I thought the fertilized water would slowly drip out but it’s been a day now and the bottles are still fairly full. I lifted a couple up and checked the soil underneath and it wasn’t noticeably damp. There was a bit of dampness but that was probably from me squeezing the bottle when I picked it up. Maybe I need to make bigger holes. Maybe I need to elevate the bottles off the surface of the soil so that the holes don’t get plugged up.

• split hosta near rain spout in backyard
• move siberian iris out from under apple tree
• spray apple tree with dormant oil
• spread corn gluten meal
• collect coffee grinds
• split bleeding heart and hosta in corner by fence door
• transplant daffodil near garden when it comes up
• block off cat access to under front porch
• split rhubarb

Lists like this are great to update throughout the year as it helps you remember what you need to do in the upcoming growing season and you can prepare at the right time.

This will be the fourth year in my house and in all that time I’ve never divided or transplanted any of the perennials. The hosta near the rain spout grew about 4′ in diameter last year, the siberian iris were flowering in the lower branches of the apple tree, the bleeding heart and hosta in the corner battled each other for supremacy, the rhubarb produced beyond consumption level and that lone daffodil in the lawn always gets mowed under. The apples from the tree are wormy, the lawn needs corn gluten meal spread three times throughout the season and the neighborhood cats like hiding out under my porch which drives me nuts. And I really need to start collecting coffee grounds again from Starbucks’ Grinds For Your Garden program.

First on my list, I think I’m going to take a shot at dividing the rhubarb this weekend if I don’t chicken out. Here’s a pic of the crowns of the rhubarb coming up right now:

I figure I can at least split it into two and have two sets of smaller plants instead of one huge one. I plan on using the Rhubarb Compendium’s guide to propagating. I’m actually kind of scared to do it because I don’t want to kill the plant or wreck it in any way that will reduce the amount of delicious stalks it gives faithfully each year despite the lack of care I give it. I suspect everything will be fine and that my fears are just newbie worries. I just know I’ll feel absolutely gutted if it dies.

I’ve created events in Upcoming and through some computer mastery by my partner I am able to give you a list in chronological order. I had to search for different events, enter them into Upcoming and it automatically refreshes my data. It also makes me feel like Ottawa’s gardening PR person. Let me know if I’ve left anything out!

I really like reading gardening blogs. What I don’t like is manually checking them day after day to see if there is a new post like a garden junkie needing a fix. Some bloggers are once-a-week types while others are more spotty which is fine. Though for me, I realized I was getting too impatient and was checking each site everyday. That’s when I started using Google Reader. Here’s a screenshot:

I have a Google email account and I love it. It’s so much nicer and easier to use than a Hotmail or Yahoo account. I also use a lot of other cool Google programs like Picasa for organizing my photos, Docs and Spreadsheets for sharing and collaborating on documents in real time, Google Earth for amazing mapping and Google Talk for instant messaging. I’m a big fan. So it made sense for me to start using Google Reader to organize my blog feeds.

I like that it’s fast, I don’t need another log in name or password, it shows the new posts clearly and I can mark everything as read with a button once I’m done. There’s other things you can do in Google Reader like apply labels and share items which I don’t use, at least not yet. Here are the blogs that I currently have in my Google Reader:

LOCAL

• Naked Tomatoes – a blogger that I met through GardenWeb
• Ottawa Hortiphilia – a blogger that I met through Plantcycle
• The Realm of Queen Sharbot – another blogger from GardenWeb

NATIONAL

• 1-2-3 Go Garden! - southern Ontario
• My Roots Run Deep – Toronto, Ontario
• Northern Exposure Gardening – La Ronge, Saskatchewan (Canadian Zone 1)
• Playing in the Dirt – near Toronto, Ontario

INTERNATIONAL

• A Caribbean Garden - the Caribbean
• Bifurcated Carrots – Amsterdam, Netherlands
• Bliss – southern Netherlands
• May Dreams Gardens – Indiana, USA (USDA Zone 5)
• My Sister’s Garden Blog – northern New York state, USA
• Seeded – Toledo, Ohio (USDA Zone 5)
• Soilman’s Allotment Blog – a fun, colloquial British garden blog
• The Balcony Garden – Milan, Italy

I realize now after putting this list together that I like reading about gardening in far away and exotic places and that I should be reading blogs from USDA Zone 4 to compare to my Canadian Zone 5. It’s easy to add subscriptions and I’ll definitely be filling it out as I find new blogs and re-visit old favourites.

Anyone got a blog they really like and think I should read?

First, I picked up some Weed Stop Garden Fabric from Canadian Tire. I knew I didn’t need that much so I picked up the smallest package:

I got a 1 gallon pot that I picked up at the last Garden Web plant exchange:

Here’s my slightly-bruised Mojito Mint that really needed to be transplanted:

One bag of organic topsoil which I assumed would be okay for a potted mint:

I cut a strip of the garden fabric, eyeballing it to be able to fit both sides of the pot:

Crammed it into the pot and folded down the edges on the outside of the pot:

And filled it up with the topsoil and dug a hole for the mint:

Stuck the mint in and patted the soil down around the sides:

Then I took a pair of scissors and cut off the excess garden fabric along the sides:

And I was done. It’s now sitting on my deck enjoying the sun in its clearly-defined growing area. Once it starts getting cooler, I will find a nice, protected area to dig the pot into the ground so that it can overwinter and come back next year.