What's Up summary of this week's news
Janet Macunovich and Steven Nikkila help you grow
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To download this issue in pdf
Issue #189, September 2, 2012*
This week we posted these items in What's Up
The
Mulch Calculator
A
new lawn from seed
New
home basics
In awe of insect predators
Good to
mulch in fall, bad to
steal plant labels
A bevy
of bird baths
Potent
potentilla at 45 mph
Zucchinis
win at hide and seek
Results and plans from
our recent poll
Greetings!
We really burned our synapses this week creating a Mulch
Calculator. We sure hope you take a look and let us know how it
works or what we can do to make it better... because we've already
launched into the work for a Soil Calculator and Rock Calculator.
(The Mulch Calculator's been reviewed by and altered for one 31
year old male, one 50 year old female, and one 16 year old female.
We'd like to accommodate more viewpoints!)
Other than that, we've been bending our backs over sod and
stone, making way for new gardens and new paths because fall is the
time to plant, and fall's upon us.
Fall's also the time to get a lawn fixed or started new. We hope
you'll celebrate the success of a recent lawn seeding with us in
this issue. Then, pass that link for this how-to article along to
someone in need -- such as one of those young people who've
recently bought a home that sat untended so the lawn reverted to
field-mowed short!
Three new items in Main features:
No more extra trips for bags of mulch! Mulch
Calculator
For you who want to order the right amount delivered or buy the
correct number of bagsthe first time 'round, we've created an
answer machine. Type in number of square feet or measurements and
descriptions of beds to learn how many cubic yards or bags of mulch
will cover it. Includes recommendations for types and depths of
mulch.
There is no better time of year to start a lawn in the Great
Lakes region than mid-August to mid-September. Same goes for
renovating poor lawn areas. A step by step how to with costs
included.
An overview of helping new home owners find the simplest answers
to the basic questions. It isn't just one article but a gateway to
many answers for those learning to clip, mow, rake and dig around a
new home or an older home with new owners.
New in the department, This week in our gardens
A closer look into webbing on shrubs:
Awesome insects
We wrote recently that spraying shrubs to kill spiders is not a
good idea. Here's further explanation, all contained in just a few
square feet of shrub surface
Green thumbs up and down
This week our nod goes to
mulching in fall. We tell you why and how.
Our digital "No!" goes to
stealing plant labels.
One topic crossed over from the Forum in Tip
cuttings
A pretty tour of back yard basins and a nod to their many
sources.
Just now seen in the 45 mph garden
A humble native shows its stuff, now in pink as well as white
and yellow.
New in the Stumper department
Nuff said? Or maybe you're new to growing this sneaky squash --
come take a warning.
We've been planning changes, reported in What's
Next
We polled you regarding our current E-summary versus our
pre-website magazine format.
By a bit more than 2:1, you say that reading articles on the
website and receiving this weekly E-summary are AOK. Thank you.
Your votes also included many comments and suggestions.
Wonderful! We've implemented some and are working on others. Our
What's Next department tracks our changes, beginning this
week.
One out of three respondents preferred our magazine format in
PDF. They reported that they enjoyed its portability -- print it
and read it anywhere. Others liked its share-ability -- make an
extra copy for computer-less Aunt Mel. Some like it because they
can connect to the Internet only now and then and want to download
all the latest news in one stroke. Others mentioned that its "look"
was more pleasing. We're glad you appreciate all of this
Thanks to the generosity of a portion of those respondents,
we'll trial the format as a parallel subscription publication,
beginning with issue #190. We will share those with all readers as
we look for others who would subscribe to this arrangement.
We'll launch a campaign for Sponsor-subscribers, too. If the
magazine PDF is your preferred format, please sign on at the
upcoming Sign of the Blue Daisy and also tell others who might like
the PDF magazine to look, compare it to the E-Summary read on-line,
and join its supporters in that campaign.
New in the library called Ensemble Weekly
Editions
We move this year's news into this department as the seasons
change, but we also keep adding to this season-based library from our
archives. This week, we've posted these issues and articles to
this collection you can use by choosing a season and key words from
titles there.
What's Coming Up #14, with lawn weeds, holiday trees and
Iceland gardens
What's Coming Up #35 with a dried flower wedding, and cool hard
cuts on weeping mulberry
Growing Concerns #255 with Sneezy's mistake, goldenrod's
innocence!
Growing Concerns #716 with runaway plants, retirement garden,
self-watering, tulips
Growing Concerns #730 natural wooded area, juniper hedge,
vertical mulch, dividing, edging, mowing
Growing Concerns #763 with pruning spirea and lavender, kill
weed trees
All of these articles also pop up when you use our Search
function - top right on any page.
Some of these additions are available now through the generosity
of Sponsors who requested a particular issue or topic. You'll see
the Sponsor's name, and often a message and/or their chosen photo
on the article. Our thanks to every Sponsor -- whether you are in
for $1 or $100, the fact of your support is what gives us the
motivation to keep on growing this network.
You can Sponsor,
too. Please do. We hope this winter to more than double the
library's content to 2,200 articles -- we have those and more in
line for posting. All we need is your support to buy the time to
format and load them.
Who are Janet & Steven?
Entertaining answers in About Us
Please support this effort to help the gardening community
grow!
Sponsor us,
order our books, photos and other good stuff at our Market
Where to see us.
Details in About Us: Where we're appearing
Troy, MI
Sept. 12; Ann Arbor, MI
Sept. 18; Dearborn, MI
Sept. 22; Troy, MI
Oct. 13; Madison, WI
Oct. 18; Madison, WI
Nov. 10; Troy, MI
Nov. 17
Where does a year go?! We're already setting up dates for
Garden By Janet & Steven sessions on bulb planting and
garden clean up. Watch our calendar for these additions.
We gladly give our time to bring you
news
but we rely on your help to keep this
network humming. Please Sponsor
us
and help pay the bills for website hosting,
programming support, computer upgrades,
camera repairs and more.
If something we've written
or shown you
has saved you time and money, please
consider Sponsoring that article or one like
it.
All it takes is an email to us.
We'll register your
Sponsorship and then
send you a bill for the amount you pledged.
If you expected to find
a different issue number and
different stories here, it must mean you came here
via the Master Link on one of our previous weekly emails.
This page always has links to the very latest news on our
site.
Recent issues: #179,
#180, #181, #182,
#183, #184,
#185. #186, #187, #188
Or use our Search function to find
topics published earlier
Or go to the Ensemble Weekly Editions
page
and click on the desired issue number.
Sorry for any delay!
The pdf issues are an alternate format
for
our news, which we have been releasing following
each regular issue. This is a limited time trial
offer.
To download this
isssue, click here
.
Please let us know if you would like to see this
continue,
and why. Does it makes saving simpler or
print more easily for off-site reading?
The extra work to make the pdf has
been Sponsored
for you by a group of readers through issue #200.
A small Sponsorship from you can
keep it going longer.
.....