Monday, June 1, 2009

Garden Blogger's Death Day

Anyone that's been around the garden blog circuit for awhile knows about Carol from May Dreams Garden. She's been voted as one of the most influential garden bloggers and she has a popular monthly post called Garden Bloggers Bloom Day. On the 15th of every month gardeners from around the country can post a comment saying what's blooming in their gardens. It's a great way to see what's growing in other gardens around the country and connect with other garden bloggers.

Then there's Carolyn at Sweet Home and Garden Chicago who hosts Garden Blogger's Muse Day on the 1st of every month. It's a nice way to bring in the month with a poem and a photograph of something inspiring. You'd think as the current U.S. LAPCPADPOUB title-holder, I'd be able to wipe the floor clean with deliciously dire cat poems, but as of now I merely enjoy reading what others write.

But where's the day for gardeners who overwater, underwater, maim, prune or otherwise neglect their plants to a state of dismal droopage or untimely death? There isn't one, my friends…until now.

Introducing my own personal meme: Garden Blogger's Death Day. I've had two planting seasons in my vegetable gardening life and I've had widespread death and destruction both times. I know there has to be some other gardeners out there like me with black thumbs who kill more than they cultivate, or even green-thumbed gardeners who have a lapse in judgment and commit accidental planticide.


Did you accidentally leave the sprinklers on for 13 hours and flood the garden? (check). Did you have an infestation of hornworms and now have leafless sticks instead of tomato plants? (check). Did a freak rainstorm flood your garden and wash away your plants? (check). Did you overheat your seedlings and singe them all to a crisp? (check). Are you so bad at remembering to water your plants that you bought some Aqua Globes from that infomercial and then you forgot to fill them with water and killed the plants anyway? (check). Well here is your support group, baby.

I have decided to host Garden Bloggers Death Day today. I'm so incredibly disappointed that I was actually "getting" this whole gardening gig a little bit this time and then most of it washed away and became a yellow, mushy lump of rotten slush after 14 inches of relentless rain. Here are some pictures of what my garden looked like after the rain - it has since sat in this state for over a week and it's more yellowed and rotten now than when these photos were taken a couple of days ago. It has now been pruned and a bunch of the dead plants have become one with the compost heap.






If you too have had an untimely plant death, feel free to post it in my comments section. Maybe I'll feel like less of a big fat gardening loser if I discover I'm not the only one who can't catch a break from Mother Nature or Mutha Shut Yo Mouth, as she's being called around here lately. Hmph. Maybe we can even support each other like a good pair of pantyhose or a well-staked garden trellis.

20 comments:

Daphne said...

Oh how funny. No not the death. Today I was thinking about a possible post for tomorrow. It is going to be called "And then there was one" or maybe "For whom the bell tolls". I have been trying to grow the sunflowers for the Great Sunflower Project. All the seeds have been used. Yesterday there were two plants left. Now just one. I planted three broccoli plants. A while ago I posted about how one was dying. Well now there is just one left. Mother nature can be very cruel even if you do nothing wrong. Hmmm you didn't do a rain dance to bring down the flood did you?

Kelly said...

Things did in fact look as though they were doing quite well before the floods came, poor veggie garden. You even did a soil test! I think thats the garden equivalent of reading to your kids for 20 minutes a day.

Oh, and if the killing involves houseplants I can join your death day club, they never last long around here.

Dani said...

My big, beautiful squash up and died on me last week. I tried saving it, but it was too late. *sniff*

Daphne said...

Ok so I had to join the meme for real. I posted it today at Daphne's Dandilons. Though it isn't a flood, it does show death in all its sappy detail.

Jeff Vandiver said...

I'll have to post about my tomatoes tomorrow, although they aren't dead - they are really strange looking! I really feel for y'all and the garden woes that have been placed upon you. Mother Nature can certainly be cruel sometimes...

Sandra said...

You know, this could be a lot of fun. Are you going to do it as a regular monthly thing? If you do, I'll glady join in. Maybe doing beautifully artistic photos of the dead and dying? Or funny photos?

Annie*s Granny said...

Great subject! I'm on my way to blog about death and dying in my garden, just because it happens. I don't care how great a gardener you are. It happens.

Will Mondays always be death days? I'll probably have enough blog material for the rest of the gardening season.

Tessa at Blunders with shoots, blossoms 'n roots! said...

Oh, I'm definitely going to have to join you on this! My friends seem to think I have a green thumb- very funny!

Peggy said...

That was absolutely painful to look at...just makes me sick...all that work zapped in a moment...makes you glad you are not a pioneer and that is your food for the year.
I should have taken a picture of my parade cucumber transplant to share. One day a beautiful thriving transplant, the next a lobbed off dried out speciment laying on the dirt...

Cheryl said...

I just joined the club. I am now a professed plant murderer.

This is a true example of taking lemons and making lemonade. I sure hope you're able to salvage something in your garden.

Mrs. Darling said...

Oh you poor thing! The death of the garden this year is really not your fault! No ones garden can withstand that kind of rain. Ive gardened for 20 years and still consider myself a novice. If you want to see something funny go to my blog and click on the garden link. There you will see an entire corn crop falling to the ground under massive amounts of wind and rain. It happens to everyone!

scooterwench said...

I start out with high hopes every spring. Most years it seems the combination of clay soil and (what we call here in Santa Barbara, CA) June gloom gets the best of my garden. What survives the lack of sun for a month and a half until mid July usually are beans and a few tomatoes. Two years ago I planted sunflowers all along the borders of my vegetable garden. The only vegetables that made it were yellow: I joke not, lemom cucumbers, little pear tomatoes, yellow squash and what my husband calls baby corn. NONE of my other veggies made it and when I mentioned this to the good folks at the local nursery they told me the sunflower roots are toxic to most vegetables! :(

Carole said...

I think GBDD should be the first Monday of the month. Monday is a day when we can all gripe and get over it and then we can get on with the rest of the week knowing we have cleansed our woes to all.
Mother Nature will shine on you one day..not sure if it will be on a monday though!.

Kate and Crew said...

Wow! Misery really does love company! Hearing about your losses really made me feel better about mine! Thanks so much to Cheryl, Annie's Granny and Daphne for participating in GBDD on your blogs too!!!
I think I'll keep this meme up and think of a day to host it. I like seeing other's failures - especially from seasoned gardeners. I think it makes us unskilled gardeners feel slightly less black thumbed!
I'll post some details later about the official GBDD dates!

Thanks all!
Kate

JGH said...

Awww - yes, we need to acknowledge our losses and be with others who can understand our pain. I have no doubt that I could come up with something at least once a month!

HappyMouffetard said...

What a great idea. I always hear about people drowning under hundreds of courgettes (zucchini). Last year, despite planting 6 plants, I had a grand total of 2 courgettes. Any my sweetcord died.

Corner Gardener Sue said...

I seem to do OK outside. Just today, I saw a couple nice looking African violets, and wanted to bring them home, but I told myself, "No, you kill African violets." I left them for someone who would keep them alive. Not only do I kill them, I take a really long time to get the poor things out of the house.

Corner Gardener Sue said...

Actually, I always get the worm in the stems of my squashes after getting a small crop. My tomato plants get diseased and die after an OK sized crop.

Wendy P said...

Just found your blog. I'm glad I am not the only one frustrated. We've had heat in the 100s and no rain for so long that most of my garden has failed, even with sprinklers. Then my dogs figured out how to get in there and trampled or ate most of what was left. Between all that and the mosquitoes, I am about ready to give up on gardening in NW Florida.

sb158 said...

Here's my Death Day Post for July:

http://www.squirtbug.com/Garden/wordpress/2009/07/31/garden-bloggers-death-day/

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