What did you do in the garden today?

[Sally PB]

For you garlic growers I have a question. I planted garlic cloves last October or November (don't remember exactly) and after a few weeks they were all sprouting.

They continued growing slowly, and even survived all the snow and temperatures in the teens. The plants are still upright and green after all the snow melted away.

I thought garlic started growing in the fall, then kind of died off in the winter, and then came back to finish growing in the spring. Guess I was wrong.

So is this normal behavior for all types of garlic varieties? Do they all stay green all winter long?

My climate is very different from yours. I plant the cloves so that the tip is about 3" under the surface. I put a good layer of mulch (leaves, grass clippings, etc.) over the top. I don't see sprouts until late March/early April.

Don't they like a lot of compost fertilizer?

Yes, garlic and onions need more fertilizer, especially nitrogen, than you'd think. The bulbs are actually modified leaves, so think of feeding them as you would a green leaffy plant.

 

[gtaus]

You could make your reservoir higher than your totes and drip water into the tote's reservoir. My earth box drinks about a gallon a day, so you could adjust the drip to refill 1 gallon or less a day and shut it off at night. There is a drain hole on my earth boxes, so it can never be over filled.

Well, I am looking into some kind of gravity drip system for my raised beds. Thanks.

 

[karenerwin]

Man you are having a tough couple days! I find it so hard to get reliable help for things like that, hopefully he doesn't disappoint any further. I was just out of hot water for almost 3 weeks - that sucked. But at least we had cold water for most of the time!

A plumber came by late this afternoon. $2,200 to just repair part of the line or $5,000 to replace the entire line all the way down to the meter ( over 300 ft through the woods).
I’m going with replacing the entire thing because I don’t want to have to do this again in a few months/years. He said he can get to it on Thursday.

 

[karenerwin]

I found a hidden nest of 31 eggs. 30 of which are frozen and cracked. I fed those vack yo the chickens.
Don’t they realize I’ve had to BUY eggs this winter!!

 

[gtaus]

I found a hidden nest of 31 eggs. 30 of which are frozen and cracked. I fed those vack yo the chickens.
Don’t they realize I’ve had to BUY eggs this winter!!

That sure is a stash of hidden eggs! As someone who lives in northern Minnesota, the last 2 weeks almost all my eggs were frozen and cracked in the nest boxes before I got to them.

There is nothing wrong with a frozen and cracked egg. I wash them off and put them in a cup in the refrigerator overnight. letting them thaw out and have them for breakfast the next morning. Scrambled eggs or maybe a ham, cheese, and egg sandwich on an onion bagel.

I have never had 30 frozen and cracked eggs at one time, but you could probably wash them off, keep them in the freezer and take some out the day before you want to use them. When the eggs freeze, they seem best to use as scramble eggs, or in baking dishes. I don't cook them sunny side up if the egg has been frozen.

Nothing wrong with feeding the eggs back to the chickens, but you can eat those frozen and cracked eggs as well. Just make sure you eat them soon after you thaw them out. A cracked shell will not protect the egg from bacteria, so you don't want the eggs to go bad in the refrigerator.

 

[CNJ]

I ordered a 15oz bag of skittle candy from Amazon on an impulse. I wanted to taste the rainbow.................and I was too lazy to go to the store.

 

[jerryse]

Another rainy morning. We have appointments today.

 

[Wee Farmer Sarah]

Snowy morning. We got about 1 1/2 inches to freshen up the dirty snow. Of course the temperatures are going up and we will get some heavy rain starting this evening. I only bought one dozen eggs this winter. DD bought me a dozen as “payment” for all the free eggs this past summer. I have a Columbian Wyandotte that started laying on 2 January. One of my Buff Orpington hens started laying about a week after that. It’s enough to keep me in eggs for now but I really wish a few of the other 7 hens would get their fluffy butts in gear. Question: is it safe to put the poop board scrapings on the garden beds now? I can’t plant anything in them until mid to late April at the earliest.

 

[Sueby]

A plumber came by late this afternoon. $2,200 to just repair part of the line or $5,000 to replace the entire line all the way down to the meter ( over 300 ft through the woods).
I’m going with replacing the entire thing because I don’t want to have to do this again in a few months/years. He said he can get to it on Thursday.

I would do the same. Stinks, but you don't want to go through this again! Glad he got out there & there is water at the end of the tunnel (lol).

I would feed the frozen eggs back to the birds too, I won't eat them. I've been checking like 3-4 times a day during this cold. We got some snow overnight, but we're supposed to get rain soon, hopefully, wash it all away. The chickens won't come out of the coop. I did have my old BR start laying a little bit again & then the 3 young girls never stopped so I get anywhere from 2-4 eggs a day, I've been buying recently too. We eat a lot of eggs here.

A fellow gardener friend here got me motivated to get my current seeds in order (by sending me some ) so I placed an order with Seeds n Such. I'm excited to try this squash, it's supposedly parthenocarpic. As are the sweet success cukes, but I've grown them for a couple years & love them. Can't wait to see what my free seeds will be.

 

[WthrLady]

picked the truck up from the shop yesterday, ran errands...drove home.

A plumber came by late this afternoon. $2,200 to just repair part of the line or $5,000 to replace the entire line all the way down to the meter ( over 300 ft through the woods).
I’m going with replacing the entire thing because I don’t want to have to do this again in a few months/years. He said he can get to it on Thursday.

GOOD CALL! usually messing with outdoor plumbing in one spot screws up a bit in another. If he does the WHOLE thing, you have someone to yell at to fix it. If he just repairs the one bit, and another bit of the same line fails in two weeks from the jostling, or in empathy, he's back again on YOUR dime.