September 2008 Newsletter
Happy October! The leaves are turning, apples are pressing and autumn has shown herself in all her glory! What lovely weather we have been enjoying. Laughing oak trees are turning multicolored in an orange, red, gold and green cloak. Maples are turning gold and bright red. Elms seem to hang onto their green until the last possible moment. The elms outside my window are as green as a June day. Leaf drop seems to be spring in reverse - the upper story trees lose their leaves first, followed by under story trees, then the shrubs, down to the garden perennials. Garden perennials can provide beautiful colors in the fall garden! The conifers seem to laugh at the deciduous trees in their changes. The conifers take on special duties in the winter gardenscapes and they take that on proudly!
Nature is responding to the season changes in many ways. Colors brighten and summer's green becomes a bouquet of autumn and harvest. Birds migrating through our foothills flavor the changes. Large flocks are coming together. Grackles, those shiny black birds with startling yellow eyes, mass in congregations of hundreds of birds of noise and wing, and move through the residential forests. Rocky mountain parrots, Clark's Nutcrackers, roost together at night in flocks and take to the sky with the sun's light moving over their ridgetop. They act like jungle parrots, squawking and wheeling on the wing as they divide into smaller family groups for the day's foraging. Flocks of wild turkeys sing softly to each other to stay in touch with each other, being ground birds their singing seems to sound from everywhere and nowhere at once. Their calling moves over the land as they walk about seeking the season's last grasshoppers and berries. Surrounded by a family of turkeys sounds like being in the midst of great numbers when there may only be 20 birds. Robins gather around the Russian Olives to feast on ripe olives and seem to have their Robin conversations over the meal.
The birds are singing and any ear can hear the joy in the sunshine. But even as I pen this, dark clouds push their fingers over the hills and onto the plains. They seem stuck on the mountaintops, as if reluctant to bring in the cold. But the cold is coming and the gardeners all know…same as the birds, same as the trees. The time has come to say goodbye to the annuals (maybe not quite yet, but the end of the season is within sight!) Time has come to begin deciding what to cut back and what to leave standing in the garden to create the winter interest that is so important in our Rocky Mountain gardens. Time has come to bring in the harvest.
Blue Planet Earthscapes into the year 2009
Over the last thirteen years, in these letters of love and devotion to Blue Planet Earthscapes clients, I have been bringing forth my concerns of the changes to nature and the natural systems that seemed to be happening. Those changes are being confirmed in our science, our daily media, within our own personal observations and in every passing day of unseasonable weather. As ever, Blue Planet tries to put forth the best foot onto new ground and move into new arenas of our time on the planet. In keeping with that goal, Blue Planet Earthscapes will be turning towards the ideas of self-reliance and resilience in these times of change. In 2009, we will offer new programs within the urban and suburban landscapes. These programs will join in with the local food movement for our communities and for our clients.
Want local, healthy food? Grow it in your own yard and we can help you. Through permaculture, using techniques that focus on building good soil, growing organic, perennial food plants as well as the annual crops, Blue Planet seeks to create systems that help maintain and retain the beauty of the current gardens as well as increasing the resilience of individual household sustainability. Permaculture speaks to the long vision of sustained home grounds and happy dwellers of those grounds. The practice of complete permaculture systems would include food forest gardens, perhaps bee hives, urban livestock and bringing fruits, berries and medicinal herbs into home gardens. Permaculture goes even further into retrofitting energy systems for efficient homes, water saving and harvesting techniques, and re-building our local community.
Using nature as the guide, these methods seek to function as nature does. In permaculture gardens the built ecosystems work in harmony to feed each plant, bring in beneficial insects and, once mature, provide an abundance of on-going food. Flowers still have a place in these gardens and the beauty of the garden is not lost within the function. Blue Planet Earthscapes gardeners feel that the future will embrace these ideas and we are working to keep ahead of the changes, not working from behind. If these ideas appeal to you, please let us know and we can begin helping you create your own personal vision of sustainability in uncertain times. Thank you for the pleasure of your gardens!
Peace,
Becky the Gardener & the Blue Planet Gardeners
"Everything gardens."
Peter Bane, Permaculture teacher
Blue Planet Earthscapes P O Box 861 Manitou Spgs, CO 80829 (719) 685 - 0290