Well, when I got home today I changed clothes, set up the pool and let the kids play while I hilled the potatoe plants to try to get as much covered as possible without burrying them. With the kids in the pool and my wife out for the evening, I couldn't cut any more boards tonight. Tomorrow I'll cut more and install the next layer. I just hope I'm in time to save the potato crop. I'll be more than disappointed if I get nada for all this work, especially after 1,100 people have checked out my bin page.
Right after I put the kids down I planted out the last row of my Seneca corn (I ran out when I planted last). I also planted a bunch more bush beans to fill in where they didn't sprout after germinating inside. GRRR, I'm using up all my Jade beans in one season. I think a call to Territorial is in order to complain about how bad they sprout. I'm getting about 50% sprouting after germinating in a coffee filter. And the weather's been in the 70s for a week now. I've got more soaking to germinate and continue filling in. I don't know what I was thinking when I germinated so many corn and so few beans.
I also took the time to water and hook up some more peas to the trellis. If I'd had more time I would have planted more carrots as the two SF I planted last have sprouted.
While I was out there I saw what looks like soil ants in my corn bed. They nest under ground in moist soil and eat wet wood. My guess is that Mel's Mix with city compost, twigs and all makes a great home for them. I just don't want them in my garden (or house for that mater, but I think they're gone from the later). I may have to invest in some DE and read up on where I can spread it. Hopefully in the bed.
On a separate note, I got a new temperature gauge and 24 hr weather forecaster from Oregon Scientific. It's wireless and comes with three sensors. I've got one installed in my garden (in the shade), one in my kids' room and one in the family room on the other end of the house. Currently at 10 PM it's 74 near my computer, 71 in my sons' room and a sweltering 63 in the garden! It even has an alarm feature in case I want to set up frost warnings. Pretty cool!
Finally, I'm swimming in lettuce and spinach! I've got it coming out of my ears. And the worst part is that I've got seedlings of all my greens actually growing. EEK! We've been eating salads as often as possible. Even so some of the lower leaves are getting white spots on them. I think from lack of water (the umbrella effect). To solve the oversupply problem, I think I'll bring a salad to the party we're going to this weekend. At least the greens will be home grown.
Enjoy your garden!
Ants should not be a big problem, they mostly do good for your garden. If they do become a problem you can plant marigold here and there, ants don't like marigolds just make sure you find dwarf marigolds, some of them get really tall.
ReplyDeleteHi Sinfonian! Please take more pics of your garden! I can't wait to see how well it's doing. I think that it's great that you have even more than you can eat of the greens -- that is awesome!
ReplyDeleteYou can just "dust" the DE directly onto the soil (and your plants too). Very easy to use. Just try not to breath the dust (could probably be like breathing baby powder LOL)
Dan is right too -- if the ants are causing any trouble (biting, etc) that actually do help pollinate! I see them crawling on my okra plants and pollinating them....
I have two types of ants in my garden. Carpenter ants and Moisture/Soil Ants. Both are damaging to my home, but I'm not sure if they'll eat plants. Something's munching holes in the outside beans. Even if a few don't hurt a garden, I'm sure a huge nest isn't a good thing. I may research it before I resort to DE. Hehe
ReplyDeleteYou don't want carpenter ants in your beds. They will destroy your beds within a few yrs. All that hard work you did to built them, so not good.
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