Merry Christmas from the White House!

From a recent visitor to the White House, to be more precise. Yes, thats me standing beneath the presidential seal (major photo-op), and on the left is the grand north entrance. If Id planned ahead and contacted my congressman I could have taken the White House tour with the general public BUT for some reason cameras arent allowed during them. (A holiday bummer, right?) Then eureka an invitation to tour AND photograph the White House was sent to all staff and volunteers for the National Park Service, so this past weekend, on a ridiculously balmy night, I was there.

The White House is decorated with over 30 indoor trees, and the decorations took over 100 volunteers several days to put up. (Hey, I wonder how you get on THAT volunteer list!) And all the fuss is for the 70,000+ visitors to the White House during the season, plus the camera crew from HGTV.

We entered here and the nonstop photographing was in full swing. LOVE the over-the-door decorations here.

Another happy visitor and beyond, the book tree, close-up below.

All the decorations were fabulous, but my favorite part of the tour was hearing about all the famous and not-so-famous things that happened in each room. For example, the State Dining Room has hosted thousands of grand events, but also something we can all identify with Amy Carter roller-skating in it, a lot. So often, in fact, that the floors were ruined and had to be replaced. Okay, too bad about the floor but hearing this made me wonder if she was lonely, the only child young enough to live here with her parents.

And these famous portraits brought back memories.

These photos of recent holiday events just made me wish Id been a fly on the wall rocking with Mick Jagger and having Justin Timberlake show the prez photos on his phone!

Presidential pets are always featured in holiday displays, and Bo and Sunny here got lots of attention. Theyre made of ribbon.

The Red Room featured vases that contained real flowers but the vases themselves were covered with a sugary paste, which a tour guide told us looks better than it tastes. Close-up below.

Now for some photos courtesy HGTV, which commissions a local photographer to document the White House every Christmas, and broadcasts specials about the decorations.

The East Entrance column covers took a team of approximately 40 volunteers more than two months to make. Each cover was constructed over a plywood base using a total of 60,000 berries, 15,000 gold pinecone scales and 15,000 pieces of lemon leaf. These intricate column covers feature elegant berry, pinecone and leaf designs intended to form a 3-D geometric motif of illusion cubes.

Detail below by yours truly.

The gingerbread house features Bo and Sunny, with trees made from pinecones found on the White House grounds. The fountain is fully functioning.

This video from the White House demonstrates the construction of the gingerbread house.

The gingerbread house features its own miniature (edible) veg garden.

HGTV has a compilation of Bo decorations over the years here. The Bo above is made of cotton balls, and the one below is constructed of buttons.

This last Bo is made of plastic garbage bags.

The Bidens dog Champ cant compete with all that attention, but he DOES get this one replica, made by a volunteer. Champ, sleeping on the stairs here, seems unimpressed. From HGTVs Vice Presidents Mansion tour.

After leaving the White House I stopped to admire the view down Pennsylvania Avenue toward the Capitol and below, the official White House Christmas Tree, which is oddly lavender.

For more information: White House website about the holidays, and HGTVs White House photos and shows.

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Garden in a gun

While some conspiracy theorists believe thatshadow organizations such as theIlluminati or the New World Order or the American military-industrial complex are heck-bent on taking over our lives,ProfessorRoush haslong suspected thatmarketing groups are the real shadow organizations that will bring about the downfall of civilization. After all, theyve already convinced us to buy bottled tap water at prices exceeding that of our dwindling oil supplies.

As further evidence of my theory, I learned today that an Indiegogo campaign has formed to convince willing fools such as myself to part with moneyfor the promisethat a prairie garden can be created by haphazardly firing shotgun shells packed with flower seed intoa field.Several hours ago, if you asked me what I thought shotgun gardening was, Id have envisioned a haphazard assemblage of shrubs, flowers, grasses, and plants stuffed hither and yon into the landscape without a specific plan. Icertainly wouldnt have expected thatit meant that I could step out on my back porch and, true to VP Joe Bidensrecent suggestion, fire off a couple of rounds and create a garden.

Indiegogo, for the unenlightened, is a site that lets anyone use its powerful social media tools to create campaigns for raising money (or, if you prefer, suckers to fleece).The Shotgun Garden Indiegogo campaign is run from www.flowershell.com, where you canpurchase twelve-gauge shotgun shells loaded with twelve different kinds of seeds including peony, poppy, cornflower, daisy and sunflower seeds.

I have a plethora of experience strewing countless meadows-in-a-can around my environment without altering the forb/grass ratio of the native prairie to any appreciable degree, so Im somewhat skeptical that a few shotgun shells full of flower seed will improve the outcome. And these are live shells, dangerous in their own right. What if I mistookFlowershells for rock salt while chasing offthe pack of teenage boys who constantly circle my daughter?Youreno daisymight not workanymore as a nineteenth century throwback insult for those boys.I certainlycant riskthe chance of contributing to their delinquency if their backsides eachsprouted a personal poppy field.

No, Indiegogos efforts are wasted on me because Im certainly not going to wastemy hard-won cash on Flowershells,despite howinteresting andtemptingthey might seem to a bored gardener in winter. My gardening money is going to have to be wasted the old-fashioned way, attempting to grow meadowsfrom a can.

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Snow Challenged Chickens

We love to think of chickens frolicking in open pastures, living the sustainable life by chasing bugs and laying big, beautiful eggs. But have you ever wondered what happens when winter arrives and those free-ranging hens have to deal with snow?

When I started our flock in the salad days of June, it hadnt occurred to me that pasturing chickens might be a problem in winter. But after a noreaster dumped half a foot of snow on our Upstate New York farm recently, I have to conclude that chickens are no fans of the white stuff. When I opened the door to our mobile chicken coop after the storm passed, the hens just stood on the threshold and stared out as if in shocked disbelief at our newly snow-covered landscape.

Only days earlier, I need only crack open the coops door and the chickens would fly out in a mad rush to spend another day scratching in the grass in the orchard where the coop was parked. They ranged widely in their foraging. Our farm was their playground. Now, I opened the coop and the chickens refused to budge. Even their feeder full of grainstationed just a few feet away in the snowcouldnt make them stir.

I worried a little, because our coop-on-wheels was designed only to be big enough for the chickens to sleep in at night. It wasnt meant to be a full-time residence. But since the chickens seemed determined to remain inside, I moved the feeder into the coop so they at least wouldnt starve. That left even less room for the birds. Still, they continued to use the nesting boxes attached to the sides of the coop to lay the usual number of eggs. Every couple of hours I would trudge through the snow from the house to the orchard to collect the eggs before they froze.

I managed to tempt some of the hens out of the coop by placing the feeder on the ground closer to the door. Eventually, about half our 27 hens and the two resident roosters decided it was safe to hang out underneath the coop where the sod was bare. But they wanted nothing to do with the ocean of snow that lapped at the edges of their little home. Apparently, six inches might as well be El Capitan if youre a Rhode Island Red.

Would we really have to wait for spring before our hens stopped being so chicken and acted likewell, like chickens again? Is there a Plan B for pastured layers in winter?

Ah, but there was one intrepid hen who was not deterred. She had grown used to laying her eggs atop a stack of straw bales in a livestock shelter about 50 yards from the coop. No amount of snow would stop her from her appointed mission: she was bound to get to her favorite nest.

It was pretty hilarious and a little sad watching her plod through snow as deep as her legs are long. The best she could do was a kind of lopsided waddle, dragging herself along, one impossibly slow step at a time. When she finally made it to the shelter, the sheep gathered round to make sure she was alright. Then, after depositing her egg, she began a slow march back across the paddock toward the chicken coop. Our Jersey heifer bent low as the hen passed and gave her a big lick on the behind as encouragement.

Finally, I took pity on the hen and carried her that last few yards to the coop.

Such a brave little hen. Brave, but not crazy. As it turns out, this was one snow adventure even she had no interest in repeating. Our chickens would just as soon wait until all this snow disappears.

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Overpriced, useless, or just plain bizarre: an anti-garden gift guide

Gnome image courtesy of Shutterstock (Only kidding on this one. I heart gnomes.)

Inspired by the wonderful Haters Guide to The Williams Sonoma Catalog, which you have no doubt enjoyed via its countless Facebook postings, here is a similar look at the world of garden-related mail order. Sadly, a) I am not even one millionth as funny, and b) the gardening world lacks the rich diversity of overpriced and utterly superfluous crap that the food world has in such abundance.

We gardeners arepretty muchpractical folk and were not as likely to throw our money around as much as rich and bored foodies might. Fortunately for me, W-S has ventured into the gardening realm, and a lot of their gardening goods are just as WTF-ish as their food-related offerings. In fact, Deadspin has plenty to say about their chicken coops. (I dont really mind those. They help maintain living creatures, at least.) And there is other stuff that might not be expensive, but provides little benefit, unless you think we need more landfill fodder.

A hardworking table. It better be.
Remind me again why its necessary for me to use a table made with reclaimed 19^th-century European pine salvaged from buildings scheduled for demolition as a surface for putting plants and dirt into pots and taking plants and dirt out of pots.

But its bespoke!
This might look lovely as a stationary indoor fruit basket or some suchand at least its not $100 any morebut as for actually using the thing, all I can think about is the bumping against my hip and the scraping against my arm.

Heheh. They said agrarian.
This is priced at $12.95$269.95. The $12.95 part is the replacement liner. Now. I have nothing against raised beds. But this is not a truly useful raised bed. This is a dumb-looking wooden crate that will yield a few herbs and lettuces to be used in a salad thatI will inform my dinner party guestswas just picked from my garden.

Stupid bulb tricks.
Theres an argument to be made for expensive handmade garden tools. But this is not the item that would convince me. I plant hundreds of bulbs a year, and one thing Ive learned is that you really dont need a special tool for it. Stick a spade in the ground, drop the bulb in, cover it up. Boom. Better yet, stick a big shovel in the ground, throw a bunch of bulbs in, and cover them up. Double boom. This is $50 plus a backache.

Recipe for fail, part I
Oh, seeds. Oh, seeds, seeds, seeds. Ive learned my lesson with seed-starting and learned it the hard way. I am thinking that if, and only if, you filled up the cell part with better stuff and put it in a real greenhouse, you would likely get seedlings, but Im also thinking that people with real greenhouses wouldnt be buying this.

Recipe for fail, part II
And it looks so uninviting, like stuff you might wear to protect against against toxic waste. To get folks to spend $35, I would have gone another way with this photo shoot.

I have no idea what this is or what it does, but it has the word farm in it.
On the other hand, it is only 17 bucks. Maybe I should buy it, put it on, walk around with it for a few daysyeah, at work would be bestand see what happens. People keep talking to me, and its annoying.

Got some useless garden gifts youd like to complain about? Ormuch more likelydo you want to rebuke me for needlessly trashing things that other people might really like and that might encourage them to garden? Regardless, I hope you all get great gardening giftsincluding the best gift of all: a honking big gift cert to your favorite IGC!

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Garden Sage: One of my Signature Plants

Garden sage (Salvia officinalis) was one of the first useful plants I added to my first garden; my goal was to grow enough that I could use it fresh for Thanksgiving turkey and stuffing. Fifteen years later, Im on my third garden, and though it is brand new this autumn, it already includes several sage plants (which recently contributed to a delicious Thanksgiving dinner).

In Minnesota, where I gardened previously, garden sage makes a nice pathside plant. It forms a fairly compact upright mound with a silvery color and interesting bumpy-textured leaves. Brushing against the soft foliage releases a pleasant aroma. Sited well, it may achieve a height of 12 to 18 inches and a spread of up to two feet, and it may return for several years before dying out permanently. I have always thought of it as a short-lived perennial, even though it is technically a sub-shrub.

Yes, that is one magnificent sage specimen behind me (thanks, Sis!), giving my new garden a head start on structure.

My perceptions were radically altered when I started my Boise garden and my sister offered me a couple of 5-year-old garden sage plants for it. The two of them filled the bed of my husbands truck. The largest is as wide as I am tall! Im here to testify that garden sage is definitely a shrub. And furthermore, its going to be one of my new gardens signature plants.

I love the idea of signature plants. They are plants that occur throughout a garden, giving a characteristic look, and they are a great way to endow a garden with a strong sense of place. Apparently the repetition of a signature plant or group can lend a reassuring familiarity to a garden, so as people stroll through, they are subconsciously soothed. (You are not lost; you are still in my garden.)

My sages, when they grow into shrubs, will tie in to the similar-looking but not-closely-related sagebrush (Artemisia tridentata) and other shrubs dotting the nearby foothills. They will not only give my garden a distinctive character, but will ensure that its character echoes that of its local natural landscape.

Shrub-dominated high desert landscape bordering the Boise area.

Im not sure if it was the experience of growing up with that high desert landscape, but I do have an affinity for garden sage. Not just its soft, silvery leaves, with their friendly rounded oblong shapes so much like the ears of puppies (and giraffes, and alpacas!). Not just its aroma, warm and dusty and a bit sharp. I have always liked its flavor, with that menthol undertone that dissipates any greasiness in a meal (my turkey and stuffing deliver a lot of butter). Its a great wildlife plant that will bring hummingbirds and bees and supply cover to the quail that roam through my new property. Its also being studied for its ability to mitigate mild Alzheimers and dementia, so maybe there is something behind its historical powers to bestow wisdom.

Such friendly looking ears they have, reminiscent of garden sage leaves.

Garden sage is fairly adaptable, a good trait for a signature plant, as it can inhabit different areas of the garden despite variations in sunlight, moisture, and wind exposure. Plusand this is KEYI think I can keep it healthy. Its not too demanding, which is a perfect match for my hands-off gardening style. The main thing will be to site it correctly, keeping its roots from being waterlogged by avoiding clay pockets and low spots where rain or melting snow might pool in winter.

One-year-old garden sage plants make low hedges around the beds in this edible garden in Minnesota.

Years ago, I read a somewhat mystical text on how to experience plants with your heart rather than your analytical mind. It advised choosing plants with which you sense a special affinity and sitting with them, training your awareness on them in order to receive more information about their special qualities.

I like to think that meditating on any plant (or indeed, any rock or seed or shell or lichen) might help a person to sense nature in this deeper way. Maybe the place to start is with a few appealing and well-adapted signature plants. Maybe my garden sageslike the sages of oldwill teach me some things about this new environment as I put down roots here.

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No tree, no problem

Most years, we have the Christmas tree post here on Rant (heres a great one); the topic is a source of mild controversy among gardeners, mainly because of the sustainability angle. It breaks down this way:

Just buy a cut tree
Trees are an agricultural product and buying from a local tree farm usually means youre supporting a small independent business. The trees provide oxygen and wildlife habitat when theyre in the ground, a lovely scented focal point in the home, and then are recycled into municipal mulch in most communities (including mine). Win, win, win, win.

Buy a live tree and plant it
I have only one problem with thiswhere? This wont work for those of us who dont have a few acres sitting around empty waiting for evergreens to fill them up. But still, a nice idea, if you can do it. A quibblemost live trees I see are kind of puny.

Buy an artificial tree of some type
Personally, I hate these trees and think theyre kind of gross. However, I suppose there is a sustainability argument to be made, as they can be continually reused. But who made them, where were they made, and what are they made of? The answers to those questions can really undermine whatever benefit these trees have.

No tree at all
Actually, thats where I am now. We dont have kids, so we have the choice. We do have three mantelpieces and lots of other architectural features that will take lights and other dcor. I also have several large houseplants that are just about the size of most live trees; theyre tough enough to stand up to a little decorating once a year. So instead of focusing on a tree, I bring in bales of cut branches, which gives me the choice of many different types of evergreensjuniper, cedar, firs, pine, spruce, etc.

And then there are all the forced bulbs that are coming up from the root cellar now. I have so much stuff already growing in my house that it just doesnt seem necessary to haul in a cut tree. But I love visiting the beautifully decorated cut trees of my friends and relatives.

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Decorating Time, White House Version

Just how its done in MY house. Yours too, I bet.

Next, Bo does his final inspection.

Possible Gardenblogger Report!

Ive never been inside the White House when its all dolled-up for the holidays, so I looked into it and discovered that 1, it takes congressional intervention and that 2, that has to start 6 weeks ahead of time. Oh, well.

But then wowzer, an email comes inviting all National Park Service volunteers to a special White House Open House!!! Just for us, though we were warned not to expect the actual First Family to be on hand to greet us. But still, unlike the regular old public, WED be allowed to bring our cameras and use them to our hearts content!

The only catch is that there isnt room for everyone, so its first-come-first-served. I got my application pronto and assuming I pass muster with the Secret Service, my chances are pretty good. Fingers crossed.

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How to Stop Bee-Killing Pesticides? Start with the Box Stores!

The first alarm about bee-killing pesticides that caught my eye warned of plants that had been sprayed with neonicotinoids doing the killing. Then petitions like this one got my attention and I hoped it meant that only the big boxes stores were at fault here, selling horrible products. But then I read some more and realized its not just two unfeeling companies involved here. These bee-killing pesticides (neonics for short) are sold everywhere. You know, on the shelves of garden departments and garden centers everywhere products from companies like Ortho and Bayer. Scroll down here for the list of products.

Worse, the deadliness of neonics to bees is being claimed not by some fringe greenies but by such establishment authorities as the USDA. Theres really no argument about the problem here.

No surprise then that the campaign against neonics has gained a lot of momentum and big bucks are being spent to get the message out like for this full-page ad in the New York Times. The ad announces that This week, 15 countries are imposing a two-year restriction on the use of several of these chemicals. Meanwhile, the United States is stalling. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency estimates it will be2018, 5 years from now, before it makes a decision on this deadly class of pesticide.

So far, all the EPA has done is to develop an advisory warning consumers not to use these pesticides where bees are present. HUH?

The Impact on Retailers

So, what would be the impact, both horticulturally and financially, of banning these bee-killing pesticides, anyway? I turned to people in the independent garden center world for their thoughts on the matter, since like the big boxes, they stand to be hurt financially, and I actually WANT them to make a profit and continue to feed my plant-buying habit.

Heres how important these pesticides are to them: They sell lots of those blue and green bottles, especially the bizarrely named Rose and Flower Care sounds harmless, doesnt it? And almost all growers, Im told, use these pesticides. Heres why, via email from a perennial buyer.

Virtually all ornamental plants we sell are treated with them at one time or another. Thats why they are the most popular pesticides on the planet: They work. They have low mammalian toxicity. They came on the market at the same time that many of the other long-term pesticides were coming off due to environmental and health concerns. They replaced diazinon in grub treatment for example.

He went on to predict that the since the EPA has banned just about everything over the years, I have no reason to think that they wont act properly on this issue.

And what are the alternatives to neonics? Not a lot: hort oils, pepper spray, Neem and pyrethrins, to which there is wide resistance.

Even without EPA action, retailers with a conscience could just stop selling neonics, right? Just like the good ones refused to sell Impatiens this season (due to downy mildew) and took a huge hit because customers got right back in their cars and drove to Home Depot to get their sickly annuals. No doubt that would happen again if small retailers took these super-effective pesticides off their shelves.

And what if the small retailers tell their growers to stop using neonics? One wrote to tell me that:

Weve contacted most of the growers we buy from to ask about their spray programs and to find out whether they are aware of recent reports about neonics, or how widely publicized they are. I spoke to one grower who said they would quit using neonics (which they use sparingly, in rotation with other controls) immediately if they thought that we, the garden centers, and our customers would buy plants with pests and occasional, visible insect damage. I hope to see a lot of education from the garden media, and anyone who has the eyes and ears of the public about the fact that we will have to adjust our notions about all insects being pests. We need to accept that if we want to save the bees and butterflies, were going to have to live with some aphids too.

There are several growers who were proud to say they didnt treat with neonics, so Id like to see some education among the growers, who will have to implement new methods to address all of our concerns. I have great respect for the people who are growing our plants, and I hope the public understands they are farmers, with much at stake on their crops and methods.

Another retailer agreed that Growers will do what their customers want them to do. Do we think the main players in the horticultural world, which is the mass merchants and their suppliers are willing to do this? Not yet.

One garden center owner suggests better labeling and education about the proper use of neonics:

The use of neonicotinoids on plants that are visited by pollinators is inappropriate, and nursery professionals should advise their customers of that regardless of what the product label might say. If we want to retain these products for appropriate uses, we will need to stop using them in ways that harm beneficial insects. They have become among the most widely used pesticides in agriculture and horticulture, and in many cases they are unnecessary and clearly have unintended, undesirable consequences. We as an industry need to support reasonable re-regulation and re-labeling of neonicotinoids and discourage their inappropriate use by our customers.

Solutions, please

From what I read, the EPA absolutely should act faster to ban neonicotinoids because the science is clear. But until they do, we should put pressure on the huge retailers with oversized clout to stop selling these products now, and tell their growers to stop using them, too. Then the local garden centers can follow without digging their own graves. Thats my take, anyway. Yours?

Sources, and for more reading: Chemistry World, Mother Jones, the Center for Food Safety, and Minnesota Public Radios report that plants for bee habitat may be killing bees.

Bee image courtesy Shutterstock.

Via: How to Stop Bee-Killing Pesticides? Start with the Box Stores!

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Serenity now

Who knew that this forward-thinking garden center was only 15 minutes or so from my house? Make no mistake, Western New York is relatively wealthy in excellent independent garden centers and seasonally open greenhouses. I never need to visit the local big boxes. But Serene Gardens had not really been on my radar until I heard that the combo restaurant/garden center was opening another restaurant within the city of Buffalo.

Their main operation is in the town of Grand Island, about 10 miles north of Buffalo. It is a Japanese-themed garden center/landscaping company and restaurant. The owner, Josh Smith, has a PhD in sociology from Osaka University and also studied Japanese gardening during his twelve years in the country, apprenticing at Furukawa Teijuen in Kansai and maintaining the Taimadera Temple in Nara. Smith still apprentices in Japan periodically. His wife Satomi is the chef of the operation, having grown up in a family-run restaurant in Fukui. Shes also a certified Ikebana instructor. Joshs brother, Matt, is the garden manager and landscape designer and was recently the cover boy for Green Profit (Young Retailer of the Year).

Serene Gardens may be physically near me, but my gardening aesthetic is light years away from Japanese principles; Im messy, I dont prune anything unless absolutely forced to, and although I get the concept of serenity, I dont actively seek it. But stillwow! These people are impressive; theyve created an interesting niche business that must be very attractive to a lot of people around here. The concept of the Japanese garden is one that appeals across the board, including those who may not care that much about gardening per se. And theyve definitely brought the concept of the garden center caf to a new level. I just hope their branching out to Buffalo does not move the business so much into food that the garden part drops away. Though given their backgrounds, I dont see that happening.

Just one thingSerene Gardens, your website, though better than anyone elses around here (which says nothing), could still be improved. Its slow and there needs to be a much better photo gallery of your local landscaping jobs. Id like to see some garden photos that are as enticing as the cocktails.

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