September 29, 2008

Today, after an annoying day at work, I got to do two of my favorite things, play with my kids and play in the garden.  The kids got pushed on the swings and time with dad at a tea party my eldest delivered an invitation for.  For my part I brought the last two plums from the well-harvested tree we dined under.  They had fun, though they aren't fans of the sun going down so early.  Boy are they in for a rude awakening come December!

The garden part of my evening, I started by grabing the bloodmeal and 5-10-10 organic fertilizer mix I made up for the corn and sprinkled it in a plus fashion between my four lettuce seedlings and around my cauliflower.  I also hit the area where my peas aren't sprouting.  Who knows if they're down there, but darn it, one or two plants per square will not make for many meals come winter.  Grrr.  After I fertilized, I watered it in.  Oh, and as a silly side note, I figured out why I've been having really poor water pressure from my hoses.  Someone, likely 2 or 4 years old, unscrewed the adjuster peg in the back.  Tightening it up fixed my pressure issues right away. /sigh.  Kids. hehe

I also checked the temp on my compost pile.  Alas, I think it may be just about done. Although it's tall and deep and I only have a meat thermometer, I couldn't get it to read over 100 degrees anywhere.  Normally the day after I fluff and add it's over 130.  Ah well, I won't be adding too much after the leaves and the grass clippings from the final lawn mowing.  Then it will sit for the winter, hopefully under corregated fiberglass roofing to stay relatively dry.

Other than that, I watered in the blueberries again, and gave the existing blueberries some more water.  I must say a year after I planted those bushes, they still drain like a dream!  Gotta love Mel's Mix with extra peat moss.  The new bushes don't drain so well!

To make EG happy and prove he's not missing anything, I haven't harvested my russett bin.  Here is a pic of it all wrapped up to keep water away to dry out the soil.



I wasn't so worried about covering all the leaves, mostly the top of the bin.  However, if I stake it up, I could probably use that cheap thin plastic drop cloth to cover the cantaloupe to warm it up if it gets too cold to ripen.  You can see how close the cantaloupe is to the potato bin, it's at the bottom right of the picture.

Speaking of cantaloupe, I finally got the courage to pick off some of the redundant female buds.  Looks like I got good pollination, but I didn't really want 6 cantaloupe per plant.  Especially when it was all one plant.  Now I have the three best growing on the most productive plant, and as many as may be growing on the other two.  Odd that the most productive plant is to the north.  /shrug.



Here is a close-up of a baby cantaloupe.  After I took this I found one farther along, but I settled with this pic.  Hehe, I'm reminded of a thread where EG shared a similar pic and took flack for it.  Good times!

Finally, after reading on the PTF journal tonight, I found out something VERY disturbing. Territorial Seed Company may have signed a pledge to keep GMO free, but that doesn't mean they don't sell Monsanto seed. Apparently with the acqusition of Seminis seed company in 2005, they acquired ownership of countless popular vegetables, two of which I am currently growing in my garden... Red Sails lettuce and Early Girl tomatoes. I am so mad and disappointed I could spit. One company should not have that sort of monopoly through acquistion. That's what anti-trust laws were made to protect against. People get on Microsoft for anti-trust, but they created products that dominated the market, not through acquisition. Big difference folks. GRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR!

Well, on that note I'm hitting the sack.  Long week ahead of me.  Here's to a little garden time for everyone to smooth out the rough edges of the week!