Thursday, April 3, 2008

"Feed Me!" says the Garden...

What seems so simple and sensible a garden task to do can be the hardest to get accomplished. Why is that? Why do we find the number one recommended garden solution, like feeding your plants, is not thought about as often as it should be? Perhaps the answers will never come to us if we talk about plants.

So let’s talk about people as if they were plants. And in this way perhaps you can think to change the word ‘people’ for ‘plants’ as this blog reads on. We all understand people need to eat when they wake in the morning, right? After all Frances could easily say “You are such a bear in the morning,” sometimes… Or perhaps you just thought about bears coming out of hibernation. We would then say “Oh yea I get it, they have not eaten all winter, no wonder they are hungry.” No wonder I act like a bear in the morning. I am sure some of you act like one too. I’m hungry; we’re all hungry! Certainly a good breakfast has been known to go a long way. And after a long days work, dinner would be a welcomed sight too. So everyday we feed ourselves. No big deal, right? We just do it as if it is second nature. Bears forage for food after a long winters sleep; second nature once again. So when it comes down to it why do people eat? They eat to stay healthy, fight off disease, feel good, the list is endless. Basically people eat to stay alive.

I know you get it now. But please indulge a moment more to wrap this up. The lawn will not green up without being fed food in the spring. So apply a good organic fertilizer now before it starts to wake up. The flowers you plant in spring will not grow as well as you would like without being fed through out the spring, summer and fall. So when you plant them, make sure to amend the soil by adding fertilizer. The trees and shrubs will not grow old gracefully without food too. So before they break bud, make sure there is something for them to wake up to and eat. And as if you need an example here is what an evergreen would tell you if it could talk. “So you expect me to grow old with lush full branches from the top to bottom? And with what should I dine on if you do not feed me twice a year?” So now as you drive by many a home to and from work looking at every evergreen tree in sight, notice the young thin yellowing ones or the old tall ones that look like they are loosing their bottom or inside branches. What you see are starving trees. They are dying from the bottom up and from the inside out.

I could only hope to drive down the road someday and hear someone yell out the window to some poor soul raking his lawn “Hey Mack, looks like your trees are hungry and it looks like you never missed a meal in your life! Could you do your trees a favor and feed them too? I can’t take it anymore!”

Now you know what goes through my gardening mind everyday. So enjoy your dinner and don’t forget to feed your plants the dessert...Get it?

See you in the nursery... http://www.grossmans.com/

1 comment:

Sid Raisch said...

Hi Larry,

Nice to read your insight into hungry plants. It's easy to ignore their signs of hunger since they're not audible until it's sometimes too late. Today is the day to fertilize!

Sid