Gabe & Rebecca chat about what's happening in garden in winter, everything from evergreens to dried flower blossoms to overwintering insects.
Gabe & Rebecca chat about what's happening in garden in winter, everything from evergreens to dried flower blossoms to overwintering insects.
Welcome to leafing out a podcast about gardening. I am Rebecca. And I'm Gabe. And we are not experts. We're amateur gardeners, sharing what we learned as we learned it on our gardening journey. It's been a long journey,
Gabe Long:and a long time since are like less fun.
Rebecca:Very long time. We've been on quite a journey since our last podcast episode. It's a journey. rife with daycare closings, lack of child care.
Gabe Long:COVID scares
Rebecca:COVID scares, just ventures late. Wait. COVID Malays?
Gabe Long:Yeah, yeah. All right. I'm gay. What are we talking about?
Rebecca:Why don't we just do like, I want to know, I feel like you've been doing gardening and I have just not at all. Can you just tell me what is going on our garden? It's winter now. It's, we should probably give like a little timestamp. It's December 2008. Yep. 2021. Yeah. And so a lot of things I just asked for an update. And I'm already giving the update myself. But what I've been noticing outside is we finally have done something that people always say to do that I always read and was like, that sounds so boring. I don't want to do that, which is plant things that are green in the winter so that there's something to look at, even in the winter time. Last year, we last spring, I guess we planted some stuff, some more stuff that's Evergreen. And gosh, have I been noticing what an upgrade it is out back? Yeah, but you've been actually plodding around out there. I've just been kind of looking through the back kitchen window as I like do dishes yet again.
Gabe Long:Why I like talking about evergreens for a minute, because I think I remember early conversations about our, our garden and you talking about that piece of advice. And for some reason. I don't maybe maybe it's what everybody thinks of or maybe it was just me. People talk about evergreens and I think of needles, I think of like, you know, a Christmas tree or like, you know, a shrub, as needles or, or whatever. And I think something that changed my perception of that advice is just realizing that like there are lots of things that have leaves like rhododendrons, or mountain laurel which is what we planted a whole bunch of along our back fence that don't have needles.
Rebecca:Yeah, it's true. I think when I was hearing like, plant evergreens so that there's something to look at in winter. My mind went to like Arbor of it and other like prying eyes, Evergreen things that are like it's not the right word. That's not even the right word. But you know what I mean? Like evergreen, what you think of as evergreen plants? Yeah, like,
Gabe Long:well, they don't have leaves. They they're that they're the title. Yeah, have a sort of very spine, whether it's an actual needle,
Rebecca:this is the part where we're not experts.
Gabe Long:Well, whatever I think suffice to say that there's lots of different types of evergreens.
Rebecca:There's plants that are that happen to be evergreen that aren't what what light leaped to my mind when I think about an evergreen like an evergreen shrub or tree or something? Yeah, that I have been delighted to find that feel kind of like needle in a haystack little finds. Like we were just out there and I was really enjoying having let's just rattle off what some of them are. Yeah, there's the woods birch wood Spark is so cool. So cool. There's a lot of different spring urges and things that call themselves spurge, and people know different things as spurge. But we're talking about I've sometimes seen referred to as cushioned spurge. It's Euphorbia amygdaloid and they Deloitte these employees Yeah, and they Deloitte Euphorbia amygdaloid. These would spurge let's take that back a little bit. So,
Gabe Long:I was gonna say I'm back with a non squeaky chair.
Rebecca:I guess you could you we paused you've come back with a not squeaky chair. I was gonna say that the, what we have is Euphorbia amygdaloid ease variation. Roby, a wood spurge, which is also known as I'm reading this off of gardenia, dotnet. Wood spurge, Mrs. Rob's bonnet, Rob's spurge and Euphorbia Roby a it's a spreading evergreen perennial. It's just cool. It's one of those plants that to me looks something like something that almost looks like it would grow under the sea, like something that you would find in like a coral reef or something, you know, a little bit strange looking.
Gabe Long:Yeah. And it's not a native to North America. I think it's a native of Europe. But I think when we talked in the past about like, using your non natives for something kind of special like like sprinkling them and I think it's a great one for that because it is evergreen because it's like a low grower that has this really cool leaf shape. It's also, I think, pretty adaptable to different light levels. Like we have it in very part shade. And some might even say full shade. And it's doing great. So it's
Rebecca:not here that it's a full sun depart shade lover. I would say we have it in like, part verging on full sheet. Yes, just fine. And it's nice because it kind of clumps up pretty fast. Like, I'm really surprised by how it has filled in. We haven't planted right under a magnolia. And it just is lovely. And looks like it's been there for years. And it's so nice that it is just robust this time of year. What else do we have this really nice right now we have Christmas Fern that is looking great. It is so lovely.
Gabe Long:Christmas fern is really one of my favorites, I feel like and that is a native. At least in North America. I don't know what part but I feel like it's is when I think of like a plant that can go and like any garden like any garden like you could put in the Christmas Fern, it's full shade. So it's like fills in a you know, a niche that not a lot of other plants do. It's so pretty. And until me it's like almost evergreen, like it'll it'll last pretty much through the winter.
Rebecca:So this is our first year having it so it'll be interesting to see exactly how long it holds out. Because I feel like our garden we've talked about this before has a little bit of a microclimate where it doesn't receive that much wind. And some things kind of stick around and don't get too cold blasted. Even though we're in zone six be some things that shouldn't last all winter kind of tend to with us. So we'll see. But I think my impression is that part of why it's called Christmas fern is that it stays green through like January and it holds up for most of winter. And then it's gonna you're gonna lose it by the end of the winter. But it will provide some some green interest. Even when I'm when most things have died, it holds out like way, way way through the first frost when so many of your foliage plants are gonna just be done for the season. And I
Gabe Long:want to jump on your point about wind. I think that is something that even if we have said this on a previous podcast bears repeating that when I was starting out, I definitely always thought of hardiness as a function of temperature. And the more I've delved into particularly like creating low tunnels for some of the vegetables in the garden, the more I've realized it's really a function of temperature combined with wind exposure. So if you have, like you're saying a place that is sheltered from wind, you can get away with, you know, overwintering rosemary, and zone six be where we are or some of those other plants that like might only really be hardy to zone seven. You can really kind of push it if you shelter them from wind. Yeah, that
Rebecca:gives you kind of a nice little window for that a lot of plants will be pretty happy with. Why don't you tell us more about the wind tunnels that you're doing? What did you do out there?
Gabe Long:So well, they aren't wind tunnels there.
Rebecca:Oh, yes. Not wind tunnels. That was interesting.
Gabe Long:But yeah, so over two of the beds. I have those, those remash panels that I turned into little tomato cages. And so you just bend them into place. Yeah, I just sort of, you know, unhook them. I had like, cut them so that I had little sort of hooky pieces on the end. And I can turn them into like a column that creates a tomato cage.
Rebecca:So you buy rematch sheets of remash at like Lowe's or Home Depot or whatever. Yeah. And you bring them home, on the roof of your car holding on to them down the highway, if I recall
Gabe Long:correctly. That sounds right. I know that story.
Rebecca:And then you bend them into like a half circle kind of for the
Gabe Long:tunnels. Yeah. So for the tunnels. I mean, I was just telling my whole journey with it, which was turning them into the tomato cages and then unbending them slightly so that they're half circles. And I drape greenhouse plastic over them. And it's just an open ended tunnel. So back to the frost question like if it provides no like there's no greenhouse effect. It's not trapping air. It's not any warmer in there than it is outside. More of like an umbrella situation. It's exactly like an umbrella. Yeah, but an umbrella that goes to the ground so that you're not getting that wind exposure. And I don't totally understand the science behind it. But there is something yeah, there that that the wind, the snow can make a difference, but particularly the wind, I think it's like a drying effect on the leaves of plants that somehow sort of like dries them out to the point that they can't
Rebecca:I know that that is a thing what we think about water loss in plants as being related to the dryness of the soil, but like on hot days when you have the sun beat down, we think of the plants is getting really dry because like so much is evaporating, the wind is making it if it's breezy, and windy, the wind is going to make your your evaporation rate so much faster, right? Yeah. So wait. So you're you're just covering the tops of the low tunnels, you but I think you put a photo of this on Instagram, someone wants to actually see what they look like I would be so confused right now if I didn't know what they look like. But why don't you cover the ends? Like wouldn't? Would you be able to grow more things if you covered the ends and had it be warmer inside what
Gabe Long:so that's what I started with is I thought like, Oh, I'm going to make this like miniature greenhouse and like, it'll be a few degrees warmer and like things will grow and whatever. And I realized that on that small of a scale, you really can't do that you won't get a greenhouse effect. Because it just like isn't big enough to trap enough air. Like you don't really have any insulation, right, you just have this piece of plastic. So you're relying on like, a lot of sunlight coming in heating up like a large amount of air heating up the soil that is like underneath that greenhouse and on a on a much larger scale that can really work like you can go into a, you know, a greenhouse, that's that, that you can walk into in the middle of winter. And on a freezing cold day, it'll be you know, 75 degrees, but on this scale, it just doesn't. It doesn't really work. Or it's I'll say it doesn't work for me. Maybe there are other people who have different experiences. But please
Rebecca:write down if you have turned your low journals into a little greenhouse situation, let us know.
Gabe Long:Yes, man, I would love to hear from folks. Because I know there are people who sort of proselytize about different sorts of setups, little boxes with hay bales, and windowpanes, all this sort of stuff. But what I found is that like, it really wasn't getting any warmer in there. And what was happening is that I was getting tons of bugs. So like we had parsley. And Parsley is great. Like it can, you know, can last all winter if it's under cover. But it was just covered in aphids, because there was nothing they got in there and there was nothing to eat them. And you know, it was sort of to a point where I didn't really want to use the parsley. So I figured well, this year, I'll leave the ends open that will hopefully take care of the bug issue because there'll be predator bugs and if the if the aphids are alive, then things will be alive. They can eat them. And I think it'll serve pretty much the same. It'll give pretty much the same amount of protection.
Rebecca:So we're in the aphids last
Gabe Long:year. Things were last year. Yeah, so
Rebecca:we're gonna see what happens. We're gonna see what happens.
Gabe Long:Yeah, this is no this is unproven.
Rebecca:They're even our aphids. I hate aphids. I'm so surprised that they're aphids. In winter. This is dismal news for me. Really? We've talked about this before.
Gabe Long:Well, there aren't that's the thing is I just covered the the parsley the other day, and there weren't any aphids on it. So I think it's like I think it takes like a special set of circumstances for the aphids to thrive in winter a special set of circumstances provided by a low tunnel that is closed
Rebecca:your attorney father would say you were creating an attractive nuisance for the fit something by creating your closed low tunnels with such nice cozy protected. Yeah, circumstances for them. Right. So what else are you going to grow this year,
Gabe Long:so I'm taking it pretty easy i in i guess it was late summer I planted a whole bunch of arugula in one bed and there's also parsley in that bed. So it covered that, that will that'll last like pretty much all winter. I mean, maybe by like, late February, if we haven't eaten it all by then it might be a little funny. But um, the arugula is super Hardy, and it develops like, I mean, he gets definitely stronger in flavor. Like, I don't think I would want to even now eat like a whole salad of that arugula. It's like, spicy, but it's a wonderful greet. It feels like very special to me to like, you have your salad of like romaine or spinach or you know, whatever sort of mild green and you throw a bunch of that in and it really like add something nice. You have this now it's growing out there now like it's ready to go. Yeah, it's ready to go should throw it in the soup that I'm gonna make tomorrow. We'll do it gonna make I'll tell you what the soup is.
Rebecca:I'm going to make a soup. That is chicken stock. Pasta, like radiator pasta, you know? And pork and fennel seed. So it's like a sausage G soup with she calls her broccoli Rob. And that would be I was planning on doing that. But maybe we could just like throw a handful of the arugula in. Yeah, the very. I was like doing the soup and like just throw a handful of spinach or something on the very end. It'll just wilt as it goes in. Yeah, that sounds really good.
Gabe Long:Another point. That is something that sort of took me a while to figure out is to your question of like, Is it ready to go now, with all of these like little low tunnel setups, you really don't have enough light, or warmth to grow anything. Like you're just keeping stuff alive, basically like what you have out there in like mid to late September, like that's it, it's done growing like you are not going to get your plants will not get any bigger, they will not grow more leaves they want if you're doing like just a low tunnel, if you're doing something like unheated. I mean, admittedly, we don't have like a TON TON of light here. So maybe this would be different if you had like full full full sun if you're in the middle of a field with like, as much light as possible. But even so, like farmers who do this, professionally, I think, October through February, you're not growing anything, you're just keeping it alive. So you have to kind of think about that when you're planting you really want to be that arugula and maybe planted in mid August so that it had like a good month, month and a half to grow. And then it's just hanging out for the winter. You'd ask what else I'm growing in the other bed, there's claytonia which right now is little tiny seedlings.
Rebecca:Let's see Tony I gave.
Gabe Long:Well, this is also on Instagram, I feel like we're doubling up, but that's fine. Um, claytonia is also called miners lettuce and meanors miners lettuce. Yeah, because like children, like the youths know, like gold miners. Because when the gold miners went west to California, and they were all I don't know, had scurvy or whatever other diseases came from not eating any greens. claytonia is like the first green that appears in the springtime. So it will start growing from seed once temperatures get below about 50 in the fall. And it stays really, really small for most of the winter. And then as the days start getting longer, and this is an interesting thing. Like it's not actually the temperature is getting warmer so you're like oh, it's still seems cold out but you can notice that the the the miners letters really takes off at the Tony really takes off. And I have planted it, what two years ago and it just recedes itself in this bed even though I'm growing lots of other things in that bed over the summer. And every seeds itself and in the fall I start seeing you poking up and then by I would say like, early April, the whole bed is full of this really nice, wonderful green that I feel like is a little bit special because you can't really buy it and stores have bruises so easily that unless you have like a, you know, farmers market that sells it, it's pretty hard to find.
Rebecca:It is so delightful. I had no idea that that is always just receding itself. Like we've had it several years in a row and I thought that you planted it. It's a this is lazy lazy genius kind of stuff. Yeah, that I love. And it's so cute looking too it's I feel like those leaves come up and they're like kind of heart shaped and smell and the taste so good. The leaves almost have the texture of like baby spinach or something the way that those leaves are kind of like thick and spongy and Chris Yeah.
Gabe Long:Or like a watercress or spray Yeah, it's
Rebecca:so like, mild and sweet and nice.
Gabe Long:And then they get they go to seed in or they start flowering I should say. And I think like mid April or maybe late April may have those cute little white blossoms that are kind of honorable how adorable
Rebecca:edible flowers so tiny people are like what is the wanna impress your friend? Yeah,
Gabe Long:yeah,
Rebecca:grow some claytonia and throw it in a salad like I grew it. Yeah, they will be like I guess maybe maybe they well I guess it depends on your friends depends
Gabe Long:on your friends. I would say my other favorite things that are growing right now are the who grow which is just a I love the lucra it's so another plant that I feel like what garden Wouldn't that work in another low light plan? Not evergreen but definitely like gives you something to look at something green
Rebecca:it's another one that lasts almost all winter long Yeah, at the very end of winter the leaves will be kind of beat up where we live anyway but then soon enough the new growth will come and it's just like a wonderful I don't know it's not I was gonna say focal point but it's it could be a focal point or not depending on what variety because there's so many there's like
Gabe Long:an in the church. Right? It's a focal Miss like an evergreen in that way.
Rebecca:But it can be a really nice filler in the summer to you know, bolder kind of things. And it's also native.
Gabe Long:Yeah, there's a million different colors. I mean, we have what we have dark purple, we have bright lime green. chartreuse chartreuse,
Rebecca:you might say, yeah, there's so nice heucheras also known as coral bells. And it's a relative that you'll also see who chlorella, which I think is a blend of who Cora and tiarella, which also is a native and is also a favorite of mine out there right now that's still going strong out there and is tearing. So great. And we just planted it this past summer and it's like a carpet. It's so beautiful. So happy. It's just nice to see one of those natives that's like, Oh, I know exactly what I'm doing here. I'm happy to be here. This is my ideal circumstances, and I'm just going to make myself at home right?
Gabe Long:It is a strong argument for that very practical, like if you plant natives, you don't have to do a lot of gardening. It's gonna be there. It's gonna go well for you. Yeah, play the antithesis of roses or something. Right,
Rebecca:exactly. Yeah, everyone should have some some coral bells in their garden. I think it's like one of those things like Japanese forest grass that just looks good everywhere. And those two actually go really nicely together. Yeah, any other favorite winter plants that you're enjoying right now.
Gabe Long:I'm just gonna vote again. For the Mountain Laurel. It's so pretty. It's native. It's a gorgeous shrub to small tree in the wild, I think in like a garden setting usually tops out at about 15 feet, beautiful leaves sort of waxy. Like somehow very, it's like a dark green, but it seems like very bright. At the same time. I don't quite know how to describe it. But it's like a very saturated green. And I guess it's
Rebecca:just really beautiful and like, just a little bit different. I'm going to go ahead and say if you're thinking about planting Arbor vitae, or something that you need for privacy, so you're like, Oh, I needed to be done in Evergreen. Oh, our Bravais at Home Depot said Arbor Friday. Please Please plant Mountain Laurel. It's native. It's beautiful. It's not as common as Rhododendron or something else. It flowers so
Gabe Long:beautifully and spring. Oh my god, the flowers are incredible.
Rebecca:You know what I'm really enjoying too. And some of the plants that are like dried and dead, but have you Oh, yeah. Yeah. Our Limelight hydrangea is really nice. All of the blooms are kind of dried in place on it. And we had our first snowfall right around Christmas time. Luckily, oh, so nice to have snow on Christmas amidst everything that's been such a shit show this year. Anyway, seeing the snowfall on the hydrangea dried hydrangea blossoms out there was so beautiful. And some of the grasses and stuff I think are really pretty out there. I don't even know what what is like so pretty out there.
Gabe Long:Right now Fern spore we called them seed heads. And then we were like wait for in stone have seeds. They're not seed heads. But the whatever part of the fern is that kind of sticks up and has the little I think spore dispersal pods attached to it. They're just these like little brown husks. But they're so pretty. And yeah, cool looking that idea of something for the snow to fall on.
Rebecca:Yeah, the Asobi also the blooms of that have dried and are still sticking up and just providing a little bit of texture and back and it's just really nice and kind of haunted looking in a cool wintery way I love like not doing the winter cleanup that people do, and just letting it lie and letting the insects overwinter and stuff. It's great for the environment. It's less work for me. Yeah. And then you can kind of poke around and see how the form that things take as the top part of the plant. Material dies and the energy of the plant is all resting under the ground. You can kind of remember what's where and
Gabe Long:and you're allowed to do your spring cleanup. Once it's above 50 The insects have hatched and you can you can still get it's not like you have to leave it there forever. But yeah, it is really nice to have it in the winter. Yeah. I think we did it.
Rebecca:Thanks for listening. If you have a question that you want answered on the podcast, we would love love, love to hear from you. You can email us or even better email as a voice memo and we'll play it on the air. Email us at leafing out pod@gmail.com And you can also DM us on Instagram we're at leafing out pod over there we post a lot of photos and Instagram stories so that you know what are
Gabe Long:some photos, little credit posts
Rebecca:and it would be really awesome if you wanted to pop over to Apple podcasts and rate and review us that really helps other people find the podcast in the sea of gardening podcasts that apparently exist. I've found more and more like every day. Thanks again for listening. Happy gardening.
Gabe Long:See out there