Above is our neighbour's (Richard and Marlene) boulevard. I talked about them quite on last years blog. Marlene and Richard are very supportive of the Boulevarden (in spirit and - offering labour and plants to the Boulevarden, and explaining to people who pass by what the garden is. Richard has dug up two large 'gardens' and is planting them in with tomatoes. Richard's brother-in-law grew an abundance of tomato plants and have them 20 or so.
The first time I grew tomatoes from seed I ended up with literally hundreds of plants. Because I had grown them from seed I was attached to every plant and couldn't bring myself to send any to their death in the compost. I walked up and down our block offering tomato plants (I didn't have have any guerrilla gardens then). Okay and now to 'For the Birds', part one. It all started this morning...(cue foggy, rippling screen)
...the morning started out innocent enough, I had some breakfast, did a bit of reading and was getting ready to go out to the garden. Then all of a sudden my cat Fury came running in the bedroom with a bird in her mouth...zoikes with a capital zee...unfortunately I behaved completely irrationally. I like to think of myself as independent person who can tackle anything - but the first thing I did was run out of the house screaming and call my partner Paul who thankfully wasn't in a meeting and came home to remove the bird (in fairness we only live a couple blocks away, but still)...I feel like a lame louse that I couldn't do it myself...
After Paul left I started to wonder where the heck Fury could have caught a bird as she is an indoor cat...it turns out from the fireplace! This is the second time a bird has come down the chimney so we are going to put wire mesh on the roof opening...whew
After all the excitement I went out to the garden for a few hours - I planted some corn in a space which I am pretty sure does not even remotely have enough room to grow...I know, I know, so why did I plant it there, right? Well for two reasons, first the garden is pretty full at the moment. I need divide and remove some of the plants and also to get rid of some plants that were fast growing 'fillers' that we planted last year before we got things going. For example, we have seven Catmint plants...which were great last year to give texture and colour to the garden, but this year I am going to take out four plants, divide and pot them up, and then put them in the Boulevarden for the tak'n. (side note all of the seedlings and volunteers I put out last night were gone this morning).Ummm...okay now where was I? Oh right..the corn. So, the second reason I planted it where I did was in the hopes it would be a bit of a wind barrier for the tomatoes. See the picture below...and...I know...shake your head at my poor, poor planting choices - more than likely later in the season I will post a picture documenting their move.
'For the Birds' part two - sparrows have been taking insulation from our neighbours house. As i sit at my kitchen table I can watch them go up under the siding of their house and come out with a piece of insulation so large they can barely fly away. The other day Marlene was out with some foam insulation in attempts to keep the birds out. Later when I was outside she and I chatted about the scampy nest building birds. Our chat reminded me of something I had read a while ago in one of my gardening books or magazines...it suggested putting out dryer lint for the birds to use for their nest building. So I grabbed a bundle as well as a bundle of thin willow branches I had cut from a small bush on the Boulevarden and tied them to a branch of our birch tree with some jute. Below is a picture - Paul thinks it looks nasty - I think it looks lovely...we will have to wait and see what the birds think.
Last night when I came home there was a flat of seedlings - some sunflowers and squash (dark zucchini, yellow zucchini and two butternut). I planted the squash and some of the sunflowers today. I found out later that Annie Martin had dropped them by. Thanks Annie.
Today - although it was very wet we spent the day in the Boulevarden - lovely. I weeded - don't you just love weeding just after a rain fall - it is oooo satisfying - the grass just pulls up. I planted some seeds - Lettuce and Swiss Chard and moved around a few plants. I then gathered some volunteers - some Sedum, Phlox, Black Eyed Susans, Sunflowers, Chives, Lemon Balm and Chinese Lanterns - and put them out for others to take.
We will also have some seedlings for the second downtown guerrilla gardening project. I have not checked the Coyote Garden for a few days - I will visit it tomorrow.
Michelle and I were driving around downtown and found the perfect spot for a guerrilla community garden. It is a large lot, lots of sun, and not in the 'open' open...it is shielded from strong winds. Clue: it is behind a space that was filled with drink and song, some even lived there, and it is missed by many.
We need help from fellow guerrilla gardeners...we will need to prepare the soil and we will need plants and seeds...and some sort of rain collection bins/system...it is exciting though...I will keep posted for a first meeting when we can visit the site - plan and then get started!!! Even if we just do a small patch this year - we can then build more next year.
Oh and Shawna pointed out that there is a large wood planter in the downtown IGA parking lot...we thought that would make a great herb garden.
And...read this story http://www.indymedia.org.uk/en/2006/05/339335.html
Just a reminder of what the Boulevarden looked like last year...then the sod removed.
The Garden last week
The Garden today.
This is the perennial bed - as well as the rhubarb (we have four large plants...might have to remove a couple)...and squash side.
This is the vegetable side (we try to keep the veggie plants grouped as much as we can so that we don't have to water the whole garden - the flowers are pretty much all drought tolerant). We planted lots of tomatoes, cauliflower, walla walla onions, beans, cucumber, watermelon, zuke, carrots, grasses for texture, flowering kale for 'prettiness'... We also added the annual herbs (basil, flat leaf parsley, fennel (although we had some volunteers from last year) to the herb garden We still have some shifting around of plants and might plant some more in this weekend.
I went down this morning to see how the garden had faired over night. Not only was everything looking great - but it had been watered! Yea! I could tell it was not the nightly watering of the 'downtown park' grass that had watered the bed because the grass was still really dry...only the garden that was watered. It is funny how something so small (or not - depending how you look at it) can make your heart smile...well mine anyway...the fact that someone else has come along and contributed to the garden is just wonderful.
This morning I dug up some Brown Eyed Susans, Chives, Sedum, Catmint and gathered some seeds.
MIchelle brought some of her self grown tomatoes and alpine strawberries as as well as some sunflowers.
We sat on the deck and made a sign for the garden and some rock plant identifiers. We grabbed our tools and a big...I mean seriously big..jug of water (it was brutal) and headed down to the garden.
Just as we got there Shawna and Liam arrived. Shawna brought some Oregano and Lavender for the garden.
As Liam (at 6 months old our youngest Guerrilla Gardener to date) supervised, we got to planning and planting the garden.
We added four tomato plants (should 'tomato' and all the other names of the plants be capitalized?? I can't decide...), Swiss Chard, Chives, Alpine Strawberries, Lavender, large and small Sunflowers, Oregano, Cat Mint, Sedum and Brown Eyed Susans. Michelle has some potatoes that she is going to bring down.
Shawna also acted as our official documenter so she will be posting some other pics.
We named the garden 'Coyote Garden'.
Before (Picture by Michelle)
Before (Picture by Michelle)
Before (Picture by Michelle)
Above is on the left Glenn, then me, Loralee, and Michelle on the right.Yesterday Michelle and I went down town to scout out some spots that we thought could use some guerrilla force. We found a small bed in.... let's just say a 'downtown public park'...that we have been working on. Today we prepared the soil and added compost. We had two men that joined us in the work and two men (security) that spied on us.
Glenn was the name of the first fellow who helped - his nephew, whose name I didn't get was the other. They were both a great help and suggested that tomatoes and peas would be good vegetables to plant.
The security came over - NEVER asked us what we were doing - BUT asked us if Glenn was bothering us, MIchelle said no...a little while later the two security guys came over and told Glenn that his friends were waiting for him and that he should go join them at Studio 54...Glenn said he was just fine and would stay and work...I told them that he was helping us, he then said, "well...they were REALLY waiting for him", those security guys, they are sooo helpful!!
Anyway, like I said we got the soil worked and will be planting 'soon'. Michelle has some tomatoes she has grown from seed that we will plant, then we will add lettuce, peas, beans and some pretty perennial flowers as well as a few sunflowers for the peas and beans to grown up.
Above is our neighbour's (Richard and Marlene) boulevard. I talked about them quite on last years blog. Marlene and Richard are very supportive of the Boulevarden (in spirit and - offering labour and plants to the Boulevarden, and explaining to people who pass by what the garden is. Richard has dug up two large 'gardens' and is planting them in with tomatoes. Richard's brother-in-law grew an abundance of tomato plants and have them 20 or so.
'For the Birds' part two - sparrows have been taking insulation from our neighbours house. As i sit at my kitchen table I can watch them go up under the siding of their house and come out with a piece of insulation so large they can barely fly away. The other day Marlene was out with some foam insulation in attempts to keep the birds out. Later when I was outside she and I chatted about the scampy nest building birds. Our chat reminded me of something I had read a while ago in one of my gardening books or magazines...it suggested putting out dryer lint for the birds to use for their nest building. So I grabbed a bundle as well as a bundle of thin willow branches I had cut from a small bush on the Boulevarden and tied them to a branch of our birch tree with some jute. Below is a picture - Paul thinks it looks nasty - I think it looks lovely...we will have to wait and see what the birds think.
