Don’t try to read my mind, it’s scary in there.
My Hardy Ageratum is blooming!
I bought two of these last year, and this is the second bloom season since I purchased them. They are easy to propagate from cuttings, grow well in less than perfect soil (mucho clay in my yard), and are apparently a cultivated version of a local native. I’m really happy with this plant and I will definitely be taking cuttings before we move.
“The holly bears a berry, as red as any blood…” but before it gets there, it’s green, and then brown. The holly outside our townhouse is currently very brown, but quite attractive.
I never would have planted this myself, but I’m enjoying watching
Gardeners, Plant and Nature lovers can join in every Sunday, visit As the Garden Grows for more information.its development.
The first eggplant that I’ve ever grown was eaten on Friday, September 26th, 2008. It started out looking like this:
And then it became oven-roasted eggplant slices with an asian-inspired tahini sauce. (Sorry, no after photos - it didn’t last long enough!) I think it was pretty tasty, but I’m not sure that it was actually that fabulous. I was kind of caught up in the “I grew it myself” moment, so it might have just been kind of “meh”. I couldn’t even tell you. 
Several people have asked me about the Salvia guaranitica that I mentioned a couple of posts ago. I’m happy to answer individual questions vial email, but I thought readers might be interested in having the information at hand.
If you’re interested in some technical information, you can find it via the University of Florida Extension Service. You’ll see that this Salvia has a wide potential range of habitat. It is not, however, a U.S. native, so keep this in mind if you’re trying to keep your garden focus on native plants. Please note that there are several spellings for S. guaranitica. I’ve seen it also spelled “guarantica”.
If you’re interested in purchasing this Salvia, both times that I’ve purchased it, I purchased it as a mature plant from Home Depot (two different states). I’ve seen it at other nurseries, and if you do a google search, you should be able to find it easily. I’m going to attempt to grow it from seed next year, so we’ll see how that goes.
I really love this plant, and I’m glad to see that there is so much interest in it!
I didn’t intend to pick these… they kind of picked themselves. When I tried to re-stake the tomato plants, these puppies peeled away from the main stem.
As it turns out, this plant that I thought was a Cherokee Purple tomato plant probably isn’t Cherokee Purple. They are however VERY dense and quite tasty. I hope these guys will ripen on the counter - I’ll be sad if I have to throw them away.
Nasturtiums are one of my most favorite plants. Easy to grow, pretty, and edible. You can’t really ask more than that!
Gardeners, Plant and Nature lovers can join in every Sunday, visit As the Garden Grows for more information.
I popped out to the garden this morning to check on things. The butterflies and bees are going nuts over the Coreopsis and the tomato flowers. They seem to like the sage flowers as well.
There are about five tomatoes on the Purple Cherokee tomato plant (that isn’t actually Purple Cherokee, but that’s another post) and one on the Pineapple tomato plant. The Better Bush tomato plant isn’t doing so hot. I finally had to transplant it from the upside down container into the ground. I think we’ll get a few more tomatoes from it, but I don’t know if it will survive.
If I’m reading the signs right, we have 3 eggplants incubating right now. I’m over the moon about eggplant these days, so I’m very excited to grow my own. I keep buying them at the farmer’s market and grilling them, and now I will be able to grill my own!
The basil went crazy once I transplanted it into the ground:
Maybe I should have carried this at my wedding instead. 
I needed a small bag of potting soil this weekend, so I stopped by the local Home Despot on my way home from another errand. I picked up a small bag of Miracle Gro Organic Choice Potting Mix, which is apparently the only option if you want something smaller than a cubic foot of soil.
When I got home, I opened up the bag of potting mix and started to repot a geranium and a couple of other things that were in desperate need of a larger pot. As I stuck my hand in for the fourth or fifth time, sans gloves, I noticed that the bag says “use gloves when handling this product”. WTF? It’s supposed to be organic soil. Are they afraid I’m going to sue them if I can’t get the cow manure smell off my hands?
Andrew commented on my last post, that the flower pods (or whatever they were) look like alien heads. When these ‘aliens’ grow up, they’ll be quite beautiful. Can you guess what they are?
