msmemory_archive

And who's this going to interest, besides me?

Unpack and stow luggage
Swap polos and turtlenecks out/into storage
Frugal Fannie's if they have any more Miraclesuits in stock
Patri's memorial
Prune forsythia
Trim box hedge and that green bush out front
~~Buy a rosebush. Never had one before.~~ (

damascene,

jdulac, that's a hint for advice!)
Get tomato plants if not already too late
Hunt up mail from last two+ weeks and deal, esp. bills
Lochleven guest meeting
Laundry, ironing, laundry, ironing
Do we know anybody who wants to do garden work for pay?
Organize receipts for expense report
Change bed linens, wash sheets ~~& towels~~
Clean downstairs shower
Amazon order
Compile (or find!) list of electrician tasks; call electrician.
Hair appointment?
Freecyle list entry for old couch
15 minutes of sorting old paperwork in office (baby steps)

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

From:

eclecticmagpie.livejournal.com

Can you send me Susan MacGregor's email address? I thought I had forwarded it to myself, and I didn't, so here I am at the office (where the publicity text is) and her contact info is at home (where the publicity text isn't). I need to send something out to the rev war community.

Best place to send it would be mike at prospecthillforge.com

Thanks!

(hoping you read this in time)

From:

msmemory.livejournal.com

Done!

From:

msmemory.livejournal.com

Mail to you at prospecthillforge.com bounced; I re-sent and cc'd your old MIT address as well.

From:

goldsquare.livejournal.com

If you can't get advice elsewhere, Robin is a gardening nut and loves roses.

From:

fitzw.livejournal.com

We have a potted rosebush near the back of the house, next to the driveway. Well, it started out as a potted rosebush. Came in a plastic pot. We put it beside the driveway until we could determine a good place to plant it.

It grew out the bottom of the pot, and now we can't move it without digging a huge hole. Since it's right next to the driveway and a fence post, digging a hole is ... impractical.

I guess that was where it was supposed to be.

helwen can probably also give advice on gardening, since we have plants of several different types: roses, Roses of Sharon, green onions, potatoes, strawberries, tomatoes, etc.

From:

msmemory.livejournal.com

See below... Chives, mint, rosemary, lavendar, and basil are already in or perennial. Tomatoes and roses in the next 1-2 weeks. A few annuals to prettify the mailbox post and similar small spots are also in order.

From:

lucianus.livejournal.com

I just dropped J and IM about rose advice for you.

Tomatoes are still available at many nurseries, failing that I have some extras (4-5 plants) you are more than welcome to have, also some peppers.

From:

msmemory.livejournal.com

Yes, I dropped by Mahoney's at lunchtime and they have plenty of tomatoes. Maybe I should plant a Jalapeno or a Habanero for J as well. I'll be returning tomorrow when I can spend the time to figure out just one (or two) roses to start with.

From:

lucianus.livejournal.com

Great, I'm glad they still have plenty of stock. They usually have a nice selection of heirloom tomatoes (which I prefer) and interesting peppers as well. If you see any pepper plants called "fooled you" or some such name as that please drop me a note. They look and taste like jalapeños but they are mild. I'd love to have one or two of those this year but haven't started any from seed.

From:

fitzw.livejournal.com

You might be surprised at how many people like to give advise on such matters. ;-)

Get tomato plants if not already too late

Our local farmer's market had several different types of tomato plants for sale, so I would say that it's definitely not too late.

Freecyle list entry for old couch

Go, Freecycle! That's where we got one of our rain barrels.

From:

msmemory.livejournal.com

Glad to collect multiple viewpoints. I know

jdulac to be a gardener, and

damascene offered to answer questions when she saw

jducoeur earlier this week, too. Happy to hear from you and

helwen as well, and others I haven't named!

Advice invited on tomatoes, roses, pruning, hedges. Also if anybody knows what those thistley things are that grow really really tall with a single stubborn, hollow, stalk, please say.

From:

fitzw.livejournal.com

Also if anybody knows what those thistley things are that grow really really tall with a single stubborn, hollow, stalk, please say.

Really tall? Like twice a person's height or more? That sounds like horseweed/wild lettuce (!), grows along roadsides and other "verge" areas.

I used to make blowguns out of that stuff (long before I started in the SCA). ;-)

From:

msmemory.livejournal.com

Yeah, that tall. Hairy leaves of the general shape of a thistle's. Not too hard to pull up intact, but prolific and invasive.

From:

jdulac.livejournal.com

rose bushes: what do you want in a rose? any particular effect you are looking for, or characteristics that you like? climbing? bushy? fragrance? color? long-stemmed? clustered? where do you want to put it? have you decided you have a spot where you want to put a rose, or do you want a rose and then you'll figure out where to put it?

From:

msmemory.livejournal.com

I like roses with scent. I'm leaning toward either a blood red, or a yellow with orange-red tips (sunset colors). I'm planning on putting it against a 3' open picket fence, not far from the tomatoes, but could also be convinced into something that didn't need a support, out in the middle of a bed. I have limited places with that level of sunshine (AFAIK it would need approximately full sun) that aren't grass, you see. No educated opinion on long stemmed, clustered, etc. Not really high maintenance either.

From:

cvirtue.livejournal.com

I am only a dillatante gardener, but: roses generally take a fair amount of fussing, even the relatively low-fuss varieties. Water, bugs, powdery mildew, etc.

I *think* that if you get heirloom types you'll have less trouble-- but check with those in the know. I decided I wanted complete abscence of trouble, and went with rosa rugosas, which take abuse of all kinds.

Here's a list of easy things to plant that will flower in succession -- from gardening junkmail which I got earlier this year:

"List of flowers that will have something blooming successively throughout the growing season:
crocuses*, daffodils*, tulips*, lilacs, peonies, roses, tall garden phlox, daylilies, asiatic and oriental lilies, coreopsis, black-eyed susan, tall sedum, asters, and mums."

(*Clearly for northern areas that get below freezing in the winter.)

They didn't mention daylilies, especially reblooming ones, but they should have. Oodles of colors.

From:

jdulac.livejournal.com

roses theoretically need full sun, but in actually they can be more flexible than that. 6 hrs is generally plenty.

A lot of modern roses are lower maintenance that the traditional hybrid tea rose. The really low maintenance roses (like the various "Knockout" roses) generally don't have a lot of scent.

The classic deep red, fragrant rose is "Mr. Lincoln," a hybrid tea. This is a long-stemmed rose. Generally I don't recommend people looking for "low-maintenance" use HT's, but it might be worth it to you. It is widely available.

I've had good luck w/the David Austen English Roses -- "William Shakespeare" is a deep red variety that tends to be pretty available. These are technically shrub roses, and have a lax habit. They also are generally fragrant, have big old-fashioned blooms. Don't require a lot of fussing

If you want an easy yellow rose w/red edges, you might consider "Joseph's Coat", also widely available. It is a climber, pretty vigorous. Not a heavy fragrance, but it has the interesting property that the roses begin more yellow and gradually the edges get darker and spread.

more later, I must leave now.

From:

msmemory.livejournal.com

The "William Shakespeare" at Mahoney's was a very pretty shade of purple, but not the glorious deep velvety shade of the other one you mentioned in another comment.

So I ended up with a "Mr Lincoln" even though it's a hybrid tea and may not survive my benign neglect, and a "Rabelais" which I was much taken with.

From:

jdulac.livejournal.com

good for you! that is the way to choose roses -- by what strikes you personally. I hope you enjoy them!

From:

jdulac.livejournal.com

so more thoughts... given where you live, you should go to Mahoney's in Winchester (the "real" Mahoney's) to look for your roses. They have the best selection of anyone in the area. The other place I recommend is Russell's in Wayland.

moving on...

Old Garden Roses... aka "antique roses"... these are generally quite vigorous and sometimes make nice shrubs out of bloom. You have to treat them as once-bloomers, even if they are supposedly "perpetual." Still, their period of bloom is longer than the average peony and they can be spectacular. They tend to be big and need a lot of room. They also aren't usually easily available at the average garden center. "Rose de Rescht" is a small one although mine has gotten rather columnar over the years due to its situation and is about 5' tall. The flowers a very double and fragrant, but they are actually quite small. Don't know if you care for that fuschia tone in your red flowers, but it is one that you can find at garden centers. It does rebloom pretty well.

There aren't yellow OGRs, because that color comes from China tea roses, not bred in until later in the 19th c. Most of them tend to be shades of pink. If you want deep, deep red you should look at Gallicas. You can sometimes find them -- I just picked up "Belle de Crecy" in the Home Depot for $6.99! "Charles de Mills" is one that you sometimes see around. And if you see "Tuscany" for sale, buy it! They are only June blooming.

On the opposite end chronologically, there are a number of modern shrub roses that bloom well and are very disease resistant. I see that Mahoney's is featuring "Easy Elegance" roses -- some of these are amazingly nice. As mentioned before, the "Knockout" roses are extremely disease resistant and constantly blooming. "Bonica", a pink rose, is hard to screw up -- they plant this one on highways. I also recommend anything from Dr Buck, who breeds very hardy roses in Iowa.

Another modern rose that might suit you is Rouge Royale. It was at Russell's last year, and late in the summer when everything else was looking pretty poorly, it was lovely. And it's fragrant -- the price you pay for many of the tough-as-nails modern roses is that they aren't always that great at fragrance.

well, I've driveled enough for now. I think my favorite suggestion is the new William Shakespeare (I had to put that link in , the pic is so luscious).

From:

msmemory.livejournal.com

Mahoney's is where I head for any plants. Bought the herbs there earlier this year, will be there Sat-Sun or some such for the tomatoes. I'll check out the roses while I'm there.

Tell me more about once-bloomers vs. perennials?

From:

msmemory.livejournal.com

that is, once-bloomers vs perpetual?

From:

jdulac.livejournal.com

Wild European roses are normally bloom once per year -- their season is early summer. They produce hips from the roses and that's it for the year. Remontancy (re-blooming) was introduced into rose breeding stock from southern Chinese roses, which are normally not hardy in our climate. The first re-blooming European roses were produced in the 19th c. "Rebloom" can mean several things -- if they rebloom, Old Garden Roses typically bloom in flushes, a wave of roses, then a rest, then another wave. There may be only 2 waves, early summer and autumn. Usually the early bloom is the most abundant and subsequent bloom is sporadic.

Some modern roses have been bred to be almost constantly blooming. That takes a lot of energy from a plant. They typically don't make a lot of hips, and they like a lot of plant food (but who doesn't?) People generally expect roses to be reblooming nowadays. But many antique roses are not. I just mention this because Cynthia had suggested antique roses as being hardier (generally true), but one reason they aren't easily found in garden centers is that they are very different from what people expect.

From:

jdulac.livejournal.com

I should clarify: it is not once-blooming vs perennial, it is once-blooming vs. re-blooming. Roses are perennial, although some are not reliably hardy in our climate (although you won't generally find those on sale here).

One reason the David Austen English roses are so popular is that they have the look of old-fashioned roses, but the re-bloom of modern roses. Right now my Abraham Darby and Othello and Graham Thomas are to die for.

From:

cvirtue.livejournal.com

(drools over roses, off in a corner by herself)

From:

msmemory.livejournal.com

An incidental fact - part of the point of the rosebush is to use the ashes from our late cats as some of its fertilizer. Plus my yard could use some thing(s) that flower later in the year, since much of what I have now is spring stuff like lilacs, lily of the valley, and clematis.

From:

jdulac.livejournal.com

ah, so you want a "specimen", not a "landscape" rose. That helps...

From:

jimpage363.livejournal.com

Lordy, you're a busy woman.
On the roses - the National Gardening Association has sites for all regions and offers excellent advice, as well as a weekly regional gardening report. I have had 1 out of 4 roses survive, it's true, but that 1 is glorious. Good luck!

From:

damascene.livejournal.com

Coming in late to the conversation, sorry...

I have a few hybrid teas, including a Mr. Lincoln that we inherited on buying the house almost 13 years ago. I'm thrilled to have it, it flowers a gorgeous deep red, almost continuously from June through September, and has a wonderful spicy scent, but it took me 6-7 years of careful work to restore it to health from the condition it was in when we moved in. HT do take more attention than many other types, including being generally more susceptible to black spot, mildew, aphids, and various other all-too-common ailments. Their greatest advantage is in being the classic cutting rose, with strong straight stems and flowers that often last a full week in a vase. If your vision includes being routinely able to cut a couple of flowers for a living-room display, there's probably a HT in your garden plan at some point. Not necessarily now, though.

I'm not as fond of the David Austin's English as

jdulac is, and don't have any, although there are several at Melville Keep (I work on the garden planning over there, too). They're good plants, much less susceptible than the HT, but my experience with them is those lovely huge delicate-colored high-petal-count flower heads are often too heavy for their stems and flop downward almost as soon as they open which doesn't look graceful or attractive to me. (I grow peonies, too, which have the same failing but not usually until the first spring storm after they open.)

If you're content with the notion of not having a HT right away, well, I'm particularly fond of floribunda roses. They're generally smaller than HTs, easily freestanding, often hardier, and produce multiple blooms on each stem (hence the name) that are often suitable for bowl arrangements and smaller vases -- the vase on my dresser usually has 2-3 floribunda blooms in it throughout the summer. Looking at the Mahoney's web list for this year, if the Winchester store has a Chihuly or a Topsy Turvy available, those would be possibilities for you to consider. (A better Chihuly photo.)

A couple of other notes:

As you probably know from other garden adventures, the USDA Plant Hardiness Zone maps color all of eastern MA as Zone 6 -- and this just ain't so. My front yard, for example, faces north and east, and is a clearly-defined pocket of Zone 5, as I am reminded every spring when that space "wakes" more slowly than the rest of the garden. For roses, this does make some difference, so if your warm sunny picket fence is in a micropocket that gets disproportionately colder in the winter, plan to mulch and shelter accordingly.

Even against an open picket fence, if you decide to plant a climber I'd recommend some sort of trellising for it, that you can train it along and clip it to to support the growth and shape you want. If you pick a climber we can talk more about options; it won't need much for the first few months :) .

From:

damascene.livejournal.com

So? What did you choose, and where have you planted it?

From:

msmemory.livejournal.com

As I said, above, to

jdulac, I ended up with a "Mr. Lincoln" even knowing it's a hybrid tea and may not survive my neglect, and a "Rabelais", another red one that caught my fancy.

I seem to be corrupting the white-blue-purple garden theme I inherited when we bought this house :)

From:

damascene.livejournal.com

Oh, hydbrid teas take more attention but they're not impossible. Start by just keeping an eye on it, and if you see anything that doesn't look like a healthy rose (black spots, white fuzz, little green bugs, beetles with irridescent green wings, &c., &c.) you'll ask questions and you'll get more advice than you can usefully use :) .

That Rabelais looks lovely, I may have to find a place for one... it's nicely compact, maybe under the garage window, hm...