Gardening through the years

“That’s all the work I need done for today,” I said to my almost 16-year-old helper.

We had just cleaned up the mess we made creating a new flower bed next to the east side of the house and a couple other smaller projects.

After I drove him home, I returned to my house and rested in bed for almost two hours. When I got up, my knees and hips ached so much I could hardly walk! I had supervised and worked alongside him for almost four hours and although he did all the heavy work, even that little effort was too much for me.

In August 2011 after 12 years of living in Slana, we returned to Palmer and purchased a small ranch style house — our fourth residence in Palmer. Our little acre came with a small plot of want-to-be lawn in both the front and back yards, a huge crop of dandelions, a gravel driveway, and the rest is natural Valley vegetation.

Because of health issues, we haven’t done much gardening or yard work since returning to Palmer. Working in the dirt this morning certainly felt great, but my limitations were also quite noticeable. Gone are the years of unending youthful energy.

When I was a kid growing up in Glennallen, Dad grew potatoes and carrots most every summer. Some years there were other vegetables too. Although he did most of the planting and watering, we kids were expected to help with the weeding and harvesting.

One summer he built a little “bubble” greenhouse off the dining room windows and grew some prize-winning cucumbers. He later built a real greenhouse out of wood and glass. The summer I was 16 I bought one of those ready-made seed trays of snapdragons for the windowsill in my bedroom and those beautiful blooms lasted nearly until Christmas.

After Gary and I married, it was two years before we grew a garden of our own. We started from scratch clearing the willow brush and then turning the ground over on our 10 acres at 23½ mile Chena Hot Springs road. Gary even fashioned a small greenhouse attached to the south side of our trailer house. The neighbors bought the extra tomato plants we started, but our tomatoes never did much because once the willow and aspen trees leafed out, the greenhouse was in the shade. Since we hauled our water, we only grew edible plants with a few marigolds strategically located for pest control.

Although we were pleased with the results of the garden, we ended up selling out and moving to California in the fall of 1975. The decision was spurred by Gary’s longing for some of the fresh fruit he grew up with in California and the negative changes we saw in the Fairbanks area during the building of the oil pipeline.

Supposedly, we would have an even better garden in California. We bought 20 acres in the foothills of the Sierras. As it turned out, between the rocky soil, scorching heat, lack of running water, and gophers; after two months, we only had three hot pepper plants left in our newly created garden. After some wandering cows passed through and ate the pepper plants, we gave up.

The next summer Gary helped his mother improve her little garden in the foggy coastal mountains of the San Francisco Bay area, which was another totally new gardening climate for me. The following year I was overjoyed with our decision to return to Alaska.

Settling in the Cooper Landing area of the Kenai Peninsula, we reclaimed a garden spot that had not been used in more than 20 years and built a little make-shift greenhouse. I took a gardening class from the Cooperative Extension Service in Soldotna to learn about the local techniques, especially how to work with the cooler soil temperatures compared to Interior Alaska. We had lots of vegetables for eating fresh, freezing, and canning. I also started experimenting with different types of flowers for the first time.

Five years later we moved to Palmer and it was time to start over. After the first two years of living in a trailer, we bought a 10-year-old house that had a nice greenhouse attached. We even received permission to plant the greenhouse two weeks before we closed on the June 1 purchase date just so we wouldn’t miss a good growing season. That greenhouse provided all we could eat tomatoes and cucumbers for seven years. The vegetable garden had to be developed from scratch, though.

When we moved to a smaller house in Palmer, Gary built a greenhouse for the tomatoes and cukes, but this time I concentrated on growing flowers instead of vegetables.

The next six years found me working at a garden nursery for three months every spring where I purchased wonderfully healthy six-packs of flower starts at employee discount. I greatly enjoyed watching the growth and blooms of annuals and perennials, and heartily endorsed my employer’s philosophy that flowers are food for the soul.

Then we moved to Slana, an area according to some people in which a garden would not grow. While we did manage to grow a garden there, I will be the first to admit it was rather difficult. My garden journal shows that during the summer of 2002, we had a killing spring frost June 11 and the first frost of the fall was on Aug. 14! One summer it actually snowed on July 4. The fall of 2007, I babied my gladiolas along unsuccessfully with a Visqueen tent trying to get them to bloom before the frost. Only diehard gardeners will understand this behavior.

But, we had successes, too — the most wonderful potatoes, carrots, lettuce, kale — and I learned to grow my green beans in the greenhouse. Gary built our nicest and biggest greenhouse in Slana and we reclaimed another feral garden spot. The greenhouse was his domain and the vegetable and flower gardens were mine.

Last summer during our several trips to Slana to ready the house for sale, I dug up and brought my extra iris, Arctic daisies, delphinium, and chives to our new Palmer residence. I potted them up and buried them in the ground to winter over, holding my breath because of our crazy January weather. But they survived and I sold many during the Valley Garden Club plant sale May 24. It only took two days to figure out what I wanted to use that money for; a strong young helper.

We don’t have a greenhouse yet and Gary says we may never, but he did build me a small raised bed for a few vegetables. And now that we are back to enjoying a longer growing season, I can’t help but dream of beautiful flowers again. It’s hard to narrow the possibilities to just a few favorites. The new bed my helper busted the sod out of this morning is a good start.

I also picture a large portion of the backyard all landscaped with many perennials clustered here and there, but those dreams would involve the cost of renting heavy equipment and much physical labor. For now, I’ll be content with the progress made by my youthful helper.

Gardening has certainly changed in a variety of ways through my years and locations in Alaska. The key to success seems to be accepting change and being adaptable. Best wishes for lovely blossoms and tasty produce to all my fellow gardeners.

Maraley McMichael is a longtime Mat-Su Valley writer and resident.