The Convergence Zone

Yesterday, I put in two yellow twig dogwoods, both about 3 ft high, one recently acquired at the Green Elephant Plant Swap in Redmond, the other has been in the front for several years, not growing very well. Also put in two tiny starts of red twig cornus, pulled up from some place last year. Walking in the business park near North Creek, in the Quadrant as we call it, sometimes I see overgrown plantings edging near the sidewalk, often rugosa rose or red twig dogwood, so I just pull up a little start with some roots. It will be cut back anyway. More on Scrounging for Plants later. Also planted Native Iris, Douglassi, and dayliles, some other iris I had lying around, three starts of sword fern, and on the upper edge, zone 3 which gets the least amount of water, planted two mugo pines, two Evergreen bluberries, and several starts of Euphorbia, red bonnet I think -- all stuff from the plant swap. The Zone areas areas loosely defined, so far. But I've been able to increase the siz...

Rain Garden - Modified Dug a hole, not too big, reading thru the Rain Garden Handbook and trying to follow every step. But my space is more of a drainage area on the way to other drainage areas, but still it can be a sort of a rain garden.

I still have some of the florist cyclamen blooming at various customer's gardens, and we've had several freezes since they were put in. Even in my own backyard I found one left out (I'd taken most of them inside in Nov) and it was doing fine, starting new leaves, maybe a small bloom -- covered in maple leaves. Hardy cyclamen I need to get more of. But these dark red blooming cyclamen, too pretty not to keep trying to grow year roung

The Convergence Zone is, for me, a place where things come together. Where I put down thoughts and jottings as I like for whoever may be interested, relating to living here where we are in the middle of the Puget Sound Convergence Zone. As a weather feature of the Puget Sound region, this zone is remarkable as a place where weather systems collide and create storm conditions: Heavy rain, storm, wind, hail, snow, thunder, lightening, and so on. The following is adaped from the KOMO TV explanation: The Puget Sound Convergence Zone occurs when there is a northwest flow in the upper atmosphere, and unstable air. Frequently following a storm system, northwest winds blow stronger and can collide with the Olympic Mountains. Part of the air flow is then deflected east down the Strait of Juan de Fuca toward Puget Sound, while the other part is deflected down the western side of the Olympic mountains. When the northern air flow reaches the Cascade Mountains, it is forced to the south. Meanwhi...