What did you do in the garden today?

[BReeder!]

Watered just.
DS and DD were proud to go in the garden and clean up some sticks from woody weeds I pulled last year and tossed in the corner to dry. The piled then in the firepit, and then demanded a fire after dinner. Of course I am now sitting by the fire and they are off playing in the yard.

 

[Sally PB]

Kids, huh?

 

[Sally PB]

We probably got down to 31 here. I *think* the fruit blossoms are all ok. Another frost advisory for tonight, then some warmer nights/days. Next Monday/Tuesday night we could have frost again.

I had a serious talk with the cherry trees, telling them that it was still too early to bloom.

 

[BReeder!]

We probably got down to 31 here. I *think* the fruit blossoms are all ok. Another frost advisory for tonight, then some warmer nights/days. Next Monday/Tuesday night we could have frost again.

I had a serious talk with the cherry trees, telling them that it was still too early to bloom.

Tonight looks like the last frost for me. Fingers crossed.

 

[Swiss]

I had to cover the fig tree last night, not sure if we actually got frost or not but it was close.

i saw a couple flowers on strawberries, which is weird since they’re June bearing. I’ll blame our lack of winter.

most of my EWO did not come back. I have 2 plants left of probably 20. I think I will call it quits with them a repurpose that bed next year. Weird since we didn’t have a winter, I know lots of you grow them fine through winter.

I looked at the wild strawberries down by the road the other day (the ones I saved seeds from and am growing), and they have FLOWER BUDS! I know they are wild and hardy, but that is a completely different level!

Chilly, gray day today. No rain all day but it's hovering. Will probably rain all night.

From around the garden...
Roses are budding out.
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Catawba grapes are loaded with promise.
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Concords too....
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Egyptian Walking Onions (my first year for these so I'm excited!)
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Raspberries have exploded... This bed was 5 bare root sticks last fall.
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Carrots and Basil
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Pink lemonade blueberries might actually produce a few this year.
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Indeterminate tomatoes
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Determinate tomatoes
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Lavender is beginning to bloom
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Glencoe raspberry sharing a bed with flax
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New irrigation system (in progress)
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New strawberry beds
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Romaine doing well. Summer lettuce and arugula starting to sprout.
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Does the cardboard around your tomatoes make them difficult to water?

 

[gtaus]

Just posted this to the thread Show Me Your Pallet Projects! and thought I would share it here to because it deals with my cement mixer compost sifter. I will be in the compost sifting business in the next few days now that the snow has finally melted...

Last week I was talking about some of the pallet projects I have on my to do list. Almost got a chance to start on them last week, but then we had a 3-day snowstorm over the weekend, dropping as much as 6 inches of new snow on the ground.

The snow has been melting off the last few days, and today was dry enough for me to hitch up the trailer to a riding mower and move some pallets around. One of the easiest pallet projects I had in mind was building a platform base for my cement mixer compost sifter. In the spirit of no pallet project is too small to share, here is my compost sifter on top of the pallets I set aside for platform....

I will screw a couple lag bolts through the base of that front leg into the pallet wood. That should make everything rock solid this year while I sift the compost.

In this picture, you can see the wagon that catches the compost rejects. I have a Gorilla cart that I put under the barrel screen to catch the sifted compost. I was going to get the Gorilla cart under the sifter for a picture, but it started to rain so I threw a tarp over everything and called it a day. At any rate, my compost sifter is almost all set up and ready to go.

In the background, you can see my chicken run composting system. I just use a pitchfork to scoop out the compost to be sifted. I have a number of muck buckets (in front of the fence) which I use to carry the compost to the sifter. Last fall, when the chicken run was filled with leaves from the yard, it was about 18 inches deep. Over winter, with all the snow sitting on it, it is back down to about 12 inches deep. Even better, I pushed aside maybe only an inch of the top litter, and it was already a rich, dark, lovely compost underneath. It will have to dry out a bit before I can properly sift it, but it is ready to be harvested.

Next on my pallet project list is building a few more pallet wood hügelkultur 16-inch-high raised garden beds.

 

[Swiss]

I have all the main garden beds tilled/weeded, except for the one against the back fence that is really long because I really am sick of digging out grass. Well, guess who is bringing the tiller up this weekend? So, an experiment is in the works: if I till that bed, and rake out the grass chunks, will it be better or worse than the other beds? My husband also said, "We could use it to prep next year's garden extension." I said, " THIS year's garden is already double the size of last year's... Am I doubling it again next year? Do I need to change how big I'm making the fence? (Gears in my brain grinding at the thought of trying to reconfigure the garden fence and tilling up more beds)" He apparently was thinking of berry patches and stuff like that outside of the fenced portion. I love growing my garden and having a big garden, and would love to make it even bigger, but I plan on keeping the fenced (aka main) one this size for at least 2 seasons. Instead of extending that one, I'll be creating my kitchen/medicinal/closer-to-the-house garden, and clean/fill up the flower garden beds up against the house.

When we moved back to the state a few years ago, I asked my mom if I could clean up her flower garden because it was pretty weedy and grassy. I dug it up, removed weeds and grass, divided up the plants, transplanted in violets from around the yard, and mulched with wood chips. I also extended it on the other side of the front steps. It looked way better, but I was unhappy with the wood chips, as they were bulky and tended to float away when it rained.
A few weeks ago, she texted me saying, "I'll pay you to come clean up my garden!"
So, today, I went down with some slow release fertilizer and cedar mulch. When I got there, I realized how much everything had spread in the years since I tended to it (except the weeds and grass that were removed)! I am happy with how it has filled in!
I pulled the little amount of baby grass that was coming up under the bird feeder and the small amount of weeds, divided up some thick clumps of the flowers, raked out leaves and the remaining wood chips, spread the fertilizer, spread the wood mulch (how didn't I know that wood mulch was different from wood chips?!), and cleaned up. I was running late to pick up my husband from work, so my mom watered it while I cleaned up. It looks a million times better than it did (especially compared to when it was all grassy). I brought home some extra plants for my pretty empty flower garden, too. I'll get to bring home even more soon because she wants the garden on the other side of the front steps gone.
Both times, I forgot to take "before" pictures, and I forgot to take "after" pics today. It probably doesn't need to be said based on how long this post is, but I am very proud of all the work I have done in that garden!! I look forward to seeing how it looks later in spring/summer!

Tomorrow, I plan on planting the flowers I brought home, and getting started on the fence extension. Once my fence is extended, I get to FINALLY plant my potatoes (I'm a few weeks further behind than I want to be on planting those).

 

[TJAnonymous]

I looked at the wild strawberries down by the road the other day (the ones I saved seeds from and am growing), and they have FLOWER BUDS! I know they are wild and hardy, but that is a completely different level!

Does the cardboard around your tomatoes make them difficult to water?

Congrats on your strawberries!

I used cardboard last year with wood chip mulch (instead of straw I'm using this year...). I didn't have any problems with rain penetrating through it and it did a great job of holding moisture in the soil while blocking weeds.

This year I'm using the cardboard again (with straw mulch) but I've added dripline irrigation below the cardboard. This is how I'm hedging the inevitability that Mother Nature shuts off the sky spigot through July and August every year. So I expect to have no issues with soil moisture except to monitor it for potentially too much.

 

[Acre4Me]

We might have a broody hen!! Yes, we will try to hatch some chicks bc it is so great to watch momma hen with babies!

 

[karenerwin]

Baskin Robbins was also very good. We used to have a store down the street but it disappeared long ago

There is a Baskin Robbins in Poplar Bluff within walking distance of the house down there. I was just there on Tuesday to cut grass and made sure I stopped in for ice cream before I headed back home.