What did you do in the garden today?

[BullChick]

Good morning all. Still a little cool in the morning but overall mild temperatures. I managed to get the fence posts pounded in for the expanded chicken yard. I'm taking advantage of another rainy day and heading out to pick up the decorative fence gate since garden work is not realistic today. I should be able to get all the wire hung and the gate attached tomorrow. The cucumbers and squash plants are still looking good. My carrot seedlings are definitely coming up. There's a couple of additional asparagus spears coming up also. To my relief my fig tree is developing more leaf buds. I think I forgot to mention this yesterday but my large bowl planter of impatiens that overwintered in the sunroom has flower buds on it. It's still too cool to put outside, but they are doing well inside. My mini mower weed trimmer is corded @NewBoots, however they do make a rechargeable battery operated version. Try googling this:

BLACK+DECKER 12 in. 20V MAX Lithium-Ion Cordless 3-in-1 String Trimmer/Edger/Mower with (2) 2.0Ah Batteries and Charger Included​

Black& Decker make pretty good products that are durable and user friendly.

I have that, and I am not exactly sorry I bought it, but I prefer the trimmer alone. It’s heavier than my other trimmer, and doesn’t stay in the base. I actually would have returned it, but when you realize how much it costs for the batteries, I was very happy to have two additional batteries for the other trimmer. The string too. Believe it or not, you can buy B&D trimmers in-store, but they don’t sell the string.

 

[jerryse]

What will they cross with?

Butternut will cross with Dickinson pumpkin ( canning factory pumpkin ) and long butternut type once called Tahiatian melon squash . Not sure what they are calling it these days . Any other Moschata group squash . You likely are not growing any . The Pepo group has the most commonly grown squash .

 

[Sueby]

@NewBoots thank you for sharing the pics. Your garden looks fantastic. I will have to get myself a bee (& probably a bug) house, I love it! I have only been here a few years so I'm still working on adding stuff for the bees. DH still shakes his head when we talk about how I over seeded the whole back lawn with clover, unbeknownst to him at the time.

& my gooseberry just shot out a runner & I keep meaning to google if I can dig it up & plant it in another spot. I feel like I can. This is the first year my gooseberry has flowers, I can't wait.

I saw both my first bee & hummingbirds of the season yesterday. It's on now!

It's raining all day today so nothing happening here.

 

[jerryse]

Ok on squash Territorial seed list the group their squash are in . The long one goes by Tromboncino and they have a Autum Frost in the moschata group . Seed Savers Exchange has a very good listing of varieties in their groups but I do not know where my yearbook is right now .

 

[BReeder!]

my gooseberry just shot out a runner & I keep meaning to google if I can dig it up & plant it in another spot.

I planted my first ever gooseberry this year just a few days ago. It's a Hinnomaki red. I did not know they put out runners. That's fine though. I'll gladly propagate a few more in the future then.

 

[WthrLady]

Just spent an hour working in the greenhouse and in the garden. Man, pollen levels are HIGH. Between the congestion of that, smoke in the air, and the crappy lungs Covid left me with, the garden was a chore. There's NO Wind so everyone is burning like mad before planting starts this week.

I moved 50 bags of damp, heavy mulch to their "knife goes in, guts come out" spot in the garden. Heavy lifting and walking, but very poofing. It's only in the 60s, but without that wind, the sun is like a magnifying glass. (The air is DRY.)

I'll take a hydration break inside for a bit, and then mask up and go cut some bags open and dump. Take another good break and MAYBE take the rake to the piles. (@BReeder! I get a HORRIBLE sinus infection when I move around mulch and compost, and sometimes a lung infection to boot from all the mold spores in there. JUST a thought. If you go in to the DR. make sure you let him know you've been playing in the mulch, dirt, and compost.)

It looked like I needed 5 more bags. I checked my notes. YUP. 55 bags. I only bought 50. So next trip to town. But the missing bags go right by the gate, so I'll drive up and just roll them out of the truck.

4 trays of marigold starts are all that are left in the starting shed, another few days and I'll move them out. The 4 remaining trays of tomato starts are going to the greenhouse today, so I can start putting away all the seeding trays and boxes on those empty shelves.

I can't wait to start all the seeding, but I sure am glad to see it in the rear-view mirror.

I need room in the greenhouse so the onion starts, and horseradish is being kicked out.

Have a great day all. Go get dirty.

 

[WthrLady]

H-E- double hockey sticks.

 

[BReeder!]

H-E- double hockey sticks.View attachment 2641150

Oak pollen was really bad a month ago on our way to and from Florida, particularly in TN. Our minivan was covered in a layer of the green powder. I didn't know what it was at first and then we stopped for gas and I got a look at the stuff and sure enough it was pollen. We could see it blowing like smoke from the woods along the side of the road. Fortunately, it didn't seem to bother our allergies. DW is allergic to mold (and hating the wet conditions we have right now). I think I have a grass allergy of some sort. I get bad in the Fall usually and just a bit in the Spring.

 

[TJAnonymous]

old greek recipe for flu:

1 tsp of corn starch
1 cup of milk
little sugar

boil it till you see bubbles and drink it as hot as you can stand it. cough can be gone the same day.

Old Redneck recipe for the flu:

Whiskey.

 

[TJAnonymous]

Could the soil in the duck area have been too acidic from duck grease?

Maybe....I figured that maybe there was a drainage issue or that it was too wet which is why I dug it up and moved it to a raised bed in the garden. In the raised bed I used new soil and added lots of fresh, black compost and some 10-10-10 fertilizer. I also put a thick layer of pine mulch around the base to ensure the soil retained moisture.

Didn't help. The leaves have all slowly died one by one. I looked at it briefly this morning when I went down to the garden. There are maybe 2-3 clumps of green leaves left on it. Each clump has 3-4 individual leaves. All of them are wilted and browning. I looked closely at the leaves to see if maybe there's evidence of a virus or something. Didn't see anything that sticks out.... I checked the trunk and branches for any obvious canker or whatever. Nada. I really have no idea why it is being so finicky.

Once the rain stops, I will try to prune it down to basically the trunk and see if it sends out new branches... I don't know what else to do with it.

If my county extension coordinator was more communicative, I'd send them pictures and see what they think is causing it. But every time I ask her something, she gets snooty. She's supposed to be a tree expert.... But I get the feeling she doesn't want to help me or answer questions any time I've talked to her.