July 9, 2008

Exhausted so short post.  I just had to give thanks to Joe from over at Ft2Garden.com. He is a composting genius.  He's been helping me fix my compost issues, working with my difficult system to work out some finished compost.  I'm going to rake my old bin to the corners, add some greens (likely coffee grounds and maybe some grass) and wet as I fill back in on top of it.  My bin is way too dry for the microbes to do their thing. 

I also read that I made an oopsie when finishing up my plantings.  Wanting to plant some more onions, I put them next to my marigolds, my carrots and pole beans.  Unfortunately, I forgot to check my companion planting sites.  Seems onions don't like beans, or visa versa.  I may have to get rid of my onions there and replant (or maybe transplant, not sure) to an open square.  Frankly putting them in one of my vacant radish squares is a better solution anyway.  It would be right next to the other onions.  Don't know why I didn't think of that sooner.

Well, time to put the kids to bed and follow right after them.  Hopefully there's a light at the end of the tunnel at work so I'll have more energy for the kids, the house, my wife and the garden.

Enjoy your garden and the nice summer weather!

*EDIT*

Ok, I either got my second wind or my kids riled me up by not wanting to go to bed when they got home.  Anyway, I went out to water my garden and check out some things.  The first thing I noticed was a stow away in my corn.  This little guy was sitting on the next to top leaf of a stalk and wasn't going anywhere.  Anyone identifiy him?



He was about an inch long and that's yellow accents witha  black body.  I'm not sure if those are wings but I'm guessing they are.  Anyway, it's gone now. I smushed him once I got my gloves on.  Sure hope he wasn't a good guy.  On second thought, maybe I do cause there is likely more where that came from.

Speaking of corn, I just had to snap a shot.  Do you see any growth since um, yesterday?



I personally think it grew a couple of inches myself after looking at the two pics and comparing them to the coldframes stacked up under the eave.  Wouldn't it be cool. 

Anyway, thanks to Carrie for identifying the tassels for me.  Hehe it's been WAY too long since my last graduation so I didn't remember what one looked like.  Regardless, I understand it's a good thing, but does it mean my corn isn't going to get any taller?  If so I'm going to have very runtish corn plants.  They're not even 3 feet tall from dirt level.  I swore they were going to grow much taller. /shrug

While I was out there I manipulated the tomato plants a bit, pinching off the suckers and checking the leaves for bugs.  Nothing thankfully, but the leaves are all curling.  I know it's going through tons of water but I keep topping it off every night.  What gives?  Tomorrow I'll take a pic to show you.

I didn't mention it yesterday, but I noticed some strange things growing on my bush bean plants.  They're either the start of flowers or maybe little immature beans?



Finally, I just had to take a picture of the radish that ate New York!



Hehe, think I otta pull it?  Well tomorrow I harvest for the 8th floor potluck at work.  It'll be lettuce, spinach, green onions and radishes, with pine nuts and cranraisins.  I think peas would be a bit odd. Hehe