What have you done today in the Garden?

Odif--That bumblebee looks wet and cold, poor thing. Nice lily's.
Your veggie beds are looking pretty good to me. They will enjoy the mulch.

Went into the bees today and did the Chelsea chop on my Phlox plants a few days ago. It is very wet today.

 

I have no idea how I missed all these posts. For whatever reason, they didn't come in my E-mail.
Sjoerd, I need hints on how to get spinach to grow without bolting. We get maybe a couple of small pickings before it bolts.
Lettuce is being eaten and given away every day. Most everything looks healthy.

 

Doghouse, I'm in love with your entire yard. Such an array of color and beautiful petals.
Sjoerd, the yellow/green plant, is it a flower or an herb? I have an herb
of several years which looks a lot like your's. Mine is either Golden Basil or Golden Oregano.

 

Yesterday....what did I do? I sweated. it was in the mid 90's with a dew point in the 70's. tropical weather. the sweat just rolled off of me. but I got a lot done even as hot as it was. planted another 50' row of cukes after I heard we will be the only vegetable vendor at the one market (yikes). worked on weeding the front flower garden I plant just for making bo-kays for the markets, watered watered watered. let the neighbor borrow my van to transport the huge tomato plants he bought a couple weeks ago. then it stormed.

today... planted zucchinis, cantaloupe, butternut squash, flowers, watered a bit. it wasn't as hot today as it was yesterday. customers always come first. planted more flowers.. and now I am off to plant more of the garden.

 

Oh Carolyn, I do envy you being able to plant now. Our planting season is over and we are in the "keep it alive, carry water phase of gardening. "
I checked the tomatoes and peppers, who will need watering tomorrow, the cucumbers and squash are doing well, and probably won't need tending to until the weekend. I haven't watered the pumpkins yet--they seem to be doing fine on their own.
You will be the only vegetable vendor at one farmers' market? Be prepared to be swamped with customers!

 

Jane, I don't envy you the heat. we had tropical heat and humidity after record cold. oyvey. whiplash weather.
I string together a lot of hoses ... I am thankful to have a never ending supply of fresh water to run. I don't envy you carrying water either.
and , Yes, we are the only vegetable vendor signed up to sell at the one market and I am the anchor vendor at the other market.. I am not doing the Wed market this year. first because of the covid but secondly at this point I just don't have the time if we are the major vendor at two markets. I expect to be swamped. As much as this covid thing has driven me us crazy there is some good to come of it. more people are gardening, more people are more aware of how fragile our food chain really is and more people are being to shop with their eyes and not their fingers politely of course... you touch it you buy it now... which has always been my desire to keep upfront and aware of to the consumers... no one wants you to touch their food.AND the best thing is people who have never had fresh from the garden food realize how much better it tastes.

 

I managed to weed an asparagus bed, a long process, due to the facts that one has to be careful weeding asparagus and that I had broadcast parsley all over the asparagus bed because they are apparently good companion plants. I mulched and transplanted some tomatoes and took some tomato cuttings too. I thinned and harvested some carrots. It then started raining as usual. My friend reckoned his radishes rotted because of too much rain.

 

Carolyn, so true, so very true!
the best thing is people who have never had fresh from the garden food realize hoe much better it tastes.
I love giving fresh vegetables to folks, and then hearing how great the taste is!
I weeded the zinnia patch today, much to the joy of the hummingbirds. They love zinnias.

Other than that, no work in the gardens, but my house is semi-clean now!

 

tonight I am tired. we did two farmers markets today I baked all day yesterday and brought home one loaf of potato bread and one dozen chocolate chip cookies. I made 15 dz cchip 14 sz soft lime and 14 loaves of potato bread.. then I came home and had customers all afternoon. in the midst of that I planted up one row of dwarf tomatoes from the dwarf project at tomatoville. then I worked on planting up 80ish tomatoes in the garden then on to the peppers. of which I got about 1/3 of them in... maybe 100 plants? time to go to bed.

 

Yesterday I was doing a bit of pruning, using the pair of secateurs I'd bought on impulse from Aldi some months ago. They were quite cheap and the pair I'd been using weren't cutting very well.



Anyway. I put them down somewhere and couldn't find them. I usually carry a large bucket around with me for clippings,prunings, weeds etc., so I may have put them in this bucket and chucked the lot in the green bin. I'm sure the odd trowel has ended up that way over time.

I wasn't going to empty the green bin to look for them. I went into the shed and found the old secateurs in drawer, plus two other pairs that had been replaced over time when they weren't working as well as they should.
I dismantled all three (they were fortunately not of the type, "no user serviceable parts accessible,") or whatever.
I cleaned them up sharpened the blades, re-alligned a couple (with a hammer), oiled them and reassembled them.
All three are now working perfectly.

I'll probably now find the ones I lost, somewhere in the garden.

 

I sieved compost and transplanted 9 cauliflower and weeded.

 

Our daughter came to help me yesterday in the community garden. She dealt with the aparagus beetles on the aparagus while I weeded, spread wood ash, and watered. I watered almost everything.
I also harvest garlic scapes strawberries and dinner self down lettuce. Everything looks good.

Our daughter was very pleased to go home with garlic scapes and strawberries.

On Friday, our son was briefly home from Spain and I asked him to give me some design suggestions for my perennial garden. That kid has an eye. He knew what I was talking about as I described what I was trying to do and could see the issues I was having. His suggestions were really helpful.

One comment he had about the back of my perennial garden (a long standing problem area) "I don't even know what to say about that area. I don't even know what's GOING ON there. I'd start all over with it".
I had to laugh!

 

Cayuga, please, what is "self down lettuce?" This is one I've never heard about and, if it will grow in Texas, I'd like to try it. The food pantry never gets lettuce (too perishable) so all I can take in to the pantry in the springtime is greatly appreciated.
I loved your son's comment about the back of the perennial bed--he's honest, and funny!

 

I made a cage around my strawberries, yesterday. I used PVC and strawberry netting. And just in the nick of time, the berries are starting to turn.

 

MG:. Oh dear. I really really must proof read before hitting 'post'. That was supposed to be 'some self sown lettuce'. I let my lettuce plants go to seed every year and then have a crop of babies. I find they come along a lot faster than seed sown lettuce.