Saturday Gardening and Puttering Thread, February 6 [KT]

Hello, gardeners, putterers and dreamers! How is the weather where you are? Good for digging?

The handy gardening tip above is from PointyHairedBoss. Perfect as we near Valentine's Day, no? Remember to choose your garden gifts thoughtfully.

I trust that your weather is not like the weather experienced last September by the Anonymous Lurker who sent us the daffodil photo last week. A fire required an evacuation alert, then started to clear, then the wind shifted:

It looked like Armageddon.

Scary. Changes your gardening priorities.

Wildlife

I often think about wildlife when I see news of fires like that. PointyHairedBoss sent us some wildlife photos last year. Do you know your frogs from your toads?

Our friend JT sent in a handy guide to help us identify the remaining two creatures:

But what species are they?

Talons there.

"Except for the hawk, all photos were taken with an Olympus TG3 point & shoot camera. On macro setting it can focus as close as 1 cm & has a cool feature called "focus stacking" that automatically combines several photos at varying focus distances to get maximum depth of field."

Greenhouses, etc.

A couple of weeks ago, we had a question about cold weather greenhouses. We had some discussion in the comments, but also some plant protection photos sent in by The Horde. Feel free to send more. This is an Idaho West Centra Mountains greenhouse and barn in winter (& summer).

Thank you for all you do! Keeps us sane.

We built our barn in 2013, and had the foundation poured for the greenhouse at that time.

Bought the greenhouse kit from Santa Barbara Greenhouses, quality redwood and tempered glass stuff, and free truck shipping of 14 big heavy (100+ lbs each) boxes, if you buy during their slow season (before June 1).

It took about 4 months to varnish each piece twice (3 sides each time) and subassemble each panel, then assemble on site.

Our greenhouse is 11 ft x 24 ft. I put 2 vertical posts inside to the ridge beam at 8 ft intervals to assist with the snow loads.

The kit is very complete. Includes

Greenhouse
Pair benches
Auto mist system
Exhaust fan
Thermostat
Heavy duty heater
Auto shutter (solar vent opener on deluxe)
Sunscreen shade cloth

The auto shutters are a British product, with an actuator that automatically opens and closes based on temp. Self regulates.

Water is on a timer also, so we can disappear for a month, and all continues healthy without us having to tend it daily.

Jimmy Doolittle

Cheers!

Wow!

Any questions?

Gardens of and Puttering by The Horde

Neal in Israel sent us some hibiscus photos to cheer us up. He sent some growing information, too, but I'm saving that for later.

Do you recognize the buds in the photo below?

Anything going on in YOUR garden? Doing any puttering?

If you would like to send information and/or photos for the Saturday Gardening Thread, the address is:

ktinthegarden
at that g mail dot com place

Include the nic by which you wish to be known when you comment at AoSHQ,
unless you want to remain a lurker.

posted by Open Blogger at 01:22 PM

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