What have you done today in the Garden?

Clay—I don't know those bugs. Mercifully we do not have them over here.
I hope that they will stay off your plants this time.

 

Today I harvested the Rhubarb in the lower garden and called a neighbour to come and collect it. She was thrilled and makes rhubarb cake for many neighbours. She also collected some lettuce and chives for their salad tonight.

The corn that was started in the greenhouse was planted. The corn that I sow directly in the ground under a sheet of clear plastic with and X cut for the seedling does much better, but I also wanted to put some random ones in the garden with the warm summer predicted.

The spinach was weeded. I'm not sure how it will do as our spring was so warm, but we shall see. The spinach, lettuce, kale, swiss chard, carrots, and green beans are doing well in the upper garden.



The tomatoes and peppers are coming along. The beesteak, big beef hybrid, early girl bush and all of the red robins have their first tomatoes.




The peppers were unhappy with the heat of the greenhouse during the last heat wave and a few have dropped flowers, but there are a couple of banana and big chili peppers forming.

The flea beatles are out and munching on the seedlings. Diatomacious earth was fluffed over the seedlings, just in time for a thunder storm. I'll redo them tomorrow.

The pasture was mowed in the nick of time, as the thunder was rolling in and a down pour ensued. I tried to leave the dandilions as long as possible for bees, but then have to choose between bees and bears. Some bear plop told me this morning that I had to mow the dandilions today. They are a first feast fave of the bears after the first green grass gets boring.

 

Melody lookin fantastic…

 

@Melody Mc. what are those round green things hanging on your tomato plants? Some sort of parasite? I'm concerned...

Beautiful garden!

 

My helper is away, so the eggplants fell under my care. During the super hot heat spell, the leaves crispiefied. They are growing new ones. I cultivated, fertilized, watered, gave them a leaf mulch.



This is supposedly a cranberry, but it's never had any. I like the flower, which is enough.



Here is that horse chestnut tree that I severely pruned during the winter.



Up close, the flowers are lovely.


The genetic dwarf peach "tree" is way too overloaded.


So I used a kitchen scissors to thin them. The rule of thumb is, separate the peaches by the width of a fist. However, these have a very short internode length compared to regular peach trees. So I dont know. I removed about 90% of the set peaches, and there must still be a hundred remaining.



I also thinned pears. There are about 40 remaining on this tree. Maybe 30 on the other.



I also mowed half of the property. I'm not into having a manicured lawn (its obvious) and major newspapers have been saying it's better to leave the grass grow, proclaiming "No mow May". However, the neighbors don't like that. Plus when fire season approaches, it's better not to have a lot of dry grass standing.

Here's an oriental poppy that I started 2 years ago from a root cutting.

 

Mel— congrats on your rhubarb harvest. I see a cake coming your way in the future.
Your gardens are looking nice too. That plot up near the house looks about as far along as some of our beds. But then the greenhouse toms. Cor! They look so healthy and are already forming fruits. Ahhh that is enviable. The structures and arrangement of the clever woodwork really do give your set-up a polished look. All going swimmingly there, so to see.

Daniel— I liked seeing those fruit trees.

I remember you pruning that uneven chestnut a coupla months ago. That turned out well, didn’t it mate. I like the flowers too.

Your oriental poppy is looking really good. Mine are not yet blooming, darn it. I like those blooms.

 

Sowed some more wallflower seeds and did some watering.

 

Did a bit today, when I came home from golf, as I'll be too busy tomorrow with shopping and the car going in to have the air-con re-gassed in the afternoon. It's working, cold enough, but I can't have "uncomfortably cold" any more. I guess after 18 years it deserves a re-gas, but there'd Honda reliability for you,
Did you know you're s'posed to run your air-con for half an hour each week during the winter? "Preventative maintenance." It'll say so in your car's handbook.

Did a bit of tidying up at the bottom of the garden. Then gave the roses a tonic spray. Mowed the back lawn and vacced up lots of dead wisteria blossom.
They are nearing the end of their flowering season.
The white one has done us proud. It's not cascaded as well this year the extreme cold in February killed off the end of a lot of long branches.









The two tree azaleas are fully out now. I'll wire them late in the autumn to make them more "ball-shaped" I don't want them spreading out further.








A lot of roses are coming out now on the two patios, but as you can see the azaleas on the left are on their way out.

 

Planted up a border with cosmos, snapdragons, verbina bonarences and some gladioli.

 

Doesn’t your white Wisteria look smart. The rest of it is so proper and beautiful, what’s not to like.

 

Watched one of KK's cooking videos just now. Very cool.

 

You know Riley, that last foto just above us really sort of sums up your garden and shows its theme, variety of planting and the “feeling” it gives. Oké, perhaps the foto itself is a bit overexposed but that does not detract from what is going on. I know that some elements are not visible on this particular view, but they do not have to be. I mean; good grief man— you have done such a magnificent job there with tidiness, variation, theme…and just the romantic effect of the presentation. What a successful effort you have made.

You were right to show more than one pic of the white Wisteria, for it really is at its spectacular finest at the minute. The view from under those racèmes is stunning.
I enjoy seeing your garden foto’s whatever the time of year.

 

The problem I have with photos late in the afternoon is that I'm looking down the garden into the sun. So it rather upsets the automatic function settings.

Didn't do anything in the garden today, was going to have my car's air con re-gassed after shopping. But they tested it out and decided re-gassing would only give me a marginal improvement. They thought it was OK.
On full blast it is too cold for comfort, but will probably still be OK in the warmer weather. If it's not, I'll get it done then. Saved myself sixty quid at the moment, not that I'm that bothered.

 

Nothing much today just moving the wallflower seedlings out of the sun and then move them back later.

 

I got a lot of work ahead of me this weekend. Weeding flower beds, planting pepper, watermelon, cantaloupe, honeydew, perennials.