Saturday, September 08, 2007

Before and after...

I planted sweet potato slips back at the beginning of May. I got the slips from my good gardening buddy Bill. Before I planted them, I spread a few wheelbarrow-fulls of trash wood mulch from the dump.

The sweet potatoes sprawled all summer, getting a bit bug-eaten but otherwise carefree and pretty enough in their own way.
I decided today was the day to harvest -- some of them were huge, some of them needed another month. I harvested about ten pounds in the, maybe, ten by ten area where I let them run wild.

The same bed, after I cleaned it out and spread about a hundred pounds of mushroom compost. That Russelia rotundifolia in the center is a remarkable butterfly attractant.

3 comments:

Eileen said...

Where did you get your russelia rotundifolia plant? I would like to purchase one. I live in the Orlando area.

Michael said...

at biosphere in apopka...

Anonymous said...

That's not Russelia rotundifolia. It's Russelia sarmentosa. There's a cultivated variety of Russelia rotundifolia in the nursery trade called Russelia 'San Carlos' that has bright red 1/2" flowers that's much prettier than Russelia sarmentosa. By the way, Russelia rotundifolia has round leaves (hence the name 'rotundifolia') while Russelia sarmentosa has lance-shaped leaves.