A double whammy of good fortune, today. I was over at my friend Lilian Maroushek's house (remember, the 90 year old). She found some more Lily books to give me, and had them packed up and ready to go . We're starting to clean out her basement, and I salvaged the framework from here light shelves where she used to grow seedlings. Her husband had made it from scratch, with ends welded quite ingeniously so changing shelf and light fixture levels is made easy. So I came home with my truck full of junk, stuff to recycle and good stuff. I haven't even had time to look at the books yet, 'cause ....

When I got home, in the mailbox was my order from the NARGS seed exchange. I get a little bit if preferential treatment because I have been donating seed for years. Among the other alpine seed, I got:
Lilium mackliniae
Lilium medeoloides wild collected from Mount Fuji, Japan
Nomocharis aperta
Nomocharis saluenensis
Lilium nanum var. flavum
Lilium calosum
Lilium amabile
Lilium grayi !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I've had a long day, putting the final blankets over my potted materials outside (we're finally going to get temps in the -20s F), over to Lilian's (includes 2.5 hours of driving), a full day's work shift, home and unloading, made something for a benefit bake sale tomorrow .... it's after 1 am and I'm still so pumped that I don't feel like sleeping yet! (Good thing I don't go to work until 1 pm tomorrow.)

Rick, Ive a baby callosum about to flower soon...Beautiful dainty stem

I was really surprised how small my first callosum seedlings were when they flowered, considering how large a mature plant is. Until the buds turned down, I assumed I must have mismarked the pot, and the only thing I thought they could be was L. concolor.

Then again, in my younger years, when I (unknowingly) grew L. lankongense in a relatively inhospitable environment, they consistently flowered at only 12-14 inches.

I decided to put my tiny bulblets from scales in a prep stage of 50- 55'F for a week or two today. From there they will be refrigerated until late March and then planted up in pots. I only started three batches of scales this year--four to six scales each, using only the outer otherwise useless scales in worst shape. A gamble of foolishness against the grain--but nothing to lose either if it didn't work. I photographed one batch for this post. These scales are of ' Beaverton Pentimento', sort of an apricot/buff version of L. Henri, var, Citrinum and thought to be one of Carlton Yerex's last releases (late 1940's)--the Edgar Kline/Carlton Yerex era. This 'older cultivar' was rediscovered growing in a church yard in Beaverton, Oregon around 1980 by an NALS member who propagated it. Hence the name Beaverton-Pentimento.



One bulblet had become detached from it's consumed parent scale, the other scales were paper thin--virtually all consumed but a shell. Not exactly a bumper crop, but considering these were pretty rough shape scales to start with, I'm more than pleased. The other two batches of other cultivar scales were just fine and put into prep as well.

We just watched wind 40mph take all the leaf barrels to the neighbors.The lid blwe off the woodash barrel and spread ashes around nicely.

Im glad we are'nt the only ones with wind , Jo Ann

That windstorm came flying thru here Saturday night; certainly didn't waste any time getting to Rochester did it! My pine bough and leaf mulch held together better than I was expecting. If we can get thru the next ten days-two weeks--then things should start looking up. We're already gaining over two minutes of daylight everyday now and by Feb. 2nd our temps start creeping higher.

Lorn! weather guy said 59 mph gusts Sunday.He also said gusts were stronger than hurricane Sandy with gusts at 54 mph>

Believe me when I say I am counting down the days.Its already bright at 5:30.PM.

P S My boughs went with the wind.In the words of Carol Burnett

That wind was really something, but we got 2' of snow after it, with another foot to come. Lilies are well insulated now.

Oh no Polly. That is a lot of snow. We are supposed to get some snow/sleet here but just a little.

I walked around the garden just to look at things and I have some of my many daffodils already comming up. Seems awefully early to me.

I see some tulips and daffs poking their heads up here too, but they better not get too happy--It only got up to 7'F here this afternoon and some places in the upper midwest never made it above zerro.

Going to get cold here too, I hate the cold.

It's the wind that gets me! I stay in hibernation as much as possible. Why even go out if one doesn't have too! Did you workout today?

Yes, every day. I don't want to skip days. I did 40 minutes on my Gizelle exercise machine and then I did 800 count on my stepper. It has resistance levels of 1-5 and I am working at the #3 level.

And I really am trying to eat a more healthy diet along wih my exerciseing. I have totally cut out all the cookies, candy, ice cream, cake and donuts I just love to eat.

Good For You!!! I admire you for your conviction. My self imposed rule always has been to have cake and ice cream only at birthday parties and anniverseries, etc. But coffee, donuts and cookies-- here and every place I go, there's coffee and doughnuts and cookies ever present. It became such a compulsion that in between Christmas and New Years I got mad with myself--really mad. And, so far I'm doing good, and happy with myself. I was only a few pounds over weight but my cholesterol and blood pressure was near or at the high limit. Glad to hear you're doing good too!

I love Donkin Donuts. And in the summer, Carvel soft ice cream. I doubt I am going to be able to do without them forever. But so far so good, I really am staying away from the sweets. Of course if I was actually where they were in front of me, I know I would eat them. I would not be able to stop myself.

My self imposed rule is that no pasta or pizza until I loose that first ten pounds off. So I haven't had pizza or pasta since before December 10th (which is when I started exercising). I can't wait to add then back into my diet.

And we always have to remember: Who's The Boss!

Seed planting time is just around the corner so today I pastuerized a couple more gallon bags of play sand. I use kids play sand because it's a little coarser grain than builders sand. I know most seeders use builders sand and swear by it too, but it 'cakes up' a little too easily in my opinion. Then I ground up moss too--I buy moss by the bale (wrapped) and grind my own in an old Waring Blender--spray a little distilled water in there with it, and let 'er rip! Works great; then pastuerize in gallon zip lock bags. Some of us will start seeding in the next two or three weeks, I suppose.

Moss... peat moss?

A coincidental happenstance: on another forum someone asked about sterilizing peat moss. (I think he meant pasteurizing.) If you are grinding it up, I assume you talking about the very raw form (light in color and undecomposed), as opposed to the brown sphagnum peat moss one normally finds in bales at nurseries and big box stores. So it ends up like milled sphagnum after you grind. Right?

In both pictues:
Left =raw sphagnum
Right =milled sphagnum



More available is smaller bags (quart size) of milled sphagnum. I thought I had some to show, but no. It is "cleaner" and much more (light) golden in color.

Have you any comparison observations of pasteurized versus non treated sphagnum? There is always some contaminate organic materials, like sticks, in with the sphagnum. Is this what you're worried about? But I wonder if the heat would "denature" the fungicidal properties (and other good qualities) inherent in raw sphagnum -- things that can really make it a "wonder drug" of the plant world. Any thoughts?

The advantage of builders sand is the variety of particle size.
The disadvantage of builders sand is the variety of particle size.

LOL ,Rick.
Is Builders sand the same as Stone Sand? thats used in laying paths and walkways?