Monarch Waystations

Yep, the goal with our 3 Neighborhood Pollinator Gardens was to develop beautiful yet valuable attractions with a focus on Monarch Butterflies as well as other pollinators! 

We are ending our first season of these new beds a success and the official designation as a "Monarch Waystation"!  We've managed to protect these precious beds of native plants from deer and rabbits and provided them with adequate sun and water to encourage well established plants!  We've added plant identification markers with common and botanical names for education also!  The Monarchs found our beds,  so we are looking forward to spring now and our second year of growth with confidence.  This has been an interesting and a learning experience!  New plants along with new people in my life this covid summer.  

To learn how your garden bed can become a 'Monarch Way Station" CLICK HERE

U of MN Garden News

 Check this out!

This Covid environment is bringing gardening information to us in so many digital formats.  It is great and either free or a modest cost for most of these wonderful formats.  Great quality for most of them!  Newsletters and Webinars are growing in abundence and quality.  

This one appeared in my email today from the University of MN Extension, a very reputable resource of gardening information.

"Yard and Garden News" in a digital format to your email address!  A quick review of the offering made for my quick decision to subscribe to this free service!

I recommend you check it out and give their free service some consideration.  It's easy to unsubscribe if you don't feel it is beneficial later.

Click here for information on U of MN "Yard and Garden News"

Sunflower Time!

A recent visit to the Albert Lea 'Fish Sunflower' Bed was amazing!

Only an hour drive from home and a perfect covid style outing of joy to behold! Great photo opportunity!   I will get this on our agenda again next year, hopefully sharing it with other friends to enjoy also!  

For more information on 'Fish Sunflower Beds' Click here:

Water feature for Tammy!

 Tammy has the magic touch with Denny!   She was admiring the water features he made for my garden beds and convinced Denny to make one for her rose bed!  Yep, he is a sucker for these younger women in his life!  Daughter, granddaughter, great granddaughter and now the daughter like gal in his neighborhood harem!  They all have that magic touch of winding him around their little fingers!

It turned out just great!  And while we are sitting on the deck under the pergola the sound of splashing water is perfect!

Pergola on a deck!

Our newest neighbor, Tammy, decided her south facing deck was just too much hot sun to enjoy with her grandchildren!  So she went shopping on the internet and Denny agreed to help her install it!  A bit of a problem with the "some assembly required" not working out so well.  So, it was returned to the company and like a true gardener, Tammy does not give up....she found another one and with Denny's approval ordered it.  

Yep, this time it all went together just fine!  Wow!  We all love it and are enjoying some social time on it!  It includes flexible screen drapery to keep the bugs out and even some weather protecting drapery!  We added garden themed lighting complete with a dimmer, thanks to Denny's magic fingers!  

"Some assembly required"  2 days worth!

Tammy rescued tools dropped between deck planks!

Almost done!

Light fixture and curtains installed!

 

Update on Neighborhood Park Pollinator Beds Project

 There is color and even Monarchs and bees buzzing in our Neighborhood Park Project!

Earlier this spring I posted about a neighborhood association project I got involved with.  We have three neighborhood parks and had received a grant to beautify our neighborhood.  The decision to develop three pollinator garden beds was achievable using native plants and was the goal.  I volunteered to get involved and ended up responsible for selecting and obtaining 150+ native plants for the project plus taking the responsibility of planting one of the beds and maintaining it for this year.  Thanks to a few gardener friends we've done this supporting the crew of volunteers that prepared the beds for us!  We've had to haul water to them weekly but created a water barrel system that has been filled by a volunteer each week, which made less work for us!  So we only had to take along empty sprinkling cans to take care of the watering tasks!

After three to four months we are seeing the fruits of our labor and investment in passion.  Lots of color and even some Monarch Butterflies and bees are showing up!  The plants, which were primarily first year starts purchased from area growers, have taken root and settled in.  Weeding has been minimal thanks to the donation of mulch from our city park department!  It will take three years for these plants to reach maturity but they are well on their way and being enjoyed by neighbors.  I am anxious to see what growth we have next year!

A week ago I took on the task of supplying stakes with labels for each group of plant varieties in the beds.  The labels included a common name plus the botanical name.  

The bed in Judd Park (which I worked with) is in part shade so this enabled me to use some different plants than the other beds in part of it.  I plan to add a few spring bulbs this fall yet and get some bluebells started next spring!  

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Garden Party Covid Style 2020

 What a wonderful event!

Our 80 year old garden club has not been able to meet since February due to the 2020 pandemic our world is experiencing.  So, when Linda, the event chair, decided to host our annual August Garden Party in her garden, covid style, I was so excited!  At last an opportunity to be able to meet and visit with some of my favorite people which  I have been missing since our club events had been in cancelled until further notice!  Our meeting location had closed, our Plant Sale location was closed, and our Garden Tour was not within safe covid guidelines!  

I arrived on the early side of the start time only to find at least 2/3's the attendees were already there and settled into some serious visiting and garden viewing!  It was all masks, some social distancing outdoors, ice cream treats from store freezers and bottles of ice cold water to quench our throats from the chatting we were doing!

We did a fun plant swap, as one of our usual happenings at this annual event.  

The change from a pot luck supper to ice cream treats was a  most enjoyable and another easy change of our usual happening at this event!  

Thanks Linda to you and your creative committee for providing us a way to socialize together in a very beautiful location!  

Hydrangea Time!

 Yipee!  At last what I have been looking forward to all summer!

Their show seems to go on until winter arrives and meanwhile provides changing colors to the scenery!

A view of both my trees in August

'Limelight'

' Pink Diamond'