After a week of cool days in the 40s and 50s with nights in the low 40s we finally have a day with sunshine and a temperature of 68 degrees. Days and nights will be warming up going forward for the next 10 days.
The rain barrels and swimming pool are full-May is usually our wettest month, and gardening activities will resume this weekend. First up is to transplant tomatoes into beds and buckets.
Then preparation and planting of one variety of corn. Starting some new lettuce and spinach. Harvest the last of the current Spinach and freeze.
Thinking about planting some peanuts and sorghum sometime next week or first week in June.
Hope all is well with you and yours. Have a great Holiday weekend! God Bless.
We’re muddling along here.
Lots of tomatoes fruit and blossoms.. All the asian pear and apples look to doing pretty , considering the drought and chemtrails and all. :-)
The peppers are OK, snails wreaked havoc on one plant, the rest look OK.
As for honey bees or such,, not a lot of them around yet.. Temps have been on the cool side lately..
Bump for Our Active Duty Service Members on the Memorial Day weekend! God Bless.
Pinging the list.
From Mrs. Don-O we have a link regarding mini farming:
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/3291237/posts
From AFTR, we have an article on the Sweetest Watermelon:
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/3291594/posts
Thanks to everyone who participates and helps to make this thread interesting, fun, and informative every week. Keep those pictures coming, it makes me feel great to see your successes and a picture is worth a thousand words. LOL
Rabbits have decimated my veggies. I put some netting up but they still managed to get through. I went out and got some pellets that are supposed to keep rabbits out. I told my wife “we are really stupid paying $16 for pellets to protect about the same cost amount of veggies when for about 50 cents worth of .22 rounds I could take care of the problem and have some meat in the pot. She vetoed that idea.
Inch worms are eating everything in sight!
The word for today is HAIL - hail, hail and more hail, and I don’t mean to the chief. I swear, I’ve never seen so much hail in this area! I can’t even remember the last time it hailed, and now we’ve had 3 hail storms in as many weeks. I’ve got new tobacco sprouts, new tomato sprouts and more. Luckily, they were all inside during the last 2 rounds of hail. Anything remaining after the 1st storm has now been entirely obliterated. That’s likely going to be the last time I plant so early! Lesson learned!
Now on to the gardening, my garden is kicking butt this year. We had a couple of cold nights but all I lost was some green onions, no biggie. I put plastic juice jugs over my tomato plants which are still pretty small. I still have some empty space to fill and will get some pictures soon. I have had to do pretty much all the yardwork while hubby recuperates. Tomorrow the barn gets painted, well maybe half of it.
If I could have one wish this weekend it would be to be able to get to Chicago and visit some graves and lay some flowers. It won't happen but I am hopeful sometime this summer I can go.
And PS to Johnny, THANK YOU for your service and Happy Memorial Day!
Happy Memorial Day to All!
God bless all those who have served, those who are serving now, all our wounded warriors, and all those who have given “the last full measure of devotion”.
One of my tomato seedlings was eaten my a gopher. 2 are growing, and the other 3 haven’t shown their faces yet.
My neighbor hasn’t plowed my field yet. I’m starting to wonder if he’ll get to it in time for me to plant. I’m already crossing off stuff that needs a long growing season.
My corn and sunflower seeds are sprouting nicely.
Not much else to report.
We are off and raining here in the heartland. I am always way too anxious to get the garden in and it sits in water—I weep for my tomatoes. We have harvested outstanding broccoli and decent lettuce. Thankfully the two peach trees are loaded, but there isn’t a critter in Mo that doesn’t eat peaches. Insects of a dozen hoards attack every part, and so, I have to spray them. Last year I murdered 13 coons. The foxes are after the chickens and they are harder to catch. Now we have a yearling large-breed, Rat Terrier to help. He is ever vigilant and very protective of family and domain. This dog is an amazing athlete, he can turn on a dime, jump a fence, and sail to the top of big hay bales, while covering the ground like a greyhound. No family should be without a good dog.
We head to the Salute to Veterans Airshow today and hope the rain holds off. It is always hard to choke back the tears for me. I think of my uncle killed and buried in N. Africa, and my B17 pilot father in law who passed a couple of years ago. Don told me many stories of his 16 bombing runs over Germany. He was a 21 YO Lt in late 1944 after just a few months training—pilots were getting thin at this time. He was shot down over East Germany and survived in a Russian Pow camp for the last 6 months of the war. God bless em all.
Hi Gang! We bought the Craftsy video on the edible garden and a whole bunch of ideas we have had knocking around in our brains coalesced! We have a five-year plan to build our dream garden, anchored on a 12’ by 12’ pergola that I have designed. I have the first two raised beds built and Barb has made one her raspberry garden. I am going to plant horseradish in the other. (Not the whole thing!)
I also planted my asparagus bed. Also a strawberry bed, all in raised beds. The rest of the beds will be for rotation on a yearly basis. Never let an engineer loose in your garden!
I have my Shopsmith and attachments up at the trailer now and today, I am going to turn some dibbles for planting. I have some 3”, seasoned Tulip Poplar and will try using it for dibbles.
Happy Gardening, Everyone!
I have another generic question, being new to the gardening world.
I have 4 small beds for now that I’m growing vegetables and herbs in, just because they already existed and I didn’t have the ability to rototill more. I rather like having the small beds, since I can easily reach all parts of them for weeding and maintenance.
However my neighbors all have large rectangular plots of tilled land. I see that watering is easier that way, weeding too since they leave room in between the rows to rototill up the weeds.
I just like the way my beds look, pretty as a picture, surrounded by grass, bushes, and trees.
Any thoughts on what is the best (I probably mean the easiest) gardening method when there is plenty of land available?
The rainy weather continues in Central Missouri, so no gardening for me this weekend. That, and I’ve got other more important things to do.
We’re having a small get-together this afternoon to celebrate #1 Daughter Leah’s return to the states from a two year tour of duty with the Marine Corps in Japan. I did pick a nice selection of salad greens this morning to serve to our guests.
She’ll be home for ten days, then the three of us will be piling into her VW Beetle for a leisurely drive to Camp Pendleton CA, where she’ll be spending another two years to satisfy her commitment to uncle sugar.