Psst… I got what you need right here. A whole dime of high quality stuff. You ain’t finding anything better. The richest loam this side of the border, that is a bona fide fact, my friend. You will not find a finer grade of dirt, no way, no how.

I bet you did not know that when you are out there tending those flowers and planting those seeds that you were doping yourself, did you? Turns out that dirt harbors a friendly little bacteria called Mycobacterium vaccae. When this bacteria infects humans, it affects our brains and causes it to make extra serotonin.

Serotonin is a funny drug for our bodies. It helps to control everything from how much we eat to how well we can remember to… wait for it… how good we feel. More of the happy, happy serotonin, the hap-hap-happier we feel.

So how does one catch this bacteria and reap the benefits? It is just as easy as playing in the dirt. Do a little barefoot walking, maybe pot up a few seedlings or two, get some weeding in and, voila, you got yourself a genuine dirt high.

This probably explains why many gardeners regard weeding as a meditation rather than a chore. The very act of touching the soil with bare skin, can bring about a chemically induced serenity. Not bad, eh?

So here we are, a bunch of strung out garden junkies, just fiending for our next Mycobacterium vaccae fix. Come on, sister, can you spare a girl a trowel? Just so I can get through to the next day?

I am not exaggerating when I tell you I have 200 tomato seedlings in my kitchen right now. A combination of using gardening as a coping mechanism and a sense of empathy that makes it difficult to even insult a video game character, let alone kill a tomato seedling has left me in this situation. I have no one to blame but myself, but I think that I have acquired a few tips to help others with their tomato seedlings.

1. Gee, non seed starting soil does JUST FINE – I used plain old potting soil this year for seed starting. I was certain that I was doing the equivalent of not breast feeding my children and that I would be destroying my germination rate. But, golly, gosh, darn, all the seeds germinated (and non-breast fed children continue to thrive). Plain old regular soil works just fine and I have nice healthy seedlings now (looking for good homes).
    
2. You don’t have to talk to your tomato seedlings, but they do like to be petted – Ok, so your tomato seedlings won’t be replacing your cat or dog any day soon, but “petting” your seedlings will result in a stronger plant. Petting or “tickling”, as the tomatophiles call it, mimics the wind and triggers a thigmotropism response. (Can you say thigmotropism? Good for you, because I can’t.). Thigmotropism is a plant’s response to its environment. In the case of tomatoes, wind means that it can get blown over, and the tomato plant grows thicker to compensate. Pretty clever plants. (BTW, if petting creeps you out, a fan on low will also accomplish this.)
    
3. Tomato seedlings are pretty hardy – I planted 3-4 seeds per pot. I am now in the process of dividing these into their own pots. I noticed this in past years as well when dividing or repotting. Tomato seedlings are pretty damn hardy. They can take a fair amount of man-handling, unlike some lettuces I have known lately.
    
4. Tomato seedlings sun-scald easily – Hardening off is a tedious process. But a very necessary one for tomato seedlings. Those babies can get sun burn faster than you can imagine. I am thinking that there is a market for a 30SPF sunscreen for plants to shorten hardening off time.
    
5. Fluorescent lights work well – All my seedlings were grown under fluorescent bulbs. Like, bought at the grocery store, screws into a normal light socket, light bulb. No timers, no windows. 24 hour light from the fluorescent bulbs. They were very happy.
    
6. Tomato seeds are viable for a good 3-4 years – I planted some tomato seeds I had from way, way back and the germination rate was as good as the new seeds I bought this year. I store my extra seeds in the veggie drawer in the fridge. Seems to work well.

I have more tomatoes than I know what to do with, but I am thinking that is because tomato seedlings seem to be pretty incompetence friendly (really I am that bad at starting seeds normally. Ask me how many pepper plants I have right now. Not an impressive number when you consider I planted about as many as the tomatoes.)

I mean let’s face it, if a tomato falls in the garden, at least a few seeds will grow the next year without your help. Just imagine how many would grow with your help. And the good news is that it is not too late to start some seeds. You might be surprised how easy it is.

Any gardener worth their salt, which is handy against slugs, knows that you want a few frogs or toads on the property, which are also handy against slugs. One of the best ways to make sure you get an amphibian to take up residence is to get yourself a good stockpile of desired amphibian’s eggs.

So this weekend I am visiting my parent’s house. The weather was warm and balmy (because March is a tease) and my mother decided to muck out her pond. My mother’s pond is rather small but filled with sexually frenzied frogs and this quickly became evident as we filled a 5 gallon bucket with gelatinous frog eggs.

So, Missus Hanna Smarty Pants, how do you know those are frog eggs? Maybe they are toad eggs. Or maybe you have frog and toad eggs in your 5 gallon bucket all mixed up. How do you know? Telling the difference between frog and toad eggs is easy. Frog lay eggs in clumps, toads lay eggs in strings. What I have here is a big ol’ bucket of frog eggs.

Frog eggs tend to creep people out at first. When you find them, they are normally stuck to sticks or logs and have an uncanny resemblance to eating jello while having the flu gone terribly wrong. The eggs will be clear and wobbly and you can see the tadpole inside develop. Depending on the age of the eggs, they may either have large black dots in the center or tiny forming tadpoles. While the eggs may look very fragile, in fact, they are quite resilient and are easy to handle. You can simply scoop them up and move them about as you like.

Which is convenient, as my mother has more frog eggs than she knows what to do with, so we will be taking some home.

Some of these eggs will go in my own pond, while some of them I will keep in the house (and maybe even sharing some with the boys’ classrooms at school. I am sure their teachers will be thrilled). Frog eggs present an excellent opportunity to let my kids see first hand the miracle of life, from egg to adulthood.

For hatching frog eggs, you need to keep a few simple but REALLY IMPORTANT things in mind.

First, the water you put your frog eggs in cannot be tap water. Ideally, frog eggs should be kept in the water from the pond where the eggs were found. But, if that is not an option, any water from a naturally occurring source will do, such as collected rainwater or a pond or stream. Do not use tap water, ever. The chlorine in the water will kill them.

Second, eggs that you find submerged should be submerged in the tank. Eggs you find floating should be kept floating.

Third, aerating the water will improve the eggs’ chances of hatching.

So, this summer, if all goes as planed and I am a good surrogate frog mom (how hard can it be, frog moms abandon their eggs after they lay them) I should have a few slug feasting frogs in my garden.

It’s green. It rises up from the ground. And no matter how often you hack at it, it just keeps coming back. (cue scary music) It’s attack of the Zombie Lettuce!!!!!!

At least that is what my husband thinks. We are reaching the tail end of the baby greens season, and we are eating baby greens every other day. It would be every day, if I had my way, but my husband draws a firm line on how often he will eat salad.  He tells me frequently that salad is what food eats.

Zombie lettuce, otherwise know as cut and come again lettuce or baby greens is the only kind of lettuce I can manage to get to grow here in the ‘burbs of Cleveland. The thought of growing a full head is almost laughable. Our “cool” season is incredibly short. Cold weather lingers well into May and hot weather normally gets into full swing around mid June. That leaves precious little time for heat and chill sensitive plants like lettuce.

But I really don’t mind. I enjoy baby greens very much and this way I can pick exactly what I need.

Planting baby greens is cheap and easy. I know that the price for them in the supermarket belies something different, as in that “beautiful virgin women pluck each individually” expensive, but really, they are easy to grow.

For less than a single bag of baby greens at your grocery store, you can have so much that you will probably grow sick of baby greens before it all bolts. All you need to look for is a small packet of “gourmet blend” lettuce. They normally retail for $2 – $4.

Prepare a bed for your lettuce. This can be out in your garden or in a conveniently located container. I have grown baby greens in both the garden and in containers and both are equally easy.

Scatter the whole packet of seeds over the prepared area. Be a rebel. Completely ignore those pesky spacing requirements. These little guys will never reach full size so they don’t need full space.

After the seeds are spread, rough up the soil a bit with a rake or your hands. Then water thoroughly.

In a week or two, you will have the beginnings of your zombie lettuce. Once the leaves are 2 – 3 inches tall, hack away to your heart’s content. You can’t stop it from coming, it will be back. Mwahahaha…

Um… Anyhoo. There are a few things to be aware of. The really big one being slugs. Slugs LOVE baby greens, so when harvesting, make sure you look carefully for them and remove them from the mix. And they are sneaky creature in this regards. So far, my family has not really boughtthe story that I threw the slugs in for the extra protein.

The other thing is that the plants will be growing so tightly together that it might be difficult to weed. Just make sure the Canada thistle and other unsavories don’t make it into the salad bowl.

I would also recommend that if you will be growing baby greens, that you invest in a salad spinner. It makes washing the lettuce a breeze.

So, yes, while they will not tear into you house and eat your eyes and heart out, zombie lettuce does add a tasty new taste adventure to the dinner table.

I am a highly superstitious person. I always throw salt over my shoulder when I spill it. I always make wishes on white horses, when I go under train tracks and when I see hay wagons. But there is one thing I never, ever do and that is kill a spider. I am certain Death of Spiders (related to Death of Rats) is waiting to pounce on any unsuspecting human that dares tread (literally) on one of his charges.

Besides, as a gardener, I know that spiders are one of those friendly creatures you are suppose to let live in your garden as they are really good at dining on the not so friendly creatures that also reside in the garden. If I could, I would make tiny little take out menus for all the local spiders.

This past weekend I found a female wolf spider scuttling through the flower beds. How did I know she was a she? As spiders don’t wear skirts, the giant egg sac hanging off her rear end is a huge clue. It brings new meaning to the phrase Baby Got Back.

Female wolf spiders lug their egg sacs around with them and when the babies are mature enough, mom rips open the sac to set them free. Then the kiddos attach themselves to her back and will stay there for several weeks while she resumes daily activities. Where is dad in all this? Probably watching a riveting game of spider football. Then again, maybe mom ate him. How’s that for modern feminism.

The name wolf spider covers a class of spiders. There are in fact over 2000 species of wolf spider. They can be found almost anywhere in the world and are identifiable by the fact that they are very hairy, have 8 eyes of varying sizes and do not spin webs.

That’s right; they lack the artistic stylings of other spiders and could not save a pig’s life if they had too. They do not build webs. They are hunters, who will pounce on passing insects or even chase down an insect that seems particularly attached to its life. In fact, wolf spiders are so named because it was once mistakenly thought that wolf spiders hunted their prey in packs, like wolves do. This is not the case though. For the most part, wolf spiders are solitary arachnids. In fact, they will eat each other if given the opportunity and lack other food sources.

Wolf spiders are not poisonous and tend not to bite, though a female wolf spider with an egg sac is much more aggressive than usual. She will, like any good mother, defend her babies to her death and will fight anything she sees as a threat.

While spiders may be scary looking, the old wives tales knew what they were talking about, almost. These little lovelies will eat hundreds if not thousands of bad buggies in your garden during their lifetime. If you kill one of these spiders, it will be your own fault, not bad luck, that insects demolish your prize flowers.

In case you have been wandering the outer fringes of Antarctica lately, you know that we Americans may or may not be, but certainly soon will be, unless a stimulus package miracle of biblical proportions happens, otherwise, we really will find ourselves in the midst of a good old fashion recession. I live in Cleveland, OH though. We have been in a recession for the past decade so, really, so not too much has changed here.

But gas prices are up, food prices are up and it is spring and there are empty flower beds to be filled. While I don’t mind missing a few meals to cover the cost of new plants, my husband and children are not in agreement with me on this. (Sheesh, haven’t they ever heard the whole feed the soul saying…)

So, since skipping meals is out and siphoning gas is illegal, I will just have to take other measures to ensure I have a plant filled spring.

• Plant Swaps – You probably have some extra plants in your yard (mostly uber-invasive ones if you are like me) that can be traded for something different. And, chances are, there is a plant swap in your area here soon. Check you local garden clubs, libraries and newspapers. Can’t find one? Organize one. Most local parks or libraries will happily let you hold them there for free and there are plenty of gardeners in need of new plants.
   
• Check the internet – Places like Freecycle, Craig’s List and eBay are great places to score cheap or even free plants. Check them regularly for deals. Feel free to post a wanted ad as well. Also, keep your eyes open for compost, gardening tools and décor as well.
   
• Become the local Trash Fairy – Trash picking is an ancient and well respected art (at least in some third world countries). You would be amazed at what people will throw away. Don’t be afraid to pick up what you see in the trash. If anyone asks, just tell them you are saving the planet. They don’t have to know that you are just trying to save money.
   
• Buy wisely - Sometimes, especially when it comes to annuals, you just have to purchase. Do so wisely. Check the base of the plant before you buy. Is there one stem or more sticking out of the soil? Chances are at least a few pots will actually have more than plant in it, so you can get two plants for the prices of one.
   
• Buy plants you can propagate – Some annuals, like impatiens, petunias and Coleus, are dead easy to propagate from cuttings. Buy the largest, leggiest plant you can and take cuttings from it. Stick the cuttings in water, and in a a week or two you will have a whole new mess of plants.
   
• Grow from seed – I suck at this one (though I do still have 30 surviving nameless tomato plants with T-minus three weeks to planting), but some people are really good at it. Grow your own plants from seeds. Much cheaper.
   
• Buy small - You know when you see the gallon plant and the quart plant sitting next to each other and one is marked $20 and the other is $5 and the gallon one just looks so damn pretty because it is huge and you think maybe it is worth the $15 extra… It’s not. That gallon plant is probably only 2 months older than the quart plant. Buy the smaller one and it will fill out before you know it.

So after you lose your job and they foreclose on your house and you can no longer drive your car because of rising gas prices and your children starve because eggs and milk now cost a $1 more than they did before, you at least know that you will still be able to get your hands on some plants to cheer you up.

Actually, gardeners in general tend to be a frugal and fiscally creative bunch anyway, and most of these tips are standard practice for me and other gardeners each year, regardless of recession fears. But blogging is now a form of accepted media and what kind of media would I be if I did not latch on to a potentially scary subject, blow it out of proportion and use it for my own ratings?

The pride of my garden, the jewel of my yard, the magnolia tree in my back yard that is bigger than my house has burst forth in a brilliant explosion of herbavarian sexuality.There is no grander sight than an ancient magnolia in full and unfrost scathed bloom.

And I can truly use the word ancient here, because while my magnolia is simply a few decades old, her ancestors date back to the Triassic period. Before we mammals were a twinkle in Mother Nature’s eye, these trees were serving as a tasty snack for some giant beast that now lives on only as a fuzzy fossil x-ray. My children are forever lamenting the loss of dinosaurs from our world. Little do they know that we have a direct descendent of their version of a Happy Meal in our back yard.

While flowers on my magnolia display are magnificent to behold, they are in fact outdated flowers. You can kind of think of them as the ’57 Chevy’s of the plant world. They don’t have those fancy features like petals and nectar. Instead they have the tepals and a super sweet smell that is designed to attract pollinators as old as themselves (which do not include the bee, butterfly and wasp pollinator trifecta of the modern world). They are pollinated by beetles.

Magnolias have an odd history. Thanks to the devastation of the Ice Age which wiped out magnolias in
Europe, magnolias developed on continents, The Americas and
Asia, that are oceans apart. Asians have revered them for centuries, using them as decoration, food and medicine. Europeans, with their usual lack of cultural awareness, “discovered” them in the
Americas and brought them back to
Europe where they became an instant hit.

But magnolias are more than just Asian herbal lore, decor and salad. Early studies show that it carries compounds that may fight cancer tumors. Who would have thought that something that evolved long before we did could one day save one of our lives?

Super drug or dinosaur fodder, it does not really matter to me. Really, all I care about is that this year, the frost did not cheat me out of my magnolia display.

I saw my first robin of Spring today, hopping around in between the blooming crocus in my back yard.

It may interest some of you out there that when we Yanks speak about the first robin of Spring and the Brits talk about the robins at Christmas, we are talking about two different birds. It seems that a robin is not a robin is not a robin. Of course the question then becomes “What is the air-speed velocity of an unladen robin? What do you mean? An American or European robin?” Well, maybe that is a question for another day.

The American robin is a victim of memory moniker misappropriation. Apparently settlers who were brave enough to make a 3 month sea journey, face native populations of unknown hostilities and wrenchingly carve out a life in a wild land had no energy left over to come up with original names for the animals they saw. When the first European settlers dared to hazard these rocky shores, they saw a little bird who reminded them of their own red breasted robin at home. So, they just said, “Screw it, I am tired. We’ll just call it a robin.”

While the robin is considered the harbinger of spring when it “returns”, it actually does not leave the area in the winter. The little American robin has once again been mis-classified. They do not migrate very far and over-winter in pretty much the same places that they summer in. They simply hide more in the winter, preferring to gather in large flocks in the woods, perhaps for warmth and perhaps to catch up on gossip from the summer. The fact that robins can produce 3 different broods in a single summer means that there is a whole lot of juicy “who’s sleeping with who” gossip to catch up on when the weather gets cold.

When the weather warms up, the flocks break up and the robin returns to our back yards and we squeal in delight because the robin has “come back”. Yeah, that trip from the MetroParks must have been exhausting.

Robins eat all sorts of tasty things. Everything from worms to fruit. BTW, in case you needed yet another reason not to use Chem-the-hell-out-of-it-Lawn, the robins you see in your back yard eat the worms from your back yard. If you use pesticides on your lawn, it gets in the worms, which get eaten by the robins and the robins die from pesticide poisoning. Tell that to the ChemLawn guy, the next time you see him. Just scream “You are killing Spring, you bastard!” I am sure it will at least freak him out enough that he will leave the area immediately.

Even if the robin does not really “come back” and has been here all along, it is still nice to see her once again gracing my back yard. It is still a sign that warm weather is just around the corner.

No, they are not those kinds of poppies. The Antelope Valley California Poppy Reserve and the surrounding poppy fields are covered with California poppies and they are all in glorious full bloom right now. Drive through the right part of Lancaster and it truly does appear that a four year old with a love of orange has taken a giant watercolor brush to the mountains.

California poppies are, shockingly enough, in the poppy (Papaveraceae) family and grow in California. They are so ubiquitous with California that they were named the State flower in 1903. The California Poppy has provided the residents of California with a food, oil and cosmetic source for as long as there were people in the area (you know, like even before California was “discovered”). Because of this, there is an Official Poppy Day on April 6th and a Poppy Week from May 13-18. I think this is the only flower I know of that gets more official days than all the previous presidents of our country combined.

These little beauties may look fragile, but they are not. They prefer to grow in sandy dry soil in view of the full sun, which in this area can be a wicked mistress. Not to mention that the areas where California Poppies frequently grow are subject to wind gusts in excess of 40 MPH. These flowers are well adapted to taking a beating and being beautiful while they do so.

They can be grown outside the state of California and will do great if you can provide the climate they like and will do ok if you can’t. While they are technically a perennial, they cannot tolerate temps that dip below 20F, so in most places, even in California, they are regarded as an annual. They do best and look best in alpine or rock gardens where their low growing, compact beauty can be showcased best.

They are also an excellent flower for those who are looking to xeriscape their yard. They need, actually prefer, little water and will flourish under xeriscape conditions. These flowers tend to grow in conditions that others simply cannot. As a matter of fact, many gardeners fail to grow them because they give them too much attention. These are one of the lone wolves of the botanical world. They prefer it if you just left them alone.

They are vibrant and strong and blindingly bright. Just perfect for the gardener who is looking for a low maintenance flower to fill in that tricky and annoying dry spot in the yard.

These past few days, I have spent some bopping around Lancaster. Enough to know that it is mostly desert country. Mohave desert country to be specific. Beautiful in its own terribly dry and scorching hot way. It is a place where a grass lawn looks startlingly out of place. (And yet people still try to grow it.)

One sure sign you are in the Mohave is the presence of Joshua trees. Passing a field of Joshua trees is like stumbling on a crowd of trees that suddenly got religion of the David Koresh kind. These born again trees raise twisted limbs to the sky in a crazed supplication. Apparently the early Mormon pioneers thought so as well, as they supposedly named for the prophet Joshua.

My sister informed me that it is illegal to take down or move a Joshua Tree and that the properties that are covered with them are rendered worthless. A search of the internet when I got home showed no such law, but I wonder if this is a widespread urban legend in these parts and if an unsuspecting homeowner’s value is affected by it.

Joshua trees are yuccas. A painfully slow growing yucca, growing only an average of a half inch a year. I was particularly lucky in that the Joshua Trees were in full bloom, which only happens from February to April and not every year. Blooming only happens if an appropriate amount of rainfall happens. I just was lucky that the right conditions happened this year and that I had the chance to be here.  The tree also has just one pollinator, the Yucca Moth.

Frequently, Joshua Trees are seen growing in groups and this happens because they can grow from underground rhizomes. They also grow from seeds.

The biggest threat to Joshua Trees is in the desert is wind. These plants have very shallow root systems and the a good stiff wind can knock them over in a heartbeat.  Struck down by the hand of God, I suppose you could say.

Crooked and bent, constantly battling the elements, these trees are a testament to the sheer tenacity of plants in the desert. They are also a symbol of the botanical beauty that exists in even the harshest elements.