As a self-confessed novice gardener, Michelle Sander claims she has “The Art of Killing Plants” down pat. But, like most gardeners, killing plants isn’t the supreme domain of ludites.
Killing Plants Doesn’t Take Much Skill
If we were truly honest, even the most experienced and knowledgeable gardeners have probably killed a few plants of their own. Surprisingly, it doesn’t take the skill of an assassin to put a plant to sleep forever. A little neglect. A little lack of TLC. Even life becoming busier than normal can render any of your prized plants DOA.
For me, this year hasn’t been about killing plants for the reasons I’ve mentioned above. Sadly, this year has seen many of my plants sacrificed for progress’ sake. We’re renovating.
And in order to renovate, plants, garden beds, veggie patches, mature trees even, had to pay the ultimate price. While most of this will be replaced once our renos are complete it’s little comfort to see established gardens destroyed.
So, many of my plants have been moved into containers and these are where the real killing fields begin. The reason: I’m not that great at remembering to water each day. While I have automatic reticulation through the garden beds and lawns, my container plants are still waiting for their driplines to be set up. Maybe this is the year so that the carnage may stop!
What about you? How are your plants fairing and have you had any keel over in the past year? Was it neglect? Did you leave your neighbour in charge of your garden for the summer break? Whatever the excuse, we’d love to hear it.
Photo source: foxypar4
Oh Stuart, you always manage to get us all to look at our warts! Great post idea!
This year, a very mild winter and early, warm spring meant that the voles were breeding freely and burrowing through our garden beds pretty much all winter.
The hungry rodents munched their way through nearly all of our tulips, several gorgeous hostas, twenty (count ‘em 2-0) roses, and a host of other perennials.
Where Steve and I have personally fallen down on the job and lost many wonderful plants are those times when we have bitten off way more than we can chew. This usually starts with a trip to the garden center. We tend to think we can get more accomplished in a day or two than is humanly possible. Even though we might pledge to only buy what we can plant in the next two days, we forget that unlike other planets, like Jupiter or Saturn, for example, days on planet Earth only have 24 hours.
Invariably, we neglect the plants we didn’t get into the ground right away and then we start bickering at each other about whose fault it is and who is going to water them and plant them ….. you’d think we’d learn! (We’re trying.)