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| Cat Mint is not aggressive, but Catnip is. Cats also love Cat Mint. |
Our weed-eater crew chopped mature Buckwheat at the perfect time. Buckwheat re-seeded the entire rose garden, which subsequently enjoyed three inches of rain and hot, sunny days. Buckwheat has reclaimed the garden, for a second laugh at me. I trust it will not grow taller than the Mr. Lincoln roses this time - Buckwheat will keel over at the first frost.
The rain gave me barrels of rainwater, and some buckets too, for pouring on favorite plants. I saw again how established bushes have the capacity to swallow gallons of water - like pouring it down a drain. The difference is that established roots take the water down and keep the soil open for the infiltration of the water. The USDA has shown that the less we plow and stir the soil, the better it absorbs rain and snowmelt.
i like planting in Peat Compost, which they could call Stinky Pete, a combination of fresh manure and peat, not all steamed and sterile like mushroom compost and other garden center compounds. The bags are $1.67 at Lowes - almost free. When I dig out a hole for a new plant, the Peat Compost bedding provides a bed of absorbent organic soil for the roots and for water absorption.
I learned early in gardening that frequent watering is essential for new seeds and plants. Last year's Crepe Myrtle, planted by the kitchen window, always got bonus rainwater and out-distanced its two siblings.
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| Hostas come in many color variations, and their flowers are Hummingbird favorites. |
Sleep Grow Leap
The rule for raising Hostas is -
- Year One - sleep. They do not seem to thrive, because the root systems are starting to grow.
- Year Two - grow. They gain in size and bloom for Hummingbirds to eat from.
- Year Three - leap. They begin to divide for free new plants.
I remember the tiny slips that Direct Gardening sent, Hostas for almost nothing. I wanted to try some without a big investment. End of year clearance! They survived, began growing this summer, and will definitely do some leaping in 2018.
The same has been true of Mountain Mint and Bee Balm/Monarda - another mint. Cat Mint is the same - a third mint I bought from Direct Gardening.
Those mints look like candidates for Intensive Care, and I dote on them as much as I can - without result the first year. They have all grown well the second year and will be divided in 2018.
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| Comfrey belongs to the Borage family. Both grow quickly the first year. |
Why the Leap Year?
Everyone wants established plants, so they should ask why so many plants take time before they enjoy their Leap Year. We reason - but of course, the roots have to be established.
But soil scientists found there was much more to this story. Fungal colonies build up and create elaborate networks to bring plant food and water to roots. In exchange, the roots give up carbon needed by fungus to grow.
Say whatever you want, this fungal network and interface - with almost all root systems - can only come from God's creation and engineering through the Word.
While we are on the topic - this had to be instantaneous rather than over billions of years, because everything works together on is own.
I deal with - and suffer from - three different learning systems, delivering academic material to a total of 200,000 students or more. Community colleges rely on them too. Even with constant monitoring and fixing, these elaborate and skillfully designed networks breakdown as regularly as a philanderer's alibis. If Blackboard does not work - a given - two other systems cannot report to it, and Blackboard is responsible for reporting to the officials in the school. In class I have been unable to record attendance (logging on problem), unable to read and grade essays, unable to assemble the statistics.
In the garden, in the wilds, and in farming, the fungal networks not only keep the plants watered and fed, they also protect against disease. Soil, sterilized by heat in the lab, is less productive than soil left alone to grow fungus, bacteria, protozoa, and soil creatures. We can identify the useful work done by each form of animal life in the soil, even if we loath some of them - like moles, who expertly stir soil and eat harmful insect larvae.
If moles stash large groups of earthworms in their own food banks, they are helping the earthworm population. Only so many worms will grow in a given amount of soil, so removing them to the food banks allows more to grow. The earthworm safety deposit boxes either become mole food or soil food, so everyone is happy.
The same is true of bacterial versus protozoa. One battles the other and benefits the other.
I was discussing beneficial creatures with one reader. If one beneficial animal does not stop an insect pest, another one helps out. Between beneficial insects and hungry birds, massive invasions are stalled at the beginning.
All Spiritual Food Comes from the Gospel Word
Many claim some loyalty to the Scriptures, freely borrowing what helps them, but rejecting the rest.
The Son of God - the Creating Word in Genesis 1 and John 1 - is connected to all sincere believers by the Means of Grace. Wherever pagans are converted to the Christian Faith, the Word has been preached and taught.
When man is satisfied with his own wisdom and intolerant of the Word, programs multiply to improve upon what God has done and will always do through the Word.
- Y'all need self-esteem.
- Y'all need time management.
- Y'all need to get rid of musty old hymns, ancient liturgies, and creeds.
- Y'all need a praise band singing songs about man's wisdom.
Barren wastelands are not caused by God's neglect, since He renews the soil in more ways than we can measure. Where the plants no longer grow and the wind drives sand and grit into the faces of the impoverished and hungry - that is where man did his best to rob Creation and build an empire, an oblation to Mammon.
When I emphasize Justification by Faith, which is the Gospel, clergy of the ELS, WELS, and LCMS mock every word and empty the vaults of their packaged insults. No matter - they are mocking the Scriptures, not me. First they emptied their seminaries of faithful teachers. Now the ELS-WELS-LCMS frauds have emptied the seminaries of students. Their graduates have destroyed more churches than the Chicago Fire, but they need more money to leverage their brilliance.
Clergy were already backing away from Creation and the Genesis Flood in the 19th century. As I have often written, Fuller Seminary rejected the inerrancy of the Scriptures from the beginning - because they only meant "inerrant in doctrine" not in matters of history or geography. So it only took one generation to go commando on the Scriptures, inspired by the vapid and plagiarized scribblings of Karl Barth and his hawt Commie mistress, Charlotte Kirschbaum.
The apostate leaders of today worship Mammon to feed their swollen bellies and diseased livers. Because of that, they hate the Word and despise the Means of Grace.
