What did you do in the garden today?

[BReeder!]

Today, picked two honeydew, one had split so I turned down the irrigation dripper. Picked more cabbage looper eggs off the seedlings and was unsuccessful at trapping the actual loopers with a pond net. Baked some chocolate zucchini bread. If any more watermelon ripen this week they will be juiced and frozen because I have no more room in the fridge.

I wondered which would win, the pole limas or the windmill - well, it's a tie. The windmill still spins, but no longer rotates.
View attachment 2801213

I have the same green and yellow wind turbine. Love it!

 

[Birdsonghill]

I am struggling to keep up on this thread... quickly caught up on 6 pages.

Anybody grow Jerusalem artichokes (AKA sunchokes)? They are supposed to flower I thought. I still see no signs of flowering. The plants otherwise are doing great and getting very tall.
Also, when do I know to harvest them?

Indeed , they do flower! At least they do once established, here in the mid south. I don't have any, but have seen it often. I too, am struggling to keep up with this thread!

 

[Phaedra Geiermann]

I hate those thorny things! They take over the world if you turn your back for two minutes! We also cut them into pieces, but put them into the city compost carts. If we put them in our pile, they would just root!

Talking about thorny things, i hate creeped Thistle 10000000000 times than bramble, ahhh, endless...

When I cut them, I usually destroy the node which side shots will grow, also the compost can reach 70 degree C. So I can still tolerate it. But for Thistle, NOOOOOOO, hate them hate them.....

 

[gtaus]

I really need to haul the compost to where I'm going to put it. I started a new pile, and need a place to fork it into.

Unfortunately, where I want to put it is up a steep hill. Well, it's good for the muscles, right?

What do you use to haul your compost? For years and years I only had a wheel barrow, which worked OK, but you got a hard workout with heavy loads. The tire finally rotted out on that wheelbarrow and I needed to replace it. I took that opportunity to replace the wheelbarrow with a 4 wheeled gorilla-type cart. It holds much more compost, dirt, etc... and it is so much easier to move around even when fully loaded. My cart handle also converts to a hitch so I can hook it up to my riding mower. Even better!

I actually got a YardWorks Poly Dump Cart from on sale from Menards,. It holds 1,100 lbs., but I don't think I've ever had anything that heavy in the cart. Even full of dirt, I don't think it comes close to the weight limit.

I think this particular 6 cu. ft. cart has been discontinued from Menards. I bought it a couple of years ago for about $120.00, which was a lot more than a 6 cu. ft. $60.00 wheelbarrow, but it was worth the extra cost to me. I can get so much more work done with less fatigue with the poly dump cart. Now that I am 60+ years old, those considerations are more important to me. Also, Dear Wife is a small woman at 5 foot nothing and has no problem loading up this dump cart with 5 bags of her colored wood chip mulch and hauling it to her flower gardens. I don't think she could handle 1 bag of mulch in the old wheelbarrow.

Having said that, earlier this year I did buy a hardware replacement kit with wheel at Menards for my old wheelbarrow for less than $20.00. So my old wheelbarrow is now back in service but I so far have only used it with my compost sifter to catch the unfinished/large pieces of compost that get sifted out. I don't use the wheelbarrow to transfer heavy loads anymore. My poly dump cart is used for almost everything.

 

[Elyrian1]

Rained last night, cloudy all day so far, just relaxing and letting plants do their thing.

DH uses the big gorilla cart for work stuff. I'm pretty sure he has maxed out or even exceeded the recommended weight capacity before. Not saying anybody should do that, just throwing the info out there, haha!

Two days after cardboard and mulch the in-ground plants are looking much happier.

 

[WthrLady]

What do you use to haul your compost? For years and years I only had a wheel barrow, which worked OK, but you got a hard workout with heavy loads. The tire finally rotted out on that wheelbarrow and I needed to replace it. I took that opportunity to replace the wheelbarrow with a 4 wheeled gorilla-type cart. It holds much more compost, dirt, etc... and it is so much easier to move around even when fully loaded. My cart handle also converts to a hitch so I can hook it up to my riding mower. Even better!

I actually got a YardWorks Poly Dump Cart from on sale from Menards,. It holds 1,100 lbs., but I don't think I've ever had anything that heavy in the cart. Even full of dirt, I don't think it comes close to the weight limit.

View attachment 2801656

I think this particular 6 cu. ft. cart has been discontinued from Menards. I bought it a couple of years ago for about $120.00, which was a lot more than a 6 cu. ft. $60.00 wheelbarrow, but it was worth the extra cost to me. I can get so much more work done with less fatigue with the poly dump cart. Now that I am 60+ years old, those considerations are more important to me. Also, Dear Wife is a small woman at 5 foot nothing and has no problem loading up this dump cart with 5 bags of her colored wood chip mulch and hauling it to her flower gardens. I don't think she could handle 1 bag of mulch in the old wheelbarrow.

Having said that, earlier this year I did buy a hardware replacement kit with wheel at Menards for my old wheelbarrow for less than $20.00. So my old wheelbarrow is now back in service but I so far have only used it with my compost sifter to catch the unfinished/large pieces of compost that get sifted out. I don't use the wheelbarrow to transfer heavy loads anymore. My poly dump cart is used for almost everything.

We invested in solid rubber tires for all of our wagons and wheel barrows. Not pretty upfront, but never go flat.

 

[Birdsonghill]

Happy wife, happy life! Going on 33+ years of marriage. Don't know what I do without her.



I imagine one could pile, wet, turn, and repeat in our Minnesota summer months and probably end up with some hot compost piles with finished compost at the end of the summer. But that would be more work than I am willing to put into the project. My strategy is to make more compost in the chicken run than I can use so nature can take its time breaking down the material along with the chickens turning over the litter. I think they call that cold composting, It takes a long time, but if you get to a point where you are adding more material than you take out, it really does not matter. I reached that point last summer so now I have more compost in the chicken run than I am currently taking out.



The big advantage to having a chicken run compost system is that I don't really have to keep up with any compost chores, per se. All I do is dump fresh material at one end of the chicken run and by the time the chickens scratch it to the other end, it's basically ready to be used. I just let the chickens and nature do the work for me. What is even better is that if I don't need any compost, it just sits in the chicken run continuing to feed the chickens. I don't know what the chickens find to eat in the older composted material, but they are always scratching and pecking in that stuff.

When I was younger, I tried to make some hot compost piles. But I don't think I was turning the piles enough and it would take forever for the material to break down. So I just got to the point with my pallet compost bins that I will fill them and let them cold compost. It may take a few years, but I now have 6 pallet compost bins and just top them off if the level goes down. I'll harvest the compost in a year or so, if needed, but mainly I just build a few new pallet compost bins each year and fill them up. I mainly use the compost from the chicken run right now, but I have a few compost pallet bins that are now about 2 years old and might be ready to harvest.

I like the idea of taking from the bottom of the bin and adding to the tops. I have been considering a system like that, but right now, I just harvest the entire bin when ready, run it through the cement mixer compost sifter, and throw the unfinished material back on top of a new bin. That is about the only "turning" I actually do these days.

I am using the larger bin for the bottom harvesting and continuous topping up , method, the last few years, with occasional, stirring, aeration or flipping when I harvest a large amount at one time. I find it fits my age better. It is a lot of work to regularly work compost bins to hasten decomposition! Glad the deep litter chicken composting works so well for you! My chickens eat a lot of select garden waste in their run, but leave nothing but droppings to be washed away. Here, that is my goal. I wish, I could successfully use your method here! Alas, the climate/location is not in my favor! I still, envy your compost sifter as a worm/casting harvester! Happy Chickens and Happy Wives , make for Happy Gardening guys!

 

[Birdsonghill]

I really need to haul the compost to where I'm going to put it. I started a new pile, and need a place to fork it into.

Unfortunately, where I want to put it is up a steep hill. Well, it's good for the muscles, right?

I placed my compost piles just outside and slightly elevated above two of my garden terraces, years ago! One benefit, was the compost is where I use a lot of it but the best thing has been, that the nutrients leaching from the piles has enriched the downhill gardens, so much, that less compost is needed in the garden! Indeed, I had to stop planting tomato in the top two rows because it was way over fertilizing and making huge vines with little fruit! I am convinced the entire garden areas are enhanced in the downhill path!

 

[Phaedra Geiermann]

What do you use to haul your compost? For years and years I only had a wheel barrow, which worked OK, but you got a hard workout with heavy loads. The tire finally rotted out on that wheelbarrow and I needed to replace it. I took that opportunity to replace the wheelbarrow with a 4 wheeled gorilla-type cart. It holds much more compost, dirt, etc... and it is so much easier to move around even when fully loaded. My cart handle also converts to a hitch so I can hook it up to my riding mower. Even better!

I actually got a YardWorks Poly Dump Cart from on sale from Menards,. It holds 1,100 lbs., but I don't think I've ever had anything that heavy in the cart. Even full of dirt, I don't think it comes close to the weight limit.

View attachment 2801656

I think this particular 6 cu. ft. cart has been discontinued from Menards. I bought it a couple of years ago for about $120.00, which was a lot more than a 6 cu. ft. $60.00 wheelbarrow, but it was worth the extra cost to me. I can get so much more work done with less fatigue with the poly dump cart. Now that I am 60+ years old, those considerations are more important to me. Also, Dear Wife is a small woman at 5 foot nothing and has no problem loading up this dump cart with 5 bags of her colored wood chip mulch and hauling it to her flower gardens. I don't think she could handle 1 bag of mulch in the old wheelbarrow.

Having said that, earlier this year I did buy a hardware replacement kit with wheel at Menards for my old wheelbarrow for less than $20.00. So my old wheelbarrow is now back in service but I so far have only used it with my compost sifter to catch the unfinished/large pieces of compost that get sifted out. I don't use the wheelbarrow to transfer heavy loads anymore. My poly dump cart is used for almost everything.

Thanks for the sharing, i do need one of this cart

 

[chickengr]

Rained last night, cloudy all day so far, just relaxing and letting plants do their thing.

DH uses the big gorilla cart for work stuff. I'm pretty sure he has maxed out or even exceeded the recommended weight capacity before. Not saying anybody should do that, just throwing the info out there, haha!

Two days after cardboard and mulch the in-ground plants are looking much happier.

when is baby due? I did not read a few pages I hope I did not miss the news.