What have you done today in the Garden?

I finally got those tubs apart tonight. I tried some dish soap, but apparently not enough of it. Tonight I was able to use a pry bar for the top tub, and hot water and more dish soap for the other two. Thanks for the ideas.

 

OMG .. finally got the buckets apart. The saga of the stuck buckets part 4 is now complete. I have struggled a few times with them too. I still have a few stuck. I will follow your hot water soap technique.

 

Not doing much today as I've other things that need my attention.
The warmer weather has brought more activity to the garden during the night.



"If I can't come in, you're not getting out!"

 

Did some more weeding, i can put it all in the compost bin now that it's empty, but not for long.

 

Productive Sunday - outside planted my lettuce seedlings then did beets seeds (Bulls Blood Detroit Red & Golden). Inside was seeds seeds and more seeds - Cucumbers (Straight 8, Marketmore 76, General Lee and Homemade), Melons ( Sweet Passion, Minnesota Midget, Green Honeydew & Model), Watermelon (Sugar Baby & Blacktail) and lately Squashes ( Straight Prolific, Waltham Butternut, Sweetnut Acorn and Zucchini).

 

Clay… reading about your plantings and seeds is making me hungry. Your garden will have plenty to harvest.

 

Amongst other jobs I did finally get to sow the Lettuce today..also planned sowing the Beetroot too, but forgot so that 's a quick job to do before I go out tomorrow.

Cleaned up another border . Went to a nearby GC this morning in the hope that something a bit different might grab my attention but unfortunately nothing did . A very rare occasion indeed as I came back empty handed.

 

Mostly, I was picking up rocks and more rocks around that ditch work my DS needed to have done last year. I was going to use the push mower around those areas after getting the rocks picked up, but it isn't working. My neighbor says it needs a new carbuerator and the doohickey to spark the plug. (I don't remember what he called that doohickey thing.)

I did do some pruning of my wild black raspberry bushes, and planted some lettuce, spinach, bunching onions and more chives. I also planted the dill in my herb garden. It was around 80 and very hot for April. I have not yet gotten around to digging up some wild blackberries to replace those dead grapevines. The blackberries already grow here on my place, so it wont cost me anything to transplant them. That is how I got the wild black raspberries in my garden, they were growing wild in the field.

I also got my new tame raspberries planted in a container. Tame raspberries cannot handle black walnut nearby, but the wild ones are not affected by them..

I found at least 4 more fairy rose bushes where I dug them out last fall. And there were a couple in pots I had forgotten about. The ones in pots were put in the large tubs where my other rose bushes had died. I guess I will leave the others in the ground.

 

Oreti, Do you have a favorite variety?

I just re-sowed some Bibb and some Buttercrunch. I don't know why the first batch didn't grow.

@Clay_22 I envy you, a little bit, that you can grow melons!

I cleaned up the Garlic Chive and weed planter, that I mostly harvested yesterday. No it's just a Garlic Chive planter. I started getting another planter ready for the same thing. The grasses had killed off all of the vegetable, so I dug them out and added compost and soil. The new batch of plants are in a big container awaiting their new home.

Watered the lettuce row.

Gave the rows of onions, and the garlic beds, a dose of fertilizer.

That's about all for today.

 

I've already had an offer of a "trade" from a poster in Michigan on a USA gardening message board. They want to know if I'll swop the hedgehogs for this.


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No not really @Daniel W ,I like them all. This year I'm growing Romaine Ballon.

Didn't get home until early afternoon and since then I've been. pricking out lots of seedlings.

Also sowed another tray of Scarlet Sophie Marigolds...you can never have too many of them.

Have to be very careful now in my nursery area and especially around where we keep the compost as there's a Robin busily rearing a nestful of chicks. The poor bird has to battle our current spell of strong winds to keep up the never ending supply of food.

 

All that i did today in the garden is bury a dead hedgehog. It was in our close just over the road from our house.It's a quiet road so how it happened i don't know. What i don't understand why it was intact
but squashed a bit.

 

That's quite the "hedge hog"

 

Nice selection, Clay!
I'm planning to start squash seeds soon. Definitely Galeux d'Eysine (spelling?) plus I'll check germination on my old seeds. If they grow, Illinois squash and / or Pink Banana, plus I think I have some hybrid butternut my seed box. Butternuts dont thrive for me. I think the nights are too cool. Current night temp is still low 40s.

 

@Doghouse Riley - that picture made me laugh out loud - your gardens are truly beautiful. And about those ladders.......hmmmmm. Brave you are.

@Daniel W - I can just picture you with your new clippers - whirring along, branches flying as your newly pruned trees say "what just happened!". I'm glad you showed a picture of them - I always pictured a heavy bulky piece of equipment. I didn't even know these existed - I should have googled Pac's suggestions.

@Pacnorwest - I don't think I could ever get tired of that photo you posted of your blossoming trees. Just spectacular. Do they all bear some type of fruit? Can you describe or give a brand of the long telescopic type battery pruners? I can't seem to find them, and that would be a huge game changer for me.

Everyone is so busy and the gardening is heartwarming.

My daughter came to visit for the weekend, and it was lovely. She brought her box of seeds. We swapped which was fun. This is her first true garden. Even though she was further north before, she had very long days and little to no frost during the summer. We settled on a greenhouse she can order and assemble at her Father's home so that she can have tomatoes, cukes, and perhaps a dwarf eggplant. We started some seeds ( after explaining maturity dates and growing times to the point of transplant) and they are under grow lights in her bedroom here. Her enthusiasm was contagious and a true joy.

I have been carrying plants back and forth the the greenhouse and porch from indoor grow lights for the last week. Today everyone will remain inside for a few days as we will have a high of 6 and some snow for a couple of days. It won't last, and by mid next week I can trapse everyone back and forth again.

Spring is on its way. My dafs are about two inches high out of the soil , the day lilies are about six inches tall beside the house. I have a few mountain blue bells showing their lovely faces beside the concrete stairs.

I did Sjoerd's soil forking/tilling trick on 1/3 of the upper garden. The area was under clear plastic for a week and the soil was warm. I then planted three rows of Yukon Spinach, two rows of Seaside Spinach and one row of Simpson lettuce. The plastic went back over the soil. I'll check daily after the next week and once seedlings sprout, the plastic will come off and remay fabric will be put over everyone instead. A handful of my earlier spinach seeds germinated, but the little Junko's loved scratching around there so I'm sure they enjoyed some spinach seed.

I saw my first bee and butterfly yesterday. There are no flowers yet, so hopefully they find something to eat.