Waterfall and pond at my old house.

     While we are waiting for better weather it can be fun to look at various elements that can be added to our yards. An increasingly popular element is the natural pond. Today's ponds are a far cry from the old concrete and stone ponds of our grandparents day -- the ones that seemed to crack at least once a year and let all the water leak out.

     Today's ponds are lined with a non-toxic and flexible liner, are run with very efficient recirculating pumps, and contain both physical and biological filters to keep the water clear.

 

     A pump in the bottom of the buried container on the left pumps water up into the bottom of the waterfall container on the right. The water spills over and down a rocky slope picking up oxygen before filling the main pond basin. The pump pulls water only from the pond's surface, pulling leaves and other debris along to be caught in a net inside the pump box.

     A system like this allowed me to keep a separate little ecosystem going for 20 years now. Over 20 fish have lived among the flowering waterlilies and other plants. The sound of the waterfall combined with the colorful flashes from the darting fish were mesmerizing and worked to smooth a furrowed brow many a time.

     The maintenance chores required to keep this system going were less than that required by a lawn. Once a year you have to do a serious clean-up. This is a wet and muddy job, but you can always hire someone like me to do it for you.

     Pond plants, like other perennials, need to be trimmed and deadheaded once or twice a season. The rest of the year you have to "top off" the pond when it gets low and make periodic adjustments to keep the pond ecology in balance. For those who find turning on a garden hose straining, an automatic filling system can be added.

     In short, despite appearances, having a pond is something that works even for lazy people like me.
     

SPRING?

     We actually had a mild winter in 2013. Despite, for example, the fact that we had next to no snow most of the season we were able to make up a bit for last summer's drought. This is because most of our precipitation was rain.

     Those balmy days are now forgotten as we stay locked in a deep freeze for the entire month of March so far. Our average temperature this month  has been a full six degrees below normal. Quite a change from the 80 degree days of last year.

     If you can stand the cold there is actually a lot you can accomplish this time of year:

     Now is a great time to do a yard clean-up before bulbs and perennials start getting in your way. If you use an organic weed-killer, now is the time to make sure you have some on hand. You want the weedkiller to go down once the crocuses come up in order to beat the first weed seeds trying to germinate. I noticed my first crocus today.

     Now is also the time to begin pruning your trees and shrubs -- especially if you want to downsize them significantly. You do not, however want to prune shrubs like forsythia and lilacs that bloom in spring. You would be cutting  off their buds. For much more on pruning you can look back at some of my entries from last season at this time.

     I am already yearning for fresh garden vegetables. We are months away from the favorites like tomatoes and peppers. But cool weather crops like peas, spinach, and many other leafy greens, are closer than you think. As of St. Patrick's Day, the barrier to planting seeds for these plants is not temperature so much as soil moisture. Our ground is still water-logged, and messing with it now will damage it. To test, dig a hole about six inches deep, grab a handful of soil and squeeze it into  a ball. If it makes a good mud ball, the soil is still too wet. If it wants to fall apart, you are in good shape.

2012

freezing rain leftovers

    Now that it is all over, what can we say about 2012? For those dying to know, I can report that I finally harvested my parsley patch on December 19. That was the day before the first hard freeze that would have killed it or forced me to run out with tarps to cover it. I used up the last of it in a Chimichurri sauce for our Christmas day roast beef.

     Outside my own little patch of dirt we can report that 2012 was the warmest year in recorded history -- in Chicago, in the U.S., and in the world at large. This is more than a fluke. Last month also constituted the 334th consecutive month with a global temperature above the 20th century average.

     Chicago was spared much of the more freakish weather upheavals that took place elsewhere on the planet. Our main problem was drought. And despite the late 2012 rains that we received instead of snow, we ended up the year with a ten inch rain deficit. One or two decent rains this month have done little to reduce that deficit, and now we are heading into yet another 10 day period with no precipitation. Unless we see an awful lot of rain in February, I plan to bring out my hoses earlier than usual.

     The good thing about today's cold snap (otherwise known as normal winter weather) is that if it lasts long enough we might finally start killing off some of the insects, fungi, and other "critters" that have plagued us after the last two mild winters. I prefer my global warming in small doses.

Best Wishes

Chicago Neighborhood Lights

Best Wishes for the Holiday Season

                              Scott

That's a Wrap!

     Friday marked the last gasp of my veggie garden. (Well, almost). We still had freshly-picked snow peas and broccoli for Thanksgiving dinner, and I picked another three pounds of Brussels sprouts over the weekend. But by early this week the thermometer was showing 20 degrees. Time to quit while we were ahead.

     I don't try to re-cycle all my yard waste at this time of year either. My plants did a pretty good job at keeping bugs and diseases at bay all season. I don't want to give the critters a head start for next year. The exceptions are my snow peas. Besides being legumes and binding nitrogen into the soil they have seldom brought unwanted problems into the garden. I chop them up and till them right in.

     Meanwhile, the composter to which I had stopped adding a few weeks ago has now done part of its job and is ready to contribute to the winter garden as well.

     So the compost, the snow peas and a nice layer of oak leaves have been tilled into the soil as the garden surface loses its raised beds and reverts to a flat surface.

     ...Or most of it has. My parsley bed for some reason still looks gorgeous, so it is sitting there as a 3 foot by 5 foot emerald patch in a chocolate-brown bed. And we are once more experiencing a "heat" wave of highs in the 60's. This time our patch's lease on life will depend on what we can still fit in the freezer. We fixed a bunch of tabbouleh last week and will make some more tomorrow. We are also freezing some more parsley pesto sauce for winter pasta. And this year I finally realized that we can also freeze Argentine chimichurri sauce for all the meat we will be grilling this winter.

     Fortunately, our freezer is not that big, so the garden really will be put to bed this week. By now some of you must be sighing with relief. So am I. Time to give some of my tools a rest.

A Green Christmas

    For some years now artificial trees
have outnumbered real trees in the
US during the holiday season. There
are many reasons to get an artificial tree, but helping the environment is not one of them.


     Our natural inclination is to think
that by going artificial we are
preventing a tree from being cut
down. Not true. The trees are not
being cut from a forest preserve or a
national forest. They are cut from
farms just like any other crop. And
like any other crop they are replaced
as soon as they are cut. In between
they grow for up to seven years and
do what trees are supposed to do --pull carbon dioxide from the air.

     Christmas trees are usually
planted on more marginal land --
land that is not suitable for corn,
soybeans, or other crops. There is a
financial advantage to planting near
urban centers where most tree
buyers are. This provides additional
income for farmers and eases the
pressure to sell the land to
developers.

     And after the season is over living
trees can be completely recycled -- depending on how enlightened the local government is.


     In contrast, all the components of
plastic trees end up in land fills --
including the PVC's that compose the
needles of most artificial trees.

     The only ecological argument for artificial trees is that they are reused.

But studies have shown that the
trees need to be used from 10-20
years to begin to match the carbon
footprint of real trees. The average
American moves every 7 years, to say
nothing of all the other family
changes that might inspire purchase
of a new tree.

     There is nothing wrong with
buying an artificial tree because it is
easy to set up and take down. We all
make compromises. But ecologically
and aesthetically natural is the way to
go.


Whether you use an artificial or
real tree you really should invest in
the new LED decorative lights. We

spend an enormous amount on
holiday lighting. LED lighting will
require ten times times less
electricity and last 10 times longer.
And because it generates far less
heat, it also reduces fire hazards
significantly. Who could object to
that?

     Meanwhile, I have a crew available for those who need help with their outdoor holiday decorations. Just email or call.

FIRST FROST

     I awoke last Tuesday morning to discover that frost had sneaked into my garden  while I slept. The last weather report I saw predicted a low of 33 degrees, which was good enough to give me an excuse not to do anything. And, of course I paid the price. My Thai basil and tomatoes and chili peppers had bitten the dust while I was still loafing in bed. I am glad now I had harvested most of the riper ones. I still have a hoard of all three in the kitchen. But they are dwindling fast.

     The rest of the garden, though, is doing fine. We just harvested some chard, spinach and snow peas for a stir- fry yesterday. The broccoli and Brussels sprouts are still producing as well.

     I had hoped for a late frost this year, but it turns out that November 6 is close to the average frost date for my Beverly neighborhood in Chicago. We city folks -- even those of us on the edge of town, benefit from our proximity to the lake and to the "heat island" produced by all the exhaust downtown and all the concrete storing it up.

     Now that the first frost has arrived, there are new things to do. I have suspended my composter operation for the season. I want to give my barrel a few weeks to work on what it has, rather than adding raw material, because I plan to till it back into the garden before the first really hard frost.

     It is now time to cut down my hostas and other perennials. I use my mulching mower for much of this task. The machine chops everything up and scatters it over the grass to add some spring fertilizer.

     It is raining now, but we are heading into a fairly long dry spell, so I am continuing my watering, especially for newly planted trees and shrubs. I leave my soakers out all winter and leave my regular hoses out, but disconnected until the ground starts to freeze.

     I am too lazy to drain and bring in my three rain barrels. The first year I had one I was caught napping by a really hard freeze. My barrel was full, and when it froze it burst apart at the seams. Please don't follow my example. Use your water stockpile quickly, keep the water levels fairly low, watch the weather, and drain the barrels if you expect a hard freeze. If you have the room and the energy, you can stick your barrels in your garage instead and then rest easy until you have to drag them out again next year.

     Two things I am not doing yet: planting bulbs and spreading mulch. The soil temperature is still too high. This is still a good time to plant trees and shrubs, though. Their roots will stay active underground and will get a head start on getting ready for their first scorching summer.