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After nearly 30 years the frog has arisen from his long hibernation and now sits guarding and spitting water into a small pond near my new patio.

I fell in love with the frog on a visit to a pottery wholesaler. I had this ill-advised idea to sell some decorative pots to supplement our income from the orchard and few greenhouses in the mid eighties. The intention with the frog was what is stated above but sometimes it takes me a while to get things done.The frog is simply an indicator that progress on my five year plan to have a nice yard is moving along well. It is hard to believe that this is already our third summer near Wakefield. Gone is the mower sliding board bank in the front yard and the backyard hole where the stumps were buried. The area mowed had been reduced in half. At least 80% of the mowed area is now real grass instead of a motley collection of weeds, crab grass, bare ground and something that pretended to be grass in good weather.

I sought professional help selecting the appropriate grass seed. Otherwise I killed what little was there, spread about 20 yards of mushroom soil, tilled and leveled, seeded and covered with straw myself. Some was planted last August, the rest early this spring.The result is not perfect but pretty darn good. I will most likely start to attack the remaining mowed areas in the next few weeks and repeat the above process. Last year I tried a small vegetable garden but concluded that I had too much shade so that area was seeded with grass this spring.

When I moved in, the back of the house featured two small decks on two levels. The upper level was fenced for want of a better term and the bottom was not. On the lower level you could not have much fun without fear of tumbling one step into the yard. The lower level was removed and replaced by a 20 by 30 foot patio.

First, four to six inches of stone dust went in. Several months, several rains, frequent waterings and rakings followed. When convinced it was solid I began to lay cobles. When informed, my four year old grandson wanted to help. His block laying needed scrutiny but he soon decided just to hand me the blocks. That worked well.His jealous school-age sisters were disappointed so they came with my son the next Saturday. It was amazing what two men could do when three little kids handed you blocks. I laid the last few Christmas morning just before winter  

What’s left? The three large flower beds that replaced the mower zone are progressing nicely but still lack the

winter interest that I want.Tall ornamental grasses and most conifers want more sun than I have. Wind is also a limiting factor. I also need more blooming perennials that will tolerate the shade.We’ll figure that out, but for now the frog is happy that he now has a purpose and I’m happy because progress is ahead of schedule.

There are two types of gardeners. Those who make a bee-line for the garden center as soon as it opens in the spring emerging with pots of pansies and perennials eager to get a head-start on the gardening season. Sometimes they are back to fill in holes over the summer. Other’s hang up their gloves and are done planting until the following spring.

The other group of gardeners waits until after Mother’s Day to plant. When fear of frost and winter temps are but a distant memory. The first group often misses some great overlooked annuals to fill in summer color. Many of these don’t look like much until the heat of summer.

If butterflies are what you are after try pentas. Commonly called starflower or butterfly flower, pentas comes in shades of pink, red, lavender or white. The star-shaped flowers bloom in large clusters at the top of the plant. The tubular flowers are a great nectar source for butterflies. They are best in full sun to part shade, good for height elements in mixed containers or the middle of the flower border.

Lantana is also a butterfly magnet in my flower beds. This sprawling, very drought tolerant South American native has been in Southern gardens for years where it can reseed and be a bit of a thug. Luckily we are far enough North reseeding is not an issue. Breeders also have been busy improving the habit. Lantana mixes well in hanging baskets, and looks fantastic in the front of a border. Often several colors bloom together in the same flower cluster for strong visual interest. As an added benefit, the fragrant (odiferous?) foliage reportedly repels mosquitoes better than citronella.

Blue is an elusive color for annuals- one of the best blues for summer is evolvulus. A member of the morning glory family,
this one does not climb or reseed. Proven Winners introduced a great cultivar ‘Blue My Mind’ last year. This cute trailer makes a carpet of blue flowers or takes the place of lobelia in spring baskets that have melted in the heat.

If you are looking for tall and dramatic, try an old-fashioned favorite, spider flower. Cleome was a staple of my grandmother’s garden. These tall plants were sticky, scratchy, and the pink, white or lavender flower heads looked like alien space ships. They would fling their seeds with reckless abandon, ensuring their place in the back of the border forever. Newer hybrids are much better behaved,sans thorns and selections like ‘Señorita Rosalita’ don’t even reseed any longer. They, too, are often visited by butterflies and other pollinators.

If shade is your situation- fill in color with New Guinea impatiens or try browallia- bush violet. Browallia come in lovely shades of blue, purple or white. Generally they stay under one foot in height, and look great covering the bare knees of shrubs, or spilling out of shady containers.

These heat-lovers of summer will work hard for you when early cooler season flowers have given up the ghost. Or if you are like me, don’t always get to your beds until June.

Given my successes bird watching this spring I’m almost worried for the cowbirds. If that sentence makes no sense I’ll explain in a few paragraphs.

I’ll admit I spent a bit more time in my yard, but being somewhat deaf leaves me with just eyes to locate birds. The only birds I easily hear are the ones that sing bass and those that perch on my shoulder and yell in my ear. Neither group is very large.

Sometimes I envy friends who can stand near the Mason-Dixon Line and hear every chirp from Georgia to Maine. Perhaps I exaggerate.  Maybe it’s only from DC to New York City. Other times I remind myself it’s bird watching not bird listening. You hear, you can add it to your list. You see it, you can enjoy its actions.

The cowbird, (male) black with a brown head, joins the English (house) sparrow and the starling on most people’s undesirable list. Cowbirds are native and are thus protected by the Migratory Bird Treaty. The other two are imports and not protected.Originally the cowbird was a bird of the Great Plains where it followed the buffalo herds. Probably that association gave its name. The problem was that to stay with the wondering buffalo herds they had no time to stop and nest.Their solution was to lay their eggs in another bird’s nest and move on. The cowbird hatchling was larger and more aggressive and it thrived at the expense of its intended nest mates.

Backing up to pre-colonial times, the east was mostly forested, certainly not an environment the cowbird used.With land clearing, paths began to open for the cowbird to expand its range. Today they are (too?) common. Still they will not penetrate large stands of forest, staying on the edge

In the spring you will frequently see cowbirds perched high in sparsely leafed trees watching other birds, hoping to spot a nest for one of their eggs.  A few bird species have learned to compensate by eliminating the alien egg or re-nesting, but most are fooled.

An endangered bird in upper Michigan and surrounding states has recovered after special licensing was obtained to control the cowbird population. In general, the bird population is left to fend for itself.Worry was a poor choice of words in the first sentence. In fact I hope the cowbirds saw fewer birds than I did. The numbers weren’t there for me this spring but each outing brought some memorable sightings and real bird watching. What more can you ask for?

Every year many tons of low quality hay leaves our area for the mushroom farms of Chester County. There it is mixed in varying combinations with horse manure, poultry litter, peat moss, cottonseed meal, cocoa shells and gypsum.My list may be incomplete. The end result, used to grow mushrooms, however, is rather uniform.

What is of interest to gardeners is what comes out of the mushroom houses at the end of the mushroom growing cycle. From the above ingredients, it is obviously a good source of compost. Large lots can generally be acquired by paying the trucking. I use local sources to get pick-up loads at a modest cost.

I’ll admit that I have long been a bit uneasy about using it, fearing high levels of fertility and salts. Those fears are rapidly subsiding after my experience using it in new grass seedings. A rather liberal application was tilled into my existing yard after killing the few weeds and blades of grass that posed as my lawn. My basically wooded lot never claimed much topsoil.

Seedings made in the fall of 2014 and spring of 2015 look very promising. About three fourth of my lawn is now renovated with completion in mind with another August seeding.Recently, I read a Penn State report suggesting exactly what I did, so I guess I’m on the right track.

Mushroom soil will have modest, but not necessarily uniform, levels of the basic soil nutrients that commonly are used in the garden or landscape. Salts of some of the elements found with the desired nutrients are a slight concern. pH levels can rise with use so I would avoid using it near acid loving plants.

The damp mushroom house environment, like that of the greenhouse, may spawn a few fly-like insects that would have little chance to survive in a garden.

I am aware of people who substitute mushroom soil for bark mulch in their general landscape. They may be doing two jobs with one application but I still ponder the aesthetics’ of that move.

My conclusion is that mushroom soil is a great source of compost, a good source of modest but adequate nutrients for most gardening uses. I still am not ready to pile it on like I see in some lush vegetable gardens but I guess it is still a learning experience to overcome my early doubts.

Petunias are just so ubiquitous. They may be everywhere but there is a good reason for that.

Discovered in South America over 200 years ago, the original petunia species were lanky, sprawling plants in either white or purple. Brought back to Europe, early hybridizers quickly saw their potential to fit nicely into Victorian gardens. Two centuries of breeding later and there is petunia for every purpose.

One of the oldest types of petunias were the “grandifloras”; characterized by large flowers, and upright habits. They were most commonly grown for bedding, and large pots. Due to their large flowers, they required deadheading and were pummeled by the rain. The other classification of petunias was “multiflora” type. Multifloras had smaller flowers, but more of them, and generally held up to the elements better. In the 1970’s breeders started comingling the two and the “floribunda” type was born. Most market-pack type petunias today are floribunda types.

Then a hops breeder from a Japanese beer company brought a wild species back to Japan to play with. He crossed it with garden petunias and came up with something interesting. Vigorous, spreading, not upright, loaded with flowers, his bosses at the beer company didn’t know what to do with it. They made beer- not petunias.

The rights to this crazy petunia were shopped to several American and European flower companies, few of which were interested because at that time in the early 90s, petunias were upright and tidy. Not four foot monsters that would eat your sidewalk. PanAmerican Seed finally bit and the whole marketing/breeding/tsunami that is the Wave Petunia was born. Now in many colors and vigor levels Wave petunias revolutionized the petunia market.

Up until this time petunias had always been cheap. The Wave petunia was the first to sell for more than 7cents a seed. Many growers thought customers would balk at paying $1 or more for a single petunia plant when they were used to buying flats of 30- 40 plants for less than $5. Homeowners didn’t hesitate- either because of the advertising or the quality of the plant spoke for itself.

Convincing customers to pay for plants individually, allowed breeders to hybridize for vegetative production- plants made from rooted cuttings, which cost more to grow. Since that time hundreds of new cultivars of petunias have been released, from the Supertunias, with a mounding spreading habit targeted to flower pots and large landscape, to the Blanket petunias whose job is to cover the ground in a blanket of color. To niche plants like black petunias, ruffled doubles, and striped and picotee types. None of these vegetatively produced petunias will come true from seed, if they reseed at all.

Petunias are easy to grow in at least 5 hours of sun, relatively drought tolerant once established, attract pollinators and hummingbirds, are relatively fragrant and come in tons of colors.

So yeah, petunias are everywhere, but they certainly aren’t common.