The Creeping Thaw.....

Puxatawney Phil did not see his shadow when he poked his little groundhog head out of his burrow last week. According to tradition, this means that spring is coming soon, that it should be here well in advance of the March 20 vernal equinox. While I agree that the end of January was looking pretty nice here in NCW, the first week of February reminded us that it was indeed, still winter. The last few days have been marked by sub-freezing temps, ice and even some frozen precipitation. Dahlia growers, however, will probably rejoice at Phil's prediction, being the eternal optimists that they are - who else would annually pack up box after box of wrinkled brown roots, more reminiscent of something the cat might bury in your garden than flowers, visualizing them as multi-colored blooms of every size and form? Being a dahlia-grower (and therefore, an optimist), I went into the storage area in my crawlspace during January's thaw, and dug out a few tubers. The intent is to attempt to get some starts that will become dahlia plants from cuttings, thus producing multiple clones of varieties that might otherwise be small in number. I planted them in soil from a no-longer frozen-solid dahlia bed for use as my growing medium. I kicked the dirt with my toes, and found that it was slightly moist, and totally loose. This was definitely my signal that the thaw had finally crept in, and the time was right to start building the boxes for my raised-bed garden. I contacted NCW's whiz kid, Beth Miracle, and asked her to describe the methods she used when creating her raised beds last year. Beth had so much success with this, and I'm hoping to copy her strategy, in hopes of doing a little better this year.

I headed to the garage, armed with my dimensions and materials list, and woke up my little blue Ranger pickup for the journey to Home Depot. Little Ranger, with routes to NCW dahlia gardens invisibly tattooed in his little Ford heart, had been hibernating since the beginning of November. I'm sure he was as excited as I was, because when I turned the key in the ignition, he started right up! Little Ranger was my dad's truck, and when he first came to live with us after Dad passed away, he often had trouble starting. We had about $1500 worth of work done on him, with the goal of using him for dahlia-related outings for years to come. So I was thrilled when Ranger and I made it safely to Home Depot, where I hustled in and bought my lumber. The helpers in the lumber department were very helpful, cutting what needed to be cut, and loading the boards onto a large cart. After ringing me up, they sent me out to get the truck to bring it up to the loading area. I headed out to where I had parked, hoisted myself into the driver's seat, put the key in and......no luck! He made noises like he was going to start, but the engine just wouldn't catch, no matter how many times I tried. Long story short, I called my sister Deb, who came to rescue me by loading the lumber into her Ford pickup, and driving us to my house to unload. Needless to say, this little event put a bit of a damper on my work plans, and, within a few days, winter barged back in, and once again froze the ground as solid as hard ice cream.

Since then, I've been kind of pre-occupied, and have had a bit of trouble getting motivated. Mom has been having some health problems, and as she approaches her 89th birthday on February 22, has required quite a bit of help with things, including doctors' visits. She appears to be doing much better now, so I'm starting to get a little itchy again to get those corner braces screwed into those cedar 2 x 12 x 8s I have stored under the deck. If it warms up enough, I might be able to get the boards coated with linseed oil, and then, start bracing the 90 degree corners into place, creating the boxes that will become my 2011 garden.

Ranger's problem turned out to be the ignition module, so $200 later, he is ready to go again. I have every reason to believe that he and I will be out and about, toting tools, compost, stakes and all the other accoutrements of dahlia growing, as soon as the earth softens and warms enough. Regardless of Ranger's readiness, however, I will get those boxes built and filled with compost and soil, well in advance of spring planting season. The thaw is on its way.....