I still haven't seen Heath Ledger's final performance in "Batman" but I thought of him and my niece, Heather, when I shot this photo.

This is my heath and heather garden. A single heath or heather by itself isn't impressive and even a patch of the same variety doesn't have much impact. But, if you have the space, a group of them with contrasting foliage color makes a painter's palette.

In this collection I have a blue star juniper growing in the middle to add even more color.

In order to really be effective you need a hillside or an elevated spot to view it though I shot this photo from ground level.

Over the winter I used one of my raised beds as an organic dump. I wasn't intending to make a compost heap - a skill I've never been able to master. It was just a handy place to dump unused squash, old corn cobs, rotten tomatoes and withered potatoes.

I figured it was an earth-friendly way to enrich the soil and keep material out of the landfill.

Come late spring I tilled the soil and carefully planted rows of onions, carrots and beets.

They never had a chance.

As soon as the warm weather started all those corn, tomatoes, squash and potatoes came to life.

I resisted the invasion at first, pulling the seedlings up left and right. But then I noticed a curious thing. The seeds I planted weren't going anywhere.

And so, I gave up. Last night, I harvested my first batch of red potatoes. They were actually causing the ground to rise by several inches. I kept digging and they kept coming.

Now, I'm waiting to see what my mystery tomatoes and squash will turn out to be.

I've learned a few things from this event: seeds can survive a wet Northwest winter and those exact seed sowing depths we're given don't mean much.

But mostly, I've learned sometimes it's better to just let nature take its course.

Here's a picture of the my potatoes with a hose for scale: