Broken eggs
Last spring a mourning dove built a nest in the cedar elm, right over the patio. Whenever I was out there, she cocked her gray head at me but sat tight. Her loosely built stick nest looked precarious, unlike the tightly woven sparrow nests I often see. I checked on her daily and always spotted her smooth, gray head and her blue-ringed eye staring back.
One morning I found disaster: her nest hanging in tatters, two eggs smashed below. The dove was gone. I wondered what had happened. Had a cat attacked? Had there been strong winds? Or, as seemed likely, had her nest been so poorly built that it had just given way?
When I’d blogged about the nest earlier, Kim commented that mourning doves are known to be inept builders. Now I was seeing the proof. And yet—the number of mourning doves in my neighborhood indicates that some are successfully hatching eggs. Obviously, if you keep trying, you’ll get it right some of the time.
Thank goodness that applies to gardeners too. When I recall how many plants I’ve killed over the years, I’m a little appalled, but I just chalk it up to the learning process. My mistakes don’t stop me from trying again with the same plant elsewhere in the garden or with a new plant at the scene of the crime.
But what if I looked at each plant’s death as confirmation of an inability to garden?
I have a friend who enjoys other people’s gardens but talks deprecatingly about her own “gangrene” thumb. “I kill everything,” she laughs. “But with your green thumb, you can grow anything.” Little does she know that my thumb is often more gangrene than green.
Culled from my garden notes, below is a partial list of the plants I’ve murdered. Sadly, many more floral John Does lie in unmarked, forgotten graves.
Ajuga
Gerbera daisy
Dahlberg daisy
Chocolate daisy
Pine muhly
Mexican coral vine
Water hawthorn
Bushy bluestem
Japanese fatsia
Red columbine
Jerusalem sage
Autumn sage
Daylily
Liatris
Hosta
‘Autumn Joy’ sedum
‘Moonshine’ yarrow
Lamb’s ear
‘Early Sunrise’ coreopsis
Southern wax myrtle
Kidneywood
Moss verbena
Flowery senna
Blue-eyed grass
Bee balm
Wooly stemodia
Hyacinth bean vine
Yellow lantana (how do you kill one of these?!)
Hollyhock
What may surprise many non-gardeners is that gardeners who read my list won’t be shocked by its length. (Am I right?) Anyone you’d consider a successful gardener has, I’ll bet, his or her own list of victims: plants that succumbed to too much shade, too much sun, too much water, not enough water, early frost, heat, insects, bad pruning jobs, being mistaken for weeds, lack of protection from dogs, deer, or soccer balls. The list goes on.
The fact is that anyone who loves plants will kill many of them in the process of gardening. It’s part of the learning curve. Whoever said, “You never really know a plant until you’ve killed it three times” was exactly right. I would add, “And that’s OK.”
Yes, it’s OK to kill plants. As a plant fails, you learn something about it : What it doesn’t like. What pests like it. A plant’s death doesn’t, however, tell you anything about yourself as a gardener.
But how you respond to it does. Those who throw up their hands and say they can’t garden are missing out on the joy of success that will surely come if they keep trying. After all, if you have to break a few eggs to make an omelet, you surely have to kill a few plants to make a garden.
All material © 2006-2010 by Pam Penick for Digging. Unauthorized reproduction prohibited.
Pam, this was an amazing post! Absolutely wonderful.
I’ve killed more plants than I care to remember: annuals, perennials, veggies, herbs, fruits, houseplants (several from each category, to tell the truth!) and I continue to kill at least a plant or two a year. It’s part of the experimentation and learning that makes gardening the joy it is. As with everything in life, you just acknowledge that it happened, learn what you can from the experience, and move on to the next adventure.
Thanks for your comment, Colleen. I knew I wasn’t the only one killing plants, but I think that non-gardeners often don’t realize how normal that is. —Pam
Me too. I kill an enormous percentage of plants that I set out too.
Bill, I try not to think about it in terms of dollars spent but as experience gained. 🙂 —Pam
That’s a pretty good list, Pam! And your post was wonderfully true. As Henry Mitchell said, “There are no green thumbs or black thumbs. There are only gardeners and non-gardeners.” A non-gardener tries once or twice and gives up, but not we real gardeners. We just keep planting.
In my part of Austin I never see mourning doves, only the White-winged doves, who are also sloppy nest builders. One of the Divas has lots of cedar elms, and a windstorm meant little dead baby white-winged doves all over her back yard.
Annie at the Transplantable Rose
Henry Mitchell always has a way of putting things, doesn’t he?
Annie, I don’t know the difference between white-winged doves and mourning doves. I’ve just always called these mourning doves. The next time you’re over, maybe you can give the doves in my garden an official ID? —Pam
When I first started gardening, I kept a list of the plants I killed–so many that I stopped because it depressed me. It made me feel like a failure and made me afraid to try the same plant again or other expensive ones.
Luckily I got over that. I spent yesterday clearing out rotted bearded iris and thinking happily, “Now I’ve got space to try something new.”
As for the mourning dove…you’d think the unsuccessful ones would die out and over time only the good nest builders would survive to pass on good nest-building traits. Not a good example for the evolutionists; yet, hardly a walking advertisement for intelligent design either.
That’s a very optimistic—and correct!—way of looking at plant killing, MSS. It makes room for something new. —Pam
Great post. Kind of a relief to me that others have lists, too. I also love the idea of thinking of the plant dying as opening a new space. When this happens in my yard, I’ve always thought to myself, “Well, I never really liked that plant anyway!” Not always true, but it’s good to know up front if a plant is not tough enough for my garden. This year the weather has been absolutely brutal, so the victims are many. Sigh. It does make me appreciate all of the ones that *do* make it, tho.
Yes, it does make you appreciate the survivors, Pam. Sometimes when I kill a plant, I’ll try another one in a different spot, just to make sure I can kill it twice. I don’t know that I’ve actually killed a plant three times, but I like the idea that others have, and that it teaches you even more. —Pam
Excellent essay. I especially appreciate how you used the eggs as a metaphor to tie it all together. And to the ways they are killed I can add: got too potbound, and speared by a garden fork (applies to bulbs). But Fatsia japonica? Isn’t that also called Japanese knotweed? I didn’t know that died anywhere.
Ooh, good ones. I’ve committed garden fork murder myself.
I’ve not seen Japanese knotweed, but I just googled it, and it’s not the same as the fatsia that I killed. However, I have managed to kill some tough plants in my day. —Pam
What a wonderful, wonderful post, Pam! I’m sorry to hear about the eggs, though… I think it breaks my heart to see those terrible nests the mourning doves build because I love them and their beautiful voices so much.
As far as the killing fields go, well, I have made a lot of mistakes. And I would probably have to count the things I send to my Mom’s house knowing that they will not be planted–it’s just having someone else do my killing for me. lol. But my list is not so long as yours… only because you’ve been gardening longer. I’m sure that when I’m no longer a newbie, I’ll have an equally impressive list. But I hope to have an equally impressive garden like yours, too. 🙂
By the way, I’m thinking that was either Tony Avent or Dan Hinckley with the “I consider a plant hardy until I have killed it myself… at least three times” quote. But my brain is fuzzy right now.
Kim, “the killing fields” is a good tongue-in-cheek way to think of it. And thanks for adding another method to the list : death by giveaway to someone you know won’t plant it. I’ve killed a few plants that way myself. May they rest in peace. —Pam
i am on my third lion’s ear(or lion’s tail)and it is doing quite well so hopefully this is it. and i do agree that you do learn something about a plant every time you kill one, just like a bad painting-you learn something from them every time. i am gardening in a different zone now after 8 years of living in zone 9 i am now in 8 and what a huge difference it makes!! i am used to having tropicals as main anchors in my gardens but i can’t have them here, they definitely don’t last the winter. it has been a challenge re-thinking the overall new look i am forced to have.
Hi, Laura. Thanks for dropping by. A zone change does make a big difference in a garden. I ran into that when I moved from Raleigh to Austin 13 years ago, although now that I think about it, I didn’t garden all that much back in NC. But my expectations of what I could grow underwent a huge shift. After the shock wore off, I began to have fun with the new zone. I hope you will too. —Pam
Great post, Pam. I have done my share of plant murder – still do if the large pile of plant tags I unearthed are any indication. I looked at some of them, and thought repeatedly, “oh yes, I remember putting that in. It never came back”. Thankfully there are far more successes than failures at this point! (I have to confess to doing exactly what Kim does – ship plants off that are on their way to dying. My parents seems to bring them back to life out at their lake garden.
If your parents bring plants back to life, you’re not committing plant murder when you ship them off to your folks. It is funny, though, to think of unearthing the evidence of plant murder—old tags serving as grave markers. 😉 —Pam
what doesn’t kill us, makes us stronger. and what i don’t kill, generally i buy three more of. thank you for tying it together so nicely. i always feel guilty when i fail one of my charges. on a similar note, i have a goldfish that was ailing. i think i’ve fixed his tank now (crossed fingers), but when i went to the pet store i was amused by all the products advertising, “reduce fish loss!” one’s instructions warned against adding too much too fast with, “rapid fish loss may occur”.
has anyone ever seen anything promising to “reduce baby loss!”? plants and fish; dying each year by the millions without any notice from the news.
Yes, I’ve lost a few fish over the years too, alas. —Pam
I killed my entire garden this year! Well, okay – only half of it, but still…
I think the difference between gardeners and non-gardeners is that gardeners don’t take plants dying personally. We accept it as a part of the process, and we keep on going. I know a few people who actually become nervous wrecks in the garden … every little spot or bite on a leaf is dire, a little bit of yellow requires calls to the local master gardener hotline. Certain people need perfection, and in my opinion, they are better off playing with interiors – I mean, a couch won’t up and die on you, causing consternation and guilt. Wonderful post … I hope you don’t mind if I riff on this theme!
Thanks for a lovely blog… I’m an ex-Texan (San Antonio), and if I ever went back, it would be to Austin…
I’m loving these gardening confessions. Thanks for visiting, Germi, and owning up to your own plant killings. You are right that people who seek perfection—and stasis—should forget about gardening and get into interior decorating. When I consult with new gardeners, I often remind them that planting a garden isn’t like decorating a room : it doesn’t stay the same for very long. Of course, that’s what makes it challenging and fun. Gardens are living entities, which means that sometimes (OK, fairly often) plants die. Oops! Now get over it and keep planting.
I’d love for you to riff on this theme. Another gardening conversation is born. —Pam
Thanks for the great post, Pam. I often maintain that gardening is more about trial-and-error, as well as perseverance, than any kind of natural ability. Anyone who tells me they have a black thumb gets something like, “No such thing! You just haven’t tried hard enough!” in response.
Thanks for backing me up, Heavy Petal. Gardening is all about “try, try again.” —Pam