Sorry folks, I wanted to post last night, but I couldn't keep my eyes open. So here's what I've been up to... work, work and more work. But I did get to at least talk gardening last night at my sons' preschool with one of his teachers. It was fun, and made me feel almost as good as being there, hehe.
Today was the second frost in a row. Not a bad one, but probably enough to kill anything non-cool weather or not under cover. I'm marking the 21st of October our first frost. Smart or lucky, I'll take lucky for putting up my hoop covers LAST weekend, even though I was exhausted. If I'd have waited until this weekend, I'm not sure damage wouldn't have been done. Now I'm golden, and the hoop covers are holding up nicely. Though they haven't had to withstand a fall storm yet.
That reminds me. Garlicman from Freedomgardens.org suggested I get these plastic tarp clip things for my covers rather than the rust-prone binder clips. I couldn't tell what they were very well, but looking at them just now they don't seem to work for me. However, I may use the 1 inch pipe split down the middle in small chunks to grip around the tarp. Kinda the same concept. Would be harder to put on and take off, but they wouldn't rust.
Also, regarding the hoop covers, commenters convinced me to put one of my remote themometers inside the hoop cover to compare to the temperature outside. So after I watered I put it in the middle of bed #2. A half hour after I put it in there (and let some warm air out watering), the initial readings showed an 8 point lead for Obama in the polls, oh sorry, wrong 8 points, hehe. That's right though, the garden temp was 53 at 8:30 and inside the hoop cover was 61! Not bad. I will have to ask my wife to check it at noonish tomorrow since I'll be at work.
And sorry to say there are no pictures. It's tough to take any in pitch black. Maybe I'll get a few progress shots (and see some growth myself) this weekend. hehe
Enjoy your garden!
Showing posts with label garden supplies. Show all posts
Showing posts with label garden supplies. Show all posts
Wednesday, October 22, 2008
Monday, July 21, 2008
July 21, 2008
Short post tonight. Well I've got confirmation of coons returning. I found prints in my cantaloupe... and to top it all off, I was so bloody interested in taking a good pic of my sprouts that I totally missed the prints in the bin!
Notice in the middle the three indents... and me? I go for a walk this evening instead of searching out the Haveaheart stuff. Grrr. Old habits die hard. But aren't the little sprouts cute? After I take care of the coons, I've got to enclose this SWC.
I noticed the prints first while watering after dusk but right before dark. I also noticed while watering that my corn is leaning toward the rising sun (it gets the most sun in the morning). Unfortunately it's too late to put the trellis netting in there to provide support. I vasillated to long. It's going to be interesting.
On a better note, I got a text message from my brother who was proud of his harvesting his garlic today. He got 85 viable heads that he is now drying/curing in the garage for the next few weeks. I hope to use some of it and plant some of it along side my blueberry bushes this fall.
Finally, more randomness. On our walk I found what may very well be our next garden purchase. All along I've been wanting a bench for my garden. It is about the only thing I can put in the dead corner where nothing grows (but voluteer lilac bushes). Unfortunately I've never been particularly impressed by what I've found or couldn't afford it. While we were stopping by our local QFC, we walked by our very local True Value franchise and saw a cedar bench.
It would match the wood choice of the fence posts behind it, and the shingles on the house. Simple and only $85 locally. I may have to go back with the van. It's only a quarter mile so how's that for local shipping? Ok, it wasn't produced locally, but you can't have everything.
Notice in the middle the three indents... and me? I go for a walk this evening instead of searching out the Haveaheart stuff. Grrr. Old habits die hard. But aren't the little sprouts cute? After I take care of the coons, I've got to enclose this SWC.
I noticed the prints first while watering after dusk but right before dark. I also noticed while watering that my corn is leaning toward the rising sun (it gets the most sun in the morning). Unfortunately it's too late to put the trellis netting in there to provide support. I vasillated to long. It's going to be interesting.
On a better note, I got a text message from my brother who was proud of his harvesting his garlic today. He got 85 viable heads that he is now drying/curing in the garage for the next few weeks. I hope to use some of it and plant some of it along side my blueberry bushes this fall.
Finally, more randomness. On our walk I found what may very well be our next garden purchase. All along I've been wanting a bench for my garden. It is about the only thing I can put in the dead corner where nothing grows (but voluteer lilac bushes). Unfortunately I've never been particularly impressed by what I've found or couldn't afford it. While we were stopping by our local QFC, we walked by our very local True Value franchise and saw a cedar bench.
It would match the wood choice of the fence posts behind it, and the shingles on the house. Simple and only $85 locally. I may have to go back with the van. It's only a quarter mile so how's that for local shipping? Ok, it wasn't produced locally, but you can't have everything.
Wednesday, June 11, 2008
June 11, 2008
Well, I was thinking tonight was going to be a very short post because I had nada to talk about, but funny how a trip to the garden sparks ideas. Before I begin, is anyone else shocked that we only have 10 days left before summer and we never had spring?!
First off, today I ran into the tomato crisis. I went to Subway and ordered a sandwich. I'm picky about veggies, which you know if you've read my blog from the beginning (aside from the onions, I planted only what I eat). So when I go to Subway, I get lettuce, tomato and cucumbers only. Today, because of tomatoes had company over (their names were Sam and Ella), I only got lettuce and cukes. Even with bland tomatoes, the sandwich was lacking. On the way back to the office, I had two thoughts. The first was how lucky I was to start a veggie garden this year so I can have totally safe tomatoes and don't have to worry about my family getting sick. The second thought was a bit more out there. I've watched the Dervaes Path to Freedom videos again of late, and what I thought today was that I shouldn't worry about not having tomatoes. Unlike Judy, my plants don't even have the start of fruit on them, let alone tomatoes ready to harvest. As my buddy Ron said, one generation ago, if a veggie wasn't in season, you didn't eat it. And tomatoes are not in season (here anyway).
Well, that was going to be it for my post tonight. But I was reading the new comments today while my kids were taking baths (playing at that point). Seems both Toasty and Tim from my area (well climate at least for Tim) are already harvesting peas. And I know for a fact that I planted peas right around the time that Toasty did. Now my peas are nothing to complain about. They're nearly 2 feet tall (only get 3 feet high) and are flowering, but I'm not harvesting peas. I even went out to the garden to closely examine them to make sure I wasn't missing green pea pods against green leaves. I wasn't. /sigh
While I was out there. I thought about how badly the peas were crowding the bean squares. Look at the pic I took yesterday...
They're more in the bean squares than in the pea squares. What you can't see is that more than half of the back side of the pea row is open and bare. They're growing toward the light. We can't have that. It's not fair to the poor beans. So I broke out my spool of twisty ties (thanks GardenGirl for introducing me to them). I love how you can make the twisty tie as long as you want. So I pushed the stalks back against the trellis one more time. This time however instead of bouncing back out, I tied them to the trellis (loosely). Here's the after picture...
Subtle change, but notice you can actually see the string separating the squares, hehe. And poor beans, they're even more stunted than they would be with just bad seeds and crappy weather. Speaking of poor beans. Look at them close up.
Have I mentioned that I have planted all four squares with 9 indoor-germinated bush beans multiple times and this is all I've got to show for it. I don't even know if I have enough seeds to finish planting out four SF if I get 100% germination inside and 100% sprouting outside, which I haven't even got 50% so far. Grrr.
In contrast, my pole beans have germinated well and sprouted over 80%. In addition, they've done exactly what Judy said they would. They got their two big leaves and sat there for weeks, doing nothing. Then they started to shoot up. Not nearly as fast as they would if it were actually spring, but look at this...
See, it is holding on to the trellis! Sure I put it there, but it's holding on and hopefully won't let go. Here's to hoping it will climb the string and touch the sky!
Well, today was supposed to be the start of three good weather days. Today was crappy. Now they're saying tomorrow will be nice and that's it. I STILL have not been able to mow, so I worked really late at work today so maybe I'll take off an hour early and mow.
Finally, my mother's been on a jelly craze of late. It helps that both familys (hers and mine) are completely out of jam and jelly so nobody's getting PB&J sandwiches. So she's been digging in her deep freezer and pulling out all sorts of berry juices, frozen berries and renderings. Last night she canned strawberry jelly (never had that before, only incredible strawberry jam), blackberry jelly and plum jelly (both from my yard last year). I think it's absolutely amazing that even with slim pickings on plums last year we can feed two families PB&J sandwiches for a year! It's been two weeks since my last PB&J, so I know what I'm having for lunch tomorrow, hehe.
Funny that both my brother and I have independently gone to my mother in the last two weeks and asked her to impart her preserving knowledge on us. As boys, even cooks, we didn't have any interest growing up in canning. Now we both want to learn. Isn't that cool! It's going to be fun! I can't wait to have the option to can tomatoes, beans etc. rather than just freeze them.
Enjoy your garden!
First off, today I ran into the tomato crisis. I went to Subway and ordered a sandwich. I'm picky about veggies, which you know if you've read my blog from the beginning (aside from the onions, I planted only what I eat). So when I go to Subway, I get lettuce, tomato and cucumbers only. Today, because of tomatoes had company over (their names were Sam and Ella), I only got lettuce and cukes. Even with bland tomatoes, the sandwich was lacking. On the way back to the office, I had two thoughts. The first was how lucky I was to start a veggie garden this year so I can have totally safe tomatoes and don't have to worry about my family getting sick. The second thought was a bit more out there. I've watched the Dervaes Path to Freedom videos again of late, and what I thought today was that I shouldn't worry about not having tomatoes. Unlike Judy, my plants don't even have the start of fruit on them, let alone tomatoes ready to harvest. As my buddy Ron said, one generation ago, if a veggie wasn't in season, you didn't eat it. And tomatoes are not in season (here anyway).
Well, that was going to be it for my post tonight. But I was reading the new comments today while my kids were taking baths (playing at that point). Seems both Toasty and Tim from my area (well climate at least for Tim) are already harvesting peas. And I know for a fact that I planted peas right around the time that Toasty did. Now my peas are nothing to complain about. They're nearly 2 feet tall (only get 3 feet high) and are flowering, but I'm not harvesting peas. I even went out to the garden to closely examine them to make sure I wasn't missing green pea pods against green leaves. I wasn't. /sigh
While I was out there. I thought about how badly the peas were crowding the bean squares. Look at the pic I took yesterday...
They're more in the bean squares than in the pea squares. What you can't see is that more than half of the back side of the pea row is open and bare. They're growing toward the light. We can't have that. It's not fair to the poor beans. So I broke out my spool of twisty ties (thanks GardenGirl for introducing me to them). I love how you can make the twisty tie as long as you want. So I pushed the stalks back against the trellis one more time. This time however instead of bouncing back out, I tied them to the trellis (loosely). Here's the after picture...
Subtle change, but notice you can actually see the string separating the squares, hehe. And poor beans, they're even more stunted than they would be with just bad seeds and crappy weather. Speaking of poor beans. Look at them close up.
Have I mentioned that I have planted all four squares with 9 indoor-germinated bush beans multiple times and this is all I've got to show for it. I don't even know if I have enough seeds to finish planting out four SF if I get 100% germination inside and 100% sprouting outside, which I haven't even got 50% so far. Grrr.
In contrast, my pole beans have germinated well and sprouted over 80%. In addition, they've done exactly what Judy said they would. They got their two big leaves and sat there for weeks, doing nothing. Then they started to shoot up. Not nearly as fast as they would if it were actually spring, but look at this...
See, it is holding on to the trellis! Sure I put it there, but it's holding on and hopefully won't let go. Here's to hoping it will climb the string and touch the sky!
Well, today was supposed to be the start of three good weather days. Today was crappy. Now they're saying tomorrow will be nice and that's it. I STILL have not been able to mow, so I worked really late at work today so maybe I'll take off an hour early and mow.
Finally, my mother's been on a jelly craze of late. It helps that both familys (hers and mine) are completely out of jam and jelly so nobody's getting PB&J sandwiches. So she's been digging in her deep freezer and pulling out all sorts of berry juices, frozen berries and renderings. Last night she canned strawberry jelly (never had that before, only incredible strawberry jam), blackberry jelly and plum jelly (both from my yard last year). I think it's absolutely amazing that even with slim pickings on plums last year we can feed two families PB&J sandwiches for a year! It's been two weeks since my last PB&J, so I know what I'm having for lunch tomorrow, hehe.
Funny that both my brother and I have independently gone to my mother in the last two weeks and asked her to impart her preserving knowledge on us. As boys, even cooks, we didn't have any interest growing up in canning. Now we both want to learn. Isn't that cool! It's going to be fun! I can't wait to have the option to can tomatoes, beans etc. rather than just freeze them.
Enjoy your garden!
Saturday, May 24, 2008
May 25, 2008
Wow, what a glorious day! As is often the case in Seattle, the forecast can change often and even then it can be completely wrong. I had been very excited about partly cloudy temps in the mid 60s, which was the forecast most of the week. Then, at the last minute, the forecast changed to mid 50s and rain showers all weekend. Just to make the forecasters completely wrong, we had a high of 77 with at worst whispy clouds if you really searched for them. It was beautiful and my garden loved it! I swear I could see the tomatoes growing! hehe
First off, my wife graciously let me sleep in this morning til 10 am, which is completley unlike me. During the time she was up with the kids, she saw the beautiful weather and plotted out a 5 mile walk for us (compared to our standard 3.5 mile course). So after our smoothie we started packing up for a long walk. Before we could make our escape my father and aunt showed up. My dad wanted to work on his car and my aunt wanted to work in the yard. Tis the season to butcher, er... prune rhodies and azaleas, and boy do mine need it. Needless to say my wife wasn't happy. She had her heart set on going for a walk and my aunt wanted me in the yard. Thankfully one of the items on my to-do list was for my aunt... to weed the rose garden area. If you recall, I'm not big on flowers. They're pretty, but I don't want to work for them, hehe. So we went to exercise while she started weeding.
By the time we got back she had half a yard-waste container filled. No, I didn't use any of that for my compost bin. I'm not that hard up for greens, ROFL. After changing clothes, I immediately went out and we started whacking back bushes. We did a ton of work. I was running around helping my aunt with the clippers, saws-all and chain saw and helping my dad with his car. The good news is that my dad helped me string up the trellis. It doesn't look nearly as good or straight as GardenGirl's or Judy's, but somehow I don't think the plants will care. I tried to get the peas to grab the trellis with moderate success. I'll work on it more tomorrow.
After lunch it was back at it. We accumulated QUITE a pile of branches from rhodies, azaleas, lilacs and some short tree we just cut down (after we cut it down I realized I had a huge hole in a garden area, now I have to plant a bush).
The funny thing is my eldest. He's four and loves to help. He was saying how strong he was by dragging branches from the front yard to the back yard. It was so cute. Here he is helping with a branch with part of the pile in the background...
Instead of taking a pickup full of branches to the dump and paying $20 to give Cedar Grove more material to charge $28 a yard for compost, my folks brought over their chipper. YAY! Just see if they get it back. MUAHAHAHA hehe. So the rest of the evening was spent shredding and chipping buckets full of composting goodness. The bits of leaves and branches all mixed together over the top of of a fluffed compost pile with a layer of Starbucks coffee grounds in the middle. Mmm Mmm Good!
Hehe yeah, I do look silly with those big ear phones. They're the best you could buy back 15 years ago when I worked in a safety supply warehouse for two summers. The did a good job because that little yellow machine was LOUD! I didn't finish the pile today, light gave out on me, but I made a huge dent in it and added about 6 inches of incredible mulch like chips. Hmm, I wonder if it'd work as a mulch for my SWC... I still need to cover the plastic. hehe.
Ok, just to warn you. The rest of my post has no pictures attached. See the digital camera batteries died and I was too busy to change them. So I relied on my wife to take the pictures, so the last one was the ONLY one with me in it or what we were doing. The rest were all of the kids. Hehe.
I actually stopped work on the cleanup before dusk. I had a to-do list that needed to get done in amongst the rest of the work today. In a half hour I got tons done. I cut another BAYG bin layer's worth of douglas fir and installed my first (or second) layer and added dirt. I must say I made a mistake in putting the bins so close to the fence. I can't get the screw gun between the fence and the bin. So I screwed the boards together and not into the 2x2 on that side. I got the idea from a forum where someone used the BAYG bin concept but made a frame out of the boards and slid it over the 2x2s like a sleeve. I didn't use that for all the boards, just the one in back our of necessity.
I filled them with dirt, covering up the stems again. Boy did it take a ton of dirt to cover all but 2 or 3 inches of potato plant. In the Butte bed I have a huge drop-off in the back right corner because there is a tiny sprout from that slow starter. Since it sprouted I didn't want to move it up to the level of the rest for fear of disturbing roots that may be finally growing. It was really hard to mound a ton of dirt to cover 6 or so inches of growth.
I also finally got to plant out my corn bed. Well mostly. I ran out of Seneca Horizon seeds that germinated, but the Precocious half is FULLY planted out. YAY! And what was already planted is really growing well. Well for this area mind you. Not like Judy's or Shots from GW in climates known for farming. I know I can grow corn here but until I eat the first cob out of my garden I'll remain cautiously optimistic. The last thing I did for my garden tonight was to soak more Seneca seeds to get germinating on the fridge to get in the ground fast. I want to get my corn bed growing in this nice weather so they get a jump on summer.
(NOTE: I snapped some pics in the morning and updated the page.)
Ok, sorry if this post isn't exactly coherent, but I'm fading fast. Time to take some Aleve and hit the sack (I wore my heart-rate monitor today and just the exercise and heavy working burned me 3,740 calories!). Let's hope the weather holds for tomorrow so we can continue to make more great compost (note that the forecast just changed to a high of 68 with a chance of thundershowers /sigh). And to think Mel suggests compost from 5 different sources. I can count two dozen off the top of my head, hehe!
Enjoy Spring and your garden!
First off, my wife graciously let me sleep in this morning til 10 am, which is completley unlike me. During the time she was up with the kids, she saw the beautiful weather and plotted out a 5 mile walk for us (compared to our standard 3.5 mile course). So after our smoothie we started packing up for a long walk. Before we could make our escape my father and aunt showed up. My dad wanted to work on his car and my aunt wanted to work in the yard. Tis the season to butcher, er... prune rhodies and azaleas, and boy do mine need it. Needless to say my wife wasn't happy. She had her heart set on going for a walk and my aunt wanted me in the yard. Thankfully one of the items on my to-do list was for my aunt... to weed the rose garden area. If you recall, I'm not big on flowers. They're pretty, but I don't want to work for them, hehe. So we went to exercise while she started weeding.
By the time we got back she had half a yard-waste container filled. No, I didn't use any of that for my compost bin. I'm not that hard up for greens, ROFL. After changing clothes, I immediately went out and we started whacking back bushes. We did a ton of work. I was running around helping my aunt with the clippers, saws-all and chain saw and helping my dad with his car. The good news is that my dad helped me string up the trellis. It doesn't look nearly as good or straight as GardenGirl's or Judy's, but somehow I don't think the plants will care. I tried to get the peas to grab the trellis with moderate success. I'll work on it more tomorrow.
After lunch it was back at it. We accumulated QUITE a pile of branches from rhodies, azaleas, lilacs and some short tree we just cut down (after we cut it down I realized I had a huge hole in a garden area, now I have to plant a bush).
The funny thing is my eldest. He's four and loves to help. He was saying how strong he was by dragging branches from the front yard to the back yard. It was so cute. Here he is helping with a branch with part of the pile in the background...
Instead of taking a pickup full of branches to the dump and paying $20 to give Cedar Grove more material to charge $28 a yard for compost, my folks brought over their chipper. YAY! Just see if they get it back. MUAHAHAHA hehe. So the rest of the evening was spent shredding and chipping buckets full of composting goodness. The bits of leaves and branches all mixed together over the top of of a fluffed compost pile with a layer of Starbucks coffee grounds in the middle. Mmm Mmm Good!
Hehe yeah, I do look silly with those big ear phones. They're the best you could buy back 15 years ago when I worked in a safety supply warehouse for two summers. The did a good job because that little yellow machine was LOUD! I didn't finish the pile today, light gave out on me, but I made a huge dent in it and added about 6 inches of incredible mulch like chips. Hmm, I wonder if it'd work as a mulch for my SWC... I still need to cover the plastic. hehe.
Ok, just to warn you. The rest of my post has no pictures attached. See the digital camera batteries died and I was too busy to change them. So I relied on my wife to take the pictures, so the last one was the ONLY one with me in it or what we were doing. The rest were all of the kids. Hehe.
I actually stopped work on the cleanup before dusk. I had a to-do list that needed to get done in amongst the rest of the work today. In a half hour I got tons done. I cut another BAYG bin layer's worth of douglas fir and installed my first (or second) layer and added dirt. I must say I made a mistake in putting the bins so close to the fence. I can't get the screw gun between the fence and the bin. So I screwed the boards together and not into the 2x2 on that side. I got the idea from a forum where someone used the BAYG bin concept but made a frame out of the boards and slid it over the 2x2s like a sleeve. I didn't use that for all the boards, just the one in back our of necessity.
I filled them with dirt, covering up the stems again. Boy did it take a ton of dirt to cover all but 2 or 3 inches of potato plant. In the Butte bed I have a huge drop-off in the back right corner because there is a tiny sprout from that slow starter. Since it sprouted I didn't want to move it up to the level of the rest for fear of disturbing roots that may be finally growing. It was really hard to mound a ton of dirt to cover 6 or so inches of growth.
I also finally got to plant out my corn bed. Well mostly. I ran out of Seneca Horizon seeds that germinated, but the Precocious half is FULLY planted out. YAY! And what was already planted is really growing well. Well for this area mind you. Not like Judy's or Shots from GW in climates known for farming. I know I can grow corn here but until I eat the first cob out of my garden I'll remain cautiously optimistic. The last thing I did for my garden tonight was to soak more Seneca seeds to get germinating on the fridge to get in the ground fast. I want to get my corn bed growing in this nice weather so they get a jump on summer.
(NOTE: I snapped some pics in the morning and updated the page.)
Ok, sorry if this post isn't exactly coherent, but I'm fading fast. Time to take some Aleve and hit the sack (I wore my heart-rate monitor today and just the exercise and heavy working burned me 3,740 calories!). Let's hope the weather holds for tomorrow so we can continue to make more great compost (note that the forecast just changed to a high of 68 with a chance of thundershowers /sigh). And to think Mel suggests compost from 5 different sources. I can count two dozen off the top of my head, hehe!
Enjoy Spring and your garden!
Monday, May 19, 2008
May 19, 2008
Well, today the garden took a back seat to my desperate need for a new cell phone. I've been pining over a single device that will replace my well-used and dying palm pilot, my broke but functioning cell phone, my fritzy MP3 player and take decent pics of my garden (or kids) on the fly. No small task but I've been patiently waiting for 5 (yes five) years. Back then I KNEW it was only a matter of time before I could drop 5 pounds by ridding myself of four devices. Needless to say I'm at a critical point and need to make a decision, but nothing is meeting all my needs. GRRR. How difficult is it? Ok, it's difficult, but not impossible, one would think.
Ok, enough rambling about non-gardening junk. When I got home my trellis netting was here. Unfortunately it isn't nylon cloth netting but more like plastic. Apparently I didn't read it well enough before I bought it. I hope it works because I need it now and can't afford to wait for a replacement. So I got the two top corner screws and washers in place, but didn't install the netting because it started raining.
I did get to add dirt to my Yukon Gold bin and boy did it need it. I didn't add to the Butte bed since I needed to install more boards and couldn't find the right screws quickly. Tomorrow I'm off work so I'll do it then.
I also am having problems with my compost bin. My eldest asked me politely to move my compost bin because it stunk and he wanted to swing on his swingset. It smells just like when I open my yard waste container after dumping my grass clippings and closing the lid for a few days. Thankfully it's not that strong since it's open to the air. I don't think it's an amonia smell, but I added shredded paper to the mix and tried to aerate it anyway. I sure hope the smell goes away because my wife is not happy.
Oh, I'm running drastically low on radishes. Without radishes, I'll have to buy garnish for my lettuce and spinach. I've got tons of that to eat, but 5 more mature radishes. I've planted tons but it takes a while to grow. Go figure.
Finally, the weather's officially turned back to rain. Today was a high of 70 but late rain showers. Tomorrow is a high of 60 and rain. And tomrrow's the beach day, rain or shine. Drat!
Ok, enough rambling about non-gardening junk. When I got home my trellis netting was here. Unfortunately it isn't nylon cloth netting but more like plastic. Apparently I didn't read it well enough before I bought it. I hope it works because I need it now and can't afford to wait for a replacement. So I got the two top corner screws and washers in place, but didn't install the netting because it started raining.
I did get to add dirt to my Yukon Gold bin and boy did it need it. I didn't add to the Butte bed since I needed to install more boards and couldn't find the right screws quickly. Tomorrow I'm off work so I'll do it then.
I also am having problems with my compost bin. My eldest asked me politely to move my compost bin because it stunk and he wanted to swing on his swingset. It smells just like when I open my yard waste container after dumping my grass clippings and closing the lid for a few days. Thankfully it's not that strong since it's open to the air. I don't think it's an amonia smell, but I added shredded paper to the mix and tried to aerate it anyway. I sure hope the smell goes away because my wife is not happy.
Oh, I'm running drastically low on radishes. Without radishes, I'll have to buy garnish for my lettuce and spinach. I've got tons of that to eat, but 5 more mature radishes. I've planted tons but it takes a while to grow. Go figure.
Finally, the weather's officially turned back to rain. Today was a high of 70 but late rain showers. Tomorrow is a high of 60 and rain. And tomrrow's the beach day, rain or shine. Drat!
Tuesday, May 13, 2008
May 13, 2008
Very short post today. The weather's really crappy out. Everyone at work was commenting on it, though it had nothing to do with gardening. Myself, I was thinking that I should ask Judy how often to water an SWC in fall and winter, since that's the weather we're having. 50 and rainy grey. And to think it's going to be 80 on Friday. I'll believe it when I see it. That said, my tomatoes are getting a little droopy and aren't growing at all. I think this weekend I'll get some mulch for the top to keep it from getting any water in the holes I cut to feed the plants through.
Good news, I got a shipping confirmation from Johnny's for my trellis netting. Hopefully it will get here this weekend so I can set it up.
I've also asked on GW about my un-sprouted potato. I hope I can force it to sprout, or maybe cut off a portion of a multiple sprouting seed potato and replant it in the blank spot, or at very least, get a new seed potato soon to hope that it catches up with the others. I would hate to have tons of open space in my Butte bin.
Well that's it for tonight, the kids are both sick with different things and my wife's at wit's end after cleaning up every mess imaginable. I had better go relieve her.
P.S. after getting the little one down because the eldest was going to eat and unfortunately we're starving the little one to keep anything in his stomach, my wife asked me to empty the crisper. Tons of store-bought veggies were well past their prime. So into the compost bucket with the dryer lint and other stuff from the week. It had been a few days since checking the temp and when I did (raining at the time) it was down in the 90s. It was dry when I cleared the middle so I wetted it down a bit and then dumped the great mix of greens and browns into the middle and recovered it with mostly composted grey matter. Let's hope it heats up nicely. I've had to much positive experience so far with it I'm not sure what I'll do if it stops working, hehe.
Enjoy your garden!
Good news, I got a shipping confirmation from Johnny's for my trellis netting. Hopefully it will get here this weekend so I can set it up.
I've also asked on GW about my un-sprouted potato. I hope I can force it to sprout, or maybe cut off a portion of a multiple sprouting seed potato and replant it in the blank spot, or at very least, get a new seed potato soon to hope that it catches up with the others. I would hate to have tons of open space in my Butte bin.
Well that's it for tonight, the kids are both sick with different things and my wife's at wit's end after cleaning up every mess imaginable. I had better go relieve her.
P.S. after getting the little one down because the eldest was going to eat and unfortunately we're starving the little one to keep anything in his stomach, my wife asked me to empty the crisper. Tons of store-bought veggies were well past their prime. So into the compost bucket with the dryer lint and other stuff from the week. It had been a few days since checking the temp and when I did (raining at the time) it was down in the 90s. It was dry when I cleared the middle so I wetted it down a bit and then dumped the great mix of greens and browns into the middle and recovered it with mostly composted grey matter. Let's hope it heats up nicely. I've had to much positive experience so far with it I'm not sure what I'll do if it stops working, hehe.
Enjoy your garden!
Sunday, May 11, 2008
May 11, 2008
HAPPY MOTHER'S DAY!!!
I hope everyone pampered their mothers or if you're a mother were pampered today. We had a BBQ despite the 45 degree temps and overcast weather. I love spending time with my brother now that we can talk gardening. But I digress.
Despite taking care of the kids and helping to pamper my wife today, I did manage to get some things done in short trips outside.
After hearing yet again about using blank space around big plants when they're small, I found the answer to my radish problem. Even with 16 per SF, that is not enough when you want 2 per salad, hehe. So my 5 SF just wasn't cutting it. So I took the opportunity today to plant radish seeds all around my broccoli seedlings. Well not all around the biggest since it shades one side too much. So while they grow, I'll hopefully get fast maturing radishes for a change now that the weather's hopefully better. I may do that elsewhere but I do have some unaccounted for squares at the top of bed #1 and the bottom of bed #2. I still felt good about making better use of space. Oh, and I threw some more bush beans in the ground that had sprouted overnight.
As for the compost bin that I turned yesterday is perfect according to some experienced folks at Ft2Garden.com, and to prove it when I took it's temperature this morning it was already back up to 145. Amazing what natural chemistry can do. Hehe I should have paid more attention in high school chemistry. I'm sure it has something to do with the natural reaction of nitrogen, carbon and oxygen. Otherwise known as who cares... hehe, it works! That and my family convinced me that though I probably didn't need two bins, I should build them just in case. So I will and hope to fill them both some day.
Finally, after visiting three nurseries, calling a fourth and checking all over the internet to find the exact sized nylon netting trellis, my father convinced me to just buy the one from Johnny's that fits perfectly. It was way more expensive even without the shipping, but I had an idea. Since my radish seeds are dwindling to the point that I don't think I'll have enough for the season, I bought more. They're not the same variety as my Territorials, but they look like regular radishes and the shipping was free, so the price was right.
Enjoy your garden!
I hope everyone pampered their mothers or if you're a mother were pampered today. We had a BBQ despite the 45 degree temps and overcast weather. I love spending time with my brother now that we can talk gardening. But I digress.
Despite taking care of the kids and helping to pamper my wife today, I did manage to get some things done in short trips outside.
After hearing yet again about using blank space around big plants when they're small, I found the answer to my radish problem. Even with 16 per SF, that is not enough when you want 2 per salad, hehe. So my 5 SF just wasn't cutting it. So I took the opportunity today to plant radish seeds all around my broccoli seedlings. Well not all around the biggest since it shades one side too much. So while they grow, I'll hopefully get fast maturing radishes for a change now that the weather's hopefully better. I may do that elsewhere but I do have some unaccounted for squares at the top of bed #1 and the bottom of bed #2. I still felt good about making better use of space. Oh, and I threw some more bush beans in the ground that had sprouted overnight.
As for the compost bin that I turned yesterday is perfect according to some experienced folks at Ft2Garden.com, and to prove it when I took it's temperature this morning it was already back up to 145. Amazing what natural chemistry can do. Hehe I should have paid more attention in high school chemistry. I'm sure it has something to do with the natural reaction of nitrogen, carbon and oxygen. Otherwise known as who cares... hehe, it works! That and my family convinced me that though I probably didn't need two bins, I should build them just in case. So I will and hope to fill them both some day.
Finally, after visiting three nurseries, calling a fourth and checking all over the internet to find the exact sized nylon netting trellis, my father convinced me to just buy the one from Johnny's that fits perfectly. It was way more expensive even without the shipping, but I had an idea. Since my radish seeds are dwindling to the point that I don't think I'll have enough for the season, I bought more. They're not the same variety as my Territorials, but they look like regular radishes and the shipping was free, so the price was right.
Enjoy your garden!
Saturday, May 10, 2008
May 10, 2008
Today was the first of my two-day celebration of Mother's Day. Of course mothers deserve every day to be Mother's Day for all they do for their families, but I digress.
We had a nice (filling) breakfast at the Maltby Cafe and then proceeded to waddle around Flower World for a few hours. I was looking for odds and ends since I don't have room for more veggies and my aunt gets me all my plants. But what I was really looking for was a 7x15 nylon netting for my trellis. Twelve feet just won't cut it to span all three of my beds plus the pathways. I've found one for $17 with shipping at Johnny's but I hate to pay extra shipping if I don't have to. Alas, Flower World only had 5x15, so I decided to hold out, despite the price at $8. Note to self, I should have bought it. hehe. I did get some tomato cages to help support the heavy fruit-laden vines (positive thinking). I also found a good price on gloves and bought some of that self-cutting twisty ties that GardenGirl has on one of her videos to help train plants to trellis. Overall Flower World was fun, but not for a veggie gardener. I was interested in their chickens that run around the park and pond. There were regular ones, ones with fluffy feather head dresses on and ones that looked soft as bunnies. Very cool. I mentioned that we should get some to my wife and she put her foot down. Eggs, fertilizer and weed control did nothing to sway her. Ah well.
When we got back home I took my eldest and headed north to Wally World to see if for once they had something Judy got at Wally World in Alabama. No luck, all they had there was 5x8 nylon netting. Grrr. Damn you regional procurement. hehe. What I did get there (other than socks and underwear for the kids) was a half pitch fork. My aunt won't leave hers here and it was only $18. Even if it's cheap and doesn't hold up I can buy a new one later. Hehe after I bought it I read Judy's blog and she wants one for Mother's Day. Great minds think alike! And so do ours...
After I got out of Walmart, I headed to Emery's nursery, which is a mile from Walmart. I've got a $25 gift card from the preschool auction last month and was hoping to use it on a trellis and maybe some other garden thingy. Too bad they were closing when I got there, but a nice sales person did show me their netting. 5x15 again, but for $9. Grrr. Since it was my first time there she showed Logan and I their Coi pond, beautiful fish! If only I had a pond, and no raccoons... hehe. She also told me they've got 6 acres there including a chicken coop. Hmm, I'm going to have to go back and look around, and maybe look more closely into the rules on chickens in the city.
When I got home I checked out my garden. The radishes are almost totally unburied, the spinach has ladle sized leaves, the lettuce is almost ready to pick and I'm getting more spouts from my bush beans. However, my final seed potato still hasn't sprouted. I'm thinking of taking it out and putting it under sunlight and heat to try to get it to sprout then put it back. Not sure.
Here's a current but blurry pick of my blueberries. Today I removed 95% of the flowers and sprinkled some acid-loving fertilizer around the ring you see in the picture. That ring's what's left of the coffee grounds I put around them a month or two ago. I sure hope it's working to make the soil acidic enough for them. I left just enough buds on the strongest canes to let just a few blueberries grow, just so I know they can, and to placate my son. hehe
After that I tested my compost bin just about 7 days after I created it. Low and behold, the temp was 135 degrees, below the zone. So out came my new pitch fork and I turned the compost. The middle was grey and clumpy so I replaced it with green and moist, with some weeds and paper towels thrown in for good measure. It's now a thinner tall mound hoping the magic will happen again. Here's to hoping I'm doing it right.
Tomorrow I'll call Sky to see if they by chance have my netting, then if not I guess I'll either bite the bullet and spend the shipping on what I want or maybe head back to Emery's and buy the 5 foot one and just raise it a foot off the beds and run a piece of twine under it. Not sure.
Oh, and let me add another twist to the whole, can I plant tulips around my trees. ROFL I forgot to mention that under the mulch and yummy compost is a layer of landscape fabric to keep the weeds and grass from growing up through it. I'm kind of doubting the tulips will make it through, or would they? Maybe I'll add some to my new rock garden when it's time to plant them.
Well, to all the mother's out there, Happy Mother's Day! You deserve to rest (and much, much more!) and maybe get out in your garden for fun while your family makes breakfast.
We had a nice (filling) breakfast at the Maltby Cafe and then proceeded to waddle around Flower World for a few hours. I was looking for odds and ends since I don't have room for more veggies and my aunt gets me all my plants. But what I was really looking for was a 7x15 nylon netting for my trellis. Twelve feet just won't cut it to span all three of my beds plus the pathways. I've found one for $17 with shipping at Johnny's but I hate to pay extra shipping if I don't have to. Alas, Flower World only had 5x15, so I decided to hold out, despite the price at $8. Note to self, I should have bought it. hehe. I did get some tomato cages to help support the heavy fruit-laden vines (positive thinking). I also found a good price on gloves and bought some of that self-cutting twisty ties that GardenGirl has on one of her videos to help train plants to trellis. Overall Flower World was fun, but not for a veggie gardener. I was interested in their chickens that run around the park and pond. There were regular ones, ones with fluffy feather head dresses on and ones that looked soft as bunnies. Very cool. I mentioned that we should get some to my wife and she put her foot down. Eggs, fertilizer and weed control did nothing to sway her. Ah well.
When we got back home I took my eldest and headed north to Wally World to see if for once they had something Judy got at Wally World in Alabama. No luck, all they had there was 5x8 nylon netting. Grrr. Damn you regional procurement. hehe. What I did get there (other than socks and underwear for the kids) was a half pitch fork. My aunt won't leave hers here and it was only $18. Even if it's cheap and doesn't hold up I can buy a new one later. Hehe after I bought it I read Judy's blog and she wants one for Mother's Day. Great minds think alike! And so do ours...
After I got out of Walmart, I headed to Emery's nursery, which is a mile from Walmart. I've got a $25 gift card from the preschool auction last month and was hoping to use it on a trellis and maybe some other garden thingy. Too bad they were closing when I got there, but a nice sales person did show me their netting. 5x15 again, but for $9. Grrr. Since it was my first time there she showed Logan and I their Coi pond, beautiful fish! If only I had a pond, and no raccoons... hehe. She also told me they've got 6 acres there including a chicken coop. Hmm, I'm going to have to go back and look around, and maybe look more closely into the rules on chickens in the city.
When I got home I checked out my garden. The radishes are almost totally unburied, the spinach has ladle sized leaves, the lettuce is almost ready to pick and I'm getting more spouts from my bush beans. However, my final seed potato still hasn't sprouted. I'm thinking of taking it out and putting it under sunlight and heat to try to get it to sprout then put it back. Not sure.
Here's a current but blurry pick of my blueberries. Today I removed 95% of the flowers and sprinkled some acid-loving fertilizer around the ring you see in the picture. That ring's what's left of the coffee grounds I put around them a month or two ago. I sure hope it's working to make the soil acidic enough for them. I left just enough buds on the strongest canes to let just a few blueberries grow, just so I know they can, and to placate my son. hehe
After that I tested my compost bin just about 7 days after I created it. Low and behold, the temp was 135 degrees, below the zone. So out came my new pitch fork and I turned the compost. The middle was grey and clumpy so I replaced it with green and moist, with some weeds and paper towels thrown in for good measure. It's now a thinner tall mound hoping the magic will happen again. Here's to hoping I'm doing it right.
Tomorrow I'll call Sky to see if they by chance have my netting, then if not I guess I'll either bite the bullet and spend the shipping on what I want or maybe head back to Emery's and buy the 5 foot one and just raise it a foot off the beds and run a piece of twine under it. Not sure.
Oh, and let me add another twist to the whole, can I plant tulips around my trees. ROFL I forgot to mention that under the mulch and yummy compost is a layer of landscape fabric to keep the weeds and grass from growing up through it. I'm kind of doubting the tulips will make it through, or would they? Maybe I'll add some to my new rock garden when it's time to plant them.
Well, to all the mother's out there, Happy Mother's Day! You deserve to rest (and much, much more!) and maybe get out in your garden for fun while your family makes breakfast.
Friday, April 25, 2008
April 25, 2008
Let me start by confessing to a horrific crime... I'm a seedling killer! That's right, I took a perfectly healthy growing seedling and slaughtered it. You see, my spinach was growing awesome... see...
Also notice the empty space between the left hand side and the edge of the bed? Also notice how close they are together? Well I got the bright idea to move the far left ones to the empty space. It's worked with all my other seedlings when I had to transplant them. Who knew that the root systems were so well developed on plants this size? I was moving them and RRRRRRRRIIIIIIIIIIPPPPPPPPP!!! I left a good amount of the root system where they were. When I packed them down they kept falling over. GRRRRRR They may very well have been just fine if I'd left them. Ah the first year gardening, live and learn, or kill and learn is a better term.
So I'm going to start more spinach germinating. This time I'll try Toasty's suggestion of the damp coffee filters in a plastic bag. That way I when they germinate I can just drop them into the ground and let them grow.
The weather's supposed to be good this weekend. Not great, but good. Good for gardening and projects. So here's my to-do/wish list for the weekend. I know I should have done it yesterday but what the hey:
- Buy stuff for and build my hoop covers.
- Build my trellis, yes trellis. I plan on building a single trellis to span my three beds along my garage wall for my pole beans, tomatoes, peas and cukes. Gonna be fun. I'll use 2x4s and either twine or netting if I can find it cheap.
- Succession plant. I've got a whole section of my middle (#2) bed that's bare right now. The plan was for more broccoli and green onions there, but I think I'll be fine with 3 SF of onions and want more lettuce space, so I'll plant more lettuce and maybe spinach. I'll have enough broccoli if I plant some next to my cauliflower in bed #1.
- Consider building a compost bin. I think for the first year the three sides I'll try to find some pallets, but I don't know what I'll do for the bottom. This is a wish list item since I'm not far enough along in the design or research process.
- I actually have to build a SWC. Unfortunately, the one I stole from Toasty (Thank you again!) is 30 inches and I've only got 24 to work with. The 18 gallon bins that we've got to hold garbage, err knick-knacks, is 24 inches. So that means I've got to build one for my tomatoes. They're more than ready to be planted and I'm holding up the show. Boy do I wish that Judy's blog didn't crash. Her instructions were PERFECT. I doubt I can remember them all. And she's been doing stuff for me and Ft2Garden.com and not rebuilding her blog pages. This needs to happen this weekend.
- Prune my blueberry bushes. Here they are today...
I know I've got to prune off the buds to help develop strong root systems and thick canes to hold up all those blueberry clusters next year. But I don't want to hurt the leaves but don't know what to pinch. Is it the little rose-like hard buds? I think so but don't want to start over with THESE seedlings... hehe. I probably should have done this already, but I didn't want to do the wrong thing.
- Finally, Saturday evening my father and I are going to the Mariner's game against the Oakland A's. He's got tickets right behind home plate, so this is also a must do... (I'm not a big baseball fan, but I'm not going to miss this time with my dad).
I'll leave you with a pic of my corn. I expect you're also reading Judy's blog for a lesson on what to do (Judy) and not to do (me). Seriously, she's got several years experience on me, and a climate that tops ours here, but I'm going to do whatever it takes to make this work. Sure I'll make mistakes, but I'll fix them, so maybe you won't have to.
Also notice the empty space between the left hand side and the edge of the bed? Also notice how close they are together? Well I got the bright idea to move the far left ones to the empty space. It's worked with all my other seedlings when I had to transplant them. Who knew that the root systems were so well developed on plants this size? I was moving them and RRRRRRRRIIIIIIIIIIPPPPPPPPP!!! I left a good amount of the root system where they were. When I packed them down they kept falling over. GRRRRRR They may very well have been just fine if I'd left them. Ah the first year gardening, live and learn, or kill and learn is a better term.
So I'm going to start more spinach germinating. This time I'll try Toasty's suggestion of the damp coffee filters in a plastic bag. That way I when they germinate I can just drop them into the ground and let them grow.
The weather's supposed to be good this weekend. Not great, but good. Good for gardening and projects. So here's my to-do/wish list for the weekend. I know I should have done it yesterday but what the hey:
- Buy stuff for and build my hoop covers.
- Build my trellis, yes trellis. I plan on building a single trellis to span my three beds along my garage wall for my pole beans, tomatoes, peas and cukes. Gonna be fun. I'll use 2x4s and either twine or netting if I can find it cheap.
- Succession plant. I've got a whole section of my middle (#2) bed that's bare right now. The plan was for more broccoli and green onions there, but I think I'll be fine with 3 SF of onions and want more lettuce space, so I'll plant more lettuce and maybe spinach. I'll have enough broccoli if I plant some next to my cauliflower in bed #1.
- Consider building a compost bin. I think for the first year the three sides I'll try to find some pallets, but I don't know what I'll do for the bottom. This is a wish list item since I'm not far enough along in the design or research process.
- I actually have to build a SWC. Unfortunately, the one I stole from Toasty (Thank you again!) is 30 inches and I've only got 24 to work with. The 18 gallon bins that we've got to hold garbage, err knick-knacks, is 24 inches. So that means I've got to build one for my tomatoes. They're more than ready to be planted and I'm holding up the show. Boy do I wish that Judy's blog didn't crash. Her instructions were PERFECT. I doubt I can remember them all. And she's been doing stuff for me and Ft2Garden.com and not rebuilding her blog pages. This needs to happen this weekend.
- Prune my blueberry bushes. Here they are today...
I know I've got to prune off the buds to help develop strong root systems and thick canes to hold up all those blueberry clusters next year. But I don't want to hurt the leaves but don't know what to pinch. Is it the little rose-like hard buds? I think so but don't want to start over with THESE seedlings... hehe. I probably should have done this already, but I didn't want to do the wrong thing.
- Finally, Saturday evening my father and I are going to the Mariner's game against the Oakland A's. He's got tickets right behind home plate, so this is also a must do... (I'm not a big baseball fan, but I'm not going to miss this time with my dad).
I'll leave you with a pic of my corn. I expect you're also reading Judy's blog for a lesson on what to do (Judy) and not to do (me). Seriously, she's got several years experience on me, and a climate that tops ours here, but I'm going to do whatever it takes to make this work. Sure I'll make mistakes, but I'll fix them, so maybe you won't have to.
Sunday, March 30, 2008
March 30, 2008
Well, it's 36 degrees and lightly snowing outside at NOON! I ran outside and checked on my hoop cover. Still leaning a bit but no change from yesterday. I may make a trip to the hardware store to see if I can't figure out how to make the hoop covers easier and more "permanent" for winter gardening.
Other than that, I just can't see planting anything more right now when I just want to stay inside and keep warm. I don't even want to go to the dump to get rid of that broken coldframe. Today will be a day to play with the kids, maybe search the internet for interesting ways to grow my veggies via Winter Sowing, and also to create a better seal on my hoop cover. Oh, and maybe even try to finish my taxes. Joy oh joy.
Well, I went through the WS FAQ again. After I got through all the talk of *flowers* I found a great post on veggies that you can WS. The ones I hope to attempt rather than using an extensive light system are:
Onions
Beans
Broccoli
Cauliflower
Carrots
Peas
Spinach
Lettuce
It says I could do corn and tomatoes, but I am still worried about doing tomatoes from seed and I think I'll just start corn inside in peat pucks for the early plantings and then direct sow for the later ones when the soil temp's higher. As for tomatoes, I did actually read the FAQ for growing tomatoes from seed... Judy'd be proud of me... she's converting me one day at a time. hehe
That said, I may even be able to keep most of these very plants alive and producing throughout the winter under my hoop house (at least the ones that can tolerate partial sun, since we have a solid cloud cover most fall/winter). /shrugOh, I forgot to mention, I saw a possum in my front yard last night when I went out to check on the snow conditions. It looked like it wanted to go into my garden area but didn't. Of course it was cold and I didn't stick around, but it was encouraging about the deterrent I put down.
That said, my wife told me while I was making dinner tonight that she saw some cats in our yard. I went out back to shoo them away and found what looked like a family of feral cats back there. So much for the predator urine working on cats (not sure it was supposed to, but it should). And the kittens (young cats) were so cute. Grrr, I'm such a softie when it comes to cats. *He says as he's posting this message with a droolie cat on his lap* hehe.
Did you check out Judy's blog for today? She posted a pic from Google Earth showing her property. OMG can you say DROOOL! It's 2 acres with well over an acre of southern facing open space. Not that I'm advocating traditional row gardening, but WOW, she could become Judy the GardenGirl (if Patti would allow the rights to be used). She could even change it from Urban Sustainable Living to Rural Sustainable Living. Doesn't have quite the ring, or give the same impression as GardenGirl's, but she could definitely feed her family and many others utilizing the techniques in Patti's videos.
Note if you don't know what or whom I'm referring to, there are links on the right to both Judy's blog and site and GardenGirlTV's site. Both are well worth as much time as you can devote to them.
Hope your weekend was more productive in your garden than mine was in mine... Have a good week!
Other than that, I just can't see planting anything more right now when I just want to stay inside and keep warm. I don't even want to go to the dump to get rid of that broken coldframe. Today will be a day to play with the kids, maybe search the internet for interesting ways to grow my veggies via Winter Sowing, and also to create a better seal on my hoop cover. Oh, and maybe even try to finish my taxes. Joy oh joy.
Well, I went through the WS FAQ again. After I got through all the talk of *flowers* I found a great post on veggies that you can WS. The ones I hope to attempt rather than using an extensive light system are:
Onions
Beans
Broccoli
Cauliflower
Carrots
Peas
Spinach
Lettuce
It says I could do corn and tomatoes, but I am still worried about doing tomatoes from seed and I think I'll just start corn inside in peat pucks for the early plantings and then direct sow for the later ones when the soil temp's higher. As for tomatoes, I did actually read the FAQ for growing tomatoes from seed... Judy'd be proud of me... she's converting me one day at a time. hehe
That said, I may even be able to keep most of these very plants alive and producing throughout the winter under my hoop house (at least the ones that can tolerate partial sun, since we have a solid cloud cover most fall/winter). /shrugOh, I forgot to mention, I saw a possum in my front yard last night when I went out to check on the snow conditions. It looked like it wanted to go into my garden area but didn't. Of course it was cold and I didn't stick around, but it was encouraging about the deterrent I put down.
That said, my wife told me while I was making dinner tonight that she saw some cats in our yard. I went out back to shoo them away and found what looked like a family of feral cats back there. So much for the predator urine working on cats (not sure it was supposed to, but it should). And the kittens (young cats) were so cute. Grrr, I'm such a softie when it comes to cats. *He says as he's posting this message with a droolie cat on his lap* hehe.
Did you check out Judy's blog for today? She posted a pic from Google Earth showing her property. OMG can you say DROOOL! It's 2 acres with well over an acre of southern facing open space. Not that I'm advocating traditional row gardening, but WOW, she could become Judy the GardenGirl (if Patti would allow the rights to be used). She could even change it from Urban Sustainable Living to Rural Sustainable Living. Doesn't have quite the ring, or give the same impression as GardenGirl's, but she could definitely feed her family and many others utilizing the techniques in Patti's videos.
Note if you don't know what or whom I'm referring to, there are links on the right to both Judy's blog and site and GardenGirlTV's site. Both are well worth as much time as you can devote to them.
Hope your weekend was more productive in your garden than mine was in mine... Have a good week!
Friday, March 28, 2008
March 28, 2008
I'm going to keep this really short as it's actually one hour into the 29th.
Quick update: We got slushy snow all day here with about a half inch of slush accumulation on my hoop cover. It is leaning pretty bad and heavily laiden with chunky water, but it's holding up well enough that I'll wait til tomorrow to fix it.
I've decided I'll go get 5 inch sections of 3/4 inch pipe and attach them to the inside of my beds at appropriate intervals. That way I can use them like flag pole stands and place my 1/2 inch hoop pipes inside them for much better stability.
As for making a better seal with the plastic (not so important to keep frost off, but it will be for the mini-green house aspect this coming fall/winter), Judy suggested something interesting that I'll have to be more awake to understand. More on that at Ft2Garden.com or tomorrow when I'm lucid.
Tomorrow is also the day when I install the Y to my faucet in the backard and attach the temporary hose to the underside of my house against the slab. Then when I reach the garden area, I'll lock it off and coil it up for use to water until we've got the deck started. Then I'll put a PVC solution in place that'll be permanent. I just hope my dad who's helping doesn't decide to come over early...
Lastly, while I was out tonight, I came across a great container for Winter Sowing. It's a clear salad green container from the grocery store. It's about a foot, by 5 inches by 7 inches deep. It should hold 3+ inches of soil no problem.
Well, I'm feeling that I'm missing something, but I can't think of it, so tomorrow's another day (or later today). Night Night!
Quick update: We got slushy snow all day here with about a half inch of slush accumulation on my hoop cover. It is leaning pretty bad and heavily laiden with chunky water, but it's holding up well enough that I'll wait til tomorrow to fix it.
I've decided I'll go get 5 inch sections of 3/4 inch pipe and attach them to the inside of my beds at appropriate intervals. That way I can use them like flag pole stands and place my 1/2 inch hoop pipes inside them for much better stability.
As for making a better seal with the plastic (not so important to keep frost off, but it will be for the mini-green house aspect this coming fall/winter), Judy suggested something interesting that I'll have to be more awake to understand. More on that at Ft2Garden.com or tomorrow when I'm lucid.
Tomorrow is also the day when I install the Y to my faucet in the backard and attach the temporary hose to the underside of my house against the slab. Then when I reach the garden area, I'll lock it off and coil it up for use to water until we've got the deck started. Then I'll put a PVC solution in place that'll be permanent. I just hope my dad who's helping doesn't decide to come over early...
Lastly, while I was out tonight, I came across a great container for Winter Sowing. It's a clear salad green container from the grocery store. It's about a foot, by 5 inches by 7 inches deep. It should hold 3+ inches of soil no problem.
Well, I'm feeling that I'm missing something, but I can't think of it, so tomorrow's another day (or later today). Night Night!
Saturday, March 1, 2008
March 1, 2008
Well, I didn't post on Leap Day because my wife had a thing last night so she dropped the kids off at my folks house. After work I went there instead of home and spent the evening with the family. By the time I got home it was close to midnight and after the week I've had and fighting this cold, I fell into bed. So I'll have to wait another 4 years to post on Leap Day. Ah well.
So my dad and I talked about the blackberries, the wood and the potato bins. He thinks the blackberry pruning is a good idea (of course he does, he doesn't have to do it). However he didn't think just putting my "dirt" on top of the weed infested ground for the potato bins was a good idea. I used up all of my landscape fabric doing my garden area, so I've been reluctant to buy a new roll for just over 4 SF. Then my dad suggested we use it over the concrete patio when we build a deck over it. It will help keep anything from growing under there and also drain well. So now I've got a reason to buy a new roll. Looks like a trip to Costco is in order since they've got their garden pallets out now.
So here's what my garden to-do list looks like for this weekend:
-Direct sow broccoli, cauliflower, lettuce, peas and spinach.
-Buy fertilizer (5-10-10) for the peas and spinach at least.
-Buy mulch for around the trees.
-Mulch the trees.
That's about it for this weekend, but I've got a ton of other errands and taxes to work on.
Today's going to be a good day for the running around because the weather's crappy. Yesterday I went out at lunch without a coat on. By the time to go home, it was rainy, windy and grey. It's been icky ever since. Tomorrow's supposed to be better weather for working outside. We'll see.
Well, the rain has been just as predicted, showers. Not worth working in but worth waiting out. My day has been pretty full since I wrote that list.
I had planned on taking my eldest out to run some errands, including several for the garden, but my aunt and dad showed up. Of course my son wanted to play in the yard with my aunt so my dad and I went on the errands.
First we went to Costco and got gas and landscape fabric. They had 4' x 220' for $21. Can't pass that up and we can use it for under the deck we're building this spring in addition to the potato bins.
Then we went to the local nursery (the $28 vermiculite one). They're still the best thing around for gardening information and stuff. We spoke to a knowlegable person there and he directed me away from Miracle Gro fertilizers because of the salt content that depletes the soil of nutrients to a more natural product. So I not only got my 5-10-10 All Purpose Vegetable fertilizer, but I got the one for Azalelas and Rhodies (read bluberries) as well.
While I was there I got mulch for around my apple and plum trees. Of course, my gardener aunt was right, they recommended compost for mulch around the tree, just not touching the trunk. So I got 4 bags or Cedar Grove compost for nearly the price of a cubic yard in bulk (if I needed that much or wanted to bag it myself).
We also asked about worms there, but they only had composting worms like Flatlander has, and agreed that they would not be good for putting in my beds. So from Sky Nursery we went to Joe's (formerly GI Joe's) sporting good store on a mission to set some bait free. We got 8 dozen worms, nightcrawlers to be precise, and dumped them in my beds, two dozen each.
Then we started unloading the bags of compost. Boy are they heavy. So I got my trusty wheelbarrrow out to move them to where the tree is. Unfortuantely over the last two weeks, the wheel went flat. Odd. So up to the gas station to fill it. Sure I could have carried them by hand faster, but I also want to move all the left over Mel's Mix to the area between the two potato bins since that's where they're going eventually. While we were filling the tire, the rain started so we came back, put the tire back on the wheelbarrow and my folks called it a day. I made lunch for the family and am posting while I eat it.
If the weather cooperates, I'll put landscape fabric under the potato bins to keep weeds from growing up into my fertile soil, mulch around the trees (putting landscaping fabric under them too rather than newspaper (since I've got it). If the weather doesn't turn nice, I'll end up doing taxes... come on sunshine!
The weather held to just be overcast. Was a bit chilly after 5 as the sun was going down, but I got the landscape fabric under both bins and put the Mel's Mix I removed back on top. Let's see the weeds get through that, hehe. It got too dark so I cleaned up and came back in to finish up today's entry. Hope you like it. I sure had fun making it!
So my dad and I talked about the blackberries, the wood and the potato bins. He thinks the blackberry pruning is a good idea (of course he does, he doesn't have to do it). However he didn't think just putting my "dirt" on top of the weed infested ground for the potato bins was a good idea. I used up all of my landscape fabric doing my garden area, so I've been reluctant to buy a new roll for just over 4 SF. Then my dad suggested we use it over the concrete patio when we build a deck over it. It will help keep anything from growing under there and also drain well. So now I've got a reason to buy a new roll. Looks like a trip to Costco is in order since they've got their garden pallets out now.
So here's what my garden to-do list looks like for this weekend:
-Direct sow broccoli, cauliflower, lettuce, peas and spinach.
-Buy fertilizer (5-10-10) for the peas and spinach at least.
-Buy mulch for around the trees.
-Mulch the trees.
That's about it for this weekend, but I've got a ton of other errands and taxes to work on.
Today's going to be a good day for the running around because the weather's crappy. Yesterday I went out at lunch without a coat on. By the time to go home, it was rainy, windy and grey. It's been icky ever since. Tomorrow's supposed to be better weather for working outside. We'll see.
Well, the rain has been just as predicted, showers. Not worth working in but worth waiting out. My day has been pretty full since I wrote that list.
I had planned on taking my eldest out to run some errands, including several for the garden, but my aunt and dad showed up. Of course my son wanted to play in the yard with my aunt so my dad and I went on the errands.
First we went to Costco and got gas and landscape fabric. They had 4' x 220' for $21. Can't pass that up and we can use it for under the deck we're building this spring in addition to the potato bins.
Then we went to the local nursery (the $28 vermiculite one). They're still the best thing around for gardening information and stuff. We spoke to a knowlegable person there and he directed me away from Miracle Gro fertilizers because of the salt content that depletes the soil of nutrients to a more natural product. So I not only got my 5-10-10 All Purpose Vegetable fertilizer, but I got the one for Azalelas and Rhodies (read bluberries) as well.
While I was there I got mulch for around my apple and plum trees. Of course, my gardener aunt was right, they recommended compost for mulch around the tree, just not touching the trunk. So I got 4 bags or Cedar Grove compost for nearly the price of a cubic yard in bulk (if I needed that much or wanted to bag it myself).
We also asked about worms there, but they only had composting worms like Flatlander has, and agreed that they would not be good for putting in my beds. So from Sky Nursery we went to Joe's (formerly GI Joe's) sporting good store on a mission to set some bait free. We got 8 dozen worms, nightcrawlers to be precise, and dumped them in my beds, two dozen each.
Then we started unloading the bags of compost. Boy are they heavy. So I got my trusty wheelbarrrow out to move them to where the tree is. Unfortuantely over the last two weeks, the wheel went flat. Odd. So up to the gas station to fill it. Sure I could have carried them by hand faster, but I also want to move all the left over Mel's Mix to the area between the two potato bins since that's where they're going eventually. While we were filling the tire, the rain started so we came back, put the tire back on the wheelbarrow and my folks called it a day. I made lunch for the family and am posting while I eat it.
If the weather cooperates, I'll put landscape fabric under the potato bins to keep weeds from growing up into my fertile soil, mulch around the trees (putting landscaping fabric under them too rather than newspaper (since I've got it). If the weather doesn't turn nice, I'll end up doing taxes... come on sunshine!
The weather held to just be overcast. Was a bit chilly after 5 as the sun was going down, but I got the landscape fabric under both bins and put the Mel's Mix I removed back on top. Let's see the weeds get through that, hehe. It got too dark so I cleaned up and came back in to finish up today's entry. Hope you like it. I sure had fun making it!
Friday, February 22, 2008
February 22, 2008
I come home and my 19 month old has added tons of new words and phrases to his vocabulary, and I've only been gone less than a week, including a darn good impersonation of Arnold doing "I'll be back"...
I must say, everything IS bigger in Texas, well at least the hotel was, it could fit a small city inside it, and I've been to some big hotels before. Unfortunately I didn't get my Texas sized steak. I'm still bumed about that.
As I just got home and it was already dark, I haven't seen my garden, but I guess it looks the same as when I left. I left the seedlings out all week hoping they'd survive some minor frosts and limited rain, but I'm still not holding out hope. Even less since my wife told me it DIDN'T rain like it was forecast to this week. In fact, my beds haven't had rain. Drat. I may have to see if my hose will reach.
I'm not sure what my wife has planned for this weekend, but if the weather's ok, I'd like to get my potato bins set up and ready for planting as soon as I get the seed potatoes. Of course that's assuming you don't need to leave them out to sprout or anything. /shrug
Oh yeah, right before I left for the airport, I posted pics of fungus that's been growing the trees in my yard for several years, including my pear and plum trees. I got several replies while I was gone and the verdict seems to be that the fungus is not a problem and only says that we've got good air quality here. If I want to get rid of it, just add polution. No thanks, duh. Good to know, though I am stumped now what's causing the lower branches of my fruit trees to die if it's not the fungus?
Finally, according to my brother, Costco has gardening stuff out now, so they've got landscape fabric if you need it and also blueberry bushes for sale. I don't have any more room in my yard for more so I'm passing, but stop by your local store if you want any.
Well I'm exhausted from a very long week with not enough sleep. I'm going to spend some time with the Mrs. and hit the hay. Enjoy your garden this weekend!
I must say, everything IS bigger in Texas, well at least the hotel was, it could fit a small city inside it, and I've been to some big hotels before. Unfortunately I didn't get my Texas sized steak. I'm still bumed about that.
As I just got home and it was already dark, I haven't seen my garden, but I guess it looks the same as when I left. I left the seedlings out all week hoping they'd survive some minor frosts and limited rain, but I'm still not holding out hope. Even less since my wife told me it DIDN'T rain like it was forecast to this week. In fact, my beds haven't had rain. Drat. I may have to see if my hose will reach.
I'm not sure what my wife has planned for this weekend, but if the weather's ok, I'd like to get my potato bins set up and ready for planting as soon as I get the seed potatoes. Of course that's assuming you don't need to leave them out to sprout or anything. /shrug
Oh yeah, right before I left for the airport, I posted pics of fungus that's been growing the trees in my yard for several years, including my pear and plum trees. I got several replies while I was gone and the verdict seems to be that the fungus is not a problem and only says that we've got good air quality here. If I want to get rid of it, just add polution. No thanks, duh. Good to know, though I am stumped now what's causing the lower branches of my fruit trees to die if it's not the fungus?
Finally, according to my brother, Costco has gardening stuff out now, so they've got landscape fabric if you need it and also blueberry bushes for sale. I don't have any more room in my yard for more so I'm passing, but stop by your local store if you want any.
Well I'm exhausted from a very long week with not enough sleep. I'm going to spend some time with the Mrs. and hit the hay. Enjoy your garden this weekend!
Sunday, February 17, 2008
February 17, 2008
Sunday night update. Dirt day was a resounding success! Despite being sick with muscles already sore from the day before, I started at 8:30 am and finished at 6:30 pm. I'm not sure I'll make it to 8:30.
Since I already had 2 of the three ingredients to Mel's Mix and the compost place didn't open until 10, I went to Lowes (I dislike them but they're closer than HD) and got 2 sheets of 3/8" plywood and had them ripped to 1x8 sections. Then I came home and set them out to create a wheelbarrow path to the beds from my driveway. Finally, I unloaded the peat moss bales and vermiculite bags into no-sun land of my garden area to get them out of the way, staged for mixing. By then it was 10 and my dad was there. My dad and I went to Sky Nursery to get 1 yard of Cedar Grove Compost and picked up my brother's wheelbarrow and tools on the way back. My brother was there when we got there and had set up my 20'x20' tarp in the driveway.
We started mixing by dumping half a yard of compost onto the tarp and put 1/4 the peat and vermiculite on top and used hoes and rakes to mix it together. Then we added more compost, vermiculite and peat moss until we had 1 yard of compost and half of our bagged ingredients mixed together. Boy was that long, tiring work. My brother tried to tell me I owed him one, but I had two comments for him. It was HIS idea to go 15 inches high and did he forget the 15 c. yards of gravel and river rock I helped him shovel and spread over his side and front yard? Oh yeah, never-mind.
Of course I had to listen to decades of experience telling me that my mix may be ok for seedlings but wouldn't work for mature plants. Finally my brother deceased his banter down to "I'm skeptical about it" but he didn't want to read the book. /sigh
So while they continued mixing, I went and got not just the second yard of compost, but another half a yard to make them happy. Doesn't the load of pure compost look great above? Anyway, I conceded mainly because our calculations were for 6.3 yards of material for the beds and I had only 6 yards worth of material, plus I needed some for the potato bins.
Anyway, we busted through the wheelbarrowing the mix to the beds and then had lunch. By then we were all pretty tired and the "mixing" of the mix wasn't quite so thorough. We convinced ourselves that shoveling the mix into a wheelbarrow, dumping it into a bed and spreading it around would mix it well enough. We were basically right.
We finished up the beds around 5:30 and while my brother smoothed out the dirt in each bed, my dad and I filled the empty vermiculite bags half-full of Mel's Mix for use in the potato bins. Also if there is any settling of material when it rains. I don't think there will be or Mel would have mentioned it, but I've got extra if need be. I actually have about a quarter yard. Not too bad calculating. Of course the bottom 3 inches of the beds is gravel. /shrug
Notice that the corn bed is a bit richer in compost than the background beds. That's because we mixed 1.5 yards of compost to 2 yards of bagged material. It still looks good.
Finally, after we cleaned up and everyone left, I broke out 8 bags of Starbucks coffee grounds we'd stored up for a few weeks and sprinkled them over each of the beds. I also did a ring around the drip line of my blueberry bushes. I had just enough. Then I gently smoothed out the grounds with a rake under the light of the moon.
I'm very content with my garden now. It's light and friable as the book would say and it should retain moisture and drain like a dream!
Now I'm going to scarf down something to eat, take some NyQuil and Alieve and get some rest.
Since I already had 2 of the three ingredients to Mel's Mix and the compost place didn't open until 10, I went to Lowes (I dislike them but they're closer than HD) and got 2 sheets of 3/8" plywood and had them ripped to 1x8 sections. Then I came home and set them out to create a wheelbarrow path to the beds from my driveway. Finally, I unloaded the peat moss bales and vermiculite bags into no-sun land of my garden area to get them out of the way, staged for mixing. By then it was 10 and my dad was there. My dad and I went to Sky Nursery to get 1 yard of Cedar Grove Compost and picked up my brother's wheelbarrow and tools on the way back. My brother was there when we got there and had set up my 20'x20' tarp in the driveway.
We started mixing by dumping half a yard of compost onto the tarp and put 1/4 the peat and vermiculite on top and used hoes and rakes to mix it together. Then we added more compost, vermiculite and peat moss until we had 1 yard of compost and half of our bagged ingredients mixed together. Boy was that long, tiring work. My brother tried to tell me I owed him one, but I had two comments for him. It was HIS idea to go 15 inches high and did he forget the 15 c. yards of gravel and river rock I helped him shovel and spread over his side and front yard? Oh yeah, never-mind.
Of course I had to listen to decades of experience telling me that my mix may be ok for seedlings but wouldn't work for mature plants. Finally my brother deceased his banter down to "I'm skeptical about it" but he didn't want to read the book. /sigh
So while they continued mixing, I went and got not just the second yard of compost, but another half a yard to make them happy. Doesn't the load of pure compost look great above? Anyway, I conceded mainly because our calculations were for 6.3 yards of material for the beds and I had only 6 yards worth of material, plus I needed some for the potato bins.
Anyway, we busted through the wheelbarrowing the mix to the beds and then had lunch. By then we were all pretty tired and the "mixing" of the mix wasn't quite so thorough. We convinced ourselves that shoveling the mix into a wheelbarrow, dumping it into a bed and spreading it around would mix it well enough. We were basically right.
We finished up the beds around 5:30 and while my brother smoothed out the dirt in each bed, my dad and I filled the empty vermiculite bags half-full of Mel's Mix for use in the potato bins. Also if there is any settling of material when it rains. I don't think there will be or Mel would have mentioned it, but I've got extra if need be. I actually have about a quarter yard. Not too bad calculating. Of course the bottom 3 inches of the beds is gravel. /shrug
Notice that the corn bed is a bit richer in compost than the background beds. That's because we mixed 1.5 yards of compost to 2 yards of bagged material. It still looks good.
Finally, after we cleaned up and everyone left, I broke out 8 bags of Starbucks coffee grounds we'd stored up for a few weeks and sprinkled them over each of the beds. I also did a ring around the drip line of my blueberry bushes. I had just enough. Then I gently smoothed out the grounds with a rake under the light of the moon.
I'm very content with my garden now. It's light and friable as the book would say and it should retain moisture and drain like a dream!
Now I'm going to scarf down something to eat, take some NyQuil and Alieve and get some rest.
Saturday, February 16, 2008
February 16, 2008
What a day, what a day. It started at 6:30 this morning when I drug myself out of bed, threw some clothes on and had a bowl of cereal before my brother showed up at my door with his truck. We then headed out to Steuber Distributing in Snohomish (30 min. away), which is a nondescript "hole-in-the-wall". Actually it's a commercial catering set of yards chocked full of pallets of all sorts of agricultural supplies. They had everything! For $300 I got 13 bags of vermiculite (4 c. ft) and 7 bales of peat moss. FYI, that totals 4 c. yards of material, and it ALL fit in the truck! Even if we did have to put four bags of vermiculite in the jump seats in back. Of course, my all my brother said was that's going to be the $500 tomato. Ah, gardening roughly 170 years of gardening experience to help me, gotta love it. I completely recommend Steuber Distributing if you're in the Puget Sound area. CHEAP gardening supplies and they had pallets of vermiculite and peat moss.
On the way back we stopped at Starbucks for an IV and picked up 4 big bags of coffee grounds. We got back to my house at 9:00 and I took my brother home. We left the truck backed up against my garage door with a tarp over the bags and strapped down tight. We don't have room to unload inside and the vermiculite will be easier to handle dry. Besides, at 10 I had to take my youngest to Music Together class. Then we ran to the party store and got balloons and plates. I took a shower and raced off to the Children's Museum in Everett for play time and a 2:30 cake and presents party. Boy was it hard to keep an eye on two toddlers in the midst of a hundred others while my wife greeted the guests. Thank goodness when my in-laws came and I could help set up. Whew, how my wife does it I have NO idea. She's a goddess for sure!
After the party we went out to dinner with the in-laws, and if I didn't notice it before then, I certainly came to the conclusion that I am very under the weather. PERFECT timing. Dirt day is tomorrow and I'm feeling crappy. So we're back and the kids are watching cartoons while I write this. I'm going to take some NyQuil and hit the sack early. Hopefully the sleep will do me good and I'll be up for working hard tomorrow, racing all over creation. It's hard to be excited when I'm feeling like this.
The plan for tomorrow is to wake up early, unload the truck, run to the lumber yard and get the sheets of plywood ripped to 1x8 pieces. Then head back there to Sky and get the first of two yards of Cedar Grove compost to create my Mel's Mix on a big tarp in the middle of my driveway. Then we wheelbarrow it to the beds, mixing in some coffee grounds in the top six inches. It'll be a process, but hopefully I'll have tons of help.
Night all, the NyQuil is working.
On the way back we stopped at Starbucks for an IV and picked up 4 big bags of coffee grounds. We got back to my house at 9:00 and I took my brother home. We left the truck backed up against my garage door with a tarp over the bags and strapped down tight. We don't have room to unload inside and the vermiculite will be easier to handle dry. Besides, at 10 I had to take my youngest to Music Together class. Then we ran to the party store and got balloons and plates. I took a shower and raced off to the Children's Museum in Everett for play time and a 2:30 cake and presents party. Boy was it hard to keep an eye on two toddlers in the midst of a hundred others while my wife greeted the guests. Thank goodness when my in-laws came and I could help set up. Whew, how my wife does it I have NO idea. She's a goddess for sure!
After the party we went out to dinner with the in-laws, and if I didn't notice it before then, I certainly came to the conclusion that I am very under the weather. PERFECT timing. Dirt day is tomorrow and I'm feeling crappy. So we're back and the kids are watching cartoons while I write this. I'm going to take some NyQuil and hit the sack early. Hopefully the sleep will do me good and I'll be up for working hard tomorrow, racing all over creation. It's hard to be excited when I'm feeling like this.
The plan for tomorrow is to wake up early, unload the truck, run to the lumber yard and get the sheets of plywood ripped to 1x8 pieces. Then head back there to Sky and get the first of two yards of Cedar Grove compost to create my Mel's Mix on a big tarp in the middle of my driveway. Then we wheelbarrow it to the beds, mixing in some coffee grounds in the top six inches. It'll be a process, but hopefully I'll have tons of help.
Night all, the NyQuil is working.
Thursday, February 14, 2008
February 15, 2008
I don't normally write posts before work, but I just checked the weather report for Sunday and Monday. Though it could change at a moment's notice, the prediction is for partly cloudy and highs in the mid 50s. Excellent news! I'll have a lot more help (the non grouchy kind) if the weather holds. There's even good weather expected for my son's party! We're good all around. Now to take the seedlings out for their walk. Have a good day all!
Boy did Seattle weather scare me today. I had forgotten that today was a 60% chance of rain. On the way home we were hit by a fair amount, and it has lasted most of the night. First thing I did when I got home as check the weather and it is still supposed to hold for tomorrow and the next day. Sunday's the day if weather holds. Saturday's completely booked up until the evening.
On a garden note, the more I look into Winter Sowing (thanks to Alberta), the more I want to give it a try. Although I could still do it this year, I'm really close to getting dirt and starting many of my veggies in a few weeks anyway, so what's the point?
I just rechecked my math (never was my strongest suit despite the 4 on the calculus AP test in high school), you use it or lose it. I need 13 bags of vermiculite and 7 bales of peat moss, which should come to $300 even with tax. Add $60 to that for the compost and we're talking $360 for "dirt" which is a far cry from the $750 I initially thought.
Well early to bed so I can get up and go get vermiculite and peat moss, then make it back to take my youngest to music class, then go get plates and balloons for my eldest's B-Day party, then go to the play time and party, then go to dinner with the inlaws before they head out to NY for a week. Finally, get the plywood for running the wheelbarrow over the gravel before I crash and wake up to dirt.
Busy weekend, but fun! Hope yours is spent enjoying the weather and maybe even working on your garden.
Boy did Seattle weather scare me today. I had forgotten that today was a 60% chance of rain. On the way home we were hit by a fair amount, and it has lasted most of the night. First thing I did when I got home as check the weather and it is still supposed to hold for tomorrow and the next day. Sunday's the day if weather holds. Saturday's completely booked up until the evening.
On a garden note, the more I look into Winter Sowing (thanks to Alberta), the more I want to give it a try. Although I could still do it this year, I'm really close to getting dirt and starting many of my veggies in a few weeks anyway, so what's the point?
I just rechecked my math (never was my strongest suit despite the 4 on the calculus AP test in high school), you use it or lose it. I need 13 bags of vermiculite and 7 bales of peat moss, which should come to $300 even with tax. Add $60 to that for the compost and we're talking $360 for "dirt" which is a far cry from the $750 I initially thought.
Well early to bed so I can get up and go get vermiculite and peat moss, then make it back to take my youngest to music class, then go get plates and balloons for my eldest's B-Day party, then go to the play time and party, then go to dinner with the inlaws before they head out to NY for a week. Finally, get the plywood for running the wheelbarrow over the gravel before I crash and wake up to dirt.
Busy weekend, but fun! Hope yours is spent enjoying the weather and maybe even working on your garden.
February 14, 2008
HAPPY VALENTINE'S DAY ALL!
With kids we decided not to pester our families to watch them while we went out to eat on a Thursday, so my Valentine suggested I bring home salads from our favorite downtown restaurant instead. It was almost as pricey as going out to eat, but they gave us more salad than one human should digest, and boy was it tasty. I love a good Italian Chop Chop and Palominos makes a great one. Anyway, today was a MUCH better garden day for me. Lots to tell. I'll compose while I have my desert smoothie.
First off, work was work, but at lunchtime I checked my email and found I had two non-spam emails. Bonus! The first was from a GardenWeb contributor, Alberta. I've been impressed by her comments on threads and experience in the garden for quite some time. Much to my pleasant surprise, she emailed me directly with thoughts on my garden woes. She suggested an alternative to lights for me. Apparently Winter Sowing is a good solution. She suggested I head to the GW forum on it and check out Vera's posts. She's in Washington also and has had great success at it.
I actually have been there and it is essentially planting seeds in potting soil in various recycled milk jugs and other transparent/transluscent containers. Then you put them outside in the winter sun and keep them watered. That's the gist anyway. I didn't try it because I figured it wouldn't work here with our lousy sun and frosty mornings. Now I'll have to check it out and see what Vera's up to. THANK YOU Alberta! I will definitely do that. Oh and I will let Judy know your troubles with the site. I have cable so it's not too slow for me.
Not that it's winter sowing, but a post I read last night said some guy in Minnesota has been putting his seedlings outside during the day to get them acclamated and hardend off or whatever to make them stouter. So I took the kiddies out for a walk today. Before work I put them out on a board resting between two beds. They seemed no worse off when I got home after dark and brought them in for the evening. I expect frost tonight or I'd leave them outside unless it rained. Too much water can be a bad thing. So I'm experimenting with these broccoli, cauliflower, onions and lettuce. They're either going to live or not, no matter what I do.
I also read Judy's comment and some of it is directly relating to my next comment, but that's good to know about peat moss. I recall it isn't as stringy as it could be, but I expect it works well once it's decompressed. I can understand how hard it is to do so, but that's what I'll end up getting. It can't be any worse than decompressing the newspaper blow-in insulation and my dad did 40 bags of the stuff in a day. I appreciate the comments and will take them to heart for sure.
Ok, so last night I calculated that I need fifteen 3.5 c. ft. bags of vermiculite to equal 2 c. yards. We check with Sky and find that they only have 5 bags, at $28 each. Thus the reason for my post on Ft2Garden's boards last night. I calculated with the peat, compost and vermiculite totaling 6 c. yards, it would cost me $750 for my dirt. OUCH! So after my wife told me Sky only had 5 (one third what I needed), I panicked.
During my lunchtime (I work through lunch), I called The Plant Farm at Smokey Point, way up north in Arlington. It's an hour north but I was desparate. They sold me my blueberry bushes so I like them. Well, they had only small bags of vermiculite, but instead of coming up blank on alternative sources (like Sky), they suggested their supplier in Snohomish. Snohomish is about 30 minutes away from us, so closer. Anyway, I called Steuber Distributing and asked if they had vermiculite in bulk, or at least large bags. They only carry it in 4 c. ft. bags, but I only need 13 of them. I asked how many they had and they said about 200! Then I asked their cost. Get this Judy, $14.50 each. WHOOOOOOT! That just cut the cost of my vermiculte in half!
Then I asked if they carried peat moss. Sky had half-bales for $17. Steuber has FULL-bales for $12.50! I couldn't believe my ears. Even getting my Cedar Grove compost from Sky (they're close and it's reasonable if you don't consider they get their product for free... all our yard waste goes there), the price of my "dirt" is now about $325 vs. $750. I'm so excited! After bugging my brother at work, we are set to head out bright and early Saturday morning to be there when they open to get 13 bags of vermiculite and 7 bales of peat moss. Boy do I hope it all fits in my brother's truck... I don't have time Saturday to make two trips (it's my eldest's 4th birthday).
So this weekend is time for dirt. Saturday is getting the vermiculite and peat moss, along with my son's party for his friends. Sunday is getting compost and mixing it all on a HUGE tarp, then moving it 20 feet or so to the beds. I'll pick up a sheet of plywood and rip it to 1 foot widths so the wheelbarrow can move over the gravel (still kicking myself in hindsight for getting pea gravel insted of crushed rock). Oh, and I'll definitely take pictures and share the experience.
All in all it was a very very good garden day. Thanks to my gardening friends out there and the nice folks at The Plant Farm who put me on to their supplier in Snohomish. If they are for real, I'll definitely add them to the vermiculite sources for Washington. I can't wait for the weekend!
With kids we decided not to pester our families to watch them while we went out to eat on a Thursday, so my Valentine suggested I bring home salads from our favorite downtown restaurant instead. It was almost as pricey as going out to eat, but they gave us more salad than one human should digest, and boy was it tasty. I love a good Italian Chop Chop and Palominos makes a great one. Anyway, today was a MUCH better garden day for me. Lots to tell. I'll compose while I have my desert smoothie.
First off, work was work, but at lunchtime I checked my email and found I had two non-spam emails. Bonus! The first was from a GardenWeb contributor, Alberta. I've been impressed by her comments on threads and experience in the garden for quite some time. Much to my pleasant surprise, she emailed me directly with thoughts on my garden woes. She suggested an alternative to lights for me. Apparently Winter Sowing is a good solution. She suggested I head to the GW forum on it and check out Vera's posts. She's in Washington also and has had great success at it.
I actually have been there and it is essentially planting seeds in potting soil in various recycled milk jugs and other transparent/transluscent containers. Then you put them outside in the winter sun and keep them watered. That's the gist anyway. I didn't try it because I figured it wouldn't work here with our lousy sun and frosty mornings. Now I'll have to check it out and see what Vera's up to. THANK YOU Alberta! I will definitely do that. Oh and I will let Judy know your troubles with the site. I have cable so it's not too slow for me.
Not that it's winter sowing, but a post I read last night said some guy in Minnesota has been putting his seedlings outside during the day to get them acclamated and hardend off or whatever to make them stouter. So I took the kiddies out for a walk today. Before work I put them out on a board resting between two beds. They seemed no worse off when I got home after dark and brought them in for the evening. I expect frost tonight or I'd leave them outside unless it rained. Too much water can be a bad thing. So I'm experimenting with these broccoli, cauliflower, onions and lettuce. They're either going to live or not, no matter what I do.
I also read Judy's comment and some of it is directly relating to my next comment, but that's good to know about peat moss. I recall it isn't as stringy as it could be, but I expect it works well once it's decompressed. I can understand how hard it is to do so, but that's what I'll end up getting. It can't be any worse than decompressing the newspaper blow-in insulation and my dad did 40 bags of the stuff in a day. I appreciate the comments and will take them to heart for sure.
Ok, so last night I calculated that I need fifteen 3.5 c. ft. bags of vermiculite to equal 2 c. yards. We check with Sky and find that they only have 5 bags, at $28 each. Thus the reason for my post on Ft2Garden's boards last night. I calculated with the peat, compost and vermiculite totaling 6 c. yards, it would cost me $750 for my dirt. OUCH! So after my wife told me Sky only had 5 (one third what I needed), I panicked.
During my lunchtime (I work through lunch), I called The Plant Farm at Smokey Point, way up north in Arlington. It's an hour north but I was desparate. They sold me my blueberry bushes so I like them. Well, they had only small bags of vermiculite, but instead of coming up blank on alternative sources (like Sky), they suggested their supplier in Snohomish. Snohomish is about 30 minutes away from us, so closer. Anyway, I called Steuber Distributing and asked if they had vermiculite in bulk, or at least large bags. They only carry it in 4 c. ft. bags, but I only need 13 of them. I asked how many they had and they said about 200! Then I asked their cost. Get this Judy, $14.50 each. WHOOOOOOT! That just cut the cost of my vermiculte in half!
Then I asked if they carried peat moss. Sky had half-bales for $17. Steuber has FULL-bales for $12.50! I couldn't believe my ears. Even getting my Cedar Grove compost from Sky (they're close and it's reasonable if you don't consider they get their product for free... all our yard waste goes there), the price of my "dirt" is now about $325 vs. $750. I'm so excited! After bugging my brother at work, we are set to head out bright and early Saturday morning to be there when they open to get 13 bags of vermiculite and 7 bales of peat moss. Boy do I hope it all fits in my brother's truck... I don't have time Saturday to make two trips (it's my eldest's 4th birthday).
So this weekend is time for dirt. Saturday is getting the vermiculite and peat moss, along with my son's party for his friends. Sunday is getting compost and mixing it all on a HUGE tarp, then moving it 20 feet or so to the beds. I'll pick up a sheet of plywood and rip it to 1 foot widths so the wheelbarrow can move over the gravel (still kicking myself in hindsight for getting pea gravel insted of crushed rock). Oh, and I'll definitely take pictures and share the experience.
All in all it was a very very good garden day. Thanks to my gardening friends out there and the nice folks at The Plant Farm who put me on to their supplier in Snohomish. If they are for real, I'll definitely add them to the vermiculite sources for Washington. I can't wait for the weekend!
Friday, February 8, 2008
February 8, 2008
Well, I ordered my Red Sails and Italienscher seeds today. Unfortunately Territorial is too darn efficient and they'd already shipped my seed order so I had to pay shipping again. Drat, expensive lettuce, but I couldn't see making salads out of just Salad Bowl Lettuce and Spinach all year long. Now I'll have color, texture and taste! Muahahahaha!
Well, I was helping put the boys to bed and checked out my garden in their nursery. Unfortunately I think my plants are getting a bit too leggy, despite being repotted deep enough to cover most of the stem. It just re-grew! What am I doing wrong? It's to tall and falling over. Should I stake it up or what?
The rest of my seedlings seem to be doing ok... here are some others...
And even my cute little onions sprouting up all over the place...
I'm not sure when to transplant the onions? A few are looking good but sooner or later the seed will give up all it's nutrients and vermiculite has none to give (thanks Judy for that tid bit).
Well, the weekend is here and aside from putting together a bed and taking down a crib, I should have plenty of time to build a potato bin or two. It should be pretty easy, just cut the boards and assemble four 1x6s to four 2x2s, then attach landscape fabric to the bottom. Shame I used up all our landscape fabric when I did the gravel work. I sincerely doubt they'll have 4 SF for sale anywhere. I'll have to buy TONS of it. Ah well.
One week away from dirt! I've started accumulating coffee grounds to mix into the top 6 inches of my beds. So far I've got 5 pounds but need a lot more. Starbucks has it free at most locations, just ask for used grounds for the garden. It's really good for improving the nitrogen (it's got a 20:1 ratio of nitrogen to carbon, and roughly an NPK ratio of 7-2-2, though another site had it at 2-0.3-0.2 what a difference espresso can make, hehe) It's also slightly acidic which makes it useful to help out the blueberries. I read that the pH of coffee grounds is 6.9, which is BARELY acidic at all. So I don't get how you can make soil more acidic by using several pounds of coffee. It doesn't seem that it could make it lower than 6.9 pH. I may use a little around my blueberries but I think I'll need a soil test kit. Blueberries like 4.5 pH, which is nearly as acidic as citrus juice.
Ah well, a quick look on the web for how coffee grounds help corn didn't yield anything. I know they're high in nitrogen so I'll throw some in to help it out. Corn feeds on nitrogen. I may also fertilize with Miracle Grow since it is really high (30) in nitrogen. This is especially the case since I really can't cycle my corn around my garden. I only have one bed big enough for corn. If I deplete the nitrogen one year, I won't have any for the next year. Something to think about, and of course diseases that may result. Maybe worms help. Who knows? Flatlander that's who. I guess I could use the second largest and smallest and then use the corn bed for traditional SFG. That would leave me with 2 less trellises.
Ok, I found this searching the internet for coffee ground benefits in gardening. Hope it helps...
Ok, here's my research on Starbucks coffee and blueberries. Unless blueberries need nitrogen, don't bother. The lable apparently says the acidity is brewed out of it (and into our coffee, read heartburn) so the pH is 6.9 for sure. No good for acid loving plants like blueberries. I guess I'll buy enough Miracle Gro Acid fertilizer to last the full 20 year life of those plants. I understand a table spoon dilutes into 1 gallon twice a year, and you get a big container. Joy.
Well, I was helping put the boys to bed and checked out my garden in their nursery. Unfortunately I think my plants are getting a bit too leggy, despite being repotted deep enough to cover most of the stem. It just re-grew! What am I doing wrong? It's to tall and falling over. Should I stake it up or what?
The rest of my seedlings seem to be doing ok... here are some others...
And even my cute little onions sprouting up all over the place...
I'm not sure when to transplant the onions? A few are looking good but sooner or later the seed will give up all it's nutrients and vermiculite has none to give (thanks Judy for that tid bit).
Well, the weekend is here and aside from putting together a bed and taking down a crib, I should have plenty of time to build a potato bin or two. It should be pretty easy, just cut the boards and assemble four 1x6s to four 2x2s, then attach landscape fabric to the bottom. Shame I used up all our landscape fabric when I did the gravel work. I sincerely doubt they'll have 4 SF for sale anywhere. I'll have to buy TONS of it. Ah well.
One week away from dirt! I've started accumulating coffee grounds to mix into the top 6 inches of my beds. So far I've got 5 pounds but need a lot more. Starbucks has it free at most locations, just ask for used grounds for the garden. It's really good for improving the nitrogen (it's got a 20:1 ratio of nitrogen to carbon, and roughly an NPK ratio of 7-2-2, though another site had it at 2-0.3-0.2 what a difference espresso can make, hehe) It's also slightly acidic which makes it useful to help out the blueberries. I read that the pH of coffee grounds is 6.9, which is BARELY acidic at all. So I don't get how you can make soil more acidic by using several pounds of coffee. It doesn't seem that it could make it lower than 6.9 pH. I may use a little around my blueberries but I think I'll need a soil test kit. Blueberries like 4.5 pH, which is nearly as acidic as citrus juice.
Ah well, a quick look on the web for how coffee grounds help corn didn't yield anything. I know they're high in nitrogen so I'll throw some in to help it out. Corn feeds on nitrogen. I may also fertilize with Miracle Grow since it is really high (30) in nitrogen. This is especially the case since I really can't cycle my corn around my garden. I only have one bed big enough for corn. If I deplete the nitrogen one year, I won't have any for the next year. Something to think about, and of course diseases that may result. Maybe worms help. Who knows? Flatlander that's who. I guess I could use the second largest and smallest and then use the corn bed for traditional SFG. That would leave me with 2 less trellises.
Ok, I found this searching the internet for coffee ground benefits in gardening. Hope it helps...
- Sprinkle used grounds around plants before rain or watering, for a slow-release nitrogen... Good for augmenting for corn when the stalks start to shoot up or the cobs start to form.
- Add to compost piles to increase nitrogen balance. Coffee filters and tea bags break down rapidly during composting... They're trying to make me compost. We LOVE tea!
- Dilute with water for a gentle, fast-acting liquid fertilizer. Use about a half-pound can of wet grounds in a five-gallon bucket of water; let sit outdoors to achieve ambient temperature... I could be dangerous with this. Seattle RAIN, hehe. If you didn't know, Starbucks started here, about 2 blocks from my work.
- Mix into soil for houseplants or new vegetable beds... This is how I plan on using it.
- Encircle the base of the plant with a coffee and eggshell barrier to repel pests.
- If you are into vermi-posting, feed a little bit to your worms... Flatlander take note.
- (From Sustainable Enterprises, so the other poster said).
Ok, here's my research on Starbucks coffee and blueberries. Unless blueberries need nitrogen, don't bother. The lable apparently says the acidity is brewed out of it (and into our coffee, read heartburn) so the pH is 6.9 for sure. No good for acid loving plants like blueberries. I guess I'll buy enough Miracle Gro Acid fertilizer to last the full 20 year life of those plants. I understand a table spoon dilutes into 1 gallon twice a year, and you get a big container. Joy.
Tuesday, February 5, 2008
February 5, 2008
Well, well, well. It seems patience really IS rewarded, at least where my onions are concenred. I planted them in straight vermiculite on 1/29/08 and where my broccoli and cauliflower sprouted in a few days, I had just about given up on my onions and lettuce. I hadn't even looked on the top of the fridge today. It wasn't until I was making dinner that I saw just over the edge of the cool whip container a tip of green. Sure enough, my son and I found three little spouts out of 16 to 20 (it's been so long I can't remember). It just goes to show, a watched cool whip container never boils, or something like that.
(Sorry if the picture's blurry. My wife's out and her cameraphone autofocuses at 2mp and mine sucks at 1.3mp with no focus. Oh, and the sprouts are TINY.)
So now they're sitting on a very crowded window sill in my sons' room. One major concept that all my advice had in common was that AS SOON as you see any sprout, move them to full sun. I have no idea what I'll do when (if) the lettuce sprouts. I guess I'll have to clear their dresser and open the shade more.
Out of all my seedlings, the cauliflower is doing the best (maybe it's a tad "leggy"). Some of the broccoli looks a bit anemic. If it doesn't perk up I may just consolidate the best growers and dump the rest. Or maybe I'll plant them all and see if they grow.
Another comment on my re-potted seedlings. Despite using extra vermiculite in my Mel's potting mix, the top of the soil is looking a tad dry. I don't want to overwater, but I don't want them too dry either. Such is the art of indoor seeding in specific and I'd guess, gardening in general.
Finally, I got an email from Territorial Seeds today saying, among other things, that they are nearly ready to ship potatoes. I must have picked good varieties because they featured both the Yukon Golds and the Buttes (had to get them because they're bakers and my Mom's family is from Butte MT). Tomorrow I'll call them and ask their thoughts on planting 4 weeks B4 the Last Spring Frost (LSF), and if 1 lb. of each variety will be enough for my 30x30 beds at 6 inch spacing? Also, while I have them, I'll ask if Early Girl and Momoato tomatoes compliment each other for continuous harvest throughout the growing season. I figure since they cater to folks west of the Cascade mountains, they'll have good information for me. I was going to call today but time slipped away from me at work.
Tomorrow's hump day, and one day closer to DIRT!
(Sorry if the picture's blurry. My wife's out and her cameraphone autofocuses at 2mp and mine sucks at 1.3mp with no focus. Oh, and the sprouts are TINY.)
So now they're sitting on a very crowded window sill in my sons' room. One major concept that all my advice had in common was that AS SOON as you see any sprout, move them to full sun. I have no idea what I'll do when (if) the lettuce sprouts. I guess I'll have to clear their dresser and open the shade more.
Out of all my seedlings, the cauliflower is doing the best (maybe it's a tad "leggy"). Some of the broccoli looks a bit anemic. If it doesn't perk up I may just consolidate the best growers and dump the rest. Or maybe I'll plant them all and see if they grow.
Another comment on my re-potted seedlings. Despite using extra vermiculite in my Mel's potting mix, the top of the soil is looking a tad dry. I don't want to overwater, but I don't want them too dry either. Such is the art of indoor seeding in specific and I'd guess, gardening in general.
Finally, I got an email from Territorial Seeds today saying, among other things, that they are nearly ready to ship potatoes. I must have picked good varieties because they featured both the Yukon Golds and the Buttes (had to get them because they're bakers and my Mom's family is from Butte MT). Tomorrow I'll call them and ask their thoughts on planting 4 weeks B4 the Last Spring Frost (LSF), and if 1 lb. of each variety will be enough for my 30x30 beds at 6 inch spacing? Also, while I have them, I'll ask if Early Girl and Momoato tomatoes compliment each other for continuous harvest throughout the growing season. I figure since they cater to folks west of the Cascade mountains, they'll have good information for me. I was going to call today but time slipped away from me at work.
Tomorrow's hump day, and one day closer to DIRT!
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