specgrade
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Talking To Your Garden

Once upon a time my grandmother and I had a garden. The previous homeowner got rid of an old swimming pool and all that was left was a big round circle of sand. My grandfather had been a farmer all his life and told us we'd never get anything to grow there. My grandmother saw things differently. We bought a lot of dirt and planted all kinds of vegetables.

A few weeks later our garden had come alive. I stopped by to see how it was doing and I found my grandmother standing in the garden talking to all the plants with words of encouragement and showering water down into the soil below. She told me that talking to the crops was important, to let them know we cared. Silly maybe but we had a great bumper crop of vegetables that year.

Do you talk to you garden...I do!
Last edited by specgrade on Fri Jul 02, 2010 12:40 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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rainbowgardener
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Nope, don't talk to it, but do spend time with it!

"The best fertilizer is the gardener's shadow."

Liska
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Yup! ALl the time! :D It's all I pretty much CAN do at the moment, and so far so good!

specgrade
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rainbowgardener wrote:
"The best fertilizer is the gardener's shadow."
I love it!! :clap:

specgrade
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Liska wrote:Yup! ALl the time! :D It's all I pretty much CAN do at the moment, and so far so good!
Just wait, you'll see! :shock:

Liska
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specgrade wrote:
Liska wrote:Yup! ALl the time! :D It's all I pretty much CAN do at the moment, and so far so good!
Just wait, you'll see! :shock:
I talk to the plants inside my house; the outside ones are no different! :D And if me talking to them doesn't work, I have a resident garden guardian spider keeping an eye on things. I found him in one of the flowers of my bell peppers this morning, just hanging out!

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applestar
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I do! :D Not baby talk, though. Just normal, casual-like, conversation, you know? "Hi, how are you?" "It's supposed to rain today." "Oh! You flowered! Wow, that looks GREAT!" 8)

My next door neighbor recently got a puppy. I guess she's toilet training him, and she's out in HER yard almost any time I'm out in mine. She's always coo-ing and baby-talking to him. "Good Boy! You're such-a-little Good BOY!" and she refers to her husband as "Daddy" -- e.g. "Look what Daddy's got!" I have to admit, I saw the puppy other day and he's a cute little thing about the size of a rabbit. :bouncey:

My other next door neighbor constantly baby-talks to her outdoor cats. She has some indoor cats that have -- oh what is that? Feline Leukemia? One has it, the other's immune or a carrier or something, so she keeps the outs/ins separate. At least one of her outdoor cats is a rescue that WON'T go inside. She also whistles Chim-Chiminee to call one of the cats but he has this routine or something -- he doesn't immediately make an appearance -- and she always goes through the same process of whistling, calling, and demanding. Often he's just hiding in the shrubbery watching her. I know, because my cats do the same thing! :roll:

So I don't feel self-conscious at all about talking to my plants... or the birds and the other wildlife -- chipmunks, bunnies, or the bugs for that matter! :wink:
Last edited by applestar on Fri Jul 02, 2010 2:17 pm, edited 1 time in total.

VeggieGrower
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It always drives my husband nuts to see me outside "talking to myself" I think he might have me committed one of these days :lol:
But my I say it's helps both my sanity and my marriage to be able to talk to my plants about all my problems in life. I always know that between the tomatos and the dog, someboby will always understand me. And they're great listeners!

petechapman
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Thats my view anyway. The Prince of Wales has often been criticised for doing the same but what harm is there?

I suspect though that the dirt and water was the main reason the plants did so well.

Yes, the "shadow of the gardener" is a great insight too. Just loving the work and caring for the results is what is needed - whether you talk to them, sing to them or just happy to be there amongst it all.

garden5
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I remember that on a TV program one time, they did an experiment: they made several garden plots, and had different types of music playing in each one. Also, they talked nice to the plants in one and mean to plants in another.

Surprisingly, one of the music plants did better or worse (can't remember) than the others.

Perhaps sound frequencies may play a role in plant grow?

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jal_ut
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Talking to your garden is talking to yourself. Its OK though, at least you have an intelligent audience.

sweet thunder
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I've heard many different answers to the question of what type of music plants like. One study I saw found that heavy metal had the best results.

MaryDel
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Does your garden ever talk back? :D

specgrade
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MaryDel wrote:Does your garden ever talk back? :D
I am sure I can hear the corn grow late at night! :shock:

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applestar
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Most mornings start with the penetrating song of the House Wren outside the bedroom window. Who needs alarm clocks when either the House Wren or the Cardinal will sing you awake at sun-up? They irresistibly turn my thoughts to the garden, and I usually manage to remember something or other that needed doing. If not, looking out the window, watching the wren's antics or the hummingbird that visits the trumpet honeysuckle flowers or the robins bathing in the Native Bog Garden, grackles striding in the grass and poking around the mulch -- all call to me to come outside and join them in the garden. :D

LindsayArthurRTR
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Most mornings start with the penetrating song of the House Wren outside the bedroom window. Who needs alarm clocks when either the House Wren or the Cardinal will sing you awake at sun-up?
Our wake up call is a red headed woodpecker. He bangs the gutter above our bed every morning at around 6:00. It is endangered in SC :evil: :?

My garden jabber is mostly to the critters, the bugs, and the gigantic spotted toad that scares the s$!* out of me every time I pick my okra. :shock: (that's where he likes to hang out!)

It's mostly in the form of sharp shrill screams as I discover some creature I wasn't ready to see. Today, I did ask an assasin bug why he wont stop eating the good bugs and refocus his efforts of the bad bugs...he didn't respond :roll: :D

elementfiftyfour
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I edited at my peas, beans, cucumbers and zucchini for being such wussy plants and not being able to take a little heat.

Ha ha, "edited."

specgrade
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applestar wrote:Most mornings start with the penetrating song of the House Wren outside the bedroom window. Who needs alarm clocks when either the House Wren or the Cardinal will sing you awake at sun-up? They irresistibly turn my thoughts to the garden, and I usually manage to remember something or other that needed doing. If not, looking out the window, watching the wren's antics or the hummingbird that visits the trumpet honeysuckle flowers or the robins bathing in the Native Bog Garden, grackles striding in the grass and poking around the mulch -- all call to me to come outside and join them in the garden. :D
Now that's the way to start ones morning. We have a Cardinal family that comes to my diy bird feeder and every now and then a Blue Jay. Do you have any pictures of the Native Bog Garden?

specgrade
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elementfiftyfour wrote:I edited at my peas, beans, cucumbers and zucchini for being such wussy plants and not being able to take a little heat.

Ha ha, "edited."
I just glare at my pepper plants because are a bit lacking :x They should be hardier :lol:

specgrade
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LindsayArthurRTR wrote:
Most mornings start with the penetrating song of the House Wren outside the bedroom window. Who needs alarm clocks when either the House Wren or the Cardinal will sing you awake at sun-up?
Our wake up call is a red headed woodpecker. He bangs the gutter above our bed every morning at around 6:00. It is endangered in SC :evil: :?

My garden jabber is mostly to the critters, the bugs, and the gigantic spotted toad that scares the s$!* out of me every time I pick my okra. :shock: (that's where he likes to hang out!)

It's mostly in the form of sharp shrill screams as I discover some creature I wasn't ready to see. Today, I did ask an assasin bug why he wont stop eating the good bugs and refocus his efforts of the bad bugs...he didn't respond :roll: :D
Now what kind of bugs does that woodpecker think she's gonna get from pecking on a gutter? Crazy Critter!

That must be an adventure for you to go into your garden! Sounds like fun to me :D

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applestar
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specgrade wrote:Do you have any pictures of the Native Bog Garden?
:oops: Now I'm embarrassed because it's actually a tiny corner in my suburban lot but that's what I call it :wink: I described it here with a photo attached:
https://www.helpfulgardener.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=139219#139219

This morning, I turned on the soaker hose for the Shade Garden (see I name all my little garden beds :lol:). It's set up so the beginning of the hose is lifted up to fill the birdbath, and the arching section mists the surrounding area. ...And a mixed flock of Chickadees and Titmouses (titmice?) descended. They looked like families with fledglings. It must have been a welcome sight for them since we're in a midst of a month-long drought with only 3 or 4 passing showers -- hardly enough to call it rain.

I could hear their conversation in their chatter as they perched on wet swaying native Azalea branches, rim of the birdbath, clutched on to the wooden fence, and hopped among the wet mulch:
-- "This is WA-TER isn't it Mama? I've never seen WA-TER before!"
-- "I have! It fell from the sky once when I was little."
-- "You're STILL little, and that's called RAIN!"
-- "HEY!! Mrs.T, Titmouse Timmy made me fall off the branch!"
-- "No, I didn't. You just need more landing practice!"
:lol:

specgrade
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applestar, you have a great Native Bog Garden! Nothing to be :oops: about at all. Thank you for sharing, being new here I missed that thread.

Urban_Garden
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I constantly talk to the bugs in my garden, and on occasion the plants (especially if I am moving them).

specgrade
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Urban_Garden wrote:I constantly talk to the bugs in my garden, and on occasion the plants (especially if I am moving them).
When I transplanted my corn I wished them well and said "You can do it, be strong. I'll water you, I promise!" 8)

LindsayArthurRTR
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Now what kind of bugs does that woodpecker think she's gonna get from pecking on a gutter? Crazy Critter!

That must be an adventure for you to go into your garden! Sounds like fun to me
I don't know what the thing is thinking...pecking at the gutter. We both work second-ish shift, so it's kind of annoying. He's not pecking on the house, just the gutter. Phill saw him out there one morning. He had been doing it for like 20 minutes :evil: . That's how we got the ID.

It is quite an adventure in my garden. Bugs and such really creep me out :bouncey: :eek: . It's an ongoing battle :roll: . I'm making progress though :wink: :D



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