Holy shamoly, that's a beauty! Thanks for sharing your garden picture with us.

Do I garden? Well, it depends on how you identify 'gardening'. I grow 99% of my over 100 plants in pots - does that count as 'gardening'? I grow a few perennials and MANY tropicals. If I have any spare time, I "garden" ie I water, prune, re-pot, fertilize, and sometimes just sit and stare at my plants - I love 'em!

That is impressive. Its a perennial? Lucky hens.

I don't make real compost. I am a Ruth Stout gardener using a no till system with heaps of organic matter. I grow summer squash and a tomato every year and whatever summer annuals tempt me, along with my old favorites. It really depends on work and how much I am home in the spring. If I do nothing, I still have sweet peas and hollyhocks, honeysuckle, blackberries I can pick standing on the mown grass, spiderwort, violets, vinca major and wild ginger. I fight the blackberry and honeysuckle all summer. I love it, but it would take over. I planted four o'clocks and cleome from seed this year and I hope they reseed. I am fond of plants that others find invasive. My soil keeps them in check. I have nearly two acres fenced with stock fencing. My land slopes north to south from the boggy field behind me (won't perk or it would be a subdivision) and is mostly red clay. My house was built cheap and used as rental property until I bought it on a land contract 10-12 years ago. I had two porches built on it, threw out the cheap carpet and cabinets, and turned it into a comfortable home for me and the animals I tend to accumulate.

I love coming in and picking a couple of squash for supper. I only eat them from my garden so I don't get tired of them while they are in season. I buy one tomato plant every year. I honestly don't know what kind. I just stop by the co-op when the time is right and pick the healthiest plant I see. I have never had one that produced a fruit I didn't like or didn't do well.

I also have lots of houseplants which I move to the porches every summer. I always accumulate more, forgetting that I will have to find a place for them indoors come winter.

I almost forgot! I have a pond this year and I bought my first pond plant yesterday. A parrot feather, I think.

good topic Char. Should we invite the Single gardeners here or has someone already done it?

Gardening in pots better count as gardening. It's what kept me going for the several years I rented before getting my own place to dig in the ground again. I even still have my pond in a pot. I bought the largest plastic pot without a hole in the bottom from Walmart about three years ago. It has a pink waterlily in it and I did have parrot feather and some mosquito fish until my teenager knocked it over with the car. I still have the lily and it blooms and blooms. I think I posted about the single life in the gardenweb awhile back but it wouldn't hurt to repost. JC, when I get all of the rocks out of my beds I'm going to do the no till method too. I have huge earthworms in my soil now! Here is a picture of my daisies today I just posted this picture over on the Texas Gardening forum and I'll share it here too.

Glad to see you post kayjones and jc. Who else out there is a gardener?

Here is a link that might be useful:

Jesiecarol, your place sounds really nice. It's just the type of place that I like too. I am also trying to keep up with the honeysuckle and blackberries in my yard. The fields are another story. I see blackberries blooming everywhere. I have not had much time in the past few years to do much gardening but hope to do more this year. I used to plant a nice, big garden and had a Troybilt tiller and really enjoyed it. But, I was younger then and had more time. I no longer have the tiller. I have been getting into roses for the past year and have always loved them. I also like all kinds of flowers and have some phlox that I just love that seem to be taking over my side yard but I am happy about it. They are blooming now and have a wonderful smell. I bought a small 6 pack of them from a woman who lives down the street and who's yard I have always admired for its many flowers. I sent them down under a tree in my side yard and forgot them. They grew roots through the bottom of the thin plastic container and planted themselves. They are a small flowered variety and look somewhat like the wild blue phlox except that these start out a dark pink and then turn to a lavender color in a couple of days and they are almost iridescent, especially at dusk. I have about a 2 acre chainlink fenced yard and I have 17 acres in all. I have 4 older horses, 10 cats and 3 dogs at present.

Judith, Have you noticed that the wild rose and blackberry are blooming at the same time this year? This is a strange season. Your place sounds nice, too, and I love the phlox. There are some similar to what you describe at an old housesite near me and I always think I should try to collect some seed. When you get settled and have spent some time getting used to your retirement, we will have to get together.

Char, I cannot grow shastas. Hard to believe I know. Yours are beautiful.

That's how rosemary should look! Mine was higher than the 5'6" fence behind it before the end of April, when I cut it back for remembrance posies for Anzac Day. And it's covered in flowers - it's a pink-flowering one, very pretty. Have you ever seen a variegated one? I've got one of those, but it keeps wanting to revert back to green, drat it.

Daisy, what is the weather like in your area? It doesn't ever get below freezing does it? The challenge to growing rosemary here in the states is the freezing temps in the winter. In this area it doesn't freeze often in the winter and they are using rosemary in landscaping alot especially the prostrate rosemary. I would love to see a big pink flowered rosemary and I didn't know that there was a variegated one. My varigated lemon thyme does that revert back to green thing and it looks weird with part of the plant varigated and part not.
Charlotte

Single? Check.
Gardener? Check.

Just checking in before heading back to the garden. :o)

M.

definitely gardening. I started about 100 tomatoes before I left KY, and brought about 30 of them up to Ohio with me. gave some to friends, and luckily planted about 15 of them in a neighbors/ friends yard. also planted cukes, zuchini, potatoes, beans, yellow squash and kale. Hopefully, the deer won't get it all.
One problem is I'm saving my compostables, but have nowhere to dump it - may have to get some worme or something.

Just simple stuff. Squash, corn, tomatoes, hot peppers, and onions. I put some asparagus roots in out by the ditch and I planted grapes and raspberries in previous years. Strawberries just grow wild for me. Getting a tiller for my tractor so next year might see a huge garden.

I love rosemary. Young boy living with me a few years ago asked his mother if I would make spagetti, "with sticks in it"!

: )
michael