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The Garden Thread - August, 2025
August 1, 2025 | Diana in WI/Greeneyes in Memoriam

Posted on 08/01/2025 6:03:57 AM PDT by Diana in Wisconsin

The MONTHLY Gardening Thread is a gathering of folks that love soil, seeds and plants of all kinds. From complete newbies that are looking to start that first potted plant, to gardeners with some acreage, to Master Gardener level and beyond, we would love to hear from you.

If you have specific question about a plant/problem you are having, please remember to state the Growing Zone where you are located.

This thread is a non-political respite. No matter what, you won’t be flamed, and the only dumb question is the one that isn’t asked.

It is impossible to hijack the Gardening Thread. Planting, Harvest to Table Recipes, Preserving, Good Living - there is no telling where it will go - and that is part of the fun and interest. Jump in and join us! Send a Private Message to Diana in Wisconsin if you'd like to be added to/removed from our New & Improved Ping List.

NOTE: This is a once a MONTH Ping List, but we DO post to the thread all throughout the month. Links to related articles and discussions which might be of interest to Gardeners are welcomed any time.


TOPICS: Agriculture; Food; Gardening; Hobbies
KEYWORDS: food; garden; gardening; hobbies
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To: MomwithHope
“the bomb room” ???

It's a safe room in the basement of our house.

6'x20', concrete walls and ceiling, steel fire door, storm shelter type of thing.

We use it primarily for storage. Keep it stocked with canned goods, dry foods, water, etc.

441 posted on 08/13/2025 8:47:45 AM PDT by Augie
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To: Augie

Sounds really nice . I wish our basement was cold enough for a root cellar. Its a downstairs walk out, unfinished room in the back for storage and canned god pantry, furnace etc. I tried two big coolers with thermometers in the attached garage this past winter. Worked really well until late January. Now I think I will just do one.


442 posted on 08/13/2025 9:31:05 AM PDT by MomwithHope (Forever grateful to all our patriots, past, present and future.)
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To: Albion Wilde

*** To quote Scarlett O’Hara, “As God is my witness, I’ll nevah buy in an HOA again!”***

Agreed, at least, not if we can help it!!

A couple of years ago, there was a neighbor on the board as president who was just a power hungry beeotch. She made things difficult and unfriendly here for 2 years.

One time she sent a nasty letter to a homeowner threatening them with hefty fines if they didn’t maintain their lawn as often as she wanted. What she didn’t know is that it was an elderly couple, and the husband passed away from CoVid the month before. Well, other neighbors heard about the widow’s dilemma, and mowed her lawn for her.

People are still helping out that family from time to time, but that was one incident (among several) that were just outrageous. People need to be compassionate instead of sticking by the fine print on the by-laws sometimes. I am so glad I don’t live near that lady. She would be hard to get along with.


443 posted on 08/13/2025 10:06:36 AM PDT by FamiliarFace (I got my own way of livin' But everything gets done With a southern accent Where I come from. TPetty)
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To: Pollard

We have a LOT of boxes come through here. I only save a few, mainly small ones for gift-giving and two for thrift store donations and book donations to the library.

The rest are broken down IMMEDIATELY and put in the burn pile or the bigger ‘Chewy’ boxes (flattened out) I give to Beau as he puts them under his vehicles to catch/look for any leaks. Those eventually get sent to his BIG burn pile for feed bags and other ‘barn junk.’

Rule of thumb, if you want to stay AHEAD of clutter, is to deal with something ONCE and be done with it. Boxes, mail, bills...ANYTHING that comes into your house.

I keep a paper grocery bag in the pantry and any and all junk mail goes in there, as well as spent paper goods and broken down pop cardboard. I burn at least once a week. It’s allowed, here.


444 posted on 08/13/2025 10:13:56 AM PDT by Diana in Wisconsin (I don't have, 'Hobbies.' I'm developing a robust Post-Apocalyptic skill set.)
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To: Paul R.

Hand pollination helps up your yield per plant. Here’s a step-by-step:

https://positivebloom.com/how-to-pollinate-tomatoes-by-hand/

The ‘isolation’ we were talking about is to prevent cross-pollination from a second variety via insects or bees if you want to save the seeds.


445 posted on 08/13/2025 10:44:36 AM PDT by Diana in Wisconsin (I don't have, 'Hobbies.' I'm developing a robust Post-Apocalyptic skill set.)
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To: FamiliarFace

My ex-mother in law was once an HOA ruler.


446 posted on 08/13/2025 12:34:21 PM PDT by Pollard (Sick of the weather? Wait a minute.)
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To: Pollard

I know they have a tough job, but sometimes, they get a power trip going and they can’t let go. That’s what happened here. Maybe it was that way for your ex- MIL.


447 posted on 08/13/2025 12:40:13 PM PDT by FamiliarFace (I got my own way of livin' But everything gets done With a southern accent Where I come from. TPetty)
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To: Diana in Wisconsin

We had to go to Lowe’s to return refrigerator filters (I gave Lowe’s guy our fridge model # & he told us the wrong one - grrrr). Once that was taken care of, we were off to the orchard for peaches - yay!

The Orchard Market Hours on the website are Mon - Sat 9-5. They were closed ... booo, hiss. Really irritating. I sent them an email about it.

We stopped at a place that supposedly has local produce, in fact they are sort of ‘famous’ for what they carry during ‘the season’. I could not believe what I was seeing. The tomatoes looked great, but the peaches were half rotten (no joke) for $2.99/lb. The cantaloupes were so bad, mom couldn’t find a single one she would spend money on. We won’t be back - it’s over the mountain to go there. Hopefully, we can find better closer to home.

On to Walmart where peaches are $1.22 .....EACH. I was dreaming of peach chutney, peach cobbler & peach bourbon upside-down Bundt cake. What a let down.

Frog strangler deluge while at Walmart. I got very wet getting to the car & I waited, along with a lot of other people, until it looked like the rain had slowed down - as soon as we were dashing for our cars, it picked up again. At least when I got home, we didn’t have a puddle of water on the floor - not sure why not since we have that pretty serious roof leak. The new roof can’t come soon enough!


448 posted on 08/13/2025 2:32:26 PM PDT by Qiviut (Imagine waking up in the morning & only having the things you thanked God for yesterday. (S. Peters))
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To: Diana in Wisconsin; FamiliarFace

Our Rose of Sharon bushes have shipped :-)


449 posted on 08/13/2025 2:34:40 PM PDT by Qiviut (Imagine waking up in the morning & only having the things you thanked God for yesterday. (S. Peters))
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To: Qiviut

Awesome! You’ll enjoy them so much!


450 posted on 08/13/2025 3:15:05 PM PDT by FamiliarFace (I got my own way of livin' But everything gets done With a southern accent Where I come from. TPetty)
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To: Qiviut; FRiends

Sorry you didn’t have better Peach Luck, today!

Beau ‘inspected’ our peach tree today and is calling it a total crop failure. They went straight to ROT without even ripening! Too much rain, not enough sun, too much heat (even without sun; Thanks, Canada Wildfires!) and too much humidity.

I’ll get another good crop from her next year, I’m sure. Seems every OTHER year works out fine for ‘Miss Peach.’ I’ve still got Peach Butter and Peach Salsa in the larder.

Pears are ready to pick tomorrow (two trees, ‘Clapp’s Favorite’) and I’ll be making Peach Butter and Beau wants to break out the dehydrator for dehydrated pears, which is fine with me. Those can be added to yogurt or cottage cheese, used as a pancake syrup (with water to re-hydrate and cooked down a bit) or just eaten as a snack.

This evening there are a ZILLION (at least!) Dragonflies cruising around eating mosquitoes, as well as dozens of Barn Swallows doing the same.

I did battle with Wasps this afternoon - they have built nests in both the smoker and one of the grills, as well as BELOW the deck (that we just re-stained last year!) and they were coming in and out in the small openings between the deck boards. The can of spray (I already used one!) is on Beau’s La-Z-Boy so he remembers to go out and spray those @#$%^&*!-’ers again when they settle in for the evening...and before HE gets to! Supposedly, they are ‘pollinators’ but in my opinion...WHAT was God thinking?!?!? Let’s make an EVIL SOB that ruins outdoor Summer Fun? And comes AT YOU like a Bat out of H#ll when you accidentally stumble upon them? Yeah. Thanks. Not.

I wish we used our back deck more - we just don’t. We are ‘Front Porch People’, it seems. It’s got me thinking about having a Four Season Room out there; it would double the size of the Family Room and the cats and (lots of!) houseplants would like it as much as I would. ;)


451 posted on 08/13/2025 5:15:26 PM PDT by Diana in Wisconsin (I don't have, 'Hobbies.' I'm developing a robust Post-Apocalyptic skill set.)
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To: FRiends

Supper tomorrow night is the LAST Tenderloin from our butchered hog from last Fall. After that, all I have left are RIBS. Darn! ;)

I have everything on hand, especially Green Beans (froze 8 quart bags of them, today; plenty more to pick) and I got a bag of those little ‘fancy’ potatoes at the Thrift Shop/Food Pantry for FREE last week.

They are attached; if there is food left over in the Pantry, they put it in the entryway to the Thrift Store (which SUPPORTS the Food Pantry) and pretty much tackle you and MAKE YOU TAKE SOMETHING before you leave. I love it!

https://www.thisfarmgirlcooks.com/pork-tenderloin-sheet-pan-dinner/#recipe

So, a VERY inexpensive meal for us that’s still impressive and delish. Can’t beat that! :)


452 posted on 08/13/2025 5:26:56 PM PDT by Diana in Wisconsin (I don't have, 'Hobbies.' I'm developing a robust Post-Apocalyptic skill set.)
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To: Diana in Wisconsin
Clean as you go. I am aware of the concept. LOL

I'm pretty good about that when cooking and am working on the rest.

When I decide to clean up though, there's no stopping like right now.

I think I've done enough to move on to vehicles but will see what tomorrow brings. I have a feeling it's going to be more clean up. Still got some mowing I'd like to do and more "stuff" to pick up and put it in it's place, a little more of which is the dump run pile.

Nice to have the push mower running again and for some reason, the leaky radiator on the tractor is no longer leaking. Used it for light duty stuff and never lost a drop of water(should be coolant). I put stop leak in it a long time ago and it held for a while, then leaked and now, I guess some of it found and plugged the hole again. Put the grader blade on it and scraped the goat manure out of the front half of the shop/barn and later put the mower on the back and did some big mowing. Some of it was 2 feet tall and looks like it was cut for baling. I took it easy and never did more than 10 minutes and any time it wasn't actually cutting, I'd disengage the PTO and lower the RPM. It did good.

Believe it or not, the mower was made in the USA and unaffiliated with Mitsubishi. Did the US company paint it to match a Mitsubishi? Seems unlikely because there were other brands of small tractors during the early 80s. Looks like it belongs though.

Now that I have doors on both ends of the shed, I had to make something to be able to keep them open while excluding goats which I did today with a couple of chunks of cattle panel with fence staples as hinges because it fits nicely around the cattle panel wire.

I was going to rig overhead micro-sprinklers to wet the part of the tunnel I'll be covering with black poly but ran across the version that goes on an 18" stake that will do the same thing so I added back some main line, plugged unnecessary holes, used two old holes and added one hole and watered for over an hour.

Did both those things plus a little project up by the house while allowing the tractor to cool down.

I guess I did two 8-10 hour days but will be taking it easier and knocking off early tomorrow. That would be going shopping and cleaning house and eating a nice dinner.

453 posted on 08/13/2025 6:31:28 PM PDT by Pollard (Sick of the weather? Wait a minute.)
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To: Diana in Wisconsin

That sounds like a nice meal. I am eating and freezing our chinese long beans. Thats all we have grown for years now and always save seeds. 6 or 7 vines growing up a pole and we are loaded with hanging beans looking like a green firework shower. We never liked mushy beans and these stir fry up great. Just with a little olive oil and a dab of sesame oil. Plus no bending over to pick, a big win. Love summer meals from the garden.


454 posted on 08/13/2025 6:32:48 PM PDT by MomwithHope (Forever grateful to all our patriots, past, present and future.)
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To: Diana in Wisconsin

I tried calling the orchard before we left the house specifically to see if they had peaches because the weather has been so ‘awful’ for so many crops. No answer - I figured they were too busy to have someone answering the phone. I did send them an email & pointed out the hours of operation on their website - to rely on that info & drive 30 miles only to find out they were closed was “very disappointing”. Based on the prices of peaches in Walmart, I suspect there are peach supply issues: still too early, failed crops, or both.

Thought about making dilly beans, but green beans (packaged) were expensive IMO. The local produce stands don’t have them. I have never had luck growing them - flea beetles eat them up early ... might try next year with a straw bale garden. The way it’s set up, it’s easy to use row cover.

I have a wasp nest in Clyde! Before I moved Clyde out of the main barn & under the lean-to, I noticed a wasp crawl under the deck height adjustment knob. I wondered if there might be a nest. Now, when I take Clyde out, I have not had a problem, but when I bring Clyde back in, several wasps are flying around & head for the knob. I looked under it & do not see a nest so it must be deep. I don’t want to spray anything down in there. Once it gets cold, I’ll poke around more extensively. Next year, I’ll have to find a way to keep wasps out of that spot.

Less rain tomorrow, but still ‘warm’ & muggy. I am missing those cooler, low humidity days of last week. I have a trailer load of dirt to shovel & another trailer load of mulch to haul after that - between the humidity, heat & gnats it’s miserable work. When I think I can’t stand to lift one more shovel full, I go look at the raised beds with the zinnias blooming, jalapeño plants loaded with peppers, the thriving herbs & try to focus on how good the end result will be.


455 posted on 08/13/2025 7:56:55 PM PDT by Qiviut (Imagine waking up in the morning & only having the things you thanked God for yesterday. (S. Peters))
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To: Diana in Wisconsin
"This evening there are a ZILLION (at least!) Dragonflies cruising around eating mosquitoes, as well as dozens of Barn Swallows doing the same."

(Checking in) I love looking at the dragonflies, and swallows, and those days when you can see swifts stitching back and forth across the sky. I enjoy hearing the Whippoorwills on summer evenings.

Goodnight!

456 posted on 08/13/2025 9:08:37 PM PDT by Pete from Shawnee Mission ( )
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