There’s another gardening column that runs in the Yarmouth Vanguard. If you’re looking for advice, please heed the words of Carla Allen.

If you fall into the fighting-a-losing-battle-against-your-flower-beds club, then read on.

Some people have a green thumb. Mine, I figure, is brown. Heck, it might even be red, yellow or orange. But green? Definitely not.

I hate my flower beds…or maybe they hate me. Either way, if a cement truck took a wrong turn up my driveway and accidentally dumped its load on my flower beds, I think I’d do a happy dance.

I don’t know when I declared a war on clover and slugs, but they’ve certainly declared one on me. And I can’t tell what’s a flower or what’s a weed. What I planted, what I didn’t. Frankly, I’m tired of these guessing games.

I’m also tired of pulling weeds out of the ground whose roots seem to extend all the way to the inner core of the earth.

A couple of weeks ago I got so frustrated with whatever was in my flower bed (and by the word ‘whatever’ I mean I truly had no idea what it was) that I grabbed a shovel and dug up half of what I had planted over the years.

Years ago I had opted to go with perennials instead of annuals. Less fuss, I figured, since the stuff would just grow year after year.

Well, it ain’t gonna grow no more.

Isn’t gardening supposed to be relaxing?

I was more at peace during the Stanley Cup playoffs even though at the end of Game 6 the team I was cheering for didn’t win the cup. I can take solace in the fact my friend Jody O’Donnell’s prediction didn’t pan out, he called the Red Wings in four.

Not long ago I was at a friend’s house and she asked if I had flower beds. I told her I had evil ones. She then took me on a tour of her beautifully manicured flower gardens. There was some sedum and some hosta, and some other stuff with green leaves. When we finished she asked me if I knew the names of her plants.

You’ve got to be kidding. Me, an expert on gardening? Seriously, I can’t name most plants – at least not names that I can include in this column.

Still, even I have to appreciate the will to survive.

When I went on my moment of insanity with my shovel, I apparently missed a plant. Actually, that’s not quite true. I saw it there, struggling to live, and I felt a little sorry for it. I figured I’d leave it and come back in a week to put it – and me – out of its misery.

Imagine my surprise the other night when I was standing on my deck only to see that this pitiful plant had thrived into one of the most beautiful additions to my flower bed. I couldn’t help but wonder if I had left some of the other plants in the ground, whether they would have had the same fate.

Hmmm….maybe if I don’t give up on them, they won’t give up on me.

Yeah, yeah, tell it to my hanging basket out front – the dried up brown one.