Seedy Saturday - Gardeners Are Made, Not Born

With the advent of C-19, gardening has never been more popular. Thousands of people who might never have planted a garden (vegetables mainly) are now creating a garden. If you went to the garden centers in March and April, they were running out of plants and other items. 

Anyway...

Some of my earliest memories were with my paternal grandparents in Jackson, Tennessee.

My grandmother was 45 when my dad was born, so they were in their 70's when I came along. They had an acre lot in town, right across the street from Union University. Unfortunately, when my grandfather passed, the lot was sold and became a parking lot. I was in high school and didn't get a chance to get cuttings of anything.

However...

Besides a large vegetable garden and 3 or 4 huge black walnut trees, there were the following in the yard..

• 2 peach trees
• 1 plum trees
• 2 apple trees
• 1 cherry tree (but cut down early in my childhood)
• raspberry and blackberry bushes
• strawberries
• grape arbor with green and purple grapes

And did I mention roses? Tons of roses, mainly on trellis growing up by the house. There was a yellow rose over the double wide gate into the back yard that the local paper usually came and took pictures of each year.

But the great thing about this yard was I could go outside from spring on and 'forage' and never have to go inside to find something to eat. It was here I remember learning to can vegetables and make jam and jelly.

I remember dropping in seeds after the garden was tilled, following along behind my granddad as he made the row.

When my daughters were growing up, regardless of where we were living, I almost always had at least a container garden. They were happy to 'watch' (or ignore) my gardening efforts.

But these days I have a new 'garden' buddy.

Several gardeners I know attribute their love of gardening to grandparents. I wonder if the 'green' gene skips a generation?