Summary
Gardeners frequently encounter dead plants and debris throughout the year, prompting a discussion on how to manage this organic waste. The hosts, Leslie Harris and Marianne Wilburn, explore creative solutions, including the construction of habitat nests from fallen sticks and branches. These nests serve as both artistic installations and functional habitats for wildlife, promoting biodiversity while recycling garden waste.
The conversation shifts to the importance of understanding plant taxonomy, particularly regarding species like Prunus laurocerasis and Carex. The hosts clarify previous discussions about these plants, emphasizing the significance of proper identification in gardening. They also delve into the challenges posed by pests like cedar apple rust, which affects apple trees and junipers, and share personal experiences with managing these issues in their gardens.
In a lighter segment, the hosts introduce a cocktail called Corpse Reviver Number Two, linking it to the episode's theme of dead things. They also discuss various gardening tips, including the use of dead hedges and the benefits of composting organic material. The episode concludes with a focus on specific plants that thrive in fall, encouraging listeners to embrace the seasonal changes in their gardens.
Show Notes
Every garden —even the smallest — produces dead things: the limbs that come down in a storm, the invasives you’ve finally pulled, the sticks that land in front of the door and sit there longer than you’d like. Sooner or later you have to decide what to do with them. Today, Leslie and Marianne go through the traditional options, from the bonfire to the chipper to the bags on the curb; but would rather make the case for keeping it all where it fell — well, sort of. To do that, Marianne catches up with horticulturist Gregg Tepper, the man behind her beloved habitat nests — sculptures built from fallen branches that shelter wrens and beetles and look fantastic doing it. And Leslie discusses her experience working in neighborhoods with sharp-eyed HOAs to create her own mini-sculptures and dead hedges. Happy Halloween. Let’s clear up the bodies.
__________ Please hit the subscribe button so we can keep you smiling while you hit the beautiful mess [your garden] out there. Full Show Notes at The Garden Mixer Podcast’s Substack ____________________ Socials – Pick Your Platform: Follow us on Instagram @thegardenmixer Indulge us on TikTok @the.garden.mixer Spar with us on X @gardenmixerpod “French Bistro” theme by Adieu Adieu. License D0LZBINY30GGTBBW
More from The Garden Mixer: A Gardening Podcast
Gardening shouldn't be boring! Join Leslie Harris and Marianne Willburn for lively conversations, strong opinions, cocktails and plenty of laughs. From favorite plants to garden triumphs and disasters, there's always something to stir up. New episodes every other week, with Barrel Aged One More Sip conversations in between. Follow The Garden Mixer and join the fun!
Welcome to a Barrel Aged episode of One More Sip. One More Sip is our every-other-week deep dive on a single topic — released fresh to paid subscribers, and then, after a year of fine barrel aging, uncorked for the wider Mixer community. You’re holding the bottle now. Enjoy!! If you’d like to catch these episodes while they’re still young — and get all the show notes, the GM Chat, and Substack LIVE events that go with them — upgrading your free subscription is easy and costs less than a decent bottle of anything. To those already subscribed: our gratitude is deep. Thank you for supporting our mission: Gardening Shouldn’t Be Boring.
Parking lot plants. The ones growing between the cart return and the McDonald’s drive-through. The ones shaved into meatballs and meatloaf and shapes that can’t be easily defined in meat terms. The ones that ask for nothing more than hard pan, cigarette butts & exhaust fumes — and deliver anyway. These plants have a reputation problem. Not because they aren’t good plants, but because they’ve been used badly, repeated endlessly, and associated with the worst design instincts of the last fifty years. And yet: there is a reason they keep showing up. They work. They survive. And they look beautiful when they are transported out of the ninth circle of hell and brought to a garden where they can be the plants they’re meant to be. Leslie and Marianne are here to raise a glass to them — and to make the case that the parking lot plant in your garden, handled with intention, is not a consolation prize. It’s a plant that has already proven itself under conditions your garden will never impose. So how about a little respect? Today on The Garden Mixer. __________ Please hit the subscribe button so we can keep you smiling while you hit the beautiful mess [your garden] out there. Full Show Notes at The Garden Mixer Podcast’s Substack ____________________ Socials – Pick Your Platform: Follow us on Instagram @thegardenmixer Indulge us on TikTok @the.garden.mixer Spar with us on X @gardenmixerpod “French Bistro” theme by Adieu Adieu. License D0LZBINY30GGTBBW
In this latest Barrel-Aged episode of One More Sip of The Garden Mixer, Marianne and Leslie talk about all of their worst gardening boo-boos over the years. The format is interesting-- this is a LIVE Substack video that took place a year ago. They bring up mistakes that range from planting the wrong thing to just plain planting wrong and one story involves the explosion of a rear window. Who knew gardening could get so violent? At least it's never boring when you listen to Marianne Willburn and Leslie Harris of The Garden Mixer. If you are interested in being up to date with One More Sip of The Garden Mixer, which is our in between episode that comes out between bigger sips (regular episodes), head over to Substack to join our community and support the show. And thanks!
Last December, Leslie and Marianne talked deer fences on the podcast — and Marianne’s imminent enclosure and ironic freedom. Somewhere in the middle of that episode, Founding Mixer and friend Erin Schanen, The Impatient Gardener, decided she’d had enough. Not of the podcast. (uh, obvs!) Of the deer. So she did what any reasonable person does when pushed past the breaking point by a herd of four-legged garden criminals: she went all in. Not with one kind of fence. With four. Simultaneously. On a suburban property with ordinances, a neighbor with opinions, a driveway that needed a gate and a woodland doubling as a deer maternity unit. She is here to tell us how it went. And more importantly, how you might piece together a solution for yourself if you can’t just pick up the phone and call the local fencing company. Spoiler: She’s zapped herself three times on the electric fence. But her phlox have never looked better. Join us as we discuss thinking outside the box to create a box. Today, on the Garden Mixer. __________ Please hit the subscribe button so we can keep you smiling while you hit the beautiful mess [your garden] out there. Full Show Notes at The Garden Mixer Podcast’s Substack ____________________ Socials – Pick Your Platform: Follow us on Instagram @thegardenmixer Indulge us on TikTok @the.garden.mixer Spar with us on X @gardenmixerpod “French Bistro” theme by Adieu Adieu. License D0LZBINY30GGTBBW