Winter Water for Evergreens
It's surprising how much green there is in my yard in winter.
We have two evergreen pines in front, several dark green spreading junipers, and the spikydasylirions hesperaloes in the front yard remain green.
In the back courtyard the skinny cedar by the garage door, the Spanish broom and the Chinese privet shrubs stay evergreen and leafy.
That's a lot of refreshing color to mitigate the brown Virginia creeper vine on the fence and the bare aspens and cottonwoods.
At the New Year's Eve party I met a neighbor, a retired priest who is a gardener, and he says I need to water the pines in front much more. They have had no supplemental water since it rained October 5. Not a drop has fallen in three months, other than a dusting of snow one December morning that evaporated by noon. There is no underground irrigation here and he said the pines looked stressed last summer too.
He was very familiar with all the plants in my yard because he had looked at the house when it was for sale and knew it well. He lives just around the corner, but wanted a larger home in the same neighborhood. His home was on the market when we were house hunting, but it was too small for us. In the end he took his home off the market and stayed in his house, and we bought the larger one.
It's been interesting to meet neighbors here and get to know something about them. No one here has ever worked for an insurance company -- most of my neighbors in Connecticut worked, of course, in insurance, including me.
The people I've met in our immediate area here are educators, nurses, an aspiring movie actress next door, and now my new gardener acquaintance, the priest. He was an Episcopal priest, with his doctorate, and remains active in church things.
It was fun to talk with him about gardens, and he's offered to help me, already giving me his secret source for soil amendments which is a prized bit of knowledge for gardeners in this area.
His garden around the corner from our house is very small and of course he wants not only a bigger house, but more space to plant, and our house would have been just that for him.
There's this thing about not coveting what your neighbor has, though. He is content where he is.
I better get outside and figure out how to get some water to the pines this winter. I suspect the other evergreen plants need winter water too. The best way is to fill a five gallon bucket, drill a pin hole in the bottom and place it next to the trunk to let it seep out. Do that twice and a mature pine gets 10 gallons of water.
I'll figure it out. The evergreens will get their winter water. It is ordained.
We have two evergreen pines in front, several dark green spreading junipers, and the spiky
That's a lot of refreshing color to mitigate the brown Virginia creeper vine on the fence and the bare aspens and cottonwoods.
At the New Year's Eve party I met a neighbor, a retired priest who is a gardener, and he says I need to water the pines in front much more. They have had no supplemental water since it rained October 5. Not a drop has fallen in three months, other than a dusting of snow one December morning that evaporated by noon. There is no underground irrigation here and he said the pines looked stressed last summer too.
He was very familiar with all the plants in my yard because he had looked at the house when it was for sale and knew it well. He lives just around the corner, but wanted a larger home in the same neighborhood. His home was on the market when we were house hunting, but it was too small for us. In the end he took his home off the market and stayed in his house, and we bought the larger one.
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| Father Juan's garden around the corner from us (in spring, when it was for sale) |
It's been interesting to meet neighbors here and get to know something about them. No one here has ever worked for an insurance company -- most of my neighbors in Connecticut worked, of course, in insurance, including me.
The people I've met in our immediate area here are educators, nurses, an aspiring movie actress next door, and now my new gardener acquaintance, the priest. He was an Episcopal priest, with his doctorate, and remains active in church things.
It was fun to talk with him about gardens, and he's offered to help me, already giving me his secret source for soil amendments which is a prized bit of knowledge for gardeners in this area.
 |
| He would love more space to plant than this tiny front yard |
His garden around the corner from our house is very small and of course he wants not only a bigger house, but more space to plant, and our house would have been just that for him.
There's this thing about not coveting what your neighbor has, though. He is content where he is.
I better get outside and figure out how to get some water to the pines this winter. I suspect the other evergreen plants need winter water too. The best way is to fill a five gallon bucket, drill a pin hole in the bottom and place it next to the trunk to let it seep out. Do that twice and a mature pine gets 10 gallons of water.
I'll figure it out. The evergreens will get their winter water. It is ordained.
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