Around The Yard In May

Wow, long time no post.
We have been very busy finishing up the planting in the vegetable garden, but it's done. I think this is the earliest I've ever had everything in! It has been another really wacky weather year.
Cross your fingers for me that this is finally going to be a good watermelon year.
Brace yourself - very pic heavy portion coming up. But I have so much to show you!

First, remember that Thanksgiving cactus that keeps going? And going? She's on her fifth (yes, fifth!) bloom cycle! She seems to be on an every two month schedule = October, December, February, April, and now gearing up for June. Weird . . . but wonderful. I have an ever-blooming TC! If she blooms in August, I can officially say I have a Thanksgiving cactus that blooms year round. How fab is that?!
:)


My Asparagus Fern made it through the winter, and quite happily, I'd say.


Ok, to the yard-
I took a quick pick of the peony and weigela hedge while the sun was shining because, well, you know what happens as soon as the peonies bloom = downpour! Sure enough, it rained last night and now they look like hell. ~sigh~


I can't get enough of this combo. Festiva maxima with wine and roses:




Festiva maxima is such a beauty!


All right, I'm done boring you with those. Onward!
The clems are looking pretty good. Not as many blooms as usual, but I still love them:


I got my first bloom on the May apple:


The dianthus are looking fab (these are either Fire Witch or Pink Cheddar):


The Halward's Silver spirea was in rare form this year:


And, of course, the Columbines always look so pretty and cheery:


And last, but not least, even the herbs are getting in on a little blooming action.
The chives are going gangbusters and have such pretty (and edible) flowers.


The thymes (regular and variegated) that I used to edge the walkway (one of my best design ideas ever!) are looking grand. They smell so wonderful when people walk the paths and brush their pant legs or ankles against them. Heaven!


We expanded the veg garden this year. This is the DH finishing up the rototilling so we can finally get the last thing in - sweet corn.(this shows almost half of the garden, the other half is over to the left).


We've even had some nice wildlife show up:
Hawks. They were hunting in a pack of five. I've never seen more than three hunting together. We've had a huge one sitting in the willow across the road every day, but trying to get a good pic is pretty much a practice in frustration.


And our hummers finally showed up. Late, but they're here, so yay! We counted 3 at once working over one weigela (one of their most favorites), so who knows how many we'll have hanging out in the yard this year. I hope they brought lots of friends!


Whew!
So, that's what's been going on in my yard so far this year. Now comes the time for the real work around the yard. I don't even have all my WS'd stuff planted yet :( Shhhh!

Happy (here come the blooms) Growing!
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When to Start Seeds

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I get a lot of search hits about 'when to start seeds', but new gardeners inevitably end up at a post I did two years ago, Don't Make Seed Starting So Complicated. That post might help on the how, but doesn't give them a darn thing about when.

I guess it's time to help out with the 'when' to start those seeds.

First, the one thing you must know is when the last and first frost dates are for your area. This post should help out with that.

Mother Nature doesn't always work around those dates. Recently, it has been a very rare year when she does. But, the least you can do is give it a try and maybe she'll decide to look at a calendar this year.

Instead of giving a long list of what to start, since everyone is in different areas of the country, and even different countries altogether, I'm going to show you something that is so simple it's ridiculous. (yeah, it's one of those 'why didn't I think of that!' things). And the best part is that it will work no matter what part of the country, or world, you live in!

It's called The Grow Guide* and it looks like this when you first get there:



It's ridiculously easy to use.
First, pick your growing season. At this time of the year it's going to be spring. It also works great for planning that fall garden come summer time - just change the season to 'fall' and switch the planning date. But, right now, we're only going to deal with the spring garden.
Select a planning date. If you leave it as is, it will automatically pick today's date.
Next, simply pick your first and last frost dates and click 'process my grow guide data'.

Since there is nothing planned for me right now and I wouldn't have had anything to show you but a blank chart, I moved the 'planning date' forward and this is what comes up for the week of March 8th based on my own first and last frost dates:



One of the best things about this program is that you can keep moving the dates forward so you know in advance what you'll be sowing weeks ahead of time. I click through from week to week and transfer the sowing dates to paper. This way I have the entire sowing season at my fingertips.

One of the great things about this planner is that it not only shows you when to start what seeds inside, but also outside, when to start hardening and when to transplant. This is my result for moving the planning date to my last frost date of May 31:




The rest of the Weekend Gardener website is equally awesome. You can find seed starting info where "One page is devoted to each vegetable, flower, or herb seed."

• Vegetables
• Flowers
• Herbs

This is just some of the info you'll get if you click 'broccoli':

About This Plant...

Family: Brassicaceae

Genus and species: Brassica oleracea (Botrytis group)

Growing Season: spring and fall

Indoor Sowing...

Time needed to reach transplant size: 6-8 weeks

When to transplant to garden: 4 weeks before to 2 weeks after last spring frost

Outdoor Sowing...

When to sow outdoors: 4 weeks before last spring frost

Other Sowing Guidelines...

Approx. germination time: 4-20 days

Germination temp.: 45-85 degrees F.

Sowing depth: 1/4 inch

Days to maturity: 50-80 days from transplant

So, if you have questions about when you should be starting vegetable seeds, I hope you'll give the Grow Guide a try. It's easy and fun and isn't that what gardening is suppose to be?
And, of course, if you don't want to bother with all that starting seeds inside thing, there's always my biggest obsession: WinterSowing! (seeds started in recycled containers outside in the snow)

Happy (when to start seeds) Growing!

*I am, in now way, affiliated with the Grow Guide or Weekend Gardener. I just think it's an awesome program and equally awesome website for both new and experienced growers.
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Graham Rice on 'A Brand New Vegetable'!

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Really, how cool is that - a brand new vegetable!

Graham says, "It’s a hybrid between kale and a Brussels sprout!"

It's called Petit Posy™ - it makes fluffy buttons - and you can read about it on his blog here: Transatlantic Plantsman.

No GM . . . Bonus points just for that!

You can get seeds or small plants, but not in North America. Rats!!

See how those Brits are - they want to keep all the cool stuff for themselves. :)

Redundant

Yup, it seems I'm posting about the same things constantly, but I really need to start keeping track of what's going on in the yard like I'd promised myself way back in this post. But, after this, unless it's something exceptional, I'll start keeping the posts to every other week or so.

What with the horrible weather we've had all growing season in the New England states, it seems a little mean to be posting about everything doing so well now that the heat has turned itself up here and the rain has dwindled to every other day instead of daily. Sorry.

The flowerbeds aren't looking half bad now that the plants are getting some sun. I had to prune out a lot of the flopping gloriosa daisies, but it looks a little neater now.



The Hosta have exploded into bloom.



The area around the lower pond isn't as full and lush as last year, but considering the weather it doesn't look half bad.



I've never had cucumber plants this loaded with blooms. The cucumbers are delicious!



Even though we haven't had a ripe tom yet, I'm considering the 'hay bale' experiment a smashing success.



Finally, a couple shots of the veg garden (so I'll remember what was where).





Happy growing!

Lightning And Other Stuff

We got hit last Friday. URGH!
It would have been nice if it could have stayed farther away from me than 5 feet -
It hurt! It felt like every muscle in my body had contracted as hard as it could. The muscles around my rib cage still hurt - they feel like they've shrunk 2 sizes. The tingle wasn't too cool either. You know how it feels when you stick your tongue on a brand new 9 volt battery? Times that by about a thousand and add your whole body. I was on the floor for a few minutes deciding if I was still alive. lol. The top of my scalp and my neck still feel weird, but not painful.
The concussion from the crack! when it hit the ground was so loud that it took out my oldest son's hearing for a little while.

This is the hole it left in the ground outside the window where I was sitting (it looks small compared to what it looks like in real life) Sorry it's a little blurry, but I was still shaking when I took the pic:



It blew the iris right out of the ground and pulverized the rocks that ring the tree (threw the rubble all over). There's a huge hole in the pathway and the plastic underneath is gone. There is a long scar mark that shows the path the lightning took up the tree. It swirled around it like a snake right to the top and blew of big chunks of bark. Harumph - the first thing anyone asked was, "Are the fish OK?" What, forget the humans, are the fish all right? lol.

My husband and I lost both our computers, the router, both tv's, the cable box, the modem, S's monitor, D's motherboard got zapped, the phone (I can't remember what else, but it was anything connected to cable or phone lines). It disintegrated the switch on the surge protector. Yeah, that didn't do much good.

Bro-in-law and sis-in-law gave me their old comp. Yay! D is going to use youngest daughter's with messed up motherboard as it can still work for basic stuff and she's getting youngest son's old one since he found a cheap one for himself on Craig's List.

Note to God: D lost his job, we lost Ronnie Tuesday and now the lightning. That's three. Are we done now??!! Please?!

Happier things -

I saw some turkey vultures sunning themselves. They're beautiful birds as long as they stay away from me. (Oh, Lordy, maybe it's another sign. ~sigh~)







I thought this swarm of ants on our front step was cool, but it kind of grossed me out at the same time.



A fabulous cauliflower we pulled out of the garden this year (that's a quarter next to it for size comparison).





OK, I guess that's it for the moment.
If you don't hear from me for a while, well, something else bad has happened and I don't want to think about it!
:(

Mid July Update

Wow, what a difference two whole days of heat, sun and no rain can make. The ground actually looks dry - I'd forgotten what dry soil looks like!

For those of you in the upper eastern states - hang in there, it's on its way. I'm outside blowing the good weather in your direction. Man, my lips are tired! :(

An update on how well the tomato bale experiment is doing: Fantastic!



Thank God I haven't seen hide nor hair of the blight. ~fingers crossed~ Pays a bit to start your own seed in this instance. I think I only have one close neighbor that gardens and he grows his own also.
:)
Bonnie Plants first said they accepted that they were to blame, now this:

Dennis Thomas, Bonnie Plants general manager, insists there never was any evidence of blight at any of the company's 61 growing stations nationwide and that his company did not ship out any infected plants. "None whatsoever," he said. "The last inspections we've had in New Jersey and Pennsylvania, and in West Virginia today, showed negative."

One of those things that makes you go, hmmmm...

On to happier stuff.

I only got one plant from the strawberry petunia seed (stupid weather!) but what a bloom it is!


Things that are finally taking off:

Popcorn


Potato (don't mind the weeds. potato is a DH thing, not a me thing, so unless he weeds them...)


Peppers (looking better!)


Onions are looking good.


Carrots have gone bonkers!


Yellow and green bush beans are finally flowering. Interesting how you can easily tell which row are which.


We had the first cabbage salad of the year yesterday. Yum! Was fabulous. I honestly should have let it go a few more days, but well, you know...
The cauliflower is almost ready and huge.
Half a gallon of peas in the freezer so far.

I guess that's it for the veg, so on to what few flowers I have that the freaking slugs didn't eat.

The view from my living room last week.


The honey bees are swarming the borage now that the sun has returned.


The bee balm is finally open for the hummers. They've been cleaning out the feeders in a day!





I lurve gloriosa daisies.


The lavender is looking beautiful.


Lilies are so fab they almost glow.


and last but not least, the coolest visitors of all to my flower beds-


Hope everyone's gardens are growing like gangbusters!
Happy gardening.
:)

(wow, I actually titled the post as June instead of July - talk about a Freudian slip - I'm still subconsciously waiting on some nice june weather! lol)

Reason # 8,000,000,000 To Have A Veg Garden In 2009

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Yeah, I'd guess that's enough 0's?
The number of reasons to grow your own this coming summer just keeps getting longer:

California drought may raise vegetable prices
Like they aren't high enough already?

More than $300 Million in crop losses due to drought
And I'm betting it isn't going to get better any time soon.

If you're one of those people who are still on the fence about starting a veg garden, here's hoping you tumble gently when you finally tip to the happy side.
:)

A Review Of Home Grown Popcorn

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Last year the hubs and I happened to spot a packet of popcorn seed at a local Ace Hardware.
We hemmed and hawed about wasting space/money on something that might not produce well, but since we try to grow something a little bit different every year (this year it's the Peter Peppers - someone is sending me seed! Yay!) and since my Aunt has experience growing it, we weren't totally in the dark. So, we decided to go ahead and waste a sweet corn row/seed money on the popcorn instead.

Wow, am I ever glad we did!

Even though it wasn't the best growing season for corn (see previous post), it still turned out very well. The ears ended up small, again, because of the weather, but it still did well even in adverse conditions. We harvested the ears after the stalks died, stored them in the open in a mesh bag inside the house for two months and my youngest and I sat at the table and shelled them all within 30 minutes.

And holy cow - the flavor! What a difference from store bought kernels! Seriously, we were blown away by how fresh it tasted. No comparison to the stale store bought. Of course, until you taste the difference you'd never know. And it did take a bit longer to start popping. But, those hard kernel skins that always get stuck in your teeth? Not so with those we grew. Those skins were so soft you could actually chew them!

This year, we're growing three rows!

Summer 2009 Will Be One Of The Warmest

And it won't stop there.

Or so says Met Office:

2009 is expected to be one of the top-five warmest years on record.
According to climate scientists at the Met Office and the University of East Anglia the global temperature is forecast to be more than 0.4 °C (.72F??) above the long-term average. This would make 2009 warmer than the year just gone and the warmest since 2005.
The updated decadal forecast indicates a rapid return of global temperature to the long-term warming trend, with an increasing probability of record temperatures after 2009.

I'm sitting at a forcasted minus 15F, so right now this 'warmth' sure sounds pretty good to me. Especially since last summer was a total bust for any warm weather veg growing. It was just too darn cold and wet. (the onions loved it) It rained almost every day! Rain is nice, but roots sitting in puddles and blasted by cold winds, not so good.

I was still sitting on the fence about ramping up on the amount of pepper and tomato plants this year, and even though I don't know how reliable this info is, this tidbit just shoved me over. Yeah, like I needed a push/excuse to sow more seeds! Tsk, tsk.

Time to plan for more of those warm weather crops in everyone's gardens?

Roadside Shopping

:)
People are chucking their spent mums . . . again.
Yay!
I picked up three big mums and a pumpkin large enough for about four loaves of pumpkin bread. I love it when people have money to throw away.
Clearance sales are still on at Lowe's - huge Boston fern and two 'Double Take' Spaths (left outside to get frosted - ugh!) for a buck.
Go me!

The weather looks like I'll be able to get the mums in the ground on Friday.
I got the Iris cut back for winter and did a lot of weed pulling. Most of the flowerbeds are cleaned up. I'm still doing that nit-picky thing I do, though. I can't help it!

Planted the garlic a month ago and they're growing very well. Transplanted the rhubarb into the garden at the same time - I don't know how they'll end up taking it. We'll see.

Collected some more seed - aster and Zebrina Malva. I'm hoping those don't become a thug.
The large pond pump and flow-through pumps have been turned off and the smaller winter pumps turned on. The koi are sulking, but it can't be helped. They'll be fine, as always.

Now comes the real limbo. Too much love for the houseplants while I twiddle my thumbs waiting to start the wintersowing. It won't be as much as previous years as I can't afford the potting soil. Oh, well. I'll just have to pick and choose a little more wisely about what I want most in the flowerbeds next year and use the peat I already have - whether appropriate or not. On a side note: I was a little miffed when someone mentioned that they bought eight bags of potting soil for 8 something a bag and thought that it was no big deal and pretty much petty change. Huh? When your figuring out which bill to pay and which to leave . . . ummmm, 60 something dollars is a lot of money! What the hell is wrong with people saying it's no big deal to just go blow 60 bucks on soil? I could almost see her shrugging her shoulders with the 'what's the big deal' attitude. Grrrr.

I need to sort through my seeds again and get them in order. Maybe I'll wait on that until after Christmas when I'll be ridiculously sick of having nothing gardenish to play in.

Still so far, so good on the rosemary.

I still need to tent my lavender with some burlap.

I found out that my Polka Dots are more of a pain in the ass than I thought they would be.

I can't get the stem rot stopped on those stupid begonias, so have about a thousand cuttings piled everywhere now. If I end up with not one begonia come spring, I'm gonna be hot!

The Majesty Palm is still puttering along and throwing up new spears.

Oh, and the weirdness for the month - a Foxglove and Lupine are flowering! What the frig is up with that? The snaps that are still in full bloom aren't a surprise, but the Lupine certainly is. Also had a Delph just get a very late bloom frozen off. Hmmm . . .

Plans are in the works to widen the garden next spring and plant potatoes again. Yay! We haven't had the room for them in years.

I may do some more roadside shopping this weekend. Hehehe.

Garden Gold

So, what gives with all the doom and gloom about garden retail sinking?
Over at Rant, Allan Armitage has posted his first contributing article - about the state of the retail plant industry.

Back in March, I blogged about (Gardening Decline) an article by Bonnie Blodgett: "This may come as news to you, but gardening is on the decline nationally. Quite a surprise to the soothsayers who were predicting just the opposite only five years ago."

Seriously, everywhere you look there are huge vibes of doom-n-gloom.
It's fear mongering, I say! (wow, that doesn't work as well without tone of voice)

Plants, and the people that buy them, aren't going anywhere. They'll simply change their buying tactics and habits.
It'll be seeds instead of transplants, the big box instead of the local nursery (unfortunately), waiting for those sales to hit, practicing patience by buying smaller sized perennials instead of the larger, more expensive, already blooming sizes and passing over annuals they would normally buy as well as replacing them with veg instead.

Personally, I think gardening is going to take a swing upwards. In a big way.
Here's a case in point: Swayed By A Shopping Trip?
And another (ABC news video): Back (And Front) Yard Gardeners

People are simply sick of it all.

Unless you're shopping at the big box, or find a freaky-deaky sale at the local nursery, most of these newer plants are out of reach for the ordinary gardener.
Times have turned from drooling over a plant pic and pushing the buy button because it's 'wanted', to thinking 'can I really afford it' before pushing that button. The times of people wandering the aisles of the local nursery and throwing plants in the cart willy-nilly, without a thought for the cost, are just about gone.

Maybe impulse buying is dying, but that urge to grow things will never go away - it will just get finagled into better and cheaper ways to get what they want.
And there will be more of them. Much more. Think 'Victory Garden'.

I think nurseries are going to have to start ramping up on the veg side and down on the inventory of those silly plants. (Silly is my interpretation of those fussy, trussy, frilly, expensive, water-hog, good for nothing but being eye-candy plants. Of which there are many even I love!)

Seriously, who wants to fill a backyard full of plants that look great but serve no useful purpose if they have a limited budget? They'll be ripping up lawns and buying vegetable transplants. Really.

It's not so much that the buyers are going away, but that the plant business needs to change their tactics around to suit the new ways buyers are thinking. It's not the instant gratification that will get the business anymore, but will be much more about 'what can this plant do for me'.

I see new gardeners popping up everywhere that wonder how they can get what they want on a very tight budget. They've been fed this useless dream of a Martha Stewart vision, or that instant 30 minute makeover TV, that just doesn't work.

That's right - these aren't reality, people! They may be some warped version of reality TV, but ninety-nine percent of what you're seeing in magazines and on TV are no more than an unattainable dream for people with ordinary incomes (I wonder if Joe six-pack gardens? lol). Seriously, they should name these shows and articles "How deep are your pockets?".
In times like these, you can't demand prices that the market won't bear.

So, put your seat belts on, it's definitely going to be a bumpy ride. But the car? - it ain't gonna crash! Who's going to survive this ride? The sellers and nurseries that 'Get It'. They need to make people fall in love all over again with doing it themselves, and helping them do it. There's garden gold in them-thar hills, the retailers just need to find it.
Good luck with that . . .

Flipped Off

I guess even the veg get a bit disgusted with the neglect they begin to suffer around this time of year. How not cool is it for them to flip you the bird?

Of course, my oldest daughter just couldn't resist messing with it :)
I think that even our pond residents are a little disgusted that our daily conversations have become a lot shorter these days. Then again, maybe they're as depressed as I am that fall is here - which means winter can only be closer than we'd like it to be.

The tomato sauce is cooking.

:)

I'll end up being able to freeze about eight gallons. Not bad! I was finally able to get ahold of some vinegar, so I'll be able to put up a few quarts of pickles tomorrow. Yay! The only things left to get into the freezer are the brussel sprouts and we're still waiting on the corn from having to wait on the weather and getting the seed in the ground late. Zucchini are still coming in at the rate of a couple a day.

Oh, and the popcorn is still to come!

The flowers are trucking along as if it'll be 80 F forever. Now that it's fall, we've finally arrived at summer. Stupid weather! We ended up only getting three very small Moon and Stars watermelons. It was just too cold for them to grow worth a crap. On the bright side - for some reason, my son's hot peppers produced great! Go figure. My green peppers didn't do crap.

I'm at that early fall 'don't give a crap' point. It'll pass. It always does.