our-best-nest

[our-best-nest]

On May 7 I dug this mailbox bed for dwarf floss flower, ornamental sage, and cornflowers. They grew well until the drought, and then gradually became unwell and died. Last night I replaced it all with coreopsis, verbena and purple sage. This morning I found a bumble bee really enjoying the verbena. 

It’s important to me to keep flowers here because our neighborhood community has a culture of meeting one another at such places. 

[our-best-nest]

We tried an experiment with the raised beds. On the right, four rows alternate strawflower, marigold, rosemary & lavender, marigold. On the left, five rows alternate onion, marigold, marigold & strawflower, pineapple sage & culinary sage & lemon thyme & thyme, marigold, oregano & strawflower.

We laid organic compost and organic composting cover paper before planting. The paper lasted many weeks and provided for wonderful weed protection. 

The four rows of alternating plants seems to be the better option. Midway through the summer, it was still possible to distinguish the four separate rows, whereas the five rows quickly became very crowded and even some of the marigolds were entirely overtaken by the strawflower. The onions are entirely overtaken and I would not be surprised if they are found dead when we do fall maintenance in a few weeks. To give the plants more room to grow, four rows would be the better option next year,

Everything in this bed did well during this year’s extreme drought. Over the last three weeks, as the drought has worsened, the marigolds, strawflowers, and all the herbs have become huger and have produced more flowers. Depending what the almanac forecasts for 2023, a good experiment would be one bed drought-hardy, the other being the opposite. 

[our-best-nest]

Our circular bed as it appeared in August 22. Narcisa is seen clinging to cosmos stems. The bed, grown from seed, is now 5 feet in diameter.