What did you do in the garden today?

[Phaedra Geiermann]

Harvested flowers (finally Lilies are about to blossom) and veggies, berries for this week.

 

[littledog]

4 pints of dill sandwich pickles with my dill & garlic, 12 half pints & 9 jelly jars of low sugar berry rhubarb jam. It has all my rhubarb, my gooseberries, my blueberries & store bought strawberries. It's pretty good. All have popped so that's good.

Really nice! Love the pickles, and your jam sounds delicious - what I'm most jealous of though is: you have lids!

 

[Sueby]

Really nice! Love the pickles, and your jam sounds delicious - what I'm most jealous of though is: you have lids!

I bought enough at the very beginning of COVID to make it through this year, I saw a shortage coming but I didn't know it would be this bad!

I'm having a hard time looking at 2 bare beds where the garlic & shallots came out so I threw some squash, beans & some lettuce seeds out. I have no idea what will happen with any of them being so late, but I guess it's worth a shot.

Got the first batch of tomatoes yesterday, the beans are starting to put out pretty well now, enough for dinner anyway. & this reminds me I forgot to collect the rest of the eggs...

 

[littledog]

Finally remembered to bring my phone while working in the garden yesterday - here's my first harvest of this year!

Can any of you folks help me identify what this is? It started growing in an unfinished bed after the crows ransacked a bunch of seed packets I stupidly left out while I went to the store. I just let it keep growing, with some mulch and watering. I'm hoping it's watermelon, though the season is getting short for getting ripe melons.

Eggplant is getting beautiful purple flowers, have hopes for a decent harvest.

Cukes flowering and climbing up the trellis

Beans climbing too, no flowers yet

Zucchini starting to produce

Not sure what this is, I got kind of random planting the squashes in my tire beds, as I was getting rid of old seeds. Either yellow crookneck or butternut.

High hopes for the tomatoes, after learning more about the proper way to prune/tie up. This is before watering, the leaves look better today.

Not sure why this parsley took so long to sprout - I was almost going to let the purslane (which was growing as a weed here) take over this tire, until I noticed these babies.

Pears developing

Here's the main part of the garden from southwest direction - The weed pile in the foreground is from the weed bed nearby, which is in the process of becoming a fall cabbage bed. The other new beds in the foreground are eggplant, carrots, the mystery bed (please, watermelons!) beyond the greenhouse, cukes. Then a basil patch in the middle, the squash, zucchini, pumpkin, chive, parsley and mystery tires beyond that, then tomatoes tied up between T-posts, and sunflowers at the far end.

The serviceberry bush we just planted this past spring, that is already producing!

The white tubes and various stakes in the background are other serviceberries, mock orange bushes, red currants, and blue elderberries. Behind the camera's back are a bunch of dead Gurney fails (boo!) then some native plums and Western Red cedars that are all doing well.

It's been close to two months since we've had even a drop of rain, I'm not too far from you, Penny1960, I bet it's the same for you.

So this weekend we dragged the garden hose down and filled the water barrels, then refilled all the slow-watering bottles for each of these bushes and trees. We've worked too hard already to let them die of drought!

The weeping willow probably has roots that have gone deep enough to find its own water, because it has not suffered at all, in fact its trunk is getting thick and it's probably octupled in size since we planted it last year. Only a year old, and it is an actual tree! Kudos to Nature Hills Nursery - they're expensive, but paying through the nose for trees that are going to survive is better than putting in just as much work, time and effort for trees that die or are already dead when they get here (cough Gurney's cough.)

Today, Mr. Dog got to see Helga the broody hen's new hatchlings! He saw two, but possibly there are more since she hides them. I'll try to get a picture later.

 

[Sueby]

@littledog - sure looks like watermelon to me. Everything is looking great! I do adore weeping willows.

 

[littledog]

I ended up with 9 extra tomato plants, 2 each of sun gold, taste-lee, Cordoba, Burbank. plus one volunteer that showed up in my compost. I put them out by the curb with a "free" sign, and 4 have been picked up so far

 

[Acre4Me]

Thanks @WthrLady ! Mealybugs-just looked them up. Apparently common in more tropical locations or greenhouses. Definitely not here. But, it’s been summer temps and a bit wetter than usual.

since I’m apparently getting a nice crop of parasitic wasps growing, I’ll stick with trying to use insecticidal soap. Ladybugs and parasitic wasps were specifically mentioned as good defenses against mealy bugs. But appears that you can use neem oil too, along with stronger pesticides (which I try to use sparingly anyway).

Ok, so next “new” pest Q.

I posted earlier, but have now found these on other things. So, not sure what they are, but mostly are fuzzy white, but some are fuzzy brown.


I found these on the cucumbers. But removed 30+ off the brassicas that live under insect netting - so nothing that flies could have gotten in and I’ve been pretty good at keeping the leaves off the sides). I also found a couple eating beet leaves.

any idea what they are?

 

[Elyrian1]

Thanks @WthrLady ! Mealybugs-just looked them up. Apparently common in more tropical locations or greenhouses. Definitely not here. But, it’s been summer temps and a bit wetter than usual.

since I’m apparently getting a nice crop of parasitic wasps growing, I’ll stick with trying to use insecticidal soap. Ladybugs and parasitic wasps were specifically mentioned as good defenses against mealy bugs. But appears that you can use neem oil too, along with stronger pesticides (which I try to use sparingly anyway).

Ok, so next “new” pest Q.

I posted earlier, but have now found these on other things. So, not sure what they are, but mostly are fuzzy white, but some are fuzzy brown.


I found these on the cucumbers. But removed 30+ off the brassicas that live under insect netting - so nothing that flies could have gotten in and I’ve been pretty good at keeping the leaves off the sides). I also found a couple eating beet leaves.
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any idea what they are?

Moth caterpillars. Look like the stinging sort, but I never test the theory.

 

[Wee Farmer Sarah]

Good morning gardeners. Another cool wet morning here. I think my weather app is broken because it says it is cloudy but it really is raining. LOL! I haven't totally given up on my corn, but yesterday I put a couple additional bamboo poles in the corn patch and ran string to give the pole beans a place to go. The beans and the butternut squash are doing just fine in there. I picked more chard today along with some green beans. Fingers crossed I may have two zucchinis to pick in a couple of days. Amazing to me are the troop of ants that appear to be pollinating the summer squash. The only flying insects I've seen lately are mosquitos and they aren't helpful at all. My tomato plants are getting loaded up with green tomatoes so hopefully the rain will slack off and the early blight slows down. The cucumbers are struggling with all the water as well. Surprisingly the okra is responding to this monsoon and have started a bit of a growth spurt. There's one plant that is developing flower buds already. The jalapeno and poblano plants are doing fine and developing flower buds. I do have a couple of tiny jalapenos developing. No plans for the garden today other than trying to plant some flowers that are out growing their pots. It's laundry day and bread baking day. DD googled floaties for the chickens in case the rain never stops, too funny. While sitting with the girls yesterday during "free range" time they had a visitor. This young bunny has been enjoying the clover in my yard for the past few days. He can't get into the big garden, but prefers clover anyway. Have a great day.

 

[WthrLady]

Good morning gardeners. Another cool wet morning here. I think my weather app is broken because it says it is cloudy but it really is raining. LOL! I haven't totally given up on my corn, but yesterday I put a couple additional bamboo poles in the corn patch and ran string to give the pole beans a place to go. The beans and the butternut squash are doing just fine in there. I picked more chard today along with some green beans. Fingers crossed I may have two zucchinis to pick in a couple of days. Amazing to me are the troop of ants that appear to be pollinating the summer squash. The only flying insects I've seen lately are mosquitos and they aren't helpful at all. My tomato plants are getting loaded up with green tomatoes so hopefully the rain will slack off and the early blight slows down. The cucumbers are struggling with all the water as well. Surprisingly the okra is responding to this monsoon and have started a bit of a growth spurt. There's one plant that is developing flower buds already. The jalapeno and poblano plants are doing fine and developing flower buds. I do have a couple of tiny jalapenos developing. No plans for the garden today other than trying to plant some flowers that are out growing their pots. It's laundry day and bread baking day. DD googled floaties for the chickens in case the rain never stops, too funny. While sitting with the girls yesterday during "free range" time they had a visitor. This young bunny has been enjoying the clover in my yard for the past few days. He can't get into the big garden, but prefers clover anyway. Have a great day.

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OH Lord. Now I have the image of a flock of chickens in tiny hemorrhoid pillow rings, floating around the yard, lazy river style.