Happy May Day !

Bettered titled: Is It Spring Yet ?

Spring sprang for a moment - and at last my native violets bloomed.  They are my true Spring *(think true north).  But then the real feel temperature went down to 35 degrees and next was the deluge. Those clever little violets closed up tight for the duration. Now, with May upon us, I am hoping they will open again.  April 2014 has to have been one of the whackiest garden seasons on Long Island, ever.

I know that at least one online native plant purveyor was confused.  I got three shipments in one week.  Various plants arrived with different requirements that had to be minimally repotted somewhere.  That kept me very busy.

So did the 20 native shrubs I got through the Nassau County Soil and Conservation District.  This is my second year participating in their re-plant the region program.  Last year I got elderberries and nannyberry.  The former are now a healthy little grove.  The latter never got beyond top greens, which the rabbits promptly nipped off.  I pulled nine of the sticks out. The tenth was totally dead.  Perhaps it had a mishap with a spray from another yard ?  It sure looks that way.  The sticks are now in water.  I hope some green appears. 

 I have an EarthBox that I hope to put any survivors in. Here is information on this retailer http://earthbox.com/ . This is my first year trying this and for the record, I will not be using the sprays that are promoted on the site. 

For 2014, I went with highbush blueberries.  Having learned the bunny lesson, I started some of the smaller slips in an RootPouch. (information here: http://rootpouch.com/ ) Hopefully they will do well.  I also did some research on companion plants that will deter wildlife, and discovered my coral bells were  useful, so the rest of them went in there. There is an excellent PDF of plants that are rabbit resistant at this link http://wdfw.wa.gov/living/rabbithares.pdf (Scroll down to Table 2, and sorry about the Pacific Northwest location, it was the best of many.) 

I also got a Native Berry Shrub collection, so I had to determine where Cranberry, Chokeberry, Dogwood and June Berry would be most likely to succeed. These bushes are really starter slips ,or whips as they are called in the industry. They are not what you would find at a local nursery.  But they have the potential to be great understory shrubs.( Understory are those plants that grow under the tree canopy.) 

The Conservation District orders must be placed in January.  If you are interested, the grower they use also has a mail order program for the public.  Here is that link:http://www.MeadowviewGardenStore.com/ .

In advance of the cold snap, I mulched over all my recent plantings, including those that were in pots. I have a ready, free source of pine needles from the neighbors, which is what I used.  I hope they survived the recent weather systems.

It seems that Climate Change or Mother Earth has the last say in all of this.   Our weather is getting harder to predict, and gardening has become a crap-shoot.  (Pardonnez moi!)  I have three books on gardening by the month; but those rules no longer apply.  It will take time, but I am sure we will get the knack of New Climate Gardening. At least I hope we do.

Now I am off to do inventory on survival and to look for open wild violets.  They grow happiest in the lawn, which is one reason it is still with us.

What native plants have you added to your land-base ?  Are they doing okay with our hard to predict weather ?   Let me know by leaving a comment here. And Happy May Day!