April garden update

Today, the first day of April, was an absolutely beautiful day in Oslo. No joke (since it's April Fool's Day); the temperatures were in the forties, the sky was blue and cloudless, and the sun shone down and warmed everything it touched. That's a good thing, because the garden has gotten a late start this year due to all the snow and cold we've had. I cannot remember a winter during the past thirty years that has had so much snow as this year's. There are still snow patches in the garden, and ice in the places where the sun hasn't reached yet. But if we have a week with the temperature we had today, the snow and ice will melt and we'll be on our way toward a real spring. And from what I can see of the weather forecast for the next week or so, no more snow is predicted, thankfully. I hope that is the case; you never know. 

I sowed out seeds in the greenhouse this past Wednesday and Thursday--pumpkin, zucchini, cucumber, cherry tomato, sunflower, cornflower, pot marigold, nasturtium, and rose mallow. I will sow out string bean seeds on Monday. I decided to sow out now rather than wait two more weeks. The greenhouse is nice and warm during the day, even though temperatures at night still dip to around freezing. But the seed containers are on raised benches, nowhere near the ground. So they'll be fine; that has been my experience in previous years. Some of my fellow gardeners call me an optimist because I sow out so early. But last year I waited too long--to mid-April--and the vegetable plant seedlings were a bit too small when I planted them outdoors. So it took time for them to grow large enough, which delayed their vegetable production. 

When the ground is completely ice-free and I can work the soil, I'll plant my seed potatoes. That will probably be somewhere around mid-April. I've already started cutting down and removing dead stems and leaves, and I've pruned the rose bush that adorns the garden arch, as well as the ninebark tree near the greenhouse. I'm hoping that pruning the rose bush will force growth on the stems growing on the sides of the arch so that when the roses bloom it doesn't look like a bouffant hairdo at the top of the arch--piled high on top and little on the sides. 

The snowdrops are finally blooming, and the grape hyacinth and daffodils are starting to come up. I haven't seen any crocuses yet, but I guess they'll bloom soon. I'm looking forward to my forsythia blooming; I have three bushes planted in different areas of the garden. They are one of my favorite spring flowers. The cherry tree and lilac bushes survived the winter, as did my wisteria and magnolia tree. The berry bushes always do well--black currant, red currant, blueberry and gooseberry. They come back each year without fail. 

I'll post some photos soon. In the meantime, for all the gardeners I know and for the gardeners who read my blog--happy gardening!

Garden update--August 2022

June and July were busy months in the garden. I wasn't there as often as I would have liked due to vacation and family get-togethers (all enjoyable), but when I was there I was efficient. My project for this season was to rearrange/transplant many of the perennials from the main garden to other locations because they have grown so much in the past few years and need more space and increased air circulation. The hostas especially had grown quite big, but they were almost not visible because they were located at the back of the main garden behind some taller plants. Since I had to take up all of the strawberry plants this year to plant new ones, I decided to allocate some of the 'strawberry patch' space (two patches separated by the entrance path) to the hostas. When I took up the four hostas, they naturally split into three plants each, so that I was able to plant twelve new plants, six in each patch. They are doing quite well and are flowering. I also bought eighteen new strawberry plants and divided them between the two patches; I planted them below the hostas. They too are spreading out and doing well. I also transplanted an astilbe (false goat's beard) as well as a forsythia bush, and both are doing well. Online gardening sites don't recommend transplanting in the summertime, probably because temperatures are too warm. They suggest the autumn for such activities, but here in Oslo the summer temperatures have hovered around 70 degrees Fahrenheit. That is an optimal temperature to do transplanting; warm enough without being stifling hot for the plants. I water well before and after transplanting and for at least a week following transplanting. We've also had quite a bit of rain during early August, so that helped the plants to adapt and thrive in their new locations. 

The crane's bill plant had also become quite large and was starting to crowd the nearby Phlox and peony plants in the main garden. So I took it up and divided it in half, planting both halves along the street fence. The other crane's bill plant was transplanted from its location at the entrance garden arch to a place further along the path fence. All of them are doing well. 

I bought two new Phlox plants, a new astilbe, and a new coral bell plant--all perennials--and filled in the empty spaces with them. I really like Phlox plants; they come in many colors and have a lovely mild fragrance that you can smell when you get near them. I divided the summer aster plant in two and planted both in the main garden where the hostas used to be. One of them is flowering and the other is on the verge of doing so. 

Of six pumpkin plants, three have produced pumpkins of a good size. A fourth plant has just started to grow a pumpkin, but the growing season is winding down here, so I'm not sure how big this pumpkin will be. It was a banner year for raspberries, gooseberries, black currants and red currants. Ditto for the zucchini plants--how many zucchinis they produce--it's amazing! The cucumber plants have given us some nice-sized cucumbers, and the tomato plants are loaded with ripening tomatoes. My string bean plants did not do very well and I'm not sure why. Likewise my gladiolas; some have flowered, most have not. Those that have bloomed have 'faded-looking' flowers, white at the edges. Strange. I've never seen that before. I googled it and the online info said that the corms could be too old. Or that thrips may be a problem (but I haven't seen any sign of these bugs). My blackberry bush is not productive either, but it doesn't appear to be suffering from any infestation. Only one of my two American blueberry bushes produced berries, which I don't understand and have to read more about. The Norwegian blueberry bushes both produced berries. Both yellow coneflower plants are big and beautiful; I love them. The rhododendron bush has also grown larger this year; it's been more or less the same size since we rescued and planted it in the garden back in 2016. The magnolia tree is starting to grow taller. But the true beauty in the garden this year was my wisteria--it is growing and expanding like crazy, and flowered early on. I cut it back a few weeks ago and it still keeps on keeping on. My pride and joy. 

I have grown very fond of ground cover vegetation--pachysandra and hostas, for example. Pachysandra grows so well in my garden and is a hardy plant. It's also lovely to look at. Hostas likewise. The bumblebees love the hosta flowers, as do the honeybees. There were a lot of bumblebees in the garden this year and that was good to see. Some honeybees as well, but not as many as in previous years since the hives were removed from the garden. The bumblebees do a great job of pollinating plants, so there's no worries there. 

My final project for this gardening season was to assemble and paint a chemically-impregnated pine wood bench that I bought from an online garden store. I painted it a forest green color and am happy with the results. Both the impregnation and the paint are designed to withstand all sorts of weather conditions, so I'm hoping that bears out. August is nearly at an end, so it's just to enjoy the rest of it, which I plan to do now that most of the heavy garden work is done. Put my feet up and read a book!

Gardening season is winding down. Of course there will be a lot to do in the garden to prep it for the winter months, so I won't be out of work during the autumn months. I've cut down the old raspberry canes already because for some reason the new cane growth for each plant has been vigorous this year. I'm not the only one who has commented on that. 

The beauty of gardening is that from one year to the next there is always something new and different to tackle, understand, accept, and work around. There's never a dull moment in the garden. There's always work to do, and when you sit down to relax, the sparrows fluttering around and spraying water here and there in the birdbath will entertain you, as will the jumbo jets of the garden (my pet name for bumblebees). Watching them land on and take off from flowers will make you smile. If I am in a bad mood before I enter my garden, I leave with a better mood, a grateful heart, and a smile on my face. Nature has a way of centering me and making me realize what is important here in this life. And what is important is not what society says is important, that is for certain. 

I'll post some photos of my garden in my next post. 

Garden update--photos

Here are some recent photos of the garden, which is always a work in progress that incorporates new ideas and new additions to the garden family.......

Wisteria growing on the fence

Wisteria flower in bloom--a heavenly fragrance

The new addition to the garden family--a cherry tree

The forsythia bush blooming happily

The magnolia tree also blooming 

How the garden looks behind the greenhouse and the adjoining fence

Another forsythia bush planted between the birdbath and the cherry tree

the part of my garden facing my neighbor's garden--separated from mine by a large trellis

facing the greenhouse

pumpkin and zucchini beds covered by fiber cloth 

Garden update--May 2022

We've had some strange weather since spring began. A couple of weeks in March were actually quite mild and I got an early start in the garden. That was a good thing because I had to dig up a rose bush that had died. I cut it down last autumn with the intention of digging up the entire plant in March, right after the ground had thawed. That turned out to be a good idea, because the earth was actually quite muddy and it was easy to dig down with a shovel to find the roots. However, it was no easy task getting the roots up; the bush has been there for many years, apparently, and the roots had spread out widely. My husband got a hold of a crowbar and he got up most of the roots for me. But we couldn't get them all up. Luckily, the bush is dead so it won't be growing underground and sprouting up new stems here and there as it had been doing the past several years. None of those new stems survived for very long. The bush itself had become infested with aphids over the past several years, and even though I kept the infestation in check, I think it weakened and sensitized the plant for other types of attack, such as from parasitic mushrooms that appeared during the autumn, at which point I knew it was 'game over'. 

April was another month with two weeks of warm temperatures followed by cold temperatures, but not freezing. I started most of the plants I wanted to plant outdoors as seeds in the greenhouse, and I planted the seed potatoes outdoors since it takes at least a month for them to begin to germinate. I also planted the gladiola corms outdoors at the same time, since it takes a month for them to begin to germinate. Pumpkins, zucchini, tomatoes, cucumbers, and string beans (from seeds) were on the planting list this year. All of them grew well from seeds in the greenhouse and are now planted outdoors except for the tomatoes which need a bit more time in the greenhouse so that they can grow taller. The giant-type sunflowers, pot marigolds, rose mallows, and cornflowers that I also started from seeds are now planted outdoors as well. 

May has been mild for the most part, with temperatures hovering around 60 degrees during the day and 50 degrees at night. But it has been a very dry month with very little rain, so that Oslo is experiencing a drought (not entirely due to lack of rainfall, but still). But luckily there is rain in the forecast for the next two weeks, so the garden should benefit from the predicted rainfall. 

I bought two new lavender plants to replace two that had died, and got some new perennials from my garden neighbor Urzsula. She has given me a plant called 'brennende kjærlighet' (translated to burning love in English). It is also called the Maltese-cross, scarlet lychnis or Jerusalem cross in English. It produces big red balls of flowers, so it should be a nice addition to my garden. I also received a yellow iris from her and some large yellow loosestrife which is beautiful when it flowers. Other new additions to the garden are 'jordskokk' bulbs planted near the fence; they are called Jerusalem artichokes in English, but taste nothing like artichokes. I got about three pounds of them from another garden neighbor, Embla, and I planted some and made soup with the rest. The soup was excellent so I will definitely make it again. Jordskokk look like this (image from Jordskokk | Bama):

You peel them as you would potatoes and then boil them until they become soft enough to mash. If you are making soup you can use an immersion blender to puree them in the pot. Here is a good recipe for jordskokk soup if you are interested. 

Jerusalem artichoke soup with bacon  (Kremet jordskokksuppe med sprø bacon | Oppskrift | Meny.no)

Needed (for 3 people)

• 525 g Jerusalem artichokes
• 3 dl chicken broth
• 3 dl whipping cream (or heavy cream)
• 75 g dry salted bacon
• 0.75 tablespoons butter
• 0.75 tart apple
• 1.5 tablespoons finely chopped parsley
• pepper
• salt

1. Peel the vegetables and cut them into cubes. Put them in a saucepan and cover with broth and cream. Cook until they are tender.
2. Cut the bacon and apple into cubes. Fry the bacon cubes in butter until golden. Put the apple cubes in the pan and remove the pan from the heat. Add parsley.
3. Blend the soup with an immersion blender until smooth. Season with salt and pepper.
4. Serve the soup in deep bowls and top with bacon and apple mixture.

The jordskokk flowers above ground are yellow, grow profusely and quite high; they also have a tendency to spread out, so keeping them in check is part of gardening work. Here is how they look when the flowers are blooming (image from Sunchokes - Bi-O) 

My wisteria plant is doing very well. I planted it two years ago along the fence and it has taken off and actually has quite a lot of gorgeous, spicy-scented flowers this year. I love wisteria, but from what I've read online about it, it is another plant that must be 'held in check', otherwise it will spread out and just keep expanding. The magnolia tree has also bloomed again, and this year I bought a cherry tree and planted it in the spot where the rose bush was. It too has settled in to its new home and has in fact bloomed, although I don't think we'll get cherries (the tart kind) this year. We'll see. I was happy to see that the two forsythia bushes that I planted along the fence also bloomed; forsythia is another favorite plant of mine--lovely cheery yellow flowers in the spring. I also planted a new lilac bush near the cherry tree. I'm guessing that in a few years I'll have to transplant it as it grows and expands, but for now it's happy where it is. 

It's nice to be part of a community allotment garden. I enjoy talking to my garden neighbors, but more importantly, we share plants and seeds with each other and water each other's gardens when one of us is on vacation. The neighborliness and generosity are worth gold. 

In my next post I'll include some recent photos that I've taken of the garden. 

Two weeks makes such a difference in a garden

My last garden update was on May 11th. Since that time, the weather has gotten warmer (almost summer-like), and the garden has just taken off. It's like someone turned the switch to 'on'. I have bought a number of new plants for my flower garden--a Japanese maple that will be the new centerpiece of the garden, surrounded by hosta, cornflowers, asters, carnations, and more lavender. I also planted wild ivy along the iron fence behind the greenhouse, in the hope that it will take off and cover the entire fence so that we will get some privacy. That whole area, from the fence to the greenhouse, has been planted with flowers, pachysandra, and hosta, among others. The magnolia tree has bloomed, and still has six buds getting ready to bloom. The wisteria tree is also doing well. My garden neighbour gave me a dogwood tree last autumn that is also doing very well. I have sowed out grass seed, and the grass is starting to spring up, but it takes time before there will be a lawn to speak of. I planted sunflowers behind the compost enclosure, and they are coming up. Behind the greenhouse itself, I have planted sweet pea flowers, which are lovely. Sweet pea plants are climbers, and produce lovely red and bluish-purple fragrant flowers.

My vegetable garden is also doing well. The radishes are finished, so I am harvesting them and using them in salads, and they are very good. My potato plants (Folva type) are also doing very well; I have about thirty plants, each of which will produce about three good-sized potatoes, plus some small ones. The small ones will be used for next year's plantings; I store them in the crisper during the wintertime and they develop eyes and sprouts--perfect for planting. This year I bought three sweet potato plants to see how they do. Otherwise, I've planted two types of pumpkins that are now starting to take off, and four summer squash (zucchini) plants, which usually do very well. I've decided to plant all of my tomato plants outdoors this year; the greenhouse gets so warm that even though they do well inside, they are constantly in need of water.

The Japanese maple, like hydrangeas, needs low pH soil, so I bought hydrangea soil and planted the maple tree with it. So far so good. I am curious to see how the hydrangeas will like this soil as well. I have had major problems with them coming back each year. The panicled hydrangeas that I bought last year have come back without any problems whatsoever, so I don't know why regular hydrangeas are so problematic.

Here's how the garden looked two days ago; compare the pics to those from May 11th. Again, the miracle of gardens--they grow and do what they do without making a big deal about it. They're amazing, majestic, awe-inspiring. I could live in my garden the entire summer. Love my garden...….

July garden update

The months of June and July have been exceptionally sunny, hot and dry months here in Norway, with temperatures in the mid- to high-80s (F) and very little rain. This is aberrant summer weather for this country in terms of the prolonged periods with high temperatures, and while most Norwegians (and I) are happy because we can finally enjoy a real summer uninterrupted by chilly spells and long periods with rain, most of the farmers are not happy because the dryness has led to crop failure and little food for the cows. The wheat and grain fields are dry and have turned brown, and we noticed the same thing in England and Ireland when we traveled there in early July. Ireland was not a green country as is so often said about it, not this year. Northern and Western Europe are covered by a heat dome, as is the western part of the United States (think California and the devastating forest fires in Riverside). The intense heat and dryness have led to forest fires in northern Sweden and in the forests on the border of Norway and Sweden. There have also been devastating forest fires in Greece with considerable loss of life. The contrast of Norway and northern Europe with New York State is striking; when I arrived here on Thursday and took the train from Manhattan to Tarrytown, I was struck by how green and lush the landscape was, especially when I looked across the Hudson River to the Palisades. Elsewhere, the lawns, bushes and trees in Tarrytown are green without a hint of brown. There has clearly been a substantial amount of rainfall in New York State.

My garden has done very well despite the dryness and lack of rain. We are allowed to water it with a garden hose every other day; on the off days we use large watering cans to water. The tomato and mini-cucumber plants need a lot of water each day, otherwise the rest of the garden can actually survive two or three days without water, but I choose not to let it go that long. Most of the vegetables I've planted are at least three weeks ahead of schedule--pumpkins, corn, snap peas, and string beans. Passersby joke that Halloween will be coming early this year, in September, when they see the size of my pumpkins. We had a bumper crop of red currants, black currants, gooseberries and raspberries this year, but not strawberries, which prefer cooler and wetter conditions. We've frozen down most of the berries, but I did make red currant jelly and juice concentrate. This is also the first year that I've tried growing potatoes, and it worked, so next year, I will be planting more of them. This has been an amazing year for the garden; I doubt we'll have another one like it, but you can never say never, because climate change is here to stay.

Here are some July photos of the garden: 

gooseberries (stikkelsbær)

red currants (rips)

black currants (solbær)

potatoes (Folva type)

 

Mid-August garden photos

my pumpkin patch

Lavatera trimestris 'Silver Cup (pink flowers)

corn plants

new grass growing

daisies

Lavatera trimestris 'Silver Cup'

a honeybee and a butterfly on the same plant

view facing the entrance to our garden

Musings on garden life

I’ve been reflecting on my life in the garden these past few months. Who knew that I would fall in love with gardening as I have done? I have spent nearly every moment of my free time since May in the garden, with the exception of two vacations that took me away from it for three weeks. I could truly enjoy those wonderful vacations because I knew that our garden was in good hands. The nice thing about being part of a community garden is that the other gardeners will water your garden while you are away. There is always someone you can ask for help. In my case it has been the friendly Turkish women who have the neighboring garden.

One of my colleagues at work, a female pathologist who also likes to garden, told me that when she lived in England some years ago, she had visited a cemetery where there stood a gravestone with the inscription—“Here lies a gentleman and a gardener”. What a good way to be remembered. I can’t help but love it.

While I was in NY for two weeks, the pumpkin patch expanded even further, and now half of the pumpkins are large and orange. I’m guessing that by the end of September/early October, when the stems that attach them to the vines turn brown, they’ll be ready to harvest. Just in time for Halloween! In the meantime, my corn plants produced small corn cobs that I was able to harvest this past week. I learned that when the tassels turn brown, they're ready to harvest. I’m happy to say that they taste very good, even though they’re small. A friend of mine recently sent me a gardening book (a gardening bible is more like it), and I’ve been reading through it, hoping to get some tips for next year on how to get larger corn. One of the things I will ensure that the corn seedlings start off with next year is newly-composted soil. I think that will help their growth a lot. The Turkish women in the neighboring allotment garden have helped me harvest the large beans that hang from the bean plants they planted for me (more like small trees, at least in their garden). They taste very good, a bit different from the regular green string beans that we are used to. The broccoli plants are forming small broccolis, even though the plants themselves were stressed by the presence of the slugs that ate holes in their leaves.

All in all, I’ve planted and harvested string beans, Turkish beans, beets, snap peas, corn, and eventually I’ll be harvesting the pumpkins. Not bad for the first year of being a gardener. I will probably plant the same vegetables next year. As far as berries and fruit go, we’ve gotten quite a few strawberries, red currants and mulberries, and some black currants. We’ve planted raspberry and blueberry bushes so that next year we can expect a good yield of berries if we take good care of the plants. And I cannot forget the rhubarb plants; there is nothing you can do to them that will stop them from growing. I’ve cut them back twice now, and they’ve grown back each time. There is too much rhubarb and not enough rhubarb recipes!

I’ve learned a lot about what it takes to plant a lawn; there are many different types of grass seed, but all of them take root within five to seven days if the conditions are right. Once you sow the seed, you have to make sure that the ground stays moist. Luckily, that hasn’t been much of a problem this summer, since the weather has been unstable with mostly sunny days interspersed with a few rainy ones. I’m happy to report that I’ve managed to get a decent lawn, although it will be interesting to see how and if it survives the winter months.

The bees have been busy and happy this year, and the resulting honey was sold this past Sunday in the garden. It tastes very good—creamy and sweet—and I’m already using it in my tea. I love having the bees around me in the garden; they keep to themselves, buzzing about, and do not bother me at all. I’d like to think they are used to me by now. The lavender and sage (Salvia) plants that I put in for them are popular with them, as is the butterfly bush (Buddleja) with the butterflies. We don’t have Monarch butterflies, but we do have smaller varieties with lovely blue, gold and orange colors. The garden also has a resident badger; he has a mate and they now have five small badgers. I have not seen them (they are generally nocturnal animals), but apparently someone else has and word gets around. They dig up small holes in the lawn looking for worms to eat, otherwise you would not notice that they are there.

Next year we have plans to buy a small greenhouse so that we can plant tomatoes and other plants that need some protection from the elements. I won’t plant spinach or cauliflower next year, since the slugs ate them this year. I will plant more corn and the same amount of pumpkin plants. It will be interesting to see what the coming years bring. What I do know is that we were given a gift this year, and that gift has given me peace of mind and soul, a peace that was sorely needed. It’s also given my body a lot of aches and pains, but they don’t last, and in any case, they are a reminder of the hard work and love that go into a garden. I wouldn’t have it any other way. In my next post, I'll include some new photos of the garden.

My pumpkin patch and other updates on garden life

My last post about our garden was on July 10th. In the interim, we did some vacation traveling, first a three-day boat trip to Fredrikstad, and then a week-long visit to Caen, France. I'll write a bit more about our travels in another post. Just in the short time we were away, the garden changed considerably--it exploded in growth as you'll see from the photos here. The pumpkin patch especially took off; the vines have spread out and fastened themselves to grass stalks and whatever else they can use to stabilize themselves. There are going to be a lot of pumpkins to harvest if growth conditions continue to be favorable. I cannot help but think of Linus in Peanuts, and his heartfelt wish to sit in the pumpkin patch on Halloween and wait for the Great Pumpkin to arrive. When the pumpkins reach maturity, you bet that I'm going to be sitting in my pumpkin patch and I'll post a photo when that time comes.

It has been very warm in Oslo during the month of July, and that's always good for plant growth. My corn plants are also doing well; ears of corn have formed on at least half of the plants, with pink tassels sprouting out from the top of the cobs. I've noted that the ears of corn do not form on the top part of the corn plant, but rather on the lower part of the plant. It should be an interesting harvest come September/October. The string bean plants have produced many string beans per plant and they taste very good--extra good knowing that they come from the garden. Ditto for the snap pea plants--there are many of them and they taste good.

I've also planted many different kinds of flowers, with the idea of 'filling in the gaps' (not having too many bare patches although there will always be some) in the flower garden. I like the result so far, as do the bumblebees, honeybees and butterflies. I've wandered around the rest of the community garden gathering ideas from other gardeners. Some of the other gardens are just so wild and beautiful--flowers in all colors, sizes and shapes. I'm picking up tips, talking to the other gardeners, watching how things get done, and storing it all away for next year's plantings.

And last but not least, we have a badger in the garden. Where he comes from nobody knows, but he likes to visit the garden at night. I haven't seen him yet, but several other gardeners have. Badgers eat mostly earthworms, but also other insects (just not the brown snails unfortunately--most animals and birds seem to avoid them, understandably in my opinion), roots and some fruits. He won't lack for sustenance in the garden as a whole, that's for sure.