2008 - A Year in Photos

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March





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May the New Year shine brightly upon you and those you love.

Chris & Katie Hobson
GardenPunks.com

Seasons

I saw this cool, short video over on a Gardener's Notebook.


One year in 40 seconds from Eirik Solheim on Vimeo.

Habitat Certification

Today I started thinking about applying for the National Wildlife Federation's Habitat Certification program. I had seen it a long time ago (probably as a child) and thought it was a really neat idea. I do remember seeing it in Sunset Magazine before I owned a house and thought to myself, "Now that is something I want to do in my lifetime."

Tonight I filled out the application and am proud to announce that Lizard Hollow is now a National Wildlife Federation certified wildlife habitat!

I always thought there was a lot more to the application process, but basically, you have to meet a minimum criteria and pay a $15 application fee, and viola! You're certified. I also ponied up $25 for a sign like the picture...

I don't want to make it seem like it's no small feat to be certified. I barely met the minimum requirements, and still have some work to do to improve Lizard Hollow's "habitat". The application actually gave me a lot of ideas to think about, and small things we can implement soon and on a shoestring budget:

Butterfly puddling area (sunken disk with sand)
Water garden (sunken 1/2 wine barrel)
More native shrubs along the perimeters
Log piles (already started with trimmings this year)
Frog/toad house (another ceramics class perhaps?)
Host plants for caterpillars

My gardening spirit has been reinvigorated over the last few weeks and I am more excited than ever with the changes we've made and the plans we have for our landscape.

Orchard Install - Year 2 Additions

This is post #3 in a series of 3. Click here to read post #1, and here to read post #2.

This year we ordered 8 more fruit trees to go with the 6+ we ordered last year (more info here). The weather was beautiful this weekend and allowed us to get them in the ground just a couple days after we received them. We were much more ambitious than last year when they sat around for a couple weeks...after we got them delivered in February!

We planted them in the area we recently sheet mulched, which might I add is aging like a fine wine. It looks great!

BEFORE

The 'before' pictures show the sheet mulched area which hasn't been tidied for a couple weeks. No fruit trees in these shots.





AFTER

You'll notice little twigs in these shots - the bareroot fruit trees!

'All in One' Almond in the lawn


'Pink Lady' Apple in foreground, 'Double Delight' Nectarine + 'Early Autumn' Apricot in background (in the same hole in the ground)


Here is Chris digging out a huge rock for the Apricot/Nectarine hole!


'Laroda' and 'Santa Rosa' plums + 'Flavor King' Pluot in same fruit bush hole. For more info about planting fruit trees in the same hole, visit Dave Wilson Nursery's website page on the topic of Backyard Orchards.


You will notice that I cleaned up the edges of the sheet mulched areas. Some of the burlap became exposed over the last couple months, so I swept and raked the mulch down again. I tried to redistribute the mulch to areas like the edges that didn't get as much in the first go-round. It was easier to see how that it has tamped down some and isn't so fluffy.

I really like the way it looks!

We planted the pear in the backyard today near the fruit trees we planted last year (I will update you on those soon). I also spread some more mulch around and everything looks so tidy now.

Chris' back hurts. He's such a good and dutiful husband when I ask him to dig holes!

PS - There are lots more pictures from this weekend on my Flickr page.

Digital Christmas Card

I never got around to taking a Christmas-y picture this year, but here is some virtual Christmas cheer for you!



(Clicking on picture will take you to a page that tells you what kinds of cookies these are)

One of my favorite childhood memories of Christmastime was the array of cookies and goodies my mom made.

She stopped for a long time, but has come through strong for the last two!

This tin is 4 layers deep and will hopefully last us a few days after New Years.

I hope your holiday traditions are alive and well, and that you're safe, warm (for those in the Northern Hemisphere), cool (for those in the Southern Hemisphere), and with the ones you love this holiday season.

Happy Holidays from GardenPunks

- Chris & Katie

Garden Experiment

Every year it seems that we clean up and tuck in the garden for winter before we get any killing frosts. Come to think of it, I've never seen what a frost or freeze does to a tender annual like basil.

This year we left the basil to the elements to see what would happen when we got a killing frost. Plus it was flowering and covered with bees, so we felt like it would be good for the local bee population to leave it.

Ho boy, were we rewarded last week!

Wednesday night we received a really hard killing frost. We've had a couple light frosts, but this bad boy took out darn near anything that isn't hardy.

WARNING: Plant carnage pictures below

Basil


'Thai Dragon' pepper


'Cal Wonder' bell pepper


Another bell pepper (Sage next to it is ok)


Potatoes


Potato mush


Nasturtium


The lantana in the backyard also got nipped as well. (Not pictured)

It has been interesting to see how the different raised beds have different microclimates. The bed above tends to be the coldest bed, whereas the ones parallel and closest to the South-facing stucco wall seem to benefit from the radiant heat it lets off. Although, last week's hard frost did affect those beds as well.

For more raised bed pictures, check out Raised Beds set on Flickr. It was great fun to go through it today and remember how far we've come!

We're supposed to have rain every day for the next 10 days (if it really happens, I will do a happy dance, videotape it, and post it here for you to see), so we won't be able to get out and cleanup. Chances are all these plants will turn to mush by then.