of my 5 favorites?

10 underplanting do’s and don’ts MAKING MOSAICS—that’s what I call good underplanting of trees and shrubs with a tapestry of plants for many months of enjoyment. Here’s how I do it.

a ribbeting bullfrog whodunit LET BULLFROGS BE BYGONES? No way. Where have all my biggest frogboys gone? The latest frog mystery explained.

stars of the spring shrubbery BEYOND LILACS (and forget forsythia!), a slideshow of some of the finest spring shrubs you may not grow (yet).

speeding up the compost DRIVE BY, HIT-AND-RUN composting is my latest craze, and speeds up the decomposition process while making good mulch quickly. Here’s how.

making a 365-day garden THINK FALL (YES, FALL): Don’t get sucked in by spring-bloomers only when nursery shopping. A great garden happens 365 days a year: Shop smart to make it so.

the facts about bulbs SOMETHING UP with a flower bulb? Paltry bloom, or wondering when to feed or cut off the foliage? It’s all here.

must-read garden poem MY FAVORITE GARDEN POEM celebrates loss, one of gardening (and life’s) realities. It does it with humor: "Why Did My Plant Die?” is a must-read.

12 steps to sanity? HELP FOR GARDENERS: Hi, my name is Margaret, and yes, we operate a 12-Step program here. Welcome.

orchid rebloom made easy I REBLOOMED MY FIRST ORCHID last year (finally!) and it turns out to be pretty easy going. Here’s how.

my seed-starting 101 WHAT ABOUT SEED-STARTING in general? The A Way to Garden method.

crispy refrigerator pickles WHAT IS IT ABOUT refrigerator pickles that makes everybody so happy? Get those cukes growing now. And then some.

hail the stewartia I LIKE PLANTS THAT EARN THEIR KEEP. By that I mean they do more than a week or two of showing off; they look good in more than a single moment, or season. The small-ish to medium trees in the genus Stewartia are a good bet if that’s the kind of multi-season interest you are looking for. Sound good?

can-do pruning REPEAT AFTER ME: I can prune. I can prune. If you follow this simple method for starters, your woody plants will thank you.

the ‘other’ peonies JUNE IS PEONY TIME, the big raucous kind of peony time, but just before that another kind of peony you might want to consider adopting does its subtler, wonderful thing.

which lilac to plant? SO MANY LILACS, so little space. Browse a glossary of some of my favorites before you shop—maybe you’ll like them, too.