Two straight weekend of soggy and threatening weather can make a person just a little bit grumpy. But still, we have kept busy – so busy about the only thing I have been able to do is to pick strawberries during the fairly dry breaks.

The lawn does need mowing, and I might have to haul out the power mower. The human-powered reel version does not work well when 1. the lawn is wet and 2. when the lawn is long. Complain, complain.

We've picked about 12 quarts of strawberries so far. And while they have been tremendously early, they have not been particularly large. But having strawberries on cereal or pancakes most days for breakfast and a couple of meals of strawberry shortcake – serving 14 peole on the first occasion – have made it quite nice. We will probably have strawberries for a couple more weeks, and then the patch will have gone by.

The peas are just about to start producing. Nancy's sister Martha came up from Florida earlier than normal, and she is the one who is absolutely wild about peas. She left Saturday and I went through the World's Record – the earliest of the three varieties we are growing this year – and came up with four pods that were large enough for her to eat. I expect we will have enough for a meal by next weekend.

The radishes have just about gone by, but the lettuce is doing really well. There are quite a few weeds in the garden, but I am thinking it can't rain three weekends in a row. I'll get to all of that next weekend.

The garden blooms are out in full force. I will show you some plants today and some later in the week, I hope. And there are bunches of plants like roses and daylilies that I didn't take pictures of.

Oh: more evidience of the early garden year. The Maine Iris Show held its 50th annual show Saturday in Auburn, and it has about a third of the entries it normally does. All of the irises had gone by.

Now for the plants. The first one is Rodgersia, which likes shade and dry soil and is big enough to stand out in the garden. This one bloomed earlier than the others, but I think it gets a lot more sun.

The second plant is Kalmia or Mountain Laurel.

Another plant that does well in shade, but needs its share of moisture. This is probably the species Kalmia latifolia, because it is about 8 feet tall already, while most of the hybrids are shorter.

This is the first year we have gotten blooms on our wisteriea, which we planted about three years ago. In celebration I am posting both an overall shot with our house in the background and a closeup of the bloom.

My gardening column in Sunday's paper is advice on what you should plant in the vegetable garden for the rest of the summer. There is still time to put in late crops. And that is something I should get busy doing. Once it is dry on the weekend.

About the Author

Tom Atwell has written the Maine Gardener column in the Maine Sunday Telegram since the spring of 2004. He has worked at the Press Herald/Sunday Telegram since 1974, about the same time he started gardening with any seriousness.

He gardens with his wife, Nancy. She not only is the better gardener of the pair, but also knows the botanical names of plants. They have two grown children and four grandchildren.

Tom was born in Skowhegan, grew up in Farmington and graduated from the University of Maine with a BA in journalism. His goal each year is to have continuous compost from his three compost bins, continuous bloom in his low-maintenance garden and more fruits and vegetables on his family table than the garden pests eat in the field.

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