82-Lancaater Farming, Saturday, July 5, 1997
On Being a
Farm Wife
(and other
hazards)
Joyce Bupp
Well, it was predictable. sprouts just fine. By comparison,
After a prolonged spring of the planting of sugar snap-type
windy, dry and chilly, wc were on iy came U p marginally as
fast-forwaidedinto the worst kind weU And seed l purchased
of heat, humidity and desert-like f res h and stU ck in the soil within
weather that we ever get around j, ours
here. On the first day of summer. Likely> the lingering cold mi
Appropriate, huh. damp rotted the earlier-planted
Unfortunately, in between those see ds. Digging at several spots in
dramatic extremes. cxcept for a flrst yielded no
few isolated spots m the area, it of H whitc ***.
forgot to rain. had vanished. Zip. Gone.
Some years you can lay a seed And> secon d batch has gcr
or cutting on the pound, and con- minated only ha i f . hcartcdly> * ith
(htions are so ideal that it roots on precious little moisture in the top
die spot. Untended and uncovered £ w inches of dto t
Makes us gardeners puff up with j In f there’s
pride, thinking we really have our M a wholc , ot of moisture
. i u„ even you go down several
Not this season. This one looks inches d J a s s tetc ofthe soi , ,h at
ominously like those we get occa- . H
sionally Uiat put us gardeners in farmers in ™ g bb°rhood
our proper, humbled places. And *f owu l g I” 01 ® J , lttei ? .^, th e^f ry
we t£e reminded that just sticking ** of Popple-topped curling
something in the ground is no co 7* bnght, sunny, hot... hot
assurance it will grow. ••• .**o* temperatures- Say, did we
My second planting of * c °“P le ° f wceks 11 s
string beans has finally come up. ac hja g y August.
Some of it. anyway. The first W c ’ve done the drought
attempt sprouted a total of five stnckcn su ™ mers ™ und hc ' e
stalks in about a 20-feet-long row. morc “ of " ca ” »
Not a single one of the yellow wax remember. Been there. Done that,
beans geminated. 1 care to do it again, thank
Old seed, you say? Could be,
though I’ve kept other bean seed
from year to year and it usually
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you.
On the other hand, the volunteer
stuff that shows up from year to
year even in a less perfect
growing season like this one
never fails to amaze me. And it
persists through the most inhospit
able conditions. v \
Several years ago. I shagged a
few cuttings of a tender, varie
gated vine from a good friend’s
porch box planters. They rooted,
were coddled through the winter
in the greenhouse and set out the
following spring in a wooden
barrel-half, ih company with red
geraniums. That continued for a
couple of years, each fall I made
sure to take a few cuttings to con
tinue having this happily-growing,
pretty vine.
Maybe it was the relatively
warm winter, but there is presently
a thick, three-by-five patch of the
stuff growing where I never even
planted it. I’d like to transplant a
bunch of it to banks and garden
comers, but it seems to thrive bet
ter left alone.
About ten years ago, I started a
seed pack of cleomes. Cleomes
are tall, somewhat gangly, flowers
that bloom heavily with large,
pink, white and lavendar bloom
clusters, set lots of seeds and drop
them profusily. I’ve not planted
any since, but every year have
recurring cleome volunteers in the
garden, along with morning glo
ries of the same eager willingness
to replenish and reseed
themselves.
And, last year The Farmer spent
a few minutes at dusk a few even
ings tending a small patch of wild
flower seed he scattered on a steep
bank of the little pond. By late
summer, several plants had
bloomed, including an annual
poppy or two. After reseeding
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themselves, they make the
prettiest patch of flowers on the
place, with a couple of dozen stun
ning red and orange poppies, gol
den coreopsis, some sort of laven
Train Plants
To Compensate
For Indoor Enviroments
UNIVERSITY PARK (Centre
Co.) While human beings can
live indoors with low light levels
and dank air, plants are another
story entirely. Luckily, plants can
be trained to better adapt to the
rigors of indoor living, according
to a horticulturist in Penn State r s
College of Agricultural Sciences.
“Keeping indoor foliage plants
alive has long been a challenge for
plant lovers." says J. Robert Nuss,
professor of ornamental horticul
ture. ‘Too often, homeowners will
bring a plant home from a green
house and put it inside, only to see
it die within weeks.”
Nuss says most plants must be
carefully prepared for the light
condi tionsmsidc a building before
placing them in a home. He
explains that plants need enough
light indoors to maintain a slightly
higher, level of photosynthesis
the food manufacturing process in
plants then die energy the plant
loses from transpiration, a process
by which plants lose moisture
through tiny openings in their
leaves and stems.
“If a plant doesn’t receive
enough light it will begin to use up
its food reserves,” Nuss says.
“This results in leaves dropping
off the plant, which means a loss
of chlorophyll necessary to main
tain photosynthesis. Without
INC.
dar phlox and a few assorted
unidentifieds.
Sometimes I suspect us garden
er types just try too hard.
adequate light, plants will decline
and then die.”
Nuss points out that plants can
be trained to accept lower levels of
light by acclimatizing, or gradual
ly reducing their light levels to the
point that comes closest to an
indoor environment “But accli
matizing plants is not a quick pro
cess,” he warns. “Depending on
the plant the process could take
up to IS weeks.”
Nuss recommends starting a
plant in a sunny spot and then
slowly moving it to areas of lesser
light every few weeks. “Once the
plant has stabilized, you can pro
vide the necessary light with
incandescent or fluorescent
lights,” he says. “Indoor light
sources can give off a lot of heat
so remember not to place the light
too close to the foliage.”
Nuss says that incandescent
lights, which given off much more
heat should be placed toward the
ceiling, directly over plants.
Fluorescent lights, which are cool
er, can be placed closer to foliage
and within smaller spaces.
“The indoor environment is
tough for plants,” Nuss explains.
“Even tropical plants native to
darkened jungles can have prob
lems. In general, however, plants
with thick leaves adapt better to
indoor conditions.”
Road, Route 241 S