gardening in the dead of winter

February can be a dreary and cold month in the Pacific Northwest, but since weather conditions are insane in other parts of the country –lowest wind chill for the entire county at -109°F at Mt Washington in New Hampshire; ice storm in Texas – I'll take dreary and cold any winter. Still, that doesn't mean our gardens can be forgotten for a time while we wait for the weather to change.

The work in the garden does not end with the cold weather. I've spent the last several weeks cleaning up the garden beds, and removing dead plant material and debris. This will help prevent the spread of diseases and pests. Except for the evergreen trees, most of the trees and shrubs in the yard have also been pruned to promote growth in spring.

Two things I enjoyed the most at this time of year is planning the upcoming season's garden, and ordering/starting seeds in the greenhouse. I typically use a large sketchbook to outline the garden beds and plan on what plant goes where. I do not re-do the garden beds every year, but I often end up creating new beds. Last year, I added a new bed with a bamboo cattle panel trellis. This year, I am adding a plot next to the cypress grove so I can plant corn, pole beans and squash together. I am also adding another plot so I can have a permanent space for artichokes, Jerusalem Artichokes, and some Giant Sacaton. It is always exciting to plan the garden at this time of year, to imagine all the possibilities, and to see the dream flower in summer.

I have a few go-to sites for seeds: Baker Creek Heirloom Seeds (where I finally found some snail vine seeds), Territorial Seeds, Gurney's (where I found an upright squash called, Smooth Criminal!) and J&L Gardens, where I sourced a lot of my tomato seeds for this year's planting. Some of the seeds will be started this week in the greenhouse, others will be started outside for winter sowing.

One other thing I enjoyed doing this season was exploring DALL.E2, a new Artificial Intelligence system that can create almost realistic images from a text description. The cover photo we have for this month is a DALL.E2 generated image from a prompt asking for a "forest filled with giant flowers, giant dragonflies, tim burton". What does DALL.E2 have to do with gardening? Maybe something, maybe nothing. For now, this is just an exercise in exploration. Who doesn't love a forest with giant trees sporting orange canopies?