Since I didn't take a pictuer of the peas to share with you, I'll leave you with a photo of my "rare bird" feeding at the feeder.
Friday, May 25, 2012
Pea Progress
I am happy to report that my peas have pea pods and flowers! Adding bone meal to the soil did the trick. It took about two weeks to see results, but my pea plants are in full on production mode. I anticipate a small crop when by the end of the weekend because I already have a number of baby pea poddlings on the vines. I know I could eat them now, but they're barely an inch and a half long, so I want to let them get a little bigger before I raid the plant!
Since I didn't take a pictuer of the peas to share with you, I'll leave you with a photo of my "rare bird" feeding at the feeder.
And here I've been blaming the squirrels for everything. Looks like they have a co-hort in crime! I will name him Dale after the infamous duo - though I don't remember Disney's chipmunks having tails...
Since I didn't take a pictuer of the peas to share with you, I'll leave you with a photo of my "rare bird" feeding at the feeder.
Monday, May 21, 2012
Correction - Wolfsbane
A couple years ago, I was trying to identify a flowering ground cover using the assistance of Yahoo images. I found what I was looking for, but unfortunately, it was mislabeled. The poster of the photo had called it Wolfsbane. It is not. Wolfsbane looks like this:
(photo borrowed from VampireRave.com)
This morning though, I was helping a friend review common weeds so that she wouldn't pull flowers up and leave the weeds behind. I found the website Illinois Wild Flowers and while reviewing the list, found my old friend "Wolfsbane". It turns out that what I've been calling "wolfsbane" these last couple of years is actually an Asiatic Dayflower.
(photo from Illinois Wildflowers)
(Photo from my garden)
As you can see, clearly the same plant. Oops. Correction now made. Honestly though, I'll probably keep calling it Wolfsbane in my own head, the same way we all keep calling baseball stadiums by their original names.
Friday, May 11, 2012
Additions to Garden 2012
Last Friday, May 4, we decided it was time to finish putting in the vegetables before another week got away from us and summer crept ever closer. So we went out to the garden to survey what warmer weather and a lot of rain had wrought.
The broccoli is coming along splendidly. I have 3 healthy plants and two struggling plants. I'm comfortable with these numbers and I find I care a lot more about my broccoli this year because I grew it from seed (direct sowed) and didn't cave and buy a starter plant at the garden center. I did this last year and found I wasn't very emotionally involved with my broccoli. Perhaps this was why it never gave me any heads.
The three types of lettuce we planted never showed their leafy little heads. I don't know what happened to all of them. Maybe the seeds packets were older and the seeds weren't viable. At any rate, in their place came some wolfs bane, many clovers, a couple sprigs of grass and many, many whirligigs of doom (also known as Maple tree seeds). Oh, and about 15 volunteer cherry tomato plants.
So once we weeded, we planted a second row of carrots, some tomato seeds, pumpkin seeds, bell peppers, more lettuce and some spinach. The tomatoes will all get their own containers this year.They take over too much of the raised bed and bully everyone else around so they're being put in plant time out. We'll see how this goes.
The lettuce is a the spring mix seeds left over from last fall that did so well (don't bother looking for a blog about this because I failed to create one). I planted it a different spot than the first rows because I had a hole. I threw the spinach in another hole. Where the lettuce was supposed to go will now be bush beans. About six of them if they all come up.
The pumpkin I planted in the oregano pot. The first year I had success with pumpkin, it was right next to my oregano. I did not have any squash murdering bugs. Last year, I'd moved the oregano to a pot and clear to the other side of the yard and the squash murderers arrived and decimated. So this year, I put the seeds IN the oregano pot. We shall see what we shall see.
I feel pretty certain that the container the bell peppers were put in will not be nearly deep enough, but hubby insisted and this is a shared learning experience, so I let him.
Lastly, we planted our potatoes. We'd bought seed tomatoes at the Flower and Garden Show in March. This was not what we planted. What ended up going in were some store bought potatoes that were growing healthy eyes, ears and a couple even had noses. Just kidding. At any rate, the seed potatoes don't look the healthiest, so I'm afraid that was $5 wasted. You live, you learn.
The potatoes will have more room to branch out this year. I bought a pop-up garbage bag from Sherwin Williams. It's made of a heavy duty plastic and can be folded down flat. We have started with one bag of potting soil with the potatoes on the very bottom and the sides banded down with bungee cords to allow light into the soil and eventually the little plants. Then as they grow, we will let the sides up to accommodate more soil. After the blue bucket last year, I really felt I needed something much deeper to grow the potatoes in. Especially after the heavy winds almost upset the entire process. When the garbage bag is completely expanded, it's about 3 feet high. Hopefully this will also net more potatoes.
I still have some hot peppers I want to plant and some zucchini. I've never had luck with zucchini, but perhaps this is the year. Fingers crossed and prepare to plant seeds!
The broccoli is coming along splendidly. I have 3 healthy plants and two struggling plants. I'm comfortable with these numbers and I find I care a lot more about my broccoli this year because I grew it from seed (direct sowed) and didn't cave and buy a starter plant at the garden center. I did this last year and found I wasn't very emotionally involved with my broccoli. Perhaps this was why it never gave me any heads.
The three types of lettuce we planted never showed their leafy little heads. I don't know what happened to all of them. Maybe the seeds packets were older and the seeds weren't viable. At any rate, in their place came some wolfs bane, many clovers, a couple sprigs of grass and many, many whirligigs of doom (also known as Maple tree seeds). Oh, and about 15 volunteer cherry tomato plants.
So once we weeded, we planted a second row of carrots, some tomato seeds, pumpkin seeds, bell peppers, more lettuce and some spinach. The tomatoes will all get their own containers this year.They take over too much of the raised bed and bully everyone else around so they're being put in plant time out. We'll see how this goes.
The lettuce is a the spring mix seeds left over from last fall that did so well (don't bother looking for a blog about this because I failed to create one). I planted it a different spot than the first rows because I had a hole. I threw the spinach in another hole. Where the lettuce was supposed to go will now be bush beans. About six of them if they all come up.
The pumpkin I planted in the oregano pot. The first year I had success with pumpkin, it was right next to my oregano. I did not have any squash murdering bugs. Last year, I'd moved the oregano to a pot and clear to the other side of the yard and the squash murderers arrived and decimated. So this year, I put the seeds IN the oregano pot. We shall see what we shall see.
I feel pretty certain that the container the bell peppers were put in will not be nearly deep enough, but hubby insisted and this is a shared learning experience, so I let him.
Lastly, we planted our potatoes. We'd bought seed tomatoes at the Flower and Garden Show in March. This was not what we planted. What ended up going in were some store bought potatoes that were growing healthy eyes, ears and a couple even had noses. Just kidding. At any rate, the seed potatoes don't look the healthiest, so I'm afraid that was $5 wasted. You live, you learn.
The potatoes will have more room to branch out this year. I bought a pop-up garbage bag from Sherwin Williams. It's made of a heavy duty plastic and can be folded down flat. We have started with one bag of potting soil with the potatoes on the very bottom and the sides banded down with bungee cords to allow light into the soil and eventually the little plants. Then as they grow, we will let the sides up to accommodate more soil. After the blue bucket last year, I really felt I needed something much deeper to grow the potatoes in. Especially after the heavy winds almost upset the entire process. When the garbage bag is completely expanded, it's about 3 feet high. Hopefully this will also net more potatoes.
I still have some hot peppers I want to plant and some zucchini. I've never had luck with zucchini, but perhaps this is the year. Fingers crossed and prepare to plant seeds!
Where's the Peas?
I must scour the web in search of answers. Things are not going as they should...
My peas, which are planted in the same pot as I grew the potatoes in last year, are leafy and tall and green. All green. There is not a flower one on this plant. It should have started flowering by now. It's almost four feet tall for crying-out-loud! Where are my flowers?!?! Did the potatoes suck all the good stuff out of the soil? If I throw some bone meal in the pot, will it be enough? Will it be in time?
As you can see, I need answers and I need them soon, because warm weather is due to arrive sooner or later and when it does it'll be all over until fall. And that's not acceptable because I WANT MY PEAS!!!
My peas, which are planted in the same pot as I grew the potatoes in last year, are leafy and tall and green. All green. There is not a flower one on this plant. It should have started flowering by now. It's almost four feet tall for crying-out-loud! Where are my flowers?!?! Did the potatoes suck all the good stuff out of the soil? If I throw some bone meal in the pot, will it be enough? Will it be in time?
As you can see, I need answers and I need them soon, because warm weather is due to arrive sooner or later and when it does it'll be all over until fall. And that's not acceptable because I WANT MY PEAS!!!
Monday, May 7, 2012
Sunday, Sunday - so good to me...
Since my hubby has changed schedules, we now make an honest attempt to attend church on Sunday mornings. The service we attend doesn't start until 11 a.m., which helps our attempts to be pretty successful 90% of the time.
This Sunday the weather was so sublime when I woke up, I knew I had to let the cats out to roam the yard. They kitties roamed, the hubby mowed, I weeded. Then we went in and had omelets for breakfast and off to church we went, my yard and garden looking tidy and glorious in it's early blooms (the iris and clematis combo, with some leftover columbine. Very nice.)
During church, a couple of the lights dimmed right by our seat, then came back up. It was so fast, at first I thought I'd imagined it. Then it happened again. Our friend Jessica who was sitting with us whispered she'd heard we were in for a bad storm. A bad storm? It was sunny and bright when we went into the church. My hubby scuttled out of our seat and made a dash for the car. In nice weather like this, we have a bad habit of leaving the car windows down. I know, I know, but if you saw the car, you wouldn't want it even if I left the keys in the ignition. Well, anyways, he came back covered in water droplets and whispered, "yep, the seats are soaked." We both stifled giggles and went back to trying to pay attention to the service. Glad we were sitting in the back!
So, thank you Sunday for that awesome morning that drew us out into the yard and coaxed some productivity out of us, otherwise the yard still wouldn't be mowed and the dandelion army would continue to march on.
This Sunday the weather was so sublime when I woke up, I knew I had to let the cats out to roam the yard. They kitties roamed, the hubby mowed, I weeded. Then we went in and had omelets for breakfast and off to church we went, my yard and garden looking tidy and glorious in it's early blooms (the iris and clematis combo, with some leftover columbine. Very nice.)
During church, a couple of the lights dimmed right by our seat, then came back up. It was so fast, at first I thought I'd imagined it. Then it happened again. Our friend Jessica who was sitting with us whispered she'd heard we were in for a bad storm. A bad storm? It was sunny and bright when we went into the church. My hubby scuttled out of our seat and made a dash for the car. In nice weather like this, we have a bad habit of leaving the car windows down. I know, I know, but if you saw the car, you wouldn't want it even if I left the keys in the ignition. Well, anyways, he came back covered in water droplets and whispered, "yep, the seats are soaked." We both stifled giggles and went back to trying to pay attention to the service. Glad we were sitting in the back!
So, thank you Sunday for that awesome morning that drew us out into the yard and coaxed some productivity out of us, otherwise the yard still wouldn't be mowed and the dandelion army would continue to march on.
Wednesday, May 2, 2012
Oh My! Clematis
My best guess as to what caused this change would be all the flowers I planted around the base have altered the composition of the soil. I had a number of bulbs planted around it last year, but only my Iris bloomed. This year however, my daffodils bloomed first. It's hard to say what they may have taken from or added to the soil that would cause this change. But as Annie from Annie's Annuals and Perennials would say, when your working with mother nature, you're working with a co-designer which means things will not always go according to plan. This is where some of your happiest "mistakes" can come from.
Friday, April 20, 2012
Apologies
I went to a talk last night on Kitchen Gardens at my local library. It was given by a Master Gardener. I had to leave before the talk was over, and I just want to offer an apology for doing so. It wasn't your talk. It was the fact that my husband was waiting. The talk was only suppossed to be an hour, hour and a half, but with all the interuptions, it was ony 2/3's done when I left. So, again, I offer my apologies for walking out.
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