that form my raised beds. Rosemary and sage grow
along with different forms of cranebill (perennial
geraniums), Alchemilla mollis (Lady’s Mantle),
dianthus, dahlias and other plants. The blue flowers of
Borage, parsley and chives reseed and grow throughout
the garden. Lilly Miller swiss chard, called Bright
Lights, grow multi-colored stems -- rust, red, yellow,
white and bronze, and with Ed Humes’ Red Sail leaf
lettuce add color to the garden. My favorite herb is
Bronze fennel which gives both height and feathery
leafed texture in the bed of dahlias. I use the foliage in
salads, soups or to give flavor to fish. In the fall the tai,
stems develop flower heads which when ripe produce
seeds. The seeds can be saved, later to be ground and
used as a spice. Fennel has a liquorice flavor.
Two large artichoke plants I’ve planted on the
south side of the wood shed are bordered in front with
onion and garlic, and in the spring I scatter various
annual poppy seeds, both from Shirley poppies that
bloom in the spring and California poppies that bloom
through out the summer. Behind the two artichoke
plants some years I mix sweet peas and edible peas or
beans to climb the netting that’s attached to the wall of
the wood shed.
A row of raspberries grow along the east side of
the woodshed. The shed protects them from the wind
off the ocean. In a sunny spot a large pot with side
openings for plants is filled with strawberries.
On my deck many of the large pots and wall
planters are filled with various herbs. In the comer of
the deck in the sunniest area 1 plant a sweet hybrid
cherry tomato in a large pot and a small pot of basil.
Chopped fresh basil leaves enhance the taste of ripe
tomatoes.
Vegetables as well as flowers need well
prepared soil. In the garden area each spring I add
compost either from my own pile or commercial
mushroom compost and processed fertilizer. In the
planter I add time-released fertilizer and water with
diluted liquid fertilizer.
Whether you have room for a few pots of herbs
or vegetables or a small garden space is not a factor.
The reward of raising a few edible plants is to wander
through your garden in the late afternoon to gather fresh
vegetables, some herbs and fruit for your dinner. Pluck
a ripe tomato, a berry or two to taste as you gather a
bouquet of flavors.
As my father found out a crop of potatoes may
not enrich and loosen the soil, but I still prepare small
new potatoes as my mother did, cooking them with their
jackets left on, basted with melted butter, seasoned with
chopped fresh leaves of parsley, fresh ground pepper,
and a sprinkle of salt. Out of all the recipes she tried
this was our family favorite.
“Bon Appetit”, as Julia Child says as she signs
off her cooking program.
'J unes
Lawn Potatoes
Have you ever heard to enrich and loosen clay
soil, plant a crop of potatoes?
Someone advised my father that a crop of
potatoes would help prepare the soil where he later
planned to plant a lawn. We had just moved into a new
house on a city lot. I remember Dad saying the soi, was
like cement. Mr. Erivin, our next door neighbor, who
had the most perfect lawn and neatly trimmed shrubs on
the block, watched Dad with skeptical eyes when Dad
planted the whole front yard with a crop of potatoes.
That fall Dad harvested and gave away sack! of
potatoes making new friends with many families in the
neighborhood, and we became respectable; especially
with Mr. Erivin, when Dad planted a lawn.
The problem was potato seedlings left in the
ground continued to sprout along with the new grass as
long as we lived there and the cement-like soil never
improved until he added other amendments, but we had
a lot of potatoes. Mother wasn’t an adventurous cook.
The year of the potatoes Mother came up with every
kind of potato dish she could think up. Dad loved to
garden and most homes we lived in he would plant a
few edible plants. Even when we lived in an apartment
in Berkeley, California, pots of herbs lined the kitchen
window sill.
I ’ve carried on the family tradition of adding a
few edible plants to my garden. Having fresh
vegetables, fruit or herbs at your doorstep is rewarding
for both the taste and the enjoyments of gathering your
own produce, though now I am always careful to plant
my potatoes in barrels.
When I started my garden here in Cannon Beach
some of the first plants I planted were onions and
potatoes. My reason was to have these vegetables to go
along with the razor clams I ’d dig, to make chowder.
Clams aren’t as plentifully as they used to be, but when
I manage to dig my limit of clams to go with new
potatoes and sweet onions my family considers Mom’s
chowder the best.
My garden is small, the planting area is only
about 1/3 of a 50’ x 100’ lot. I don’t have room for a
separate vegetable garden, so I mix vegetables and
herbs with the flowering plants. I’ve used swiss chard
and lettuce to border the flower beds or the many root
vegetables. Herbs, many of which are perennials, are
scattered through the garden. Golden maijoram, low
growing oregano, and thyme cascade over the bricks
•>r
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It s a small world, but I wouldn’t like to have to
Paint
Steven Wright
....by Bill Wickland
Am I really a part of nature?
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I’d like to be a procrastinator, but I never seem to
get around to it.
Chris Dundee
The trouble with doing nothing is that you can never
take any time off.
Hogey Carmichael
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97110
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THE BINOCULARS I failed to bring would have made no
difference, nor would have the digital camera, because 1 wasn’t
ready.
I didn’t notice the great blue heron until it spread its wings
and began first to glide, and then to fly, away.
It did not fear me, I felt, but simply figured that twenty feet
was close enough for a dufus human who didn’t even know it
was there. S o it casually left.
Same with those tw o deer with white spots at their tails. The
first one looked right at me from thirty feet, and just stood
there a while. I thought it was planning to stare me down.
I love how deer prance. That first one unhurriedly walked
into the brambles, but the second one pranced o ff through the
marsh grass toward the Umpqua River.
It didn’t matter that I wasn’t ready this time. It was my first
walk under the Hwy. 101 bridge in al most-downtown
Reedsport, and I’m staying here to do it again. I live a ten-
minute walk from that spot. I had visited the Umpqua
Discovery Center nearby, and had som e idea o f where I was.
Just a few feet upstream, the Smith River joins the Umpqua for
the three-mile tnp to the Pacific Ocean, and I was looking for
som e way to walk along Scholfield Creek.
All this was in the Port Industrial Park. The port isn’t as
busy as New York Harbor, but things are going on here. There
are working boats in the basin, and repairs arc happening, and
marine products are being manufactured. I could hear and
smell grinders and sanders and furnaces in use.
Right there, in a little finger o f Scholfield/Umpqua slough,
was the great blue, and over there where the blackberry
bramble grew out o f Umpqua marsh grasses, were those two
unruffled deer, and I hadn’t noticed them until they moved.
Next time, I’ll be quieter and try to notice more things.
Maybe I’ll take a digital camera, but I sure w on’t need
binoculars for this amazing little hike.
Bill W ickland is a life-long w nting person and sometime jo u m a h x
who has recently moved Io Reedsport on purpose
UPPER. LEFT EÙSE APRIL 2000
I
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