Well, at least you know your gardens will never be swallowed up by an earthquake/mudslide/wildfire or blown/washed away in a hurricane/tornado. And you needn't worry about fire ants, scorpions or poisonous snakes while gardening (though we do have some awesome mosquitos).

Seriously, I wish I could find my notes from a presentation this past winter by the Native Plant Society of NJ, but I do recall that NJ is a gardener's paradise - humidity, frosts, and pests notwithstanding. It has more plant diversity than states 10 times its size, and growing zones ranging from USDA 5 to 7. We are on the northern edge of the growing range of many "southeast" plants, and the southern edge of many "northeast" plants. Many plant species were carried down from northern regions eons ago by the glaciers and deposited here, where the glaciers stopped.

I often fantasize about being able to grow lupins or delphinium, or having less trouble with blackspot on my roses ... but wouldn't trade the wonderful range of plant options we do have here.

So, yeah, next time someone says something, just grin ... and think of the above :-)

I can't speak for Cali., and most people would rate it's climate the best perhaps in the world anyway, but anyone from Florida ragging on Jersey and its crop potential has been tipping too much vodka into the fresh squeezed orange juice. The soil down there is no where near as fertile or accomodating as ours. Sure, you can grow tomatoes year round, and they might even look nice...but, c'mon now, a Jersey tomato wins hands down for flavor, not to mention the sweet corn too. And...it's possible to grow certain "tropical" species here (I'm doing it, with in-ground overwinterization). Try northern plants down there and you'll fail. So, turn the other cheek, and go have a great BLT.

For all the whining I do (and cursing) when lugging the umpteenth load of hand gathered rotted leaves/worms from the woods to amend the non-draining clay around here I keep being told by articles and people that our soil has great nutrients. Getting the soil to the point where the plants can spread roots and take up the nutrients is the challenge. Given that my patience seems to decrease in direct correlation with the aging process I can't wait for years to have that "fine tilth" everyone tells me about and the repeated instruction to start composting myself is beyond me. The raccoons that ripped apart the wild bird's metal suet cages would scoff everything down in minutes. Besides...my father looks at me like I've lost my mind when I mention "composting". So I lug bags of it from Lowe's and do my best with it.

This is my first year gardening and doing it at my father's house to keep my relative sanity while spending days there watching out for him.

I don't think financial sales is this hard and the much anticipated rewards of seeing beautiful things spring to life will hopefully make all the work worth it. Got my fingers crossed, anyway.

Started a new Butterfly Garden last fall in memory of my late Mom. The miserably invasive Chinese Wisteria has so weakened trees that many of them keeled over in last high wind storm we had. One, naturally, is perched precariously over the Butterfly Garden. I wasn't here the day supposedly experienced tree pruners did their job and they hacked off limbs willy-nilly...and left the precarious limbs over the butterfly garden right where they're still hanging. Way too high for me to reach on a ladder particularly since I tumbled off the ladder a few times last fall while pruning trees that hadn't been touched in years.

The precarious limbs are the "other shoe waiting to drop" but I've still got my Butterfly Garden and high hopes for a summer/fall of great, varied blooms and hopefully see some butterflies stop by for some nectar and even lay some eggs on host plants. I better see some darn butterflies after all this...LOL.

The darn vines didn't die or even miss a beat when the trees keeled over. When I went out back last week to do monthly cutting and yanking of vines I saw them moving on to other trees they couldn't reach before bigger trees were downed.

To be honest, I'll keep Jersey conditions over scorpions, red fire ants, poisonous snakes, etc. as long as I can keep chasing the deer, rabbits, groundhogs & chipmunks away from everything I try to plant.

This spring had tulips for the first time in 20 years in front of my father's house. I spent less on the bulb themselves than all the bulb cages and Repels All spray to keep moles/chipmunks from eating them underground and deer/rabbits/gophers from eating them above ground...LOL. But those tulips were glorious and already looking over tulip/hyacinth/iris reticulata choices for planting this fall!

I'm a Jersey gal and couldn't think of living anywhere else.

Grew up in mountains of Bergen County where Jack in the Pulpits were everyday wondrous plants I marveled at while spending carefree summer days wandering the woods.

Been in Monmouth County since mid-80s and it's beautiful although quickly becoming way too overdeveloped.

I've had the experience of asking for information about certain plants and people often suggest things that are deer ambrosia. Won't work here...spend enough time trying to keep buds on Azaleas long enough to get some semblance of bloom in spring! But I could be in Minnesota or somewhere they have to contend with deer AND bears.

I always tell myself I could be living in a drainage pipe in Calcutta which makes anything I have to contend with here bearable.

But there are times when everyone's had their fill of something or other and they need to blow off a little steam.

Thanks for the vicarious rant...and the opening to have one of my own. :)

hi guys! thanks for all the posts and for reminding me of all the great things to love about new jersey.

as i write this, we just dug up our long-blooming perennialized tulip bed (the one close to the house that the deer don't touch) because our exploding chipmunk population began devouring the bulbs - one eating a huge bulb brazenly in front of us (DH said: look at that cute one eating a huge acorn - oh it's not an acorn ..it's a tulip bulb!) and i didn't mind one bit ... because kids just love those furry little creatures and i guess my garden is mature enough that i will have other flowers to compensate. yes, digging up those rocks and amending that orange clay dirt in one of our old garden beds as mosquitos pricked my buttocks through my shorts on saturday morning before the heat wave certainly was an ordeal, but i wouldn't love my flowers as much if i hadn't gone through the effort.

newbie_in_nj i hope those dangling wisteria branches fall only in the dead of winter, when your butterfly garden is safe and dormant! you are right, i just had to have a rant! and what a great way to deal with your garden frustrations than to think of all the lovely things to enjoy here...like:

1) the HUGE patch of wild ramps i found less than 1 mile from our house (and that i'm trying to naturalize in our back yard)

2) the amazing jack in the pulpits, the wonky looking mayapples, and the cute trout lilies everywhere in NJ and my backyard, not to mention the really good wild raspberries i look forward to eating off the bushes in the summer

3) the dopey little baby bunny rabbit living under my neighbors shed who comes over every day to nibble a couple clematis flowers (i have so many i don't mind it)

4) eat fresh NJ!! yum, trishmick, those NJ tomatoes sure are lovely!

and so to adapt a quote from Shakespeare: "Give me a NJ BLT. In this I bury all unkindness." i.e., turn the other cheek.

kitova...this line just cracked me up: yes, digging up those rocks and amending that orange clay dirt in one of our old garden beds AS MOSQUITOS PRICKED MY BUTTOCKS THROUGH MY SHORTS on saturday morning before the heat wave certainly was an ordeal (caps my addition)...LOL.

I'm really looking forward to Jersey tomatoes as I'm currently not buying ones from Mexico or Florida since people got sick from some strain of salmonella. Supposedly they were mostly served in some chain restaurant but they haven't named the chain that I know of.

Layer those Jersey tomatoes with the fresh basil growing on the deck, some freshly made mozzarella all drizzled with good olive oil for a tasty appetizer...or dinner with enough crusty Italian bread.

If you don't mind, though, you can keep the "cute little baby bunnies" as their older siblings have eaten all but 2 buds off the 2 large Liatris Spicata, most leaves off Coreopsis Grandiflora (supposedly rabbit/deer resistant) and 2 kinds of Gaillardia (also supposedly rabbit/deer resistant). I've gone through bottle after bottle of sprays to deter them and even put up a 4' fence which I didn't know they could jump as someone on another forum informed me.

Bloodmeal is next attempt to deter them with ammonia soaked sponges in little perforated containers around the perimeter. Also putting rabbit fencing circles around plants as they seem to work better than fencing entire garden. It's ending up looking like Fort Knox.

Bunnies live all over the US so that's not Jersey's fault!

Maybe I'll post a couple recipes for Rabbit stew on the fence like the "No Hunting" signs stapled to trees along country roads...LOL. Just kidding...I can't even eat a cornish game hen since it reminds me of all the birds I feed in the yard!

dear newbie_in_nj,
my buttocks have recovered, thank you :P

but after reading about your problems, i was wondering ... are you sure it is rabbits eating your flowers and not groundhogs? some of the plants on your list are supposedly rabbit-resistant, plus our bunnies would eat clematis flowers until they discover clover (which we have abundantly in our lawn because we do chemical-free gardening) after which they never touch my flower beds again.. last year, we had a mean case of flower pillage and gorging by 2 adolescent groundhogs before we caught and relocated them. so cute. but so very naughty.

if you're resorting to scattering pellets, you might try looking for deer scram in local stores. it is supposed to deter deer and rabbits and the ingredients aren't as high in nitrogen as blood meal. many people in this forum have reported good results (with deer, so it's possible it'll work as advertised on rabbits too) and i just started using it myself (too soon to tell yet, so far no damage). i feel for ya. the local critters will always surprise you by eating something new. this year i put up fishing line around the rear perimeter of our yard (where the deer mostly set their path) and that has definitely scared off a couple browsers. and as for my edible garden, it is permanently off the ground and on my deck (in the highest section above ground where even squirrels and chipmunks dare not tread).

boy, am i looking forward to some nice, ripe, home-grown tomatoes. and even trying something new this year - vertical watermelons! it was an impulse buy at one of our local farmer's markets, i don't even know what kind it is, and whether the season will be long enough to produce fruit, but what the heck, it's fun.