GARDENING WEEK OMG
May. 24th, 2010 05:00 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
bluesgardenI have a stretch of good weather this week! It's time to plant! Uh, again. For real this time. Sorry it's so long?
Planted (direct seed)
Corn - 4 rows each of Mandan Red (for flour) and Supai Red (for parching), 2 rows of True Gold (sweet corn)
Kohlrabi - a short row, maybe 10 feet (this seed was an impulse purchase at WalMart *sigh* - it's Early Vienna White by Burpee)
Sunflowers - 1 row each of Mongolian Giant and Ring of Fire
Cucumbers - the remaining Diva seeds so 8 holes with 2 seeds each
The sunflowers went into the potato area, which required filling the trenches in, but half a dozen inches of rain packs clay down really well, so that was a lot of fun (or not, as the case may be). Scratching out the rows and planting the corn was relatively easy but tedious and today's weather had its own challenges - after a spring of temperatures in the 60°F - 70°F range, today it suddenly jumped to 85°F - 90°F plus humidity. Always a challenging adjustment, particularly when you're out in it. I had to pace myself and there were stretches that I was inside and in front of fan every half hour.
Planted (transplants)
Gave all some Plant·Tone in planting hole (Why does that sound so dirty? Well, besides the actual dirt. Never mind.)
Pumpkins - 6 Fairytale
Melons - 8 Ha'ogen, 2 Ambrosia, 7 Charentais
Everything - seeds and transplants alike - was watered in (which required hauling watering cans for part of the corn and the pumpkins as the hose doesn't reach that far), which had a certain irony to it.
I went ahead and scratched out the 6 rows for the beans, which I hope will arrive in the mail tomorrow.
The entertaining discoveries of the day included a Knearly Yellow Eye bean that germinated and is growing (I had to stop and start that row on either side of him *g*) and a handful of radish seeds that made it (D'avignon). The radish seeds were a portion of the ones planted closest to the middle of the garden, where it's better drained. I also discovered that a) the orange mint is growing in the garden again, despite being dug out and roto·tilled over twice, once with a tractor, and b) there's spearmint growing in the corn section. I pondered it for a moment today, thinking now where did you come from? until I remembered that I'd planted spearmint behind the Black Krim tomato plants last year and forgotten about it because the tomatoes had sprawled out so much. I have a deep fondness for mint, so as long as it's not crowding out anything I actually planted, it can wage war with the other weeds.
Speaking of volunteers - those plants you didn't actually plant but show up anyway - I found that there were at least 3 garlic cloves growing, roughly where the compost pile used to be. I hadn't thought I'd be able to grow garlic since it's something you plant in the fall and it comes up in the spring. Given the lack of drainage and spring rains, it seemed like a recipe for disaster, but here I had 3 of them doing just fine in an area that I know was underwater for the better part of a week. Huh. I may have to re-evaluate my thoughts on growing garlic.
While planting the corn, I also discovered that there were a number of wild carrots that seemed to be springing up. Huh, I thought, they all seem to start... right about where I planted the carrots last week. Right. So it's entirely possible that my carrots are growing, just not where they're supposed to be thanks to the wind and rain. Personally, I find that kind of hilarious.
Container Activity
The radishes are growing! They've got two full leaves showing on the wee seedlings. The lettuce has put in appearance as has some of the potatoes in the buckets and the overflow container. The lettuce seedlings are very tiny and the potatoes are just pushing up through the soil (in some cases, the soil disturbance is the only indication), but-! Growing!
In the Greenhouse
The tomatoes are losing some of their yellow cast and picking up a better green color. I'm planning on purchasing some more tomato plants tomorrow, but it will be another day or two until they're planted. The onions that I transplanted to individual cells are looking good, but I'd like to give them a few more days to recover from the last transplant before I spring another on them - maybe even wait until next week. The leeks are ready to go out any time as are the rest of the beets and, considering how the weather has warmed up, so can the peppers.
Still to go out in the melon category would be the few D brought home and all the watermelons. Hopefully I'll get those in the ground tomorrow and direct seed another set. I'm also hoping to plant the two sunflowers.
I have a considerable number of flowers I have no idea what to do with.
Planting the Supai Red parching corn.
Newly transplanted Fairytale pumpkin plants.
BUSTED
There was nothing in that space - I dug out the dead plant yesterday. They've both been sniffing around the holes I opened up though, which were amended with manure, fertilizer, egg shells, and hardwood ashes last week before I put the tomatoes in. River, at one point, was caught noshing on the overturned dirt.
(Blue: "River, dagnabit! No eating the fertilizer! I don't care if it's organic!"
River: "Killjoy")
Planted (direct seed)
Corn - 4 rows each of Mandan Red (for flour) and Supai Red (for parching), 2 rows of True Gold (sweet corn)
Kohlrabi - a short row, maybe 10 feet (this seed was an impulse purchase at WalMart *sigh* - it's Early Vienna White by Burpee)
Sunflowers - 1 row each of Mongolian Giant and Ring of Fire
Cucumbers - the remaining Diva seeds so 8 holes with 2 seeds each
The sunflowers went into the potato area, which required filling the trenches in, but half a dozen inches of rain packs clay down really well, so that was a lot of fun (or not, as the case may be). Scratching out the rows and planting the corn was relatively easy but tedious and today's weather had its own challenges - after a spring of temperatures in the 60°F - 70°F range, today it suddenly jumped to 85°F - 90°F plus humidity. Always a challenging adjustment, particularly when you're out in it. I had to pace myself and there were stretches that I was inside and in front of fan every half hour.
Planted (transplants)
Gave all some Plant·Tone in planting hole (Why does that sound so dirty? Well, besides the actual dirt. Never mind.)
Pumpkins - 6 Fairytale
Melons - 8 Ha'ogen, 2 Ambrosia, 7 Charentais
Everything - seeds and transplants alike - was watered in (which required hauling watering cans for part of the corn and the pumpkins as the hose doesn't reach that far), which had a certain irony to it.
I went ahead and scratched out the 6 rows for the beans, which I hope will arrive in the mail tomorrow.
The entertaining discoveries of the day included a Knearly Yellow Eye bean that germinated and is growing (I had to stop and start that row on either side of him *g*) and a handful of radish seeds that made it (D'avignon). The radish seeds were a portion of the ones planted closest to the middle of the garden, where it's better drained. I also discovered that a) the orange mint is growing in the garden again, despite being dug out and roto·tilled over twice, once with a tractor, and b) there's spearmint growing in the corn section. I pondered it for a moment today, thinking now where did you come from? until I remembered that I'd planted spearmint behind the Black Krim tomato plants last year and forgotten about it because the tomatoes had sprawled out so much. I have a deep fondness for mint, so as long as it's not crowding out anything I actually planted, it can wage war with the other weeds.
Speaking of volunteers - those plants you didn't actually plant but show up anyway - I found that there were at least 3 garlic cloves growing, roughly where the compost pile used to be. I hadn't thought I'd be able to grow garlic since it's something you plant in the fall and it comes up in the spring. Given the lack of drainage and spring rains, it seemed like a recipe for disaster, but here I had 3 of them doing just fine in an area that I know was underwater for the better part of a week. Huh. I may have to re-evaluate my thoughts on growing garlic.
While planting the corn, I also discovered that there were a number of wild carrots that seemed to be springing up. Huh, I thought, they all seem to start... right about where I planted the carrots last week. Right. So it's entirely possible that my carrots are growing, just not where they're supposed to be thanks to the wind and rain. Personally, I find that kind of hilarious.
Container Activity
The radishes are growing! They've got two full leaves showing on the wee seedlings. The lettuce has put in appearance as has some of the potatoes in the buckets and the overflow container. The lettuce seedlings are very tiny and the potatoes are just pushing up through the soil (in some cases, the soil disturbance is the only indication), but-! Growing!
In the Greenhouse
The tomatoes are losing some of their yellow cast and picking up a better green color. I'm planning on purchasing some more tomato plants tomorrow, but it will be another day or two until they're planted. The onions that I transplanted to individual cells are looking good, but I'd like to give them a few more days to recover from the last transplant before I spring another on them - maybe even wait until next week. The leeks are ready to go out any time as are the rest of the beets and, considering how the weather has warmed up, so can the peppers.
Still to go out in the melon category would be the few D brought home and all the watermelons. Hopefully I'll get those in the ground tomorrow and direct seed another set. I'm also hoping to plant the two sunflowers.
I have a considerable number of flowers I have no idea what to do with.
Planting the Supai Red parching corn.
Newly transplanted Fairytale pumpkin plants.
BUSTED
There was nothing in that space - I dug out the dead plant yesterday. They've both been sniffing around the holes I opened up though, which were amended with manure, fertilizer, egg shells, and hardwood ashes last week before I put the tomatoes in. River, at one point, was caught noshing on the overturned dirt.
(Blue: "River, dagnabit! No eating the fertilizer! I don't care if it's organic!"
River: "Killjoy")
