Washington – Recent figures show that 2013 is turning out to be a banner year for the tireless workers who turn the fertile soil of American public opinion, planting seeds of doubt and raising the hackles and ire that feed our public discourse.
“We’re seeing massive amounts of confusion over everything,” said Republican narrative farmer Walter Todd, who planted a new variety of Obamacare Satanis in early July and is reports it is already in full-flower coast to coast.
“All I did was I told my brother in law at a Fourth of July picnic that Obamacare would ultimately lead to the socialist re-branding of Disney World as ‘Occupy Orlando’. It was just something provocative to say – I chased it with a few beers and the thing took off. I didn’t expect it to grow so fast.”
Experts say just about any story that has an identifiable villain and ends in disaster will take root and grow tall this year.
“The environment has been perfect for it,” says Katie Boo, a professional fear monger in the Boston area. “The summer got a late start and people had to cram a lot of activity into just a few short weeks. They’ve been too busy to think much about what they’re hearing – they just believe the last person they talked to.”
All the hours and care spent sewing confusion are starting to pay off. Now that Autumn has started we’re seeing record crops of divergent convictions, from where responsibility lies for the partial government shutdown (Republicans or Democrats) to the real cost of failing to raise the debt ceiling (impending financial cataclysm or mere bookkeeping adjustment) to the true nature of orange Jello (tasty low calorie dessert or radioactive Hellspawn).
“Honestly, there’s fertile ground just about everywhere for pretty much everything,” said Lars Shrillstone, a freelance alarmist. “I was in Phoenix last week and ran into a really healthy variety of ‘Ted Cruz is an Evil Robot’. Usually it doesn’t take hold that far west, but this year, anything goes.”
What grew tall in your yard this summer?
Trail Baboon 
twas a summer of discontent, my children had a heavy doses zero giveacrap and the general overview was that there is something wrong but there is always something wrong so learn to live with it. the political malcontents that are whining ecause there side lost are tiresome but then again they are tiresome anyway so what difference does it make. that kind of summer
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Good morning. The new kind of jerusalem artichokes that I am trying are now more than 10 feet tall with yellow flowers on top. My grandchildren, who have spent some time in my yard, are gaining stature. The younger one is getting tall and the older one is reaching into young adulthood. The news that reaches me at my home about what is happening in the world is causing me swell up with concern and worry. I guess you could say that I do have some bumper crops to take care of one way or the other.
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Had no idea that Jerusalem artichokes grew that tall.
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I don’t think I will be able to find room for them in my yard in Minneapolis.
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sure you can. just don’t grow anything else.
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In June a heavy harvest of medical mail. In july enrichment-depleting medical bills. So far this month a second crop of medical mail. I foresee the November produce yet coming.
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Teenager grew in maturity over the summer… a leap that I noticed in mid-August.
In the backyard, it’s still tomato-city. I should have counted, but I’m guessing that I’m over the 600 mark with the little Santa tomatoes. It think it may still be putting put little tomatoes in January!
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What grew was mostly the sorts of plants I have gotten from friends and planted haphazardly – some of those tall purple thingies (a variety of phlox?) here and there, yellow stuff (evening primrose is one theory) taking over as much as it possibly can and then some, and a lovely bit of Siberian Iris that continues to hold its own. The rain garden is finally looking like something now, too (though the chicken wire “border” to keep out the rabbits is something I wish we could do without).
Now that we are into autumn, we have started to see the first buds of, “Ihavetoomuchhomework” and “Idontwanttopracticepiano.” These are pernicious weeds that are best removed at the roots. If I can catch the first few, they tend not to crop back up. As our garden grows we also see more of “canihaveasleepover.” We have had some truly luscious blooms of “icantgetmynoseoutofabook” and “clarinetisfuntoplay” as well as our annual explosion of “yayihavemathhomework” – this last one can become insistent if not fed regularly with a supply of multiplication, prime numbers and algebraic concepts.
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the math fun can be exponentially enhanced with a counting backwards from 345 by 7. on your mark get set go. i had a math head and we had a blast.
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This has been a very strange year in the garden. Because of the cold winter that hung on into spring, with snow as late as early May, some of the plants that normally bloom in spring, didn’t. Half of my lavender plants didn’t survive, and neither did my big beautiful mums and one of my hydrangeas. In years past, my hydrangeas have bloomed in early spring, this year not until September. Normally these shrubs are covered with large, colorful flowers produced close to the leaves, but this year only a few sparse blooms emerged on long wispy stems that seem to be reaching for the sun. Two of my rose bushes took off this year. Both are climbing roses, and both have grown so tall that I can’t reach their tops, and what a glorious display they offered for several months. As any gardener will tell you, gardening is full of surprises. This year I planted red winter kale, and it has thrived. I had never planted kale before, so didn’t really know what to expect, but I am delighted that even my neglect failed to thwart it. But right now the morning glory is stealing the show. It has completely covered two of my tomato cages to the point where the tomatoes still on the plants don’t get enough sun to ripen. Just yesterday I harvested 8 large, semi-ripe tomatoes, but clearly there are a lot of green tomatoes to be incorporated into our diet within the next few weeks.
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I had more winter kill than usual in my two flower beds which were filled with more than enough perennials. That was a good thing because it left more room for the ones that survived and they thrived. I’m never been able to do a good job of thinning and spacing out perennials. Winter kill created the spaces in the plantings that I should have created myself.
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Rise and Shine Baboons!
Sunflowers and weeds. Zinnias are now very tall, and one climbing rose is putting out canes 10 feet tall. What a sight.
We PASSED our site visit for recertificaton Monday! Now I get to think about other things, too.
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woo hoo
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Congratulations, Jackie. Hope they didn’t make you jump through too many hoops.
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Way to go!!! Woot woot!
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Many hoops. My legs are scarred from the hoops.
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How often are you reviewed?
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Yayayayay!
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Some folks, I hear, battle Creeping Charlie in their lawns. At my house the bumper crop currently is creeping indecision. I love living where I do and dread the toil and risk involved with moving, but I increasingly feel I owe it to my daughter to sell this place and move near her and Liam. I’m doing no better with this issue than most folks do with Creeping Charlie.
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good luck with that upheaval. should be an interesting path.
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I think it is usually good for an older parent to live near to a daughter or son. That is just my opinion and I don’t know if that is something you should do, Steve. I know that you would be missed here is you moved. If you move you must promise us to continue to show up on this blog.
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Mushrooms! Right in the middle of the front yard! Tall white ones that look like basketball-playing button mushrooms. One of them had to be almost a foot tall. Another type of white mushroom, long stem and rounded pointy heads, didn’t grow as tall but were more prevalent.
Worst of all, the pus-colored yellow mushrooms that grow close to the ground, round and flat, almost doubled their territory this year. Embarrassing. If this keeps up, I might have to open a mushroom stand on my corner next year.
Chris in Owatonna
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i saw the tall one you are talking about in a neighbors yard. i really want to learn how to tell if they are edible or not. it is one of the things on my to do list. become mushroom knowledgable. a year form today i hope to be further along.
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I should do that too. I like mushrooms, but never wanted to risk trying one not from a grocery store or vetted by a mushroom expert.
Of course, if and when the economic apocalypse arrives, we’ll probably turn most of our yard into a produce garden. Nice to know where in the yard I’ll be able to grow mushrooms, too. 😉
Chris in O-town
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have you got some tree roots under the mushrooms that could be there to cause the growth?
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Dale,
On a side topic, how does one submit a guest blog for your consideration to be published? Thanks.
Chris in Owatonna
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Hey Chris — just email it to him. If you have a picture, you can send that along too! Easy peasy.
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connelly.dale@gmail.com
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Thanks, VS and Tim. I couldn’t find his email address.
Tim, as a matter of fact, I do have tree roots in that area. Two living pines and one birch that we cout down more than 10 years ago. I didn’t know that’s what the mushrooms fed upon.
C. in O.
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Most likely
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The Baboons tell you true, Chris. I look forward to reading your post!
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The William Baffin rose grew tall. That thing would take over the whole yard if I let it.
The raspberry plants are very tall.
And the weeds are so tall it’s not funny. The yard looks like I haven’t done anything to it in about 3 months. Oh, wait, I guess I haven’t done anything to it in about 3 months.
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The Brandyboy tomatoes we grew were enormous and I will plant them again next year. The hops grew their usual 15 feet up the deck, and the grapes that I cut back last fall grew right back onto the roof.
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I’ve heard that hops produce very long vines and i know that the same is true for grapes. Another plant that can get very tall is castor beans. The ones I grew in the past were about 8 feet tall with very large leaves. I have heard they can get even taller.
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Some of my raspberry plants are about 7 feet tall
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Alas, our hops, along with some of the Cherokee Purple tomatoes came down with blight and, as you probably know, once you can see the blight, it really is too late to apply fungicide with any success. We had to cut down the hops with out harvesting any of the flowers. Who wants fungal beer? We still got lots of the Cherokee tomatoes, although the foliage looked horrible.
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my garden is supposed to be idiot proof . i chose hostas because i was so impressed as a youth with the fact that when i parked a car on top of hostas they simply gorw around the sides of the tires and when the car moves the hostas fill in . i have spent years acquiring and splitting my hostas and setting the pretty ones in key places and talking the common ones and using that as groundcover to lessen mowing and watering requirements . i love hostas and have a couple other hosta folks i trade with. (jim if you have hosta you are leaving i will take whatever is reasonable.i will come and get them and whatever other perrenials you have for transplant.) my two new puppies have grown into full blown dogs and i love love love them but…. they do my hostas evil. the chase chipmonks and moles and dig up the ground and completely destroy what was a hosta garden just a minute ago, they like to lie in the cold wet soil so the not only bulldoze the plants they dig and push all those bumpy root stems on the plant out of the way and make it smooth to lay on. i waited for the hostas they toasted last year ot come back and they simply didnt. i started watching more closely this year and discovered what the deal was, i put up chicken wire first two feet next will be three foot and they are ok until the spot a chipmunk in there and then they do their antelope routine and leap with the greatest of ease over the barrier and into my fragile little babies and whammo i go out and cry and weep and wail and make plans for next years barriers,. electronic may be the next step those rotten little fence jumpers. any other ideas i ma ready to plan over the winter how to reclaim my little piece of garden. i am wondering if i have to switch to roses to keep them from rolling around on top of them and digging them out.
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We had a lab when I was growing up who insisted on digging in the garden. She liked to dig a few inches into the ground to find a bit of cool ground in the summer. My mom finally put up tall enough decorative edging that she wouldn’t go over it around the stuff she wanted to protect and left a spot that became the “dog’s spot for digging” in a shady spot along the fence. There was about a 3-4 inch deep, 4 foot wide divot/depression in that spot until the dog finally went to the shady spot in the great beyond. (Also: that dog liked to lie underneath my mom’s peonies, as I recall – wouldn’t dig them up, just slept under their leaves – pretty sure Mom kept those protected some with those metal loop cages.)
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Oregano. I always have lots and lots of oregano. Anyone want some?
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I might. I managed to kill mine.
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And in that vein… plantain. Anyone want some?
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Lots of stuff did well, but the pears knocked our socks off (ended up taking some to the food shelf), and we’ve gotten 30 gallons of cider from the apple tree. Not the best year (that would have been 50 gal.), but a treat because last year there were virtually no apples.
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I can’t say much about tall but I will talk about wide. I moved my compost pile (the wooden bin that wasband built 15 years ago had rotted and I got rid of it) and a volunteer squash or two started spreading. I couldn’t figure out what they were because they were a uniform cylindrical shape but bigger and more winter-squashy than zucchini. I looked online to try to figure out what they were but couldn’t find anything that matched.
Then I went to the Farmers’ market last week and saw the spaghetti squash. I asked the farmer if they were green when they were born and he confirmed. I cooked one and though it was still underripe, there was some of the spag squash stringiness. I have about 8 more of various sizes and one that is clearly pumpkin shaped. I will probably pick tomorrow and produce mass quantities of cooked squash to eat or freeze. Because it’s underripe, it is rather bland but I put some tasty home-grown-made tomato sauce on it and it was yummy. I love that it’s free.
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