Hello,

Well living in Vegas my flower garden is smaller than an end table. But I do get to plant seeds 2 times a year! It is so hot that my first set of flowers has burned up, they bloomed from March - June. My new seeds are starting to come up, they will get going when it cools off in Oct.

Sheryl

Delightful forum, Mary. I read every post while eating my lunch and even though I've gardened off and on for many years, there was much to learn. It never occured to me for instance to bring a geranium indoors and I certainly never heard the name houseleek applied to the hen and chicks....does this mean they are edible?

My current garden is actually a few blocks from the apartment where I live. I guess it could be called a community garden. Each of us "rents" a plot from the city to grow whatever we want but then we have group work parties to tend the pathways and community flower beds and compost bins. It is located in a really nice park with fruit trees and picnic and play areas and right next to our garden is a large garden run by a Tilth organization where they hold classes, etc. Perfect place to go to get away from the computer for a while. Don't know what I'd do without it.

Thanks for a most pleasant lunch-time.

Judy ;)

Mary,

A panda bear in disguise!  LOL

I used to have a 'working' garden, from which I grew every veggie known to mankind.  It was so much fun to work it and then eat everything in it!

Nowadays I have a year-round garden of cactus, frangi-pani (sp?) mums, spider plants, a HUGE pothos in a pot (anybody want cuttings please?).  In FL you don't have to go far to enjoy natural gardens.  And there's something blooming all the time!

I'd like to build a butterfly garden sometime....

Wow Mary,

This could end up the biggest forum posting ever.

What an eye opener. Suddenly there's dear Max the secret gardener, there's Koi and fruit trees and visions of Spain.

We are actualy finding out about people we thought we knew.

Well done for being brave, you have a lot of answering to do.

Yes we Brits know the hen and chicken and call it a type of houseleek. I doesnt survive our winter so is a pot plant here.

Today I had the pleasure of planting Camellias, Hydrangeas and Lavender for a gentleman of 98 who still loves his garden.

Two years ago I took him to Mottisfont Abbey a very old Abbey and house in Hampshire, England. Mottisfont is home to the National Collection of Old Fashioned Roses. The rose garden is within a one acre area walled garden and the scent in the evening is wonderful. The grounds and gardens have crystal clear trout streams and trees many hundreds of years old It is a wonderful place.

All of the roses are skillfully underplanted as outside of June and July there is only sporadic flowering but OH that June-time. Many of the rose varieties go back to Turkey and China for their origins with all the money spent by the French aristocracy to breed and nurture them. Later came the English ramblers and the Portlands etc.

I hope that this Forum goes on and on as it will bring so much pleasure.

Roger

The old fellow still talks about his visit to Mottisfont and treasures some roses he brought back home. Just one little bit of the magic of a garden.