Just moved to the heartland after many, many years in the wild west. While in Arizona, I became a master gardener and learned that I had to UN-learn everything that I thought I knew about gardening in order to garden in a place that can be brutal to plant life. Then I moved to the foothills of the Sierras–the high desert of Nevada–and had to learn how to garden in an even drier environment! (Plus add in freezing temps, snow and wildfire to keep things interesting!) I am an experimental gardener in every sense of the word. I like a good challenge and I embrace the plant natives. I am also a sentimental gardener, bringing a small piece of each garden with me when I move from place to place. I make a lot of mistakes and there are some failures. But I believe in the law of big numbers: try many things and the percentage of failures inevitable drops.

Now I am Kansas City, Missouri where no one measures the precipitation in tenths of inches. This week I saw more rain than I saw in the past eight months in Reno.

It’s also cold-cold-cold for this former desert lizard. And the wet makes it feel even more cold. AND WHERE IS THE SUN?? Still, I haven’t had a home-grown beefsteak tomato in YEARS and I have been assured that they will grow here. And I love every place. It’s just the way that I roll.

I know the blog design is a little boring–I will get to that soon. But I wanted to put roots down now. They say that the fall is the best time to plant. :-)

On Twitter? Me, too: http://twitter.com/IntrepidGarden

For my high desert gardening friends, I am maintaining the archives of my Northern Nevada garden blog.