Original Publication:
Snowmass Village Sun, Snowmass Village, Colorado
“Winter’s over!” shouted my
husband from his computer. He’s a
weather website junkie. “Looks like
we’ll be pretty much out of the frozen zone by the first of March.” Tom has heroically maintained semi-safe
walking paths around our icy property for months on end.
Mack has been in the frozen,
foggy, snowy zone since early December. Snowmass Village is the banana belt by
comparison. Nasty inversions blanketed
much of the Grand
Valley with a cloud of
freezing smoggy air. Fog rolling off the
Colorado River created white knuckle white out
conditions on Highway 70 many mornings.
“Winter’s over!” whispered
the pear tree outside the window. In the
last week, fat, fuzzy buds popped out to stud the branches.
“Winter’s over!” smiled the
postmistress as she handed me the big box from the seed company.
We still have a lot of snow
on the ground, but it’s going fast. The
ground is spongy. I had to put the truck
in 4-wheel-drive to navigate my neighbor’s unpaved lane.
The arrival of the seeds marks
the beginning of spring at our house. I
take a lot of time checking in my seed order.
I linger over the mental vision of each plant in its full glory. I read the instructions on every seed packet
to note any special needs and properly time greenhouse propagation. I remember past successes and failures. Each year I try some things for the first
time. I speculate about their success, optimistically fantasizing verdant
growth. Seed order check-in is a dreamy
process punctuated by entries on the propagation spreadsheet.
Our demonstration garden is
in the middle of industrial downtown Mack.
We’re on metered water. Water is rightly very expensive, so we don’t
grow a thing we can’t eat, use for medicine or sell at market. We specialize in container planting,
including old tires (which are very successful). Our garden would never compete
in the fancy neighborhoods, but it looks just fine across the street from the
repo car lot. It’s a great setting for surprising plantings. The place looks
like it was designed by Dr. Seuss.
Some gardeners strive for
symmetry and flow. We just want to stop
traffic. And it works! People sometimes hit reverse to check out broom
corn growing in a tractor tire or a block of giant sunflowers. This year we are planting fancy corn with pink
and green striped leaves and dark red tassles.
We operate the garden on a
seasonal farm market basis. It’s a lot
of fun. People bring their kids and
their houseguests to see what new weirdness we are featuring. Some take home potted
herbs for their own gardens. Most leave
with new ideas to try at home, vowing never again to part with an old tire.
We love appealing to the
kids. The pink striped corn is for them. It should also add a Seussian touch to market
flower arrangements. We are planting “Pool Ball” zucchini. It produces little round squash in various
shades of green and yellow. They look
perfect for little round hands to pick. I figure if the kid picks the veggies,
the kid is likely to eat the veggies.
We’ll test out the theory on our granddaughter, Miss Picky Pants.
This year we are trying a
short-season variety of okra. If you
have never seen an okra plant, it looks like a hibiscus bouquet on
steroids. We’ll see how a native African
staple does in the high desert. The
plant did well back in Missouri,
where my friend planted a 70-foot row of the prodigious producers just because
“they’re so pretty”. As I inventoried the
okra seed, I thought of breaded, fried baby okra and cold beer in the shade on
a hot summer day in Mack.
Pak choy and fragrant
moonflower are newcomers to our staple crops of the usual vegetables and
flowers. I’m especially excited about a
new melon we are trying. “Queen Anne’s
Pocket” is a pocket-size striped melon with edible, but tasteless, flesh. People grow it solely for aroma. This vintage variety was all the rage in
Victorian London, where ladies carried the fragrant melons in their pockets to
shield them against the disgusting odors of the street. The lascivious description in the seed catalogue
suggests that an arrangement of just of few melons will perfume the house. Of course, I just had to have it.
“Winter’s over!” announced
the president of the Fruita Farmers Market board when she called to advise us
of the upcoming planning meeting. An
additional 4-8 inches of snow are predicted in Mack this weekend. No worries.
It will soon be meltwater to nourish the roots awakening beneath the
blanket.
