Timeless Retirement

Monday, October 4, 2010

34° here on the mountain as the sun has found strength to break through the fog and clouds that prevailed two hours ago. Karl the Wonder Dog and I got out early and enjoyed the quiet and the smells of autumn on our back forest road. He loves to walk through the fallen maple leaves and dig and paw and root around even though I want to get moving. He found nothing to bark at this morning and my enjoyment was in the form of a large pileated woodpecker that left one dying sugar maple for another.

Fall frosts signal an end to many things, but for me and Gail, fall is equally as busy as summer. The nursery commands lots of very important work that is "behind the scenes" work that no one ever sees when they make a plant purchase. When frosts arrive my work slowly moves from the fields into the woods as I cut wood for the following heating season. We have slightly more than 70 acres here on the mountain, part in Marshfield and part in Peacham township. My forest work includes making a series of walking trails while cleaning up brush and fallen trees, reopening old woods roads and cleaning up around old white pines, black cherry, yellow birch and healthy sugar maples.

I retired the end of March from a career in state government that started in 1969. At the end I received constant questioning about what I would do to keep busy. Those who asked obviously never really knew me as keeping busy has never been a problem. Actually having enough time has been the problem and I have sought a "day stretcher" for some time but they just aren't made.

Yesterday Gail and I worked on our river garden along the Winooski River at our nursery. We have a vision for five acres of botanical happiness and this is part of it. It will take time to complete the garden and as those who know us say, our gardening endeavors will never cease.

We started working on April 1st and worked nonstop for over 150 days. As October approaches, the light at the end is Columbus Day when we close the nursery for the season. But since Labor Day we have been open by chance or appointment and that affords us time to catch up on things. For me, getting into the woods and back into some photography is the answer.

Up top is a picture from last Thursday. The property belongs to Marshfield's Water Tower Farm, home of Tennessee Walking Horses and a terrific therapeutic riding program. I took the picture just before the rain began to flood the area with well over 5.5 inches of rain here on the mountain. This field was still covered 24 hours ago but should begin to dry today.

If you are a photographer, there's probably a stack of pictures or a file folder on your computer that contains a bazillion pictures of the same spot. This is Marshfield Pond, a place in Vermont that is special to me. It is a couple mountains away from our house and I seem to spend a lot of time in that area. It lends an instant peace that sort of tranquilizes one from the busy life that is part of American now.

Guess I better get going here. I have dahlias and cannas to clean as soon as I change the oil in the '57 John Deere tractor. I need to get the brush hog mounted and trim out the woods roads and the back field one more time. Retirement is fun. Stop by if you have a minute. I probably have a story to share.

Writing from the mountain above Peacham Pond where Canada geese have been flying almost nonstop for three days.

George Africa
The Vermont Gardener
Vermont Flower Farm
On Facebook as George Africa and also Vermont Flower Farm and Gardens
On Twitter as vtflowerfarm

Fall Colors Make Us Happy!

Tuesday, October 6, 2009

Just finishing up with the evening news. Gail is in from a walk in the dark with Karl the Wonder Dog and Alex has come out of hibernation for the first time since last Thursday. He has had a terrible virus and is just starting to move. The regional news mentioned 175 potential cases of flu at Dartmouth College, 60 miles from here. People at work are coming up missing, either sick themselves or staying home to take care of family. Hope all gardeners are keeping up with all the recommendations and staying as healthy as possible. "hands-off-the-face!" is one of the difficult suggestions for this gardener as I swat flies and wipe off errant pieces of dirt or jewel weed seeds that have catapulted into the air at the brush of a body.

Fall foliage takes center stage right now and it won't disappoint so far this year. I had to work in Burlington and Shelburne today and the foliage views from Interstate 89 from Bolton through Richmond are the best I have seen and I have driven that road since 1980. I was cameraless again today so the pictures I am sharing are more from around here taken Sunday. My son Adam in Seattle loves foliage time so I'll keep these going for a few more days.

Gail tells me that she got another daylily order emailed in today and she has the final one ready for tomorrow. Hostas and specialty plants have already been ordered so things are shaping up for next spring. We still have well over a hundred giant clumps to get moved next spring and included are the Olallie daylilies from several years ago. Gail and I checked them out tonight and some are still blooming, many with lots of buds left. Their colors are not as brilliant as many daylilies but the fact that they are blooming here on October 6th and after several killing frosts is worthy of note.

We're hoping for a half pleasant weekend as we have a few more daylilies to dig and divide and about 20 more hostas to get planted. Then I will start vacuuming the leaves with the shredder and getting them down to the nursery to stockpile for next spring. I recommend a shredder vac but personally cannot recommend the Sears model that I purchased several years back. It does an incredible job and has a powerful motor but it is so quick that on a typical fall day the bag is full after you push your way through a twenty foot strip of driveway or lawn. That means stopping the motor, taking off the bag, lifting it to wherever you want to dump it (in the back of the truck for me), reinstalling and restarting the project again. The engine always starts well but this is a laborious set of repetitive actions to get the leaves cleaned up. The next one I buy will consider this one's shortcomings and also be self propelled. I keep thinking of that $1200 expenditure for the big one you pull behind your tractor????? Better not tell Gail.

Lots of folks ask me about the leaf mulch during the spring and summer when they see me planting. My formula is always the same. If the leaves are wet from recent rains I don't worry but if they are dry, then I get out the hose and really water them down. I sprinkle on about 20 pounds of 5-10-5 or similar fertilizer per truckload of leaves. Then I water heavily and just wait for spring. Although the top of the pile will not degrade in one winter, the fertilizer and the water create a good environment to get the chopped up leaves working and the resulting mulch is black and crumbly. A better shredder than the Sears brand would make me happy but there is a certain joy in having nice piles of leaves to jump start new transplants. A self propelled model would be super!

Now for the pictures. The one up top is looking west from the top of the daylily beds near the hosta shade house. If you click and enlarge the photo you'll notice the various different trees. I'm going to use this picture sometime soon to write a piece about "What Makes A Forest?"

I photograph Marshfield Pond annually several times because I love the place so much. The cliffs in the background were the site of our state's peregrine falcon restocking program back in the late seventies. I have finally found the trail to get to the top and I want to climb it in the next couple weeks. I was recently informed that this pond is only 12 feet deep at the deepest place although it seems to me I have lost nice fish and line caught on the bottom suggesting more depth than that. The water is so black that there's no way of seeing the depth.


This next picture is a grouping of rock-cap ferns or Polypodium vulgare. A bazillion years back Gail's father probably stacked the smaller rocks on this large boulder as he cleared the pasture. The polypodium spores landed here and the rest is a nice picture. There's a nice sugar maple to the right edge of the boulder. It still has a limb dangling out of it from when a bear climbed it in haste years back. It almost matches a broken tree limb from a nearby yellow transparent apple--similarly approached by a black bear for a fall meal.

The Montpelier to Wells River Railroad used to pass here until being thrown up in the early 1950s. Readers might remember a picture of a moose I took at the end of this picture last fall. The fish and game guys have finally trapped out the beavers who were regularly damming the culvert on the right side of the road. Some of the road edges make for careful travel as the erosion from the beavers was not a positive engineering feat. To the left of the road from this perspective is Bailey Pond.
Many daylilies left to be cut down, some to be split, all must be done in the next eight days.


Bailey Pond is the first of three kettle ponds carved out by the glaciers years ago. Glacial erratics, the name for large boulders left erratically here and there, line the road and give kids climbing challenges while their parents get weak stomachs.

Yes, fall foliage season in Vermont is a time of bright color, apple cider, craft fairs, the last of the farmers markets, harvest dinners and a time to think more seriously about putting your gardens to bed. Still think I better get with it and dig, dry and store the potatoes.


Writing from the mountain above Peacham Pond where it's 46 degree out as we await yet another rain storm.

George Africa
The Vermont Gardener
Vermont Flower Farm: a website from which someone ordered three Brunnera'Mr. Morse' plants yesterday. They filled the gallon pots before Gail got them ready to be shipped.

Turkey Irony

Saturday, November 29, 2008

For some reason, sleep left me an hour ago and I am wide awake and ready for a new day even though the balance of the house is deep in slumber. Aging has a way of changing clocks and mine feels like its still flickering after a brief power outage. Maybe one more cup of coffee will reset things and prepare me for the day's events.

It's still clean up time here on the mountain. Austin is home from the University of Vermont for the weekend and he came up yesterday to help with some clean up. Gail is immensely relieved because he has committed to working for us again this summer which means she has her same crew back again. For Gail, that's monumental relief. It is for me too as people who can show up for work on time, handle customers and wear a smile are invaluable. They give me the opportunity to move along with my projects and come closer to the goals I have set for the new nursery.

Michelle will be back with us too. In the other work world, she is a super teacher and directs some education programs for some very special people in this county. She is one of those people you can trust with everything you own and not have to give a thought about the outcome. It's always timely and correct. I'm foggy this morning but I think this is year five that she will be working with us.

Besides these two, we have dependable part time, fill-in, come-when-we-call, spring planters--that kind of mix of interested gardeners who have been with us for years. Managing a business with a good crew makes tiring days shorter and smiles frequent! Austin will be back this morning and we'll try to get a few more things ticked off the list before the sun sets.

Thanksgiving is now two days past and the turkey in the fridge has almost been reduced to bones and pieces for soup. Yesterday morning as I was sitting here, Gail advised me to look out the window under the bird feeder. I was engrossed in Dreamweaver and a new website I am working on but under the feeder were five wild turkeys pecking corn the ungrateful blue jays had scattered about. There was an old hen and four kids from this spring. It certainly was ironic that they had absented themselves from the fields for a week and now that Thanksgiving is over, they're back.

The big hen reminded me of a show on public radio on Wednesday. Every year they have a call-in show where people with less than a clue about certain culinary processes call and ask things like "Why can't I get the stuffing in?" "What's that package I found in the bird?" "Why is my mother's gravy good and mine would be better to hang wall paper with?" "How can I cook everything in an oven that's too small?"

Wednesday I was impressed with the lady who called to report a neighbor had given her family a 42 pound turkey he had raised. It was so big she didn't have a pan or an oven to cook it in and her husband was on the verge of breaking out the chain saw to cut it down to size. The turkey pro said she was on the right path and since turkey parts---legs, breast, stuffing-- all cook at different times, it would be best to break the bird down into pieces and go from there. One suggestion I am quite uncertain about was his recommendation to try cooking it outside on the BBQ. I guess there are those people in the world that like to give and accept challenges and perhaps someone will give that a shot although my BBQ wouldn't hold that big a bird either. Our turkey was 17 pounds and just the right size.

I just heard Karl the Wonder Dog hit the hardwood floor. That means that in a minute he'll be bringing in a wagging tail and a plea for a morning walk. It's 28 degrees this morning and overcast as we have a big storm coming in for tomorrow. I always enjoy morning walks with Karl but have to say I miss the enjoyment of July wildflowers such as the Lilium canadense (top) or seeing ducks and geese raising new families on nearby Marshfield Pond. Those things are on hold until spring but the memories always stay here. Try to get out for a walk today and enjoy the balance of the fall season.


Writing from the mountain above Peacham Pond where I do hope your amaryllis bulbs are doing better than mine. For me, no more of those prepotted or kit affairs. I'm going back to the wholesalers who sell big bulbs that only cost a couple bucks more and bloom strong and big!

George Africa
The Vermont Gardener
Vermont Gardens
Vermont Flower Farm

Autumn Colors

Wednesday, October 1, 2008

The rain is pounding the roof again tonight as I think back about yesterday afternoon's trip with Alex and Karl the Wonder Dog, looking at foliage from some of our favorite vantage points. Foliage this year has been about a week earlier than usual but as spectacular as I can ever remember. The colors have been so vivid that you don't want to leave one point of view for the next.

Alex and I had dedicated a couple hours to be with Karl and travel around but I was late getting back from work and we had to modify our schedule a little. We headed down to Osmore Pond in hopes of spotting a moose along the way but the trip was mooseless. The pond was as beautiful as ever but quiet this time with no loons to be seen or heard.

We back tracked to the village for some gas and a soda and headed up past the waterfalls and onto the Lanesboro Road. This is a favorite with us--the old Montpelier to Wells River, Vermont Railroad, thrown up in the early 50's and now an excellent place to drive, enjoy the scenery and the wildlife which abounds. We stopped at Marshfield Pond which I photograph several times a

year. This is a small kettle pond surrounded by some great wildflowers in spring and lots of life the rest of the year. The granite head wall on the back is still on my list of things to hike to but I still haven't made it.

We exited the road at the corner of Lanesboro and Ethan Allen Corner and then drove part way up Owl's Head and then home. The foliage was something we didn't want to leave but evening chores beckoned.

The predominant tree in these photos is the maple. There are red maples, sugar maples and some Norway maples but all are colorful. As the leaves of these trees fall around our house, I use the leaf vac to pick them up and shred them for next year's gardens. Maples have a very long root system and they store important minerals in the leaves. In the spring I'll spread an inch or so on all the new gardens at our nursery and begin the process of improving our garden beds, a little at a time.


Writing from the mountain above Peacham Pond where day time visitors from around the world will stop and click photos of fall foliage so they can talk about it forever. Vermont is a great state and it always looks better on the return trip. Come visit!

Best autumn wishes,

George Africa
The Vermont Gardener

Vermont Flower Farm
Vermont Gardens

Vermont Reflections

Tuesday eve, December 5, 2006

I just put a couple logs in the woodstove. The warmth feels very good, especially to Karl the wonder dog, flanked out in front of the brick hearth acting as if his spot is not to be intruded upon. In a few minutes he will probably become oblivious to his surroundings. Soon we'll hear his erractic snoring and twitching as he goes into dreams of chasing red squirrels and rabbits. Much has changed in the past couple days and the weather has shown it is in charge of our outside world.

Sunday morning Karl and I headed out early to try to get a few late fall pictures. We headed south on Route 232 and then took a right turn across from the turn to Owls Head. If you haven't been there yet, locate it on a good map and make a note to visit any time after Memorial Day next spring. That's when the state park system begins to open. Owls Head is special to me and I speak of it often, to friends, to visitors, and in our blogs. The profile shot of me on this blog is one Alex took several years ago when I was sitting up there enjoying a time of peace. For Alex and me, we don't make the trip up there often enough but when just the two of us go, we have good conversation.

Karl and I headed down the road until we came to Marshfield Pond. I have no idea how many pictures I have taken of the pond but Sunday morning we got there as the sun was just tossing back the bedsheets. The mountain looked cold and dark even though the temperature was almost 30 degrees warmer than it is tonight.

Marshfield Pond is a kettle pond, less than 35 feet deep and filled with browned, acidic water, warm water fish and is surrounded by some fine wildflower specimens. Despite all that beauty, the shear granite headwall has always intrigued me, forever beckoning me to visit.

The visual entrance to Marshfield Pond is similar to the entrance to our hosta display garden. It makes you catch your breath with all there is to see and as soon as you cast your eyes right or left, you're instantly fatigued by how much there is to see. Once you've looked around , you know you'll return time and again to compare differences and savor the tranquility that is so difficult to find these days.



The hosta garden entrance is impressive but it didn't turn out as expected. It serves as a good reminder to other gardeners that a good garden plan is priceless. If you visit before mid May when the hostas are first breaking ground and then visit again around the third week of June, you'll notice that the beauty of the hostas has covered the beauty of the stones that delineate the old barn foundation, three stone walls holding firm grasp to hundreds of hosta so they can't escape to adjoining land. Had I done it correctly, I would have spaced the larger hostas further apart and would have planted the smaller ones 5-6 feet from some of the larger varieties. Seeing a Sum and Substance hosta that's 6 feet across and almost four feet high makes you "wow!"; having to peal away 20" leaves to find much smaller Kabitan, Lemon Lime, Twist of Lime and Little Sunspot is not nearly as fun as seeing them well grown as perimter hostas.

Planting a hosta garden the right way makes you want to keep bending over to grab another hosta to plant. The new garden looks sparsely planted and open at first and makes you feel too stingey with the plant material. This feeling continues for at least the first two years when the plants begin to fill out.

If you can't resist that urge to fill in between plants with yet more hostas, you can always buy some fast growing annuals and pop in a few here and there. It's also prudent to remember that the first full year after planting, the hostas are typically adjusting to the soil and putting on some nice root growth. The second year they will start to grow and the third year it's a whole different look

These last two pictures show the same hosta bed two years apart. It's been two additonal years since the last picture. If you stop by to visit, you will easily see what we're trying to communicate on the spacing issue. And I'll bet even a quick walk through the lower garden will give you the encouragement needed to try some hostas. If the look is enticing but the courage is lacking, courage is something we dole out for free. Just ask!

From the mountain above Peacham Pond where colder temperatures will lead to some snow on Thursday and then slightly warmer days by the weekend. "Warmer" is relative in a Vermont winter but it's always nice for us to hear.

Happy gardening thoughts!

George Africa

http://vermontflowerfarm.com

http://vermontgardens.blogspot.com