I am looking forward to spring - the rain washes out the soil, we have heavily mineralized water here which stunts plants' growth and blooming. I suspect I'll see a few things bloom that I haven't seen bloom in years.
I told these two to go on look-out duty - to keep raccoons, squirrels and tree rats from stealing from my citrus trees.
Daffodils are late here this year the impatiens I just barely peeking out in the grow tent
I can’t say the spring either comes early or late here but I can say I am hardly ever ready for it so much to do
The lake bed has given me pawpaw seeds this winter. Guess who is going to try a container pawpaw tree, lol.
https://www.gardeningknowhow.com/edible/fruits/pawpaw/container-grown-pawpaw-trees.htm
Good Morning!
Really COLD here in New England.
Brrrrrr
I would love to be outside working today, but it’s 41 & raining.
This past week, I was able to work outside Wed, Thursday & Friday. Temps have been mild (upper 60’s, low 70’s); however, Thursday was hot in the sun - record temperature for the month of 83 - last record was in 1926!
As of today (this moment), my veggie/flower garden is UNDER CONTROL! This is a big deal because last year, I was out of commission (broken kneecap) from March 7 until June and the garden was a total mess. It was a struggle to make it through the garden season - I had tomatoes & some herbs & that was about it.
This year, all the beds are weeded as of this past week & I am on “green patrol” .... anything green showing up in a bed is swiftly eliminated. I have old shingles down between many of the beds so there will be no weeds there! The shingles are covered either with old pine needles (removed from beds before weeding) or soon-to-be-hauled wood chips.
In between work in the garden, mom and I have been raking leaves from the maple in the front yard. Usually, we have them raked up while they’re still pretty fresh off the tree, but we had “other things” going on that were more important. The leaves are totally brown & crispy & some are plastered down from being rained on. I used the mower yesterday to round up some of them - hauled them away on a tarp. Today, all that is left are the leaves in the front azalea bushes - 1 or 2 tarp loads should get rid of them.
Speaking of the front bushes, they are azaleas & I figured out they are about 35 years old (I planted them back in the 1980’s). They’re looking a little ‘rough’ and mom just cannot resist “snipping” on them when they are setting blooms so the bushes are green most of the year. She wants them gone ... I concur. We are thinking some dwarf English boxwoods - we have English boxwoods from my uncle (he is now deceased - used to raise them) in another spot and they look great, grow slow - I think mom has pruned them once in the last 19 years since they were planted. This means I have to dig up the azaleas - ugh .... but it can’t be as bad as digging up the nandina bushes that were where the azaleas are now.
So lots of projects in the future. Btw - got a great battery maintainer gifted to me a couple of months ago & put it on my mower. It cranked yesterday first try .... hasn’t been used since last (early) November & we’ve had some pretty cold weather that is hard on batteries. I was a happy camper when it started right up. :-)
Love the “Welcome To Diana’s Place”
🌸🌼🌺🌹🌻🌷
I love Neil Oliver - his monologues are really good. The title of this one caught my eye ..... good thing we ‘Garden threaders’ can grow our own and not just tomatoes!
Neil Oliver, “What the Hell – We’re Rationing Tomatoes”…
https://theconservativetreehouse.com/blog/2023/02/25/neil-oliver-what-the-hell-were-rationing-tomatoes/
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
There IS rationing in the UK:
Tesco and Aldi Join Grocers Rationing Fruit and Vegetable Sales in UK
https://financialpost.com/pmn/business-pmn/aldi-joins-uk-grocers-rationing-fruit-and-vegetables
“Tesco Plc has joined discounter Aldi in limiting purchases of some fruit and vegetables in the UK after difficult harvests due to cold weather in southern Spain and north Africa.
Both retailers are capping purchases of peppers, cucumbers and tomatoes to three units per person. The moves follow Morrisons which has a limit of two products and Asda with a restriction of three.”
We got a couple significant rain events here in Central Missouri over the past week. The one that rolled through last night was quite a squall. All of Mrs. Augie’s patio furniture was turned over and scattered about the deck. The porch swing was the only thing that was damaged. It wasn’t in great shape before it got flipped over and was probably going to be replaced this summer anyway.
I was quite pleased to see the greenhouse and low tunnel both came through the winds unscathed. With all the rain it was too muddy to do much in the garden aside from watering baby plants in the greenhouse. The spinach I planted there back in December is ready for harvest. I’ve never been able to get a crop of that stuff outdoors so I’m pleased to know that I’ll be able to grow it reliably in the future.
I’m still noodling on what to do for better control of the airflow through the greenhouse. It doesn’t get enough fresh air when the weather is warm and sunny, and it gets too much when the weather is cold and miserable. So it’s probably going to require the installation of a properly sized exhaust fan and a thermostat to control it.
We retrieved Mrs. Augie’s golf cart Flash from the golf cart doctor place on Saturday. That thing is worth another warm body when we’re doing chores outside so it’s really nice to have it back and operating properly.
Yesterday we snagged Pops and drove to Arnold, MO to meet the new granddaughter.
It was a good weekend.
