April 19, 2008

Well, I didn't do much yesterday.  A bit bummed about the weather, and the snow still hasn't cleared.  Yesterday was rain/snow/hail showers all day, though no accumulation.  I did get out and take some pictures and cover the snow-covered radishes with clear plastic held down by bricks.  A real down and dirty cover.  Hopefully it's not a case of closing the barn door after the horses are gone.   The reason no post yesterday was that my wife was out all evening and she had her phone with the pics on it. hehe.  I was in bed before she got home.  So today is a combined post.

Here is my rush job to put back up my hoop cover.  Looking at the picture I just noticed that the second PVC is crooked.  Ah well, it's holding it up.  You can't see it, but the far left PVC isn't connected to the top beam because the twist tie fell off and I couldn't find the bag to replace it.  It still holds up. /shrug.  Also note I followed Judy's advice and put large binder clips around the plastic, connecting it to the PVC.  Before I added the next one I pulled the plastic taunt, creating a decent seal.  All except the far right where I ran out of binder clips.  Ah well, there's nothing growing there, that's where my pole beans will be after I get the SWC set up. 

Glad I didn't follow through with doing the SWC and tomatoes this weekend.  My tomatoes are currently back upstairs in 55-60 degree weather with full sun.  They seem to be doing fine with it.  And I must say, this time Mel's Mix is holding moisture very well.  I soak it once a week and it's still moist 7 days later.



Here's bed #2.  I couldn't cover all the peas with the coldframe due to the trellis being in the way, but I covered the bean seeds (if they'll ever sprout). I've got 2 SF planted, but if they don't work, I'll start the next set inside and plant them once they've sprouted.  Hehe I think I'll wait until the weather changes before I go through the trouble.  Oh and the peas do seem to be holding up. They've really begun to unfurl tons of leaves on the largest seedlings.  Finally, the little knife sticking up from the field of snow is where my broccoli is.  When the snow melted, it looked ok.  It's a cool weather crop but I didn't expect much from the snow.



The small bed #3 got covering over the cuke seeds and the onion seedlings.  The radishes were left out in the cold. After I took this picture I did throw a piece of clear plastic over the radishes. I put two steaks down into the dirt to hold the plastic off the seedlings and then weighed the plastic down with bricks.  The radishes appeared to weather the storm well enough.  We'll see.





Lastly comes bed #4, or the corn bed.  With my wife's help yesterday we lifted it on top of the bed and raked back some of the snow with our fingers to uncover the seedlings.  You can see that the relative heat under the coldframe melted the bit of snow we left but not the pile of fluff over the unused portion of the bed.  We'll see, I'm not holding out hope for the corn seeds that hadn't sprouted, and maybe the seedlings won't make it.  Live and learn.  I knew I was jumping the gun.  The book may say when to plant corn, but our specific climate is too cold for that.

I raced outside in the cold and snapped a few pics.  Here is my best broccoli plant (the sole survivor of my indoor seed starting. Can you believe this guy used to be leggy? Of course you can tell it's not huge yet (compare it to the plastic knife in the ground next to it. hehe)

 

Oh, and since Judy shared pics of her magnolia, I felt inclined to do the same.  This is the one that the cherry tree fell on, forcing me to hack it back.  Then the snow weighed it down. Odd how the trunk will reshape to fit any position you move it in for an hour or 24.  The cherry tree flattened it for a few hours and it stayed that way. The snow moved it into my yard area and it's still there.  I may need to tie it up to get it off my patio.



This is a shot from inside my garden area. It looks better from the east looking west due to the sun exposure.  My neighbor loves it and it provides shade for my patio/deck, so it stays. 

Well that's about it for my lazy weekend inside.  The family's sick and I'm taking care of them while trying to take care of my plants outside.  Can't wait for the real spring to arrive and stay.