Seed packets are starting to jam up our mailbox so Gail and I are getting busy clearing the desk and making the final cuts to our plant orders. All of us, especially those of us who aren’t made of money, know that plants don’t grow on trees. These things are expensive – and for good reason. We all know what kinds of resources go into growing plants and we’re willing to pay the price for what we truly, madly want. But budgets of actual money constrain us into making either-or choices instead of both-and. We just can’t afford to buy every little (and big) thing we circled. – Which is good because where would we put them all? I really enjoy this part of the process because it sharpens the edge of my desire. By the end of the culling sessions we have a much better idea of what we want the gardens to look like.

We’re making other cut backs (cuts back?) too. February light in the greenhouse is so much higher and warmer than January light that it always surprises me. Most of our greenhouse denizens don’t go into a full die-back dormancy over the winter, but growth generally slows way-way down especially in our coolest house. Until right about now. It’s like April in the Rose Garden – time to cut back the plants, like fuchsias, that are just now starting to send out a new flush of growth for the season.

Outside, new cuts have opened patches of sky we’ve never seen before. Last week, Fred and Dan took down a rapidly declining English oak that shaded part of the Rock Garden. That has opened up all sorts of new opportunities for growth and change. – We might even need some different plants…

And finally, have you cut branches to force yet? I almost prefer blooming sticks of forsythia inside than out. They’re so easy and quick – a couple-three weeks in sun and warm water and they’ll be golden. I’m not sure if we’ll have such easy luck with the Paulownia buds (on the right side of the bucket)… Remember – and I only say this because there’s a thief in our neighborhood – always get permission before taking anything from any property that doesn’t truly, actually belong to you.

I have come to the realization – as I think I do every year – that there is nothing better in this world than feasting on the garden’s harvest. But I think the critters have it right – there are some things that taste infinitely better in the garden than out of it. I don’t love cherry tomatoes nearly as much if I take them home first and put them in a salad. Call me a wingnut but the closest I can get to enjoying them to the same degree as I do in the garden is if I eat them standing up at the kitchen counter. The same goes for the ground cherries (a sweet relative of the tomatillo) which I prefer to pick just as they’re about to drop to the ground and I have been known to take serious grazing breaks at our clump. Bring them inside for a sit-down break though and I tend to lose interest.

Maybe it’s like picking flowers to bring inside – some people love to do that while others really only enjoy their flowers in the garden. Granted, with veggies there are some things that are much better brought home – I might not be inclined to graze the beets, for instance, since I really prefer them roasted, chilled and slathered in homemade blue cheese dressing. And isn’t basil best drizzled in olive oil and draped over a slice of heirloom tomato?

It seems like it’s been a funny year for the vegetable garden – slow to start for us with all of that rain in June and July and it seems like everyone’s tomatoes took a bit of a blighted beating. We are enjoying a good onion and leek crop though; the lettuce went on for ages and the artichokes were awfully good (dipped in melted butter, of course). Plus we’ve had more than our share of thievery in the gardens this year. The deer dined on the pole beans, somebody is chewing on the sweet potato foliage and whoever wiped us out of nearly ripe and still green tomatoes this weekend, shame on you. (I think Gail and I had the right idea planting the agave with the cherry tomatoes – though even those people with permission to pick have scars now from grazing…)

Gail and Cathy and I have been wondering about all of the people who were inspired this year to start a vegetable garden – are they feeling discouraged? We all already know that every year brings some kind of strange extreme and because of that I think we veteran gardeners have a duty to try to pass along our garden-variety optimism to any newbies we meet so they’ll keep on keeping on too.

How is your harvest so far this year? Do prefer to eat it standing up in the garden too?

Blithewold has been pretty lucky so far.  For a while it seemed like there must be an invisible 8′ high barrier encircling the property but in the past couple-three (four?) years the phantom fence has been breached on occasion by those timid, hungry, cloven hoofed landscape destroyers we affectionately call deer.  Lately we’ve seen the tell-tail evidence of more frequent visits and today I caught sight of a pair just after they had breakfasted on delicious tulip tops in the North Garden and Rose Garden.  What worries me is that all of the deer in Bristol probably know now about the Blithewold All-You-Can-Eat breakfast buffet.  Gail and I scattered Milorganite fertilizer (they hate that stuff) over all the tulips in every garden to try to discourage these hungry visitors. And we’ll have to keep reapplying as more and more tasty buds surface.

You know me – I prefer to encourage visitors to Blithewold so here’s my two-birds/one-stone solution: The more welcome visitors there are on the grounds, the less frequently (much less!) we’ll see the unwelcome ones – and with any luck we’ll still have a stupendous tulip display.  Here are a few shots from my morning walk to entice you…

I hope you can help!  Now if we could just book some pre-dawn bus tours…  Do deer dine in your garden?  How do you discourage them?