Moonshine… Evening rising… Sunshine falling…
Cold wind blows away the morning sun calling…
Alone with you… Together with a meadow lark…
Seasons slide away into the never ending dark…

Sunshine fleeting… Fog rising off the calm water…
Flashbacks to carefree days… Bud and sunshine blotter…
Steadfast we glide across mountains made of lime…
Aging is just the way we come to terms with time…

We will shine… Our reflections dance on the still lake…
Confidence is nurtured… Bread is what we break…
In the morning spiritual energy tends to rise and fall…
When the weather breaks we will answer natures call…

Nightfall resigns… Yet our spirits continue to rise…
We are limited to the earth… Birds rule the sky…
Our souls fly above the clouds and into outer space…
Some folks pray for peace… Others pray for grace…

plant petunias and question everything – chriscondello

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November 2, 2014 by C.Condello

Waiting for… Finding a Home…

“Waiting for a Home” – Soergel Orchards – Wexford, PA

I haven’t posted in a while… A life consumed… A life confirmed… For me…

In the meantime… I was interviewed for Ignite… Check it out right here…

Red sky mourning… Red sky and the mourning doves…
Yellow leaves grace trees rising above…
Spring is a whimper… Summer is a reply…
Autumn is the way the seasons try to say goodbye…

Summer is falling… Fruit is rotting on the frozen ground…
Mourning doves fly through the winds winter bound…
Frozen time lost in the name of sleep…
When we wake the spring clouds will thunder and weep…

Winter is of the night… Winter is a time of passing…
Winds send the naked trees suddenly crashing…
Darkness lasts longer than the winter sun…
I am of the daylight… Together we are one…

plant petunias and question everything – chriscondello

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September 7, 2014 by C.Condello

Seasons Melting

“Bumblebee on Wingstem” – Whitney Avenue – Wilkinsburg, PA

Sunset melts into mighty rivers…
Oceans evaporate in the steady wind…
Rivers flow into the fluctuating sea…
The rain will eventually set us free…

The rain will wash away our sins…
Falling like hail from the gray sky…
Cloudy days into sunshine blinding…
Found yet wandering… Lost reminding…

Remind us of the woodland trees…
Smell of leaves before the freeze…
Air is crisp and cold surrounds…
In the spring the weather rebounds…

In the spring our spirits will rise…
Flowers bloom and youth surprise…
Snow delays are but a splinter…
Spring into summer and fall into winter…

plant petunias and question everything – chriscondello

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September 4, 2014 by C.Condello

Summer Rise – Autumn Fall

“Monarch on Milkweed” – Penn State Master Gardeners Demo Garden – South Park, PA

Stellar summer sunlight…
Autumn is slowly creeping…
When the tree leaves fall…
The earth begins sleeping…

Night sky lit in orange…
Sirens interrupt silence…
Just another reminder…
Of surrounding violence…

So into the blue we sail…
Together constantly rising…
Heaven is a hop away…
Into the stars of Orion…

plant petunias and question everything – chriscondello

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April 11, 2014 by C.Condello

Hyacinth Breeze – Naked Trees

“Hyacinth Breeze” – Whitney Avenue – Wilkinsburg, PA – Hyacinth stars burst forth in colors of Easter… Early spring has arrived…

Today is but a rain delay in the grand scheme of spring…
A rare opportunity I have to share the feelings I bring…
Last years decaying leaves now resemble faded shells…
The remaining Oak leaves ring like broken church bells…

Squirrels left the trees for the rotting open eaves…
Raccoon in the chimney just another pet-peeve…
Spring is of rain showers and summer is of the sun…
Then we fall to winters slumber and the year is done…

Meanwhile in reality I absorb the Hyacinth breeze…
Soul is rising high enough to clear the naked trees…
Way up here the air is clear and I feel a bit unsteady…
Soon the bulbs will whither back and summer will be ready…

plant petunias and question everything – chriscondello

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March 3, 2014 by C.Condello

A Plant A Day Till Spring – Day 74 – Calibrachoa

“Calibrachoa” – Summer 2013 – Whitney Avenue – Wilkinsburg, PA

“A Plant a Day till Spring” will highlight one plant a day, starting on the winter solstice (December 21, 2013)… And ending on the vernal equinox (March 20, 2014)… If all goes to plan I will be starting with old Snowdrop photos from 2013… And ending with new photos of Snowdrops in 2014…

I don’t often say I hate a plant… But I can honestly say I am not a fan of calibrachoa… I swear when you see it at the nursery in the spring… It is in full bloom… A lot of money has been spent breeding this plant into the multitude of colors currently available… I guess that money has to be made back somehow…

I would be willing to bet a lot of people believe these to be dwarf petunias… After all they are commonly labeled “Mini Petunia” or “Mini-Tunia”… This couldn’t be further from the truth… In my own personal experiences this plant shares none of the same characteristics as Petunias… Where a Petunia is pretty bug resistant… Calibrachoa is one of the first plants eaten… Petunias bloom year-round… While Calibrachoa has a small window at the end of the season…

That is sort of the kick in the ass about this plant… It is really an autumn-bloomer… But when you buy it in the store it is often in full bloom regardless of the season… This is just one trick nurseries often use to get us to buy plants that we would not even notice…

Plants that bloom during a specific time of the year are triggered to do so by the sun… Throughout the course of the year the hours of sunlight we experience is constantly changing,,, For many Autumn blooming flowers this is triggered by the shortening hours of daylight… This trait is called photosensitivity and is a trait shared by many plants… All the nurseryman needs to do to get late-blooming flowers to open is modify the hours of available light in the greenhouse… For many temperate climate plants the magic number is 12 hours on and 12 hours off…

“First Snowfall on Lilac” – Fall 2013 – Whitney Avenue – Wilkinsburg, PA

The one redeeming quality of Calibrachoa is the little fact that it blooms well beyond the first snowfall… In fact… It takes a relatively hard freeze to kill it… In its native range of South America it is a tender perennial… Some might even consider it a tender evergreen… Either way… If you do decide to plant it… Which I won’t be doing again… You will at least have something to photograph well after the first snowfall…

plant petunias and question everything – chriscondello

If you want some science – http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Calibrachoa

These “Plant a Day Till Spring” posts are simply intended to kill time until spring when I start writing more… My source (where applicable) is Wikipedia.org… The photography is all my own… And I am adding my own information…

This website and all of the information presented within is provided free by the author… Me… It is my sole opinion and is not representative of anyone other than myself… You can contact me directly with questions at – c.condello@hotmail.com

Remember to tip… My Bitcoin digital wallet address is… 1JsKwa3vYgy4LZjNk4YmPEHFJNjPt2wDJj

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February 11, 2014 by C.Condello

A Plant A Day Till Spring – Day 54 – Tansy

“Not-so-Common Tansy” – Summer 2013 – Frick Park – Pittsburgh, PA

Tansy is one of those plants that we all know exists… We have all seen it… But I’d be willing to bet none of us have paid much attention to it… I never have… And then last summer I was watching a red-tailed hawk try to steal a cooper hawks nest… During the course of this I caught a black object moving in my peripheral vision… It turned out to be a dog… A big ass dog… I got a little nervous at first… Then he saw me… As my tail crept between my legs… His tail shot straight up in the air… He ran at me full speed… I have to admit I almost ran… But I didn’t… When the dog got close… He threw himself on the ground at my feet… With his tongue out he started howling… I had a new friend…

The human attached to this dog was close behind… She was a little old lady with a thick British accent… At first I joked in my head that the dog was obviously walking her… Then she shook my hand… She had a grip like a navy seal… I’d be willing to bet she was 70 years old… And could probably kick my ass blindfolded… Anyway…

This lady knew her stuff… We talked at length about flora and fauna as we walked through the woods… I taught her a little… And she taught me a lot… One of the plants we came across on our walk was Common Tansy… Her face lit up and I could see the wheels of reflection turning in her head… I knew I was about to receive something very special… And believe me… She did not disappoint,..

Apparently… As a young girl growing up in England (wish I could be more specific – I want to say Cornwall – But I don’t even know if that’s really a place) they did not have much money… Or as she put it “pot-less”… Sanitary conditions in her neighborhood were apparently not the greatest and as a result… Flies were everywhere…

Now… It is well-known that Tansy is a powerful insect repellent… Many of todays organic insecticides contain its oils..

Every autumn her and her grandmother would go to the countryside in search of Tansy… They would harvest as much as they could carry… Bring it home and dry it… It was then placed on the sill of every window in the house… The windows could then be cracked in the hot summer months without letting flies into the house…

I have run into a lot of interesting people while walking in the local park… But I have only run into this individual once… I gave her my blogs address… And if she is reading this right now… Please email me…

Tansy is also used as a medicine… Though it borders on poison… I wouldn’t recommend using it… And I wouldn’t ingest this plant…

And I will eat just about anything… Especially tasty treats I find in the forest… Never-the-less… I gathered some Tansy seeds and will be germinating them this spring…

I was looking through my seeds the other day and realized I had gathered elderberry seeds… I forgot about them… I have actually secured permission to transplant some from private property this spring… But I plan on germinating the seeds anyway… I may try to write about Elderberry tomorrow… I know I have photographs of the plant and flowers… I just have to go find them…

plant petunias and question everything – chriscondello

If you want some science – http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tansy

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February 9, 2014 by C.Condello

A Plant A Day Till Spring – Day 52 – Nasturtium

“Super Seed” – Summer 2013 – The Garden Table Urban Garden – Rebecca Avenue – Wilkinsburg, PA – Two packs of seeds and almost every flower was orange… I had one deep red one… And this guy… I liked this one and saved the seeds…

Apologies in advance… This one may have gotten away from me…

Although the plant I am featuring today is known as Nasturtium… I think it is very important to recognize the little fact that this plant is not actually Nasturtium… But is actually Tropaeolum majus… “Garden Nasturtium” just happens to be one of the latters common name… It is so common in fact that the seed companies even use it… Honestly… If they put the real name of this plant on the package… No one would even know what it is…

I have always been more interested in the common names than the scientific names of plants… I have only had a very small number of people ask me a question using proper names… They always have some regionally based common name… Not that the proper names don’t have a place… And I do work on them… A friend actually got me a “Plant Name Pronunciation Dictionary” for Christmas… His answer to my complaint that I have never pronounced a plants proper name around my Penn State Extension friends without being corrected… After making the pronunciation changes… It is not uncommon to have someone else correct me back to my original pronunciation… For this reason… My pronunciations book has proven to be irreplaceable…

Nasturtium is an edible plant… It has a very peppery taste… Some would even go as far as to consider it food… I do not… I consider the fact that it is edible to be nothing more than a novelty… I try to view edible plants in two categories… Food and fodder… Nasturtium is one I consider fodder… Primarily because I am not a fan of the taste… But also because I value this plant as an ornamental… I love the blossoms… Like a mouth full of sharp teeth trying to bite my finger off… The leaves are also interesting… They have a blue-green shade that is different from other leaves… This contrast alone makes Nasturtium stick out in a garden…

“Curling Up” – Summer 2013 – Center Street – Wilkinsburg, PA – Some Nasturtium form clump-like plants… Others tend to vine… All plants that grow like a vine… Though they way crawl along the ground… Or flop over a wall… Are actually trying to grow up towards the sun… Using the flower photographed above as an example… As the vine grows it hangs over the edge… You can clearly see the vine attempting to curl towards the sun… If the plant manages to curl back around on itself it will climb right back up to the pot…

Nasturtium is one of those plants that seems to commonly be associated with permaculture… Like Comfrey or PawPaw… I am always surprised at the lack of originality when it comes to permaculture “culture”… The amount of permaculture logos that use the Comfrey blossom is just ridiculous… Nasturtium comes in a close second…

This is just one of the things that bugs me about permaculture… Do you have any idea how few people actually like the taste of Nasturtium… Likewise… Not very many people even know what Comfrey is… I have been told my gardens are not permaculture gardens because I grow more than food… My answer to this comment was very direct and simple… I calmly explained that permaculture has nothing to do with the type of plants in your garden… It has nothing to do with style… It is a way of thinking… And to tell someone else that they are not a “permie” because of their plant choices – well – that is the exact opposite of permaculture… In fact… It is the very definition of asshole… And I made sure I explained that very clearly… Like painfully clear… Then I walked away… My time is valuable… Not in terms of money… But in terms of life… I don’t have enough time in my life to worry about people I consider a negative influence on myself or the people around me… Our job as permaculturists is to design in a way that will attract the beneficial… And repel the destructive… Not just in our gardens… But in our lives as well…

A true permaculturist recognizes that all plants play a role in helping our environment… Hardcore permaculturists preach acceptance everywhere they go… But in hindsight… They are often the least accepting group of people out their… Permaculture is not a defined line in the sand… It is a curved line that is constantly changing shape… As permaculturists… We need to change with it… We need to accept the fact that there are things (and people) that we cannot change… But we can change ourselves… And I believe we can do it in a way that doesn’t leave us looking like self-righteous assholes… Lead by example… Not by force…

plant petunias and question everything – chriscondello

If you want some science – http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tropaeolum_majus

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February 8, 2014 by C.Condello

A Plant A Day Till Spring – Day 51 – Aster

“Aster Minibus” – Late Summer 2013 – Pittsburgh, PA

In my mind… Asters are one of the floral jewels of the autumn landscape… They grow everywhere… I have found them deep in the woods… And I have found them in urban alleys… Asters really aren’t picky plants… They will grow in almost any condition you can throw at them… I find most people pull them early in the year… Mistaken for a weed… This is due to the fact that it is an autumn blooming plant… It doesn’t even start to bud until late August or early September…

Asters are a bomb proof plant… They do not need watered… Transplanting is as easy as popping it out of the ground and cutting the root-ball into pieces… This is best done while the plant is dormant… But like I said… It is bombproof… I have ripped them out of the ground with my bare hands in the middle of the growing period… After realizing what I had just done… And looking around to make sure no one was watching… I threw it back in the hole and stomped it in with my foot… A few weeks later I noticed the plant was getting ready to bloom… A few weeks later than the undisturbed asters… But still blooming… Last summer it resumed a normal flowering schedule…

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Asters require s little work to keep looking good… Asters grow among tall grasses when in nature… Because of this… The plant has evolved to be rather tall… If left alone… Asters can grow 4′ to 6′ – tall depending on the height of the plants growing around it… The way we deal with this in the garden is by regular pruning… I do mine twice a year… In early june I drop the plant down to about 10″ tall… The plant will branch at each leaf node below the cut… Around mid July… The plant will have grown considerably… I now cut each branch down to 3 or 4″ above my early season cut… Doing this in mid to late July allows the plant enough time to recover before going into the bloom cycle… If done properly… Your Aster will not get tall… Lanky… And finally flop over and look bad… It will be short and sexy… Like me… I mean mine…

It is currently 10 degrees outside… We are expecting some snow later on this evening… It has been a long time since Pittsburgh has experienced a winter like this… It sucks… But as always I am finding a bright spot in the situation… This spring will give me an opportunity to observe plants that have been “winter damaged” to a degree I have not experienced before… To clarify… I have experienced rough winters before… This is Pittsburgh after all… But I now observe plants and nature to a different degree than I did before… i.e. I pay attention now… It is an exciting opportunity that may not come again for a long time… Fingers crossed…

I spent a while taking photographs yesterday… I may post a gallery soon…

plant petunias and question everything – chriscondello

If you want some science – http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aster_(genus)

Remember to tip… My Bitcoin digital wallet address is… 1JsKwa3vYgy4LZjNk4YmPEHFJNjPt2wDJj

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