I walk by the pond a couple of times a week and pull out the odd leaf. I stare at the beds and try to figure out what I should try next for the really difficult spots where things aren't working out. Then I go inside and play with my houseplants and look at seed catalogs, and wonder why there aren't more posts to read on GardenWeb. For some reason, I can't get motivated to order much in the way of seeds this year. Not sure why.

I'd love a pond to fiddle around with.

It's only a 300 gallon pond, really just a huge container garden, but I love it. Ponds take a lot of fiddling, especially the first few years while you're getting the hang of the whole water gardening thing. Why not build one? You can see mine at:

http://members.aol.com/perfectplantsgro/biggerpond.html

I am planning which perennials, bushes, and small trees I will move come spring. Even my peonies have become accustomed to the gypsy life. One day I will find the optimal arrangement. It will include at least one of every plant I covet, all living in the ideal space. Winter is a great time to dream your perfect garden.

Wondering how I'm going to plant all the bulbs I got at the seed-swap last Sunday....

Me too.. the bulbs that is.
Now with this new blanket of snow covering the ground, I can barely find my gardens. One more day of sunshine and I might be able to do that, but then there's the soggy ground...... Gardening is challenging.

I'm trying my luck at forcing a vase full of beautiful wantabees:

dogwood branches
redbud branches
flowering quince branches

Top them off with a camelia that is just about to bloom, some bronze and yellow chamaecyparis, red nandina's and feathery grass to top it off - it is beautiful even if the branches to not bloom.

Watergal, You are an impressive earth-moving gardener!! Your pond is lovely. How much did the project cost (barring the rocks, which I already know are expensive)?

Randi R, I'm going straight out tomorrow with my secaturs to clip branches. That sounds so pretty.
I bought a bunch of white tulips today, and they are fab.

sandra,

Thanks! It's been a while, so my prices may not be quite the same (and my memory is not too good some days!). I think the tank was around $200 from a farm supply store, give or take - way cheaper and sturdier than a fiberglass or preformed pond of that size, but you're stuck with the one shape. The rock was about $225 (prices vary greatly depending on what kind you use and what is available locally). Maybe $30 for the sand. The rest was for water plants and pots.

Oh, yes, and about $100 for Advil!!! :)

Since I have completely failed at tropical gardening I am cleaning up the mess, sticking in bedding plants (sweet alyssum is the only thing that never fails me), and dreaming of summer when I can starting my next garden with good ol' North American natives back in my beloved zone 7.
And I am dreaming of zillions and zillions of tomatoes. I have not had a Good tomato in the four years since I left the mainland!

Nice idea for a thread, Sandra; it's been too quiet! This has served as a reminder and, hopefully, will get me motivated (you're not the only one, watergal). I usually do some wintersowing, but didn't (yet) this year; maybe it isn't too late. Also want to try some Mason bees again, so had better place my order; last year's hatched, but that was the last I saw of them.

Watergal already outlined the extent of my pond activities, until today ... topped off the pond and cleaned out the skimmer box and its filter pad. At 42 degrees, a bit chilly to be playing in the water, but at least it was sunny. I highly recommend a pond/watergarden for anyone who has the desire and the willingness to plan and maintain it. Ours is a delight year 'round, about 1500 gallons with koi, plants and a small bog garden.

Cut, prepped, and stuck 72 cuttings yesterday. Moved a rain barrel into the greenhouse today and filled it for thermal mass and an ample supply for watering needs.

Planted the last of the spring bulbs a couple of weeks ago, and the garlic, sunk potted plants awaiting transplant in the front yard makeover, and just about finished shredding oak leaves and distributing them in the garden beds.

Other than that ... nothing much ... checking daily on status of new blooms on snowdrops, heather and hellebores, swelling buds on roses, tree peony, hydrangeas, quince (hmmm, maybe cut a few for forcing?) ... watching the birds that come to the feeders and waterfall ... can't wait for spring!

I better get outside soon, because inside I just seem to keep buying orchids on eBay! Someone stop me before I bid again!!

I still haven't ordered the seeds or tropical bulbs. Now that I'll have all these orchids, I'm not sure I'll have seed starting space anyway.

Ooh, one exciting thing is going on - my tropical waterlilies that I overwinter indoors every year are BLOOMING under grow lights in my plant room! Usually they just malinger until June, with scrawny leaves and never any flowers, but I bought a very bright light, and they love it!

Yes one of my brugs in the basement has a single bloom and found another bud yesterday. Steve in tropical Baltimore County.

Not much - feeding birds, starting seeds indoors, perusing catalogs...

I potted up the bulbs I got at the seed exchange and put them outside in a somewhat protected spot hoping that I can plant them on one of those freakishly warm days.

Surfing the nursery sites and drooling over plants. Has anyone seen the limegreen foliage with red blossom cardinal flower (Lobelia), it's from Terra Nova.

Am debating getting a couple trays from Terra Nova wholesale to sell at my annual plant sale in the Spring that funds my neighborhood gardening work.

Am looking forward to the Urban Gardening seminar Saturday in DC.

Just started wintersowing recently.

:)

Kathleen

Feb 22 is official Pea-planting date in our area (article in Wash. Post a year ago) I checked the soil temp. in my raised beds a few days ago and it was 48c - fine for planting peas. THIS HAS MADE ME VERY EXCITED!

Attended one of the Homestead Gardens Saturday workshops on Composting. Our speaker was the Bay Gardener from the Bay Weekly, and boy was he interesting. He's composted cows, chickens, etc. Got me all revved up about my composting. My bins are around 90C at the moment. (Can you tell I got a soil/compost thermometer for Christmas??)

I'm going to try to construct a wire hoop and plastic tunnel over another of my raised beds to start hardy lettuce, and that mache that P.Mike has in his garden, yummm.

I am picking mache like crazy. The last few weeks of wet and somewhat warm have been perfect for it, and it is sweet and delicious.

I bought enough cinder blocks, peat moss and vermiculite to start another raised bed, and I arranged for another dump truck full of composted manure from my wonderful neighborhood horse farm. I also dug two holes today for the two bluecrop blueberries from Home Depot that were just too tempting.

In the next two weeks I'll plant more mache and spinach outside, and I'll start my tomatoes and peppers and a few flower seeds inside.

Sandra - how did he "compost a cow"??

If you want to read great compost stories, check out the soil, mulch and compost forum. More than one person there has composted a cow.
Well on Saturday (just in time!) I made my cold frame: I used some painted 1 x 10s I already had to make an open box, excavated a rectangle and filled it with compost and composted horse manure (plus some lime and triple phosphate)put the box on top slightly slanted to the south, and put two salvaged windows over it. Planted radishes, kale, chard, lettuce, mesclun, and beets.

I put my remote thermometer in there and it kept the temperature 5 degrees above ambient even when it dropped to the 20s here. The remote sensor "freezes" if it gets too cold (much below 20) and it was 12 degrees this am (I know that from my other outdoor thermometer.

I have to remember to vent it every day, though, because it got pretty hot in there yesterday afternoon.

Indoors I'm fertilizing my tiny Lisianthus and onions. Just bumped up my geraniums to plug trays.

It is so much more possible to work outside in the winter here compared to WI zone 5a where I gardened for years that I still can't get over it.

I try to keep the aphids in check on my brugmanisas. earlier I had some help in transplanting a lot of bushes and trees (small ones) to reorganize my beds. I mulched, and mulched and mulched, right after weeding. I planned what tio put around my new pond-waterfall-pond, and then I did it. I ordered some trees to plant between us and the new neighbors in the meadow. The house is huge, but then there is my timer bamboo, and it seems to be growing well. This is the first winter where I utilized some muscle, DH turned 80, and it was great. The aim though was to make the garden easier to work with in the future without much help. Then I had beds built for the vegie garden, so this year, I'll have that and a real compost heap -- it was heaven, but expensive. That was the benfit of selling the meadow. This has been the first winter where the garden didn't look messy but prettyt in a bare sort of way.