http://www.theglobeandmail.com/life/home-and-garden/gardening/plant-of-the-week-dienanthe-caerula/article13674818/

This is the long long connector for my Globe and Mail column last week. It also has the videos we’ve been making on there as well.  They are fun and fun to do.

Here are links to the videos themselves:

I was on CBC’s FRESH AIR this morning and promised  a fresh new shot of my garden which is here.  The one thing I cannot get is the depth, the layering and the constant sense that is changes minute by minute.   A perfect morning to watch the light coming into the garden.

The horror happened on our street this week.  Truck after truck carted away trees, hostas, shrubs and soil.  All gone.  Then more trucks rolled in with herbicides to spray the ground, truckloads of screening was dumped and then  thumped into place with heavy duty machinery.  The final insult was ugly looking unreal all-plastic grass.  It’s awful, terrible, dreadful.

We neighbours stood around gobsmacked and upset.  There was not a damn thing we could do. The owners of this plastic hell can do whatever they want with their property. The trees were of small enough caliper that they didn’t need a permit for removal. And no one cares about that other stuff.  It’s legal and we can just mind our own business.

But what no one has taken into account  is how this is going to change the ecology in our area.  We live on underground streams from the  Taddlecreek system which runs through downtown Toronto.  This water eventually ends up in Lake Ontario.  What we dump on our gardens will end up there too.  We are on a flood plain which means the ground water rises dramatically  in a year like this one and floods everyone’s garden.

Well this stuff plastic stuff is supposed to be permeable but when you see them pounding limestone screening into the ground, what comes to mind is cement.  The water that would normally rise and then fall is going to tumble into the gardens on either side  of this awful green horror.  What’s there for birds in this wasteland?  Where will the millions of  animals that make up the soil go? It will have the smell of death about it forever.  Nothing will change.

I understand it when put plastic grass (and there some good products) in a small area, say around a swimming pool.  But to completely destroy an entire yard for plastic is unconscionable.  You can bet this home owner will get a leaf blower to remove any offending bits of nature which might stray on to his property.  Why isn’t there something we can do about it?  It’s all perfectly legal.

Here’s a remarkable blooming in the garden this week.  It’s gorgeous. And the house and garden are ready for their close up.

I am doing set of new videos for the Globe and Mail and here are the first ones we a few weeks ago. They do a terrific job editing them and we loved being at the Toronto Botanical Garden to shoot them.

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/life/home-and-garden/gardening/video-tips-for-growing-vegetables-in-raised-beds/article11883121/

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/life/home-and-garden/gardening/video-the-best-pollinator-plants-for-your-garden/article11883073

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/life/home-and-garden/gardening/video-how-to-incorporate-evergreens-into-your-garden/article11882985/

We will be adding  more to the current repertoire in a few weeks and but if you follow either of these links you’ll see what we’re doing.

And on Saturday June  8th there will be an architectural tour going through our house and (I hope) admiring our wonderful garden room and perhaps looking at the garden. If you are interested you can a discount as follows (use the promotional codes below):

 (https://modernhometours.wufoo.com/forms/toronto-modern-home-tour-tickets/) will get $5 off advance tickets. The codes

PLANT

WEISS

THINK

UNIQUE

BLUE

What having a tour going through our house has meant is much fixing of stuff, repainting, re oiling, moving of things. It’s gorgeous now and of course the garden is glorious. A friend who  was at The Chelsea Garden Show this year said “This is what the really good gardens look like this year.” Well this garden has looked like this for many years. Maybe the world will catch up:  you can create beauty when you create an ecologically sound garden.

This  is my latest beauty, not a xeriscape plant of course.  It’s Acer shirasawnum ‘Moonrise’ and the  touches of red on the palmate leaves are echoed in the red tulips which I’d forgotten I’d planted last fall. Nature the great designer, serendipity for the rest of us.

In this Saturday’s Globe I’ve got the cover story on Xeriscape Gardens. It’s a terrific take out and I’m thrilled with the design.

Sunday morning I’ll be on CBC’s Fresh Air with Karen Gordon talking about the pitfalls of trendy gardening.  Spring has indeed sprung.

On Wed. May 22 I will be giving a talk called “Let’s Stop Making Ugly Gardens” for the Whitby in Bloom Series:   7:30 p.m. at  Brooklin United Church, 18 Cassels Road East. Brooklin.  Come and say hello.

It’s astounding the difference a day or two makes at this time of year. It’s like having a teenage kid who has a growth spurt: they are crashing and bashing about.

I had given up in despair but this is the difference a couple of days has made:

Flood and mess to:

masses of bulbs, in the background there’s a Corylopis pauciflora  that’s going to bloom its head off like crazy this year.

It’s still muddy but I don’t care. With all the moisture some of the moisture  is being returned to the water table. It’s was dead dry back there last year.

It’s a good time  winkle out all those weeds and also and excellent time to learn how to identify them.  The following is a quote from Scott’s:

There are two main types of weeds: broadleaf and grassy. Or, you may hear them referred to as monocots (broadleaf) and dicots (grassy). An example of a broadleaf weed would be a dandelion and an example of a grassy weed would be crabgrass. Each type has certain control methods that should be followed to keep them out of an established lawn.

BROADLEAF WEEDS
Basically, any plant growing in the lawn that does not resemble grass is a broadleaf weed. Examples of broadleaf weeds are dandelions and thistle.

A few weeds can be pulled up by hand, but many will grow right back because of their deep tap root. It may appear that the entire weed was pulled out, but the tap root simply breaks and what is left in the soil will just sprout new weed growth above the soil.

The best defense against weeds is a thick lawn that is properly cared for and never scalped by mowing. A thick lawn will choke out weeds and never allow them a place to establish in the lawn. This can be established by mowing your lawn high and giving it proper feedings so that it grows thick and fills in bare spots.

GRASSY WEEDS
Grassy weeds are tough, aggressive plants that thrive on stressed areas of your yard. Dried out lawns, thin patches, sun-scorched areas are inviting spots for grassy weeds. Grassy weeds are often invasive species and spread thousands of seed during their lifespan. The common ones you’ll see in lawns are crabgrass, goosegrass, and dallisgrass.

Scotts EcoSense® Weed B Gon® gets right inside the cell structure of weeds, which causes them to dry up, turn black, shrivel and die, without harming the rest of your lawn.

End of quote:  I’ve never tried any weed killer because all my gardening is organic. But if you are panicked, try it in a small dose to see if it works for you and doesn’t leave an unsightly hole.

Right now I’m just grateful that the gardening season has started again.  And I’ll be back in the Globe and Mail again this year. And we have some wonderful old client and great new clients who want us to work on their gardens.  Yeaaa for spring.

It’s an astounding day: full of sun and more people around than usual because it’s the beginning of the long weekend here: Monday is Presidents’ Day. More people on the beach than we’ve seen since we got here. That means a few dozen today and maybe more tomorrow.
It’s always amazing here: we cook and eat to the sound of the waves rolling in down below. Every evening there is a magnificent sunset which I can post on FaceBook but apparently not on here. And each evening a young surfer bobs around on the waves until the sun sets and he goes off home until tomorrow.
I love the sameness, yet difference of light and the smells that linger in the air through each long day. From the sun rising on the mountains behind us to the sunset skimming across the water in front. we are incredibly lucky to have found this bit of paradise.
It’s like being in a small European town: everyone says “Good day” in one way or another and we have met people on the street who know about our books or have just seen us around. It’s a kind of warmth we have in our own neighbourhood at home.
We’ve even been to a cocktail party or two. And down here that means a banquet of food as well as lots of wine and talk. The big difference is that we all stand about watching the sun go down. A few days ago we were looking for a flash of green. But it won’t happen until there’s an atmospheric conversion a flash of green comes like an explosion when the water is warmer than the air, or vice versa. So we learned at the cocktail party.
Doesn’t matter we wait for it each evening and it becomes a Caneletto out there or a wild impressionistic painting. It is full of glory

We are here in what can only be described as Paradise: on the ocean, with a sandy beach stretching as far as the eye can see in either direction. The dolphins were out in full force today and the occasional pelican swooped in to peer around.

It’s perfect, or is it? There are no more shells at least not this week. It seems only a few years ago when big storms as we had yesterday lashed these shores, the ocean would give up its treasures to all of those trawling for them on the beach. Today is a very low tide and yet there are no shells, few stones. I swear in the past you’d see people dragging bags of them away to edge, mulch and otherwise adorn their gardens.
I asked a beach volunteer and she thought there was little being fetched up from the sea but even if you could find stones and shells, you can’t take them away anymore. I wonder if the people marching up and down know this.

The sunsets are astounding. But the wonders never cease. What I have seen this week:
A young man walking a wire set up between two palm trees
A chap practising his new equipment for hang gliding. All he needs is a cliff he said.
A surfer with a sail working it back and forth in the wild winds with dophins mucking about all around.
It’s a wondrous place with much more to come maybe a plant or two.

I’ve now had enough time to digest the amazing trip to Italy we took this past year. The Tuscan Valley is magnificent of course but I had never seen it in early autumn and it was, as always, a huge revelation.  One revelation was: don’t take a new camera on a trip if you don’t know how to use it. I messed up with my shots and barely have any record of this trip except what’s in my head.

This is Linda Clay and me at Ninfa one of the truly magnificent gardens on a trip of amazing gardens and sights. You can see we’re pretty happy.

That orange bag on my shoulder was bought in Cortona and I learned another thing on this trip:  if you see something in Italy, buy it immediately. It will not be available in the next town.  These things are very regional, very personal in many cases to the people selling. them. I should have bought all the other colours but no….couldn’t make up my mind how spend the very little I wanted to spend.

In Pienze the next town we stayed in, my good old MBT sandals fell apart making them unwalkable. I was guided to a shoemaker who pointed out all the stuff he was working on. I tried to explain my problem (no mutual language here except hands) and he had them ready for me the next day. Cost:  a mind boggling seven euros. I almost threw my arms around him but settled with handshakes and smiles.

What a country. Everywhere we went we found people incredibly receptive and kind. The food of course is non-pareil and we had magnificent meals at the home of Guiseppe, Sarah and Elise Sesti. We tasted their wines, olive oil and nose-dived into masses of  local charcouterie and bread. Then a great tour of Sarah’s garden.  I get to love them more on each visit.

Another unforgettable meal:  at Susan Mackenna Grants agrotourismo farm. Everything we had in an 8-course meal came from the farm.  Somewhere I have a picture of me about to collapse with joy at the food, the wine and the energetic and lovely talk of my table mates.

The people on this trip were so much fun. And I’ve become what will be long term friends with a few since them. We’ve even had a celebratory gathering (tea which  meant some very nice wine and lots of food) and a catch up on each other’s pix (mine euyuck), passing around of prints (thank you thank you) and plans to meet again.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=BUIY4IO7GVk <http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&amp;v=BUIY4IO7GVk>

This year we’re going to the Amalfi Coast and you can read about it by clicking on the button in the header.  Love to see you there  Marjorie

It snowed. Blessed snow. It covers the plants that need protection, weighing some down and I have to whack away with a broom to release them from the crushing weight. Here’s my HAPPY NEW YEAR from my garden to yours.