My Garden - PIC heavy - 1st harvest - Post 38

[ruth]

Quote:
We have a lot of the same issues here, way too hot and humid. I just came in from watering even though you normally don't water in mid-day blazing heat but if I don't the snow peas and leaf lettuce and other sensitive plants would wilt. So now I water twice a day at least and it's getting so hot I'll probably have to do a light watering three times a day. I bought a nozzel that has several different settings so I use the mist settings a lot just to keep the foliage from withering up.

The weather here in Woodville, MS is really, really odd. It would be 20 one day and 80 the next. We kept having light freezes and dipping temps through April. But then one day it hit 80 and has steadily gone up since so we don't have a cool season and a hot season and it makes it hard to know what to plant when. It got too hot too soon for my cool weather crops and it stayed too cold too long for the hot weather crops.

I'm learning a lot and I'll apply it to next season. I did learn okra and eggplant need the soil to be at least 75 degrees before they will sprout. I learned to start a lot of seeds inside on my sunporch where, now that it's so hot, the sun coming through the window has those little seeds baking and sprouting in no time.

I also just saw that I have some cucumbers that could be picked. I find it amazing with squash and cucumbers that one day there's barely a bump and the next day it's so big it's too tough to eat. Seems like someone comes along at night and sprinkles nuclear waste on them or something.

 

[mfsakc]

You have a beautiful garden!!! I'm really impressed that you've started everything from seed. (I'm lazy and buy a lot of things as starts.) It all looks wonderful and will taste even better!

I've been gardening in Northern CA for the last 20 yrs. Our climate is very different from yours. Last frost date is 4-15 so my eggplant, tomatoes, etc. just went in a couple of weeks ago. My garden is fenced too to keep out the deer. They are voracious! Have a drip system and some raised beds. The soil here is really rocky - when we were digging the garden the first year we hit a patch of rock so deep we were forced to put in raised beds. They originally were of redwood but rotted out last year so we replaced them w/ the stacking stone so they'll never rot again.

I too love to sit and watch my garden grow! I always place my happy chair in the middle of my plantings so I can sit and "be". Below are a few pics. Keep on gardening!!

 

[SophieLain127]

I'm jelous look at those tomatos. If my 2 year old saw those she would gobble them up she thinks they are candy....lol.

 

[ruth]

Quote:
Absolutely lovely - a real cottage garden look. I'd be sitting in that chair amongst those flowers every chance I got. I love the blue bean pole tepees and have that on my "to do" list to build. I tried to use and salvage things from around this old plantation. The beds along the fences are from old timbers and fence posts that I had dug up and you'll notice the old plow by the white tire - we found several of those in the carriage house. We gave one to the 85 year old man who was born on and used to work on this plantation back when it was a working plantation with "sharecroppers". Don't even get me started on the "sharecropper" term - it was just the South's way of keeping the slaves. This man had to work and buy his mother's way out of debt before she could leave the plantation even though his daddy and entire family had worked the fields all their lives. When he was a very small child he had to walk the long distance from their shack to the "big house" and light all 9 fireplaces at 4:00 o'clock in the morning then he had to hitch up the mule teams and start plowing. O.K......I'm not going there but not much has changed in this small Miss. town.

Back on topic.....

Our last frost was also around April 15th and I had already put some things out (I had bought a couple of tomato plants) and it wasn't long thereafter that I put out my seedlings - but, a lot of the things were just sown right into the beds and have just grown really fast.

Did I mention I filled the beds with 100 year old decomposed cow manure and whatever else comprised the barn floor. The barn floor "dirt" was so deep and so soft I could just rake into the wheelbarrow and haul it to my garden.

By summer, I plan to run a water line to the garden and put soaker hoses in the beds. It just gets too hot here in the summer and watering by hand is too time consuming.

 

[Rosalind]

Crivens! That's a lot of work. Well done!

Up here, I've only just harvested some asparagus, dandelions, salad greens and spinach. My tomatoes are about 8 inches tall! Yours look fabulous.

 

[selinagil]

AHHHHH-----Ship me that ripe tomato!!! I am so jealous--we had a few late frosts (which is really wierd for FL) and my tomatos are just now blooming. Your garden looks wonderful!!!

 

[starryeyes]

MMMMMMMMM YUMMMMY I cant waite till my garden goes in. Just now getting warm enough to plant. Love your garden


Starry

 

[ruth]

The harvest is plentiful, the laborers are few. (Matthew 9:37)


The laborers do seem to be scarce when it comes to working in my garden but today the harvest was plentiful.

Here are my first "pickins":

Those are Chinese "watermelon" radishes - really, really hot but oh so cool.

And lots of scraps for the chickens, ducks, peacocks, and geese (3 pans full) which is part of the reason I wanted a large garden, I want to be able to feed my freeranging flock, healthy organic food.

 

[wingnut1]

Monique - FABULOUS garden! And YUM on the harvest!!!

Hey - I posted some pics of some of my flower gardens... trade ya a pretty bouquet for one of those fresh cucumbers and a tomato!!

Wonderful garden...!

(bet the BCMS aren't allowed anywhere NEAR it - right? *LOL*)

My vegetable gardening is sooo weak - turnip greens for the chickens, a few tomato plants, and herbs for butterfly food!

Your garden is so inspirational! Thanks for sharing the pics!

 

[ruth]

Quote:
I saw your gorgeous flower and herb gardens and posted "name your price" to come here and whip my flower gardens into shape. The front and back of the house have formal hedge and brick "parterres" gardens and fountains with nothing planted in them. I keep buying rose bushes and pots of flowers to plant but they die before I can plant them. I can never quite figure out where to plant what or what to plant together.

I'm telling you, I'm new to the whole garden thing - herbs, vegetables, or flowers - and don't have a clue what I'm doing.