Career Decision: Landscape Architect or Major League Baseball Pitcher

From today's baseball blog at The New York Times:

"You’ve got to love what Matt Palmer is doing out in Anaheim. He tossed a complete game to beat the Red Sox on Wednesday, improving his record to 4-0. The guy nearly quit baseball to put his horticulture degree to use as a landscaper. Now he’s the Angels’ version of Aaron Small, circa 2005."

The short story is that Matt Palmer struggled for years in the minor leagues and almost gave up the dream of pitching in the Major League. The post-baseball career plan was to become a landscape architect. Through perseverence, the encouragement of his wife, and some lucky breaks, he got his chance this season. I guess the landscape architect plans will have to wait.

How to Plant Tulips Throughout Your Garden: along pathways, in mixed borders, under trees, and in raised beds

As a follow-up to my my prior posts, "What I've Learned About Growing Tulips in New Jersey," and "The Cutting Garden: the Joy of Spring Tulips," here are more photographs of this year's tulips. Where can and should you plant tulips? As you can see, you can (and I do) plant tulips almost everywhere in all sorts of colors and color combinations: along pathways, in mixed borders, under trees, and in raised beds.
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Here are some dark purple tulips that I planted along the front steps.
Here is a mix of multi-colored tulips in the mixed Front Border.
Despite the removal of the old oak tree and stump, some of the orange tulip bulbs I had planted around it actually survived.
Here is a picture of some of the later blooming tulips in the Cutting Garden.

Here is a mix of yellow and purple tulips under the crabapple tree.

Here is a mix of white tulips along the back steps.

This is a close-up of some of those white tulips along the back steps.

Some medium purple tulips in the Bird Garden.

Is the Crabapple the Best Tree for the Suburban Garden? Pictures of White and Pink Crabapple Blossoms

I love all of my spring flowering trees, but I have a special love for my two crabapple trees, one white and one pink. They have beautiful flowers, an attractive shape, and fruit that provides winter interest and food for the birds. What more could you ask for?
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The white crabapple tree replaced a dying Japanese Maple and is a year-round focal point in the Egg Garden. For a picture of this tree in winter with the crabapple fruits, click here.
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The pink crabapple is located outside of the Children's Garden. For some reason, the pink tree has grown twice as fast as the white one. Also, the birds love to nest in this particular tree.

The First Clematis of the Season: Fragrant Spring on the Fort in the Walled Garden

My first clematis of the season, Fragrant Spring, is starting to bloom. It is growing up a trellis on the side of the children's fort in the backyard. I purchased it from my favorite clematis nursery, Chalk Hill Clematis, which unfortunately has now closed. If anyone has any recommended clematis nurseries, let me know.
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Related post: How to Build a Children's Playhouse (the Fort)
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Pink Bleeding Heart (Dicentra spectabilis) Flowers in the Front Border

Google Analytics: Heirloom Gardener's April Traffic

One of the most interesting things I find about writing this blog is the readers it attracts. Without readers, there would be no point to this blog, so thank you very much for following, subscribing, searching, clicking, reading, commenting and linking.

Each month, traffic has grown significantly year-over-year, but not necessarily month-to-month as there is a definite seasonality to the readership (stronger in spring/summer). Using Google Analytics, here are some of the April Traffic statistics:

Top Traffic Sources
1. http://www.google.com/
2. http://www.images.google.com/
3. http://www.yahoo.com/
4. http://www.blogger.com/
5. http://www.aol.com/
6. http://www.gardeninggonewild.com/ (thank you)
7. http://www.sustainable-gardening.com/ (thank you)
8. http://www.images.google.ca/
9. http://www.maydreamsgardens.blogspot.com/ (thank you)
10. http://www.ask.com/

Top Search Keywords
1. raised vegetable beds
2. how to build a sandbox
3. gardening on a hill
4. annabelle hydrangea
5. keeping rabbits out of garden
6. spirea pruning
7. pee gee hydrangea
8. pruning spirea
9. caryopteris pruning
10. spirea bush

Top Content
1. How and When to Prune Caryopteris, Spirea, Butterfly Bush, Pee Gee Hydrangea, Annabelle Hydrangea, Smokebush, Elderberry
2. How to Build Raised Vegetable Beds (on a Slope/Hill)
3. Old Farmer's Almanac: Spring Planting Schedule (April) and Heirloom Seed Sources
4. A Chicken Wire Raised Bed Cover: How to Protect Vegetables from Groundhogs, Rabbits and Squirrels
5. Advice Wanted: How to Keep Rabbits Out of the Garden
6. Planting Early Spring Cool Season Crops and Vegetable Gardening 101
7. Raised Vegetable Beds: Organically Preparing the Soil for Planting
8. How to Prune Pee Gee Hydrangeas and Wisteria: Before Spring Growth Resumes
9. Two Perfect Flowering Plants for Arbors: Betty Corning Clematis and Dortmund Rose
10. The Best of Heirloom Gardener (updated as of March 2009)

Hyacinth in blue, white, pink, cream and purple - one of the most fragrant flowers of spring

Blue and white hyacinth in the Bird Garden
Pink hyacinth in the Children's Garden
Cream hyacinth near the Cutting Garden
Purple hyacinth near the Rose Garden

Spring Vegetables: Fresh Lettuce and Asparagus

As a follow-up to my March 24th post on cool season crops, the children started to harvest their first fresh vegetables this past week: loose leaf lettuces and asparagus. The fresh asparagus from the garden is especially delicious. I just wish we had more of it.

Grape Hyacinth (Muscari) - minor bulbs that are good for mass plantings and/or as edging along mixed borders

Viburnum - a great spring shrub for beauty and fragrance (zone 6b)

Buy Divisions from one of Piet Oudolf's Gardens in New York City on Thursday, May 7th

From The New York Times: "More than 100 different kinds of perennials and grasses from the Battery gardens in Lower Manhattan designed by Piet Oudolf, the Dutch landscape designer, will be available for $10 each at the Battery Conservancy plant sale on May 7, from 11 a.m. to 6 p.m...'We have over 3,000 divisions to sell, all from the incredibly strong plants in our gardens,' said Warrie Price, right, the founder and president of the Battery Conservancy, created in 1994."

You can see some of these plants in my pictures from Battery gardens here.

The Cutting Garden: The Joy of Spring Tulips

One of my early posts on Heirloom Gardener was "Creating Space for a Garden: the Cutting Garden" in which I wrote about transforming the small 15x30 foot side yard from an unused space into a delightful little Cutting Garden.

These past few weeks have been a joy in the Cutting Garden, as the tulips (pictured) have begun to bloom.

Fresh cut tulips bring such great joy throughout my home, as well as to the homes of my friends, and the variety that you are able to grow at home is so much more amazing than what you can purchase.

And, as I mentioned in my Ten Tips for Planning a Children's Garden, I plant enough in the Cutting Garden that my children can cut as many tulips as they wish without me worrying that they've cut too many.

Lastly, growing them in the fenced-in Cutting Garden protects them from the deer (though not the squirrels and chipmunks), that I wrote about in What I've Learned About Growing Tulips in New Jersey.