GARDEN JOURNAL

Seeding and Sprouting

balconygardener.ca is getting ready for the 2010 growing season by uncovering a new look and some fresh new content. Big thanks to HT for his help, guidance and expertise in building the new site. I couldn’t do this without help from my friends.

My regular posts and links to others in the online gardening community are intact and growing.

On this new site you’ll find selected plant lists and photos of my balcony garden from 2001 through 2009. Get Gardening on a balcony includes flowers, alpines and ponds and over the summer will expand to include vegetables, fruit, roses and selected plant lists.  Pots and Pieces is about hardscaping and inspiration and will grow to include not only basic info about containers and basic garden design, but inspirational garden people, places and projects. I’ve also got a new and growing stack of gardening books (really – can you have too many?) to read and review – starting this month with Gayla Trial’s Grow Great Grub. Her new 2010 book is full of great ideas for growing edibles in a small space, rooftop garden in the city. It’s a book that you’ll not only want to read but share with your gardening buddies.

I’ve got a start on an image library – but am still playing with it. My image feed from Flickr – a view from above – is active and available throughout the new site. And loading up the images from the 5+ years of regular posts is still happening, so the ‘blue box questions mark’ graphic should eventually disappear by the end of the week. So, as for many websites, it’s a work in progress and a labour of love.

Watch it grow along with my garden this year.

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Class 14

The 100-mile garden was the discussion topic today brought to us by the nice folks at Bow Point Nursery and ALCLA Native Plant Restoration. Native woodies and perennials – all grown from regional seed sources. Both of these nurseries provide contract growing and Native Plants Restoration also plants, seeds and manages the planted areas.

A gentle melt has started on the prairies, but we all know it’s just a tease. The true sign of spring though is the return of the Canada Geese. A couple of pairs are active every morning around our condo building. And at the zoo, where I think they may not have left over the winter, they are noisy, steadily flying over the area and quite indignant when they land on building roofs. Everyone is starting to get a bit restless.

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Class 13

Another exam yesterday – the last one before our final. Good to get through it so I can concentrate on the final homework assignments that I have to complete. Katherine and Nora were the guest speakers today. Both amazing gardeners in their own right. Katherine combines her love of art with gardening. Her presentation on bulbs, tubers and corms was sprinkled with history and art stories. And Nora is not only a recently trainer arbourist but also a experienced gardener, well-known author and speaker. Lead instructor Jane again assembled another great day of learning at the zoo.

And did I mention that I won a door prize? Yup, tuberous begonia – double – Picotee Apricot-Scarlett Edge. This summer flowering plant likes the semi-shade and should grow to about 12 inches high. Right now the tuber looks like a big block of hard brown wood, tough to tell which way is up – I hate that – but I know to watch for little red buds sometime soon once I plant it – hollow side up – into soil.

Now, I’ve never grown begonias before. Always though they were a bit gaudy. But the beauty of balcony gardening is that you can easily try something new. We used Rex Begonia in class last week to demonstrate propagation by leaf cuttings and there seems to be quite a range of patterns and colours in the Rex. Not sure if I like them though. So I’m going to dedicate a wee corner of the balcony to the begonia this year and play around with the plant.

Katherine is back next week to talk to the class about vines and ground covers. We walked to an area in the zoo where Virginia Creeper vines are well established and took some photos of the little suction cups the plant uses to grab onto and climb up walls. I had a round with Virgina Creeper on in the balcony garden a few years ago. Dead easy to grow but didn’t have any success wintering it over. If I try it again I plan to take the plant and quietly tuck it into the condo landscape in order to help it see another growing season.

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Foliage Follow-up

FFU follows GBB –   February on the prairies

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The End – Rocky Mountains

Needed to get out of town to clear the brain with some clean mountain air, so headed up to Banff to see the current show on at the Walter Phillips Gallery. The show is titled The End by Icelandic artist Ragnar Kjartansson. Its a five-screen music video installation that was produced in Banff a year ago and featured at the Icelandic Pavilion at the 2009 Venice Biennale. If you are in the area, make the effort to see this one. The installation itself is really well done, the video is big, romantic, gentle and funny. Ron told us to watch the piano player first – all of the way through. It will make you smile.

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Class 12

Part of the class yesterday was about propagation and I scored a Agave pup during the hands-on lab part of the day. Noelle had posted about pups early in the new year, so when I saw the opportunity to add Agave to my collection I grabbed it. But carefully as these things are spiky. And see the lovely long root on this one, it’s ready to plant into a well drained soil.

We spent half of the day talking about vegetable gardening, so I’m busy trying to figure out how best to add more vegetables to the balcony this summer. So little space, so many choices.

Also found Dinny as I said I would last week. He’s tucked between a couple of fences and buildings now, but considering he was build in ‘35 which makes him 75 years old now, he’s aged well. In a city that more often than not demolishes its history, Dinny is lucky that someone was looking out for him. Unless construction equipment runs into the sculpture, there’s no reason Dinny won’t be at the zoo for another 75 years. The plaque in front of him notes that the connection to the zoo and dinosaurs was because of public interest in the fossil discoveries that were taking place at the time in the Alberta badlands. Black and white inset image of Dinny is from the plaque, Calgary Zoo.

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February Funk

February is a tough month. Not enough sunlight, busy at work, lousy movie selection and really, really tired of the cold weather. Last year when I broke from my winter hibernation, I needed to garden. And a trip to the local nursery quickly gave me the fix I was looking forward. It started innocently enough with a single little cactus in a nice clay pot. The collection began to develop soon after. Here’s the latest addition.

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Class 11

A frosty day for class yesterday. The Urban Farmer Ron Berezan was our host for the day and his presentation covered xeriscaping, growing fruit on the prairies, plus edible perennials, mushrooms, water harvesting and sheet mulching. If you are gardening in Alberta visit his site for plant lists and information on sustainable and edible gardening. He also has a roster of workshops, travel opportunities and presentations scheduled for 2010.

So to quell the spring fever that Ron’s presentation was causing I hit the outdoors at lunch and took a wander to the reopened Prehistoric Park at the zoo.

Now the Calgary Zoo has a long history with prehistory. In 1936, 56 dinosaurs went on display at the island. Finnish sculptor John Kanerva designed the maquettes and managed the construction of the life-size models. The following year the Zoo’s Natural History Park opened. Dinny the Dinosaur was also completed that year. All hand built, full scale models based on the knowledge of the day. I think that’s an incredibly ambitious project for the time. Image below: Calgary Zoo archives 1936

About twenty years later (1959) Dinny the Dinosaur was adopted as the Zoo’s official mascot. Image below: Calgary Zoo archives 1959

There must be hundreds of Polaroids in Calgary photo albums of kids and families in front of Dinny. This 120-ton, 35 foot tall cement sculpture modelled after the Apatosaurus was massive and I remember it was always disappointing that you were not allowed to touch. Look at that tail – it was built for climbing.

Fast forward another 20ish years to 1983 and the opening the new Prehistoric Park at the zoo. I went to art college with a number of graduates who put in time building the rocks at the site. Quentin went on to build a career based on sculptured environments. And dino builders Brian and Mary Ann have built an international reputation for their sculpture. You can see their work at the Royal Tyrrell Museum, and other natural history museums in the US and Asia.

This image shows the new sculptures and fresh plantings in ‘84. It was a weirdly barren site when it opened. Image below: Calgary Zoo archives 1984

Almost 30 years later the site is now a mature woodland forest with native shrubs and plants. And the paths are paved.

The reopened Prehistoric Park is featuring a traveling show called Dinosaurs Alive! It features animatronic dinosaurs that roar, snap and twitch. It’s here until the fall. There were a number of families at the new exhibit when I visited. The sounds of the day were a combination of Jurassic Park roar and rumble mixed with squealing and crying kids.

Dinny was made a Registered Historical Resource so declared in 1987. I’m not sure where he is in the park. I thought he had been demolished and just a memory, so I’m on the search for him next Saturday.

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Class 10

Midterm exam yesterday and then everything you’d ever want to know about compost – didn’t realize how much I didn’t know on the topic. But couldn’t stay for the afternoon session. Headed up to Edmonton for the opening of the Art Gallery of Alberta. It was getting dark by the time we got there.

Randall Stout is the architect of the new show space. And you can tell from the exterior that there’s a connection between him and Gehry – he worked for Frank and Associates for seven years.

They cut the ribbon on Saturday morning, with all of the politicians, but more importantly funders and key supporters. Former executive director Tony Luppino was at the opening, himself a key figure in the project. Unfortunately he’s no longer with the AGA.

Mark Myers at the National Gallery of Canada secured a three-year partnership with AGA to showcase special exhibitions presented by both institutions. The opening show is Goya The Master Printmaker: The Disasters of War and Los Caprichos, prints of the Disasters of War of 1810-23. I like Goya and these prints were lovely to see.

But the show that you have to make the trip for is the two Janet Cardiff and George Bures Miller pieces.  The Murder of Crows is the North American premier of this piece. It’s up on the third floor and it’s their largest sound installation to date. It has 98 speakers, runs on a 30-minute loop and like all Janet and George pieces weaves together voice, music and sound. It will give you goosebumps.

And speaking of chills, also make sure to see their other installation called Storm Room. You experience a storm, including driving rain, lightening, thunder and a leaky roof. If you are a fan of prairie storms, you’ll love the sensitivities of this exhibit.

Edmonton should be proud of the Art Gallery of Alberta. Too bad, so sad Calgary.

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Class 9

Grass and invasive plants sprinkled with mulch were the topics of the day. And why not be in school all day. Not much stirring outside, not even a porcupine.

But the big tease has started. The new conservatory was awash with the fragrance of spring bulbs and colour drama displays in the containers.

Spring inside, winter out.

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