16 jan 15 winter surprise

winter day surprise

when I lift cold frame to store

crisp taste of summer

24 sep 14 harvest

My little apple tree had a good harvest this year and here's the last few raspberries, too.

The first artichoke I've ever grown!

Sunflower catching the last rays of the evening.

13 apr 20 signs of alaska spring

Two weeks ago we were 20 degrees below normal, then 10 degrees below last week, and finally yesterday we topped 40. Spring is coming!

Spring snowfall - 12" on April 9th

Icicles on the berm along the driveway

seedlings in the living room window

snow biking wearing just a sweatshirt

29 jul 12 summer color

I'm waiting for the big winds on a dreary day in Anchorage.  I'm behind on editing and posting photos from the summer so I decided to start with the annual garden tour by the Anchorage Garden Club. 

1 jul 12 nearing the first bend

Unbelievably, it's the first of July already, and my last entry reads to me like the taper before the big event. Here are a few photos of the race that is my Alaska Summer 2012.

We attended the Alaska Botanical Gardens' Gala event.  Paul submitted a cedar Japanese Snow Lantern this year. About two dozen artists included works of many media.  I liked this metal spiral that had been carefully centered over a young plant.

We took Blossom to Whittier mid-month.  The weather was unmatched on Solstice Weekend.  Endless sun and wind for sailing. 

I visited Cordova for the first time this past weekend with two former co-workers.  We had sunny weather the first two days and more typical Prince William Sound weather the last two.  South-central Alaska seems blanketed with lupine this year.  Here is a roadside bouquet down the beach from the lodge where we stayed.

28 may 12 off to a good start

Memorial Day weekend is the traditional start to summer, and in Alaska, that typically means the start of a race to cram as much Life as we can into the many hours of daylight we have.  I've taken a different approach the last few years.  Instead of scrambling to pack up for a long weekend of camping/boating/rafting/get-out-of-town and driving north/south with half of Anchorage, I stay home.

Paul still does an overnight raft trip on the Susitna River with some friends.  I do miss that raft trip but I must express a measure of self-satisfaction and calm as he shops for food, pulls camping gear out of the garage, and scurries around to get north to the put-in on time.  All that will come for me for trips that we do together this summer.  I prefer to start my summer at a slower pace, to savor the longer days, the warmer weather (hopefully), and my time outside in a quiet neighborhood.

I concentrate on gardening on this long weekend.  This is the recommended time to plant most vegetables and flowers in our area, and it usually takes me most of the weekend to do so.  This year I'm behind on cleaning up perennial flower beds because of the tendonitis in my shoulder, so there's been extra weeding and raking to do.  If I can get most of the weeds this weekend, I stand a chance of staying ahead of them despite the fact that we'll be gone almost every other weekend this summer.

Soon I'll be caught up in maximizing my use of the daylight even though it often requires ignoring the fact that the weather may not be very summery.  Maybe you really do need to live through six months of cold, white landscape and dark to understand how 70 can be considered hot and 80 is a reason to close offices.  After this winter of record snow and prolonged deep cold, I'm still amazed at how green the scene is and how warm it feels.

Summer in Alaska is so much more intense than anyplace I've ever lived and it's hard to explain the intensity or the appeal of it to others.  While talking to my mom this morning, I mentioned that the high yesterday was 48 with a constant drizzle, and that the clouds clearing overnight brought the temperature down to 38.  She said, "And you like living there?"  I echoed that question when she said she was on her way to watch a Memorial Day parade in the sunny muggy 80 degrees of central New York.  It's hard to explain that 50 in the sun early this afternoon felt about 20 degrees warmer than that drizzle yesterday.  And could she imagine that by late afternoon 58 on the deck would entice me to sit outside with my feet up, wide-brimmed hat on my head, sipping my first cojito* of the summer?

Summer is off to a good start in Anchortown.

* cojito: my version of a mojito = Midnight Sun Lemon Fizz, club soda, shot of tequila, and mint from the garden

29 apr 12 glimpses of spring

A fast spring thaw continues here in Anchorage with snow melting about a foot per week in the yard.  The white and dark green world of our long winter is slowly transforming with the emergence of large swatches of brown ground and old gray snow berms.  A few bright spots of color are peeking out at the margins - the daffodils and muscari up against the south side of the house, the rhubarb on the snow's edge in the garden.

In the morning, the songs of robins and ruby-crowned kinglets greet me and Bhikkhu as we walk down the driveway to get the paper.  The newly exposed ground presents the little dog with new smells and old ones that were muffled for many months.  My less sensitive nose is slower to notice the earthier smell of spring.  What I notice is the warmth.  Even 30 in the morning feels warmer now than it did at midday a month ago. 

The promise of summer will soon be fulfilled.

The melt is somewhat uneven depending upon sun exposure and dark objects. In the last week over a foot of snow had melted around my meauring stick yet the snow was still over a foot deep in many parts of the garden.

22 apr 12 transitions

The snow continues to melt fast enough that I felt confident that any seeds I planted would have an outside home this summer.  Several flats in the living room window are sprouting with lettuce, cabbage, radicchio, broccoli, tomatoes, and a multitude of greens.

A foot of snow melted since last week!

4 apr 12 spring thaw

The snow retreated from the south foundation only two weeks ago and the tiny heads of the muscari are already pushing through the dead leaves.  Slowly the snow level is dropping in the rest of the yard.   The depth varies around the yard, from a foot in the south yard to three at the garden to four around the driveway.  The driveway is almost clear of ice except under the deck where it remains cooler and the sun can't reach.  Almost all of the snow slid off the roof in the last week.   Only a thin shelf on the flat dormer roof continues to simultaneously melt and inch its way over the eave, leaving us to wager on whether it will teeter off or disappear first.  Warm temperatures are melting this record snowfall quickly.  We've never seen a winter like this, though, so I'll try to track the thaw progress until it's all gone.

this flamingo will be tracking the snow depth by the garden gate - 3' today

Here's the yardstick for the rise and fall of the snow - compare to the zenith less than a month ago

31 jul 2011 bloomin' anchorage

Our tradition of biking the Anchorage Garden Tour on the last Sunday of July wasn't deterred this year by a little rain. Pam and Roger joined us for a third tour, and Rose was properly baptized by Mother Nature on her inaugural tour. The quality of the gardens was especially high this year, and the biking was as rewarding as ever. Five of the gardens were somewhat clustered near us on the south side of town. One outlier in Spenard had us hustling north to catch the last -- and best? -- before the close at 5:00. Instinct and Rose's prior residence in Spenard helped us to navigate several neighborhoods so we could avoid the larger roads most of the way. We ended the tour with a picnic in Spenard on a dry patch of grass under a spruce tree.

late june garden

My brother has been sending photos of his beautiful vegetable garden in Wisconsin. Cool temperatures and a late planting have meant a slow start to my garden, so I've been less than eager to reciprocate with photos. But here at the end of June, the plants are putting on some weight and I'm not embarrassed to share.

This is my main vegetable garden area. The entire form, from materials to size to layout, has evolved in the 12 years we've lived here. Unfortunately the trees in the yard have grown so this site isn't as sunny as it used to be. As a tree hugger, however, I am stuck with the spruce and birch. So this year I looked for some other places to plant veggies on our lot.

I usually have potted herbs by the back door. I included a gorgeous red lettuce in the wine barrel this year.

In addition to the two wine barrels that I've had for years on the deck, this year I set up 6 plastic pots of similar size. They were free at the annual pot recycling event that the botanical garden hosts. The pots are planted with veggies and edible flowers. A tripod in each will hopefully support scarlet runner beans, canary bird vine, sweet peas, or nasturtium. I've also got tomatoes and basil in pots with wall-o-waters around them.

The southside of our house has a long narrow bed that hasn't had much more than daffodils and tulips. Last year I was inspired by the poor returns in my vegetable garden and the edible designs at the Alaska Botanical Garden to add vegetables and flowers to fill in after the bulbs end in early June. I've added sunflowers, shiso, amaranth, broccoli, parsley, chinese cabbage, borage, calendula, and assorted other edible plants.

Two years ago we had to replace our septic tank, which was located near the back of the house under my largest perennial bed. They dug up two large boulders which became part of the landscaping. We saw a dry creek bed on the garden tour that year and Paul created one for us. I had dug up over 200 plants and almost all made the transition to the new bed and seem more lush with the additional topsoil and compost. Paul's torii gate Balance is in the upper left at our back patio.

11 may 15 2 months in a post

This may be the longest that I haven't updated the blog in the last 5 years that I've been doing it. I keep wanting to simplify my life but saying 'no' can be a problem for me. It's been a busy 2 months with existing responsibilities, new obligations, and some fun. I'll focus on the fun to catch up on the transition from late winter to spring. I start with Bhikkhu because he is fun and the last two weeks have been busy with vet visits to make him healthy, too.

The end of March featured the glorious weather that we come to expect of that month. We took advantage of warm temperatures and soft snow to explore some trails that we normally bike in the winter.

Taking a bone from a scruffy white dog is not like taking candy from a baby... Paul found this for Bhikkhu during a spring ski at the end of March in Talkeetna.

On Aprils Fools Day we skied out to friends' cabin at Dalteli Lake with three other couples. Roger snowmachined our stuff in and left us a message in the snow at one of the intersections. We stayed for two nights, skiing to another lake on the full day, to visit other Talkeetna friends.

Alaska Airlines treated passengers to a fantastic view of Denali in early April. I was on my way back from a small conference at Chena Hot Springs, east of Fairbanks. The springs are nice but the best part may have been the fresh salads, including tomatoes and basil, that they grow in the greenhouse. The Ice Palace is also a trippy (and cold) experience. If you haven't been to Chena in the past decade, it's worth a trip.

By late April, the daffodils on the south side of the house were beginning to bloom. The snow was slower to leave the rest of the yard. In fact, there's still a small patch on the north side under a birch tree.

May has been beautiful, too. Here is sunset around 10:00 on May 2nd. It barely gets dark at night now.

Last weekend we went to Talkeetna for our annual episode of voyeurism of mating birds. We didn't set any personal records at Birdathon, but we had fun hiking and biking.

I can't promise anything, but I do hope to get better about updating the blog. We've got a new computer which has made photo uploading and editing a little faster.

2 oct 10 harvest

In many ways, this was a disappointing summer for gardening. The sun and heat of late May transitioned to one of the rainiest, cloudiest summers on record. Our vegetable garden site has become shadier over the years as the birch trees around the perimeter of our backyard have grown. And I've been busy with other activities and not spending the time I should to feed the plants and the soil and to hunt the slugs. The latter loved this summer -- between the constant moisture and my lack of vigilance, they had a long party.

At one point in August I almost gave up on getting much out of the garden. I was even buying lettuce at the farmer's market because my leafy greens weren't large enough to harvest yet and I'd already thinned as much as I could for baby green salads.

But being a gardener is partly about being an optimist, and I stuck it out. I visited the Alaska Botanical Gardens and took inspiration for next year in their edible landscape plantings. I read The Conscious Gardener by Alaskan Ellen Van deVisse, and tried to pick more slugs while not thinking of them with vengeance. I also took note of what veggies had done well -- red cabbages for the fall and winter, a beautiful red sorrel that dresses up every salad, and abundant nasturtiums.

But the real surprise and joy are the apples. I received this tree at least five years ago in a tree adoption lottery used to be held in Anchorage every spring. The little tree produced a few apples the first couple of years, then maybe a dozen, and two dozen last year. This spring on the Veggie Roll I learned that I should remove some of the spring buds to get bigger apples. I finally got around to doing that in late June and was surprised at the number of buds. Surely they wouldn't all develop into fruit. But they did. The final tally -- 103 apples!

Most of these fit within the hole formed by touching my thumb to my middle finger. They're beautiful sitting in a red bamboo bowl on the counter. The slightly tart flavor will be perfect for applesauce, one of the tastes of fall from my upstate New York childhood. These little red-golden globes may be the shiny lining in the garden in this wet summer.

31 may 10 and it's summer

You know it's summer in Alaska when ...

I'm never quite sure when to say that summer begins here. If you're Paul, you stick strictly to the idea that equinoxes and solstices bookend each season. I tend to think of those dates as the halfway marks. But when spring is really only a couple of weeks long, how can you call that a season? Or is Memorial Day the true kickoff, with a long weekend, holiday events, and the start of outdoor gardening?

I don't know when it truly starts, but this past weekend, I knew it was summer in Anchortown. I wore shorts all weekend and it was 60 degrees on Sunday morning at 7:00! I swapped out the flannel sheets with the 'cool-feel' summer sheets. All the leaves are full-fledged and green now and the elderberries are starting to bloom. And the surest sign -- the mosquitoes are so thick in the lower elevations of Bicentennial Park that I couldn't let the dog stop to do much of anything that wasn't vital.

Paul is reunioning back East with the Buttons so I devoted the weekend primarily to gardening. On Saturday, I rebuilt two raised beds for vegetables and planted all my seeds and seedlings (except the last few that I bought that morning at the farmer's market). On Sunday I pedaled around town on the Veggie Roll, a tour of vegetable gardens organized by Bicycle Commuters of Anchorage. We saw some creative and productive gardens where people are trying really hard to grow most of their produce right here in the big city. On Monday I turned to the flower beds. I weeded, watered, and mulched with leaves and wood shavings from Paul's 2009 winter project. I still need to weed and mulch the raspberry patch, but by Monday evening, I had accomplished all the big tasks on the garden to-do list.

Yes, it's summer in Alaska ... go-go-go while the sun shines.

B taking a little break on Sunday evening in Bicentennial Park

4 sep 09 fat of the great land

I've been an avid vegetable gardener for the last 12 years or so. Something about providing our own food just feels good and right. And it's another great reason to spend more time outside in the summer.

Gathering from what Nature is planting has been less of a regular activity. When we lived in Talkeetna, Paul caught the fishing bug and spent many an evening casting for kings and coho. We ate well. In the first few years after moving to Anchorage, most of our fish came from friends who worked with Paul at Katmai or Lake Clark National Parks. They had subsistence rights and would share some of their harvest. In the last few years, we've supported the Alaska commercial fishery and have enjoyed scallops, shrimp, halibut, and salmon from the local fish counters.

Berry picking in Alaska is almost as popular as fishing. I've picked some high bush cranberries over the years and have made liqueurs or mixed them with my apples for jams. We've picked blueberries, huckleberries, salmon berries, and raspberries if they've presented themselves some place where we're hiking. Most of those have just gone into our mouths immediately. We've never picked with the intent to fill the freezer.

Last year our friend Jon, an avid (obsessive?) blueberrier and mushroom picker, showed us how to identify bolete mushrooms in the local woods. He guided us again a few weeks ago to make sure we knew what we were doing (and to feed his own addiction to the hunt). Since then we've pulled a few from our yard and our neighbors and have filled up a large ziplock bag with dried mushrooms.

Summer is turning to fall here in Alaska and the primal urge is on to fill up the larder and get ready for winter. Last Sunday Paul went fishing for coho with two friends in Talkeetna. While he was casting at Birch Creek slough, I picked blueberries and boletes around our cabin. In the days since, I've been checking the garden to see what needs to be picked. Raspberries and strawberries are ripening daily. The pea pods are almost too big to eat and the romaine is reaching high to be cut. Last evening I trimmed back the basil in the living room window and froze some pesto. The tomatoes are finally ripening and once again I remember why I try to grow them without a greenhouse -- the harvest may be small but no tomato tastes as sweet as the one you just picked. I picked the end of the rhubarb over a week ago and it's time now to boil up what didn't become cake or compote and jar up some rhubarb-ginger jam.

With all these fresh, local foods, both homegrown and wild, in the kitchen, the tastes still fresh in my mouth and mind, I think that I ought to make more time for berry picking, fishing, mushrooming, and gardening. Maybe I don't garden and gather just because it feels good and right. Maybe it's because these foods just taste so good.

Bhikkhu showing off part of our harvest

Here's an inspirational and useful website for cooking with gathered foods: fat-of-the-land.blogspot.com.