Last year I was so proud of my five dollar garden hose from Big Lots. When I used it yesterday for a deep watering, I think I made more mud around the spigot than in the flower beds. Its so hot! and to buy live plants and keep 'em alive is a sizeable investment in the local watershed!
I'm trying to keep tabs on the garden, I did well for about a week with a written journal last year.
Maybe six days. . .
well, really maybe one.
This blog evolves and changes topics ever so frequently, why not keep tabs here, eh?
The figs are plump and green. I thought they would be ripe by now. I guess it will be farther into the season. Last fall was the first time I heavily pruned them (probably the first pruning in a good 8 years) and they are filling in nicely in the center. Some parts were really too tall for pickin'.
The chesnut is in bloom.
It is not quite June and it is 90 degrees. The Weather Channel told me that, and it also said not to worry, it only feels like 88. Phew. Made a world of difference.
Well, the raised bed gets progressively bigger. . . and it currently has Better Boy and Brandywine tomatoes (I think? they are the ones Bob Morrison grew), Florence Fennel, purple tomatillos, Clemson Spineless Okra, Pickling cucumbers, Swiss Chard, Brite Lights Swiss Chard, Carrots (can't remember), yellow crookneck squash, radishes. . .
that is really all i can think of. in other spots I have heirloom tomatoes waiting transplant, baby leaf spinach, cabbage from the fall that didn't do much until the spring (tasted it raw, seemed still edible!) and. . . thats all I can think of for veggies. Oh yeah, red onions and asparagus I planted a month ago, as well as the strawberries from last year that I transplanted and shocked the hell out of. They're still pouting and putting out the tiniest, juiciest and tastiest of strawberries. . . ones that tempt me, I try and end up begging them for more. They taunt and remind me of the cruel afterthought of a transplant I gave 'em.
Oh yeah, bell peppers and sweet banana peppers (also from Bob, who might be the coolest damn Republican I know. Maybe). The jalepenos didn't sprout. Old seeds. . .or seeds I saved from a grocery store pepper. I don't rightly remember.
Yesterday (just to keep up with the details) I found an army of nasty nasty aphids on the tomatoes in the raised bed. Everything else is pest free. They got what they deserved: a concoction of neem, detergent, citrus oil, red pepper and water. Fizzle and fry you little sap suckers. I'm moving some mint their way today.
I also planted Big Lots Ranuncules tubers (12, $2 for 6), Sparaxis corms (10, $2), and 10 Acidanthera ($2) see the following Peacock Orchid score, they are gonna be everywhere.
Then from the $25 free Breck's Deal I planted 15 Peacock Orchid bulbs (a type of gladiolus, actually). I spent as much as I could of that coupon without going over, simply because I thought that was their marketing hitch. . . people would spend more and they profit off our pitiful adoration of plants. I wasn't playing into their games. I think I got about 60 bulbs for free, though. Talk about cheap hose.
The rest should arrive in the fall, but I should say, I was surprised I received anything at all; you know the whole nothing-is-free, modern society's mantra of distrust.
They went in a bit late, but I won't be heartbroken if nothing happens. Woo hoo if it does, though!
My favorite part was using the bulb auger, a $15 or so investment from Home Depot that digs bulb holes. I also used it to till little areas and to uproot grass.
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