Tulips Aplenty -and- Joy from E.I.T.

As you can see in the above photograph, my tulips took a beating from the winter storms. I certainly don't have as many as I did last year. I will definitely have to replenish them once it comes time to plant bulbs.

That said, I did get a nice surprise.



Look at these funky tulips! I know this kind of tulip has a special name (are they Darwins or Parrots?) Does anyone know it? I want to plant more of these.

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For the sake of a little more substance, I did a little archive binge-ing (?) at Everything is Terrible and found these life-altering films:

Remember that one weird play your whole elementary class had to do?

This one actually made me feel sad for record executives.

Oh, how I wish I could retroactively add this to the Art Evolved Elephant Gallery.

Watch this video immediately after the immediately previous one and you will have seen the whole of not-fondly-remembered early '90s superhero cartoons.

And this last one might be the most beautiful thing they have ever shared with us.

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Sketch of the Day!

A gardening post in January?

Yeah, why not?
Some of you are probably wondering what to do with all those lovely Christmas greens you've accumulated over this jolly time of year. Specifically, what do you do with that tree?

Ah, the Christmas Tree. We got our lovely Silver Blue Balsam the weekend after Thanksgiving (unusually early) and she was still looking okay... Until the week of Christmas when almost a month of heavy ornaments, moisture-sapping lights, and "hey, did you remember to water the tree" caught up with her and she started shedding needles like a fiend.
So, naturally, the weekend after Christmas we stripped her of ornaments and lights, cut off all her branches, and used those branches as "free" mulch:

You may have heard this suggestion before in gardening literature. I'm posting about it now because this is only the second time I thought to do this and it's the first time it actually worked.  Our city has a tree-mulching program but why let some random person keep our Christmas Tree forever? Plus, we needed the mulch sooner than I thought. We were in for a hell of a snowstorm.

Which is good, at least on an aesthetic level. Hopefully, those branches will protect the new bulbs. Remember them from October?
 
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FEEDERWATCH FRIDAY!!!
Red-Tailed Hawk - 1 (OMG!!!)
Rock Pigeon - 4
Mourning Dove - 1
Blue Jay - 2
Black-capped Chickadee - 3
White-breasted Nuthatch - 2
House Sparrow - 15
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Sketch of the Day! This one has a reoccurring character in it!

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Next week is Movie Week, where I'll be posting long reviews of the three most memorable movies I saw over the holidays. On that note, I might have to suck it up and invest in a Blu-Ray player. Because...

Bulb A'Sore - or - Probably The Last Gardening Post of the Year

Well, first off, here's some art. Click for big:

A week ago, I worked in the garden for the first time in months. I will not put off working in the garden for months if I can at all help it ever again. I had to dig up a lot of weeds and encroaching grass (it is almost hilarious how I have grass growing happily where I do not want it and no grass at all where I do want it.) As of the time I am writing this, I'm still hurting in some sensitive areas.
(Oh, calm down. I meant my joints. And my thumbnails. And my most of me.)



I don't know if I've had a chance to mention this before, and even so, I'm hoping some of you are new readers who met me at Boston Comicon and are doing an archive binge of this blog (I am extremely and very nerdily honored if this is the case). I am a native New Englander. That means I am genetically predisposed to complain about the weather. However, to be honest, I like seasonality. I like the fact that the growing season is ephemeral up here; it makes it all the more lovely. And I enjoy colorful leaves in autumn and -brace yourselves- I like snow.
With all that said, I'm wondering if spring bulbs are a distinctly temperate zone phenomenon. I had a fair number of daffodils early this spring, but I figured this would be a good year to replenish the garden. Bulbs are fairly easy to deal with and are a great choice for a family project - IF your kids are patient.
Like, having to wait up to twenty-four weeks for "delivery" patient.
You see, that's the downside of planting bulbs. Actually getting them in the ground takes a bit of effort and good timing (wait until after Daylight Savings Time ends and you may have completely wasted your money). I've got at least 120 out there now, and I am betting that at least half of them make it through the winter.
If this makes you cringe, you'll be happy to know that bulbs are easy to "cheat". Wait until the week after Easter (April 4, 2010) and you can snap up full-grown tulips and hyacinths for half off. This is much more expensive than planting bulbs en mass in autumn - but it's also easier on the nerves.



This is how most books of gardening will encourage you to plant bulbs.
And normally, I don't do this. I've done it with the onions only because they're easy to see and I only have a few of them. For tulips, daffodils, and the Anemones I'm experimenting with for the first time, I just dug a pit several inches deep, tossed the bulbs in, set them right-side up, and covered them with dirt and mulch. It's just as random as the "scattering" method shown above and much easier to keep track of.

And this is the "after" picture. The yellow and burgundy mums are there just for color as my perennials have all gone to seed. Occasionally, these mums will turn out to be perennials themselves, and will show green leaves early in spring.
As a funny addendum to the previous post, there is now no evidence *at all* of the storm on Sunday. As a matter of fact, it was pretty warm in the sun on Monday.
So now, the only major thing to do out there is get the bird feeder set up...