My OMG Failures

A friend of mine listened patiently to my gardening complaints today and suggested that a posting about my (many) failures might be pretty funny.  Really?  Funny?? Oooo, she's probably right since I do manage to flame out in pretty strange ways, for someone who's supposed to be trained as a Master Gardener!

Here's a list of My More Masterful Ideas:

1. Feed the local birds a gourmet diet: plant strawberries in a raingutter and hang it near the bird feeder, just to be sure they don't miss the red strawberries when they ripen.

The rain gutter idea was a good one - I attached it to the outer edge of the porch railing so that the strawberries would grow above the wood and brighten the view with the green mounds of leaves, dotted with red berries. I did cover it all with "bird netting" but the netting only seems to work by tangling the less agile birds. And when they get caught, I naturally run out to help them get loose and fly away (to return another day to eat the berries).

2. Feed the local deer a healthy diet: plant the green beans so the vines will grow up the veggie garden fence. 

This one really isn't my fault. I built a really nice trellis inside the garden, arching over the walkway and ending beside the fence. Of course, since it's very happy green bean plant (about 8 of them, actually) the twinny little tendrils launched out and attached to the fence while I was away from home one week in early August.

Imagine how happy the deer were to discover the abundance of green beans at their eye level!  How conveniently grown.  No wonder they visit every morning, probably anxious to see what wonderful things I've provided for them to eat that day.

3. Put the Tanglefoot (a very sticky material intended to trap traveling insects like ants and weevils) on the bird feeder's post BEFORE you put it up: this way you're sure to get covered in the pine sap-like product that you will, before you realize it, transfer to your clothing, the lawn chair that was on the path to the feeder,  the neighbor's cat who desperately  needed a chin scratch, the door knob going back in the house, the light switch beside the bathroom sink...

4. Encourage the self-seeding Sunflowers and Hollyhocks (they're free and the birds really love them): this way you won't have to worry about weeds in the veggie garden since the 8' tall Sunflowers and Hollyhocks will block all access to the veggie garden.  Cutting them down seems criminal since the birds really love them - which is probably how the veggie garden became overwhelmed with both plants.  Every May I promise to pull out the little plants but it's so hard to do when nothing else is growing so well - by August, it's a jungle of towering plants, toppling into the other plants and walkway from the sheer weight of the flowerheads. But the birds love them so much (more than my hubby loves the squashes and cabbages)!

5. Be sure to start enough tomato (zucchini, squash, zinnia, sweet pea, calendula, lettuce) plants in late Winter; after all, not all 4 zucchini plants may survive: by the time all 6 tomato plants are ready to be planted out in the garden, you'll find the 7 plants that last year's fallen heirloom tomatoes have sprouted.  Pretty soon, you're reverse panhandling: "please, dear neighbor, take some tomato (squash, marigold, spinach) plants for your garden!"  Of course, if they're as over zealous as you are, they're trying to get rid of their own extra plants. And that's how I've grown cucumbers in my back porch flower pots, lettuce in my flower garden, and chives all over the yard.  To be honest, the unusual placement of the veggies is quite attractive and attention-getting.  I may intentionally repeat it next year (like I have a choice - I always start too many plants).

And who could complain about too many tomatoes??? 

What have you done that raises eyebrows and makes your family question your sanity? What 'mistakes' turned out so well you'd do them again? Share your experiences with us in the Comments, below.