As the Garden Grows

What's blooming today?


The Garden is Thriving

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Yes I’m still neglecting my garden, but it truly is thriving despite the lack of care. I’ve been so ill the last few days I haven’t been able to do much more than look out the window at all the buds developing on the roses and other flowers.

Luckily I’m married. My husband has been watering the garden every few days, and other than the pruning that I so desperately need to do on half my roses, the watering seems to be all that needs to be done.

Everything is covered in buds or is blooming. Two of my clematis, well two that I’ve noticed so far, possibly there’s more, are blooming! I ate my first homegrown strawberry of the season a little while ago too.

We’re expecting rain later today, and tomorrow. Possibly thunderstorms. I’m sure the garden will be overgrown soon if I don’t get out there and start trimming.






If you’re thinking of moving visit the Ashville Homes site

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Everyone has a dream place to live, or perhaps even an area they’d like to retire to when they can finally quite working and enjoy life in their later years.

If you are thinking of moving or retiring you might want to consider the city of Asheville. The city is located in Western North Carolina in the Blue Ridge Mountains. It’s a thriving community with many things to offer – arts, entertainment, skiing and other outdoor activities and a lot more.

If Asheville sounds like an area worth checking out you might want to visit the Asheville homes website, where you can search MLS listings with an easy to use Google map.

Ashville has been rated as one of the 50 Most Alive Places to Be by AARP and I can see why. It looks like it would be a lovely place to live whether you are just starting out or reaching your retirement years. Visit the site and see what I’m talking about.

Thin leafed poor blooming azaleas?

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How did your Azaleas, and Rhododendrons do this year? Did they bloom well? Is the foliage lush and full?

If you azaleas didn’t seem to do as well this year as they have in the past, or if the leaf coverage is rather thin you might want to be proactive and take some measure to help them get healthy so they’ll bloom well next season.

Apply azalea fertilizer in the spring. You might want to give your plants one light dose before they begin to bloom, perhaps just as they come out of dormancy, and another dose shortly after they’ve finished blooming. Fertilizing will encourage better growth and the plant should get fuller looking.

Lightly pruning blooming branches and bringing the flowers indoors or lightly prune immediately after the blooming season ends.

You’ll be cutting off some of the new growth, but when pruning takes place near the beginning of the season it actually encourages new growth. By pruning, fertilizing and watering regularly throughout the season your azaleas should be stronger the following year.

You might even want to thin some of the older branches after the blooms fade in order to shape the tree for the following year. It make take a few years to prune your azalea into a nice shape that shows off it’s fullness as you do not want to prune too much off at once.

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