What did you do in the garden today?

[Molpet]

I have an incubator ready, but what I don't want is to have to get rid of roos. Sigh.

I mainly eat meat mutts cockerels and jakes. I'm not a fan of how CX are raised .
However it's much more expensive than store meats

 

[jerryse]

I have been clearing a new garden area. Cutting brush and burning. May turn the old garden into lawn. Blood sugar is good enough I had to reduce insulin. Activity burns sugar for fuel.

 

[TJAnonymous]

what about goats? my 3 girls have 3 male kids I wonder if my big boy will make boys only. some say yes, some no. any idea?

I haven't had that experience... I've had 2 sets of kids over the past 2 years through the same doe & buck. The first year she gave birth to a girl and boy (whom I wethered). The 2nd year she gave birth to 2 girls. This year I am giving her the season off and I've bred her first doe from 2 years ago to a new buckling that I picked up last spring. She isn't due until mid-June though... If she gives me any boys, I will probably sell them off rather than keep them.

I mostly got into this to get milk for soap and cheese but I haven't gotten around to getting a milk stand or teaching any of my girls to allow themselves to be milked. I intend to do that at some point...

 

[TJAnonymous]

I'm excited for the flowering plums! So cool. I hope they will be edible.

I am very excited to see it flowering since I read online that some trees grown from store bought fruit never produce anything... The 2nd tree hasn't flowered yet but it seems to be a week or so behind the other one as far as coming out of dormancy.

I did spray them all with Dormant oil and fungicide several weeks ago but I could have sworn that I was supposed to spray them again with something at bud swell... I seem to have missed that and since some of the flowers are open, I don't want to spray now because of pollinators. Honey bees out now looking for food

 

[TJAnonymous]

All I did yesterday was pour some water into the trays under the pepper plant pots to water them. They're all looking great, but I'm pretty sure I need to up-pot them one more time before they go into the garden. I haven't been brave enough to top the pepper plants yet. And I've had a box fan blowing on them most days, during light hours, to toughen them up and prevent disease.

Looks like all the cabbage seeds have sprouted, so I'll have to get out the scissors and thin them down to one plant per cell soon. And the red Russian kale seedlings are getting a little taller. I grew the kale plants from seeds I saved from last fall.

Still about a month before I'm planting my tomato seeds. I see no reason to put tomato plants into the ground until around June 1st. Pepper plants will go into the ground around the same time, but I want them to be as large as possible. They grow slower than tomato plants so they need an earlier head start. And the "summer" is relatively short here.

When they go in earlier than that the ground's too cool and the plants just sit there, dormant, and don't grow much at all. The tomato plant that came up volunteer in the garden last year produced well, and it had a late start.

Oh, and one of my chickens had a minor feather explosion last night. Haven't been getting many eggs lately...

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Looking at your big beautiful plants makes me realize how far behind I am in getting mine started! I just seeded mine at the end of last week and my last frost date is in 2 or 3 weeks!

 

[TJAnonymous]

Anyone have any suggestions for a good organic weed killer?

I have a crazy, invasive vining plant that keeps trying to invade my garden from the pasture. There's also some privet and wild raspberries over in that area.... I'm trying to kill it all off

BUT....

1. That area of the pasture slopes towards my pond which is about 100 ft away. I don't want to spray anything that will runoff into the pond.

2. I have my thornless blackberries in a bed adjacent to area I need to spray. I'm actually HOPING that the thornless blackberries will expand into that area eventually so I don't want to poison the soil for years....

I'm thinking about spraying some vinegar over there. I've seen suggestions to add salt online but I feel that might damage the soil for the blackberries. I've also seen suggestions to use boiling water but that spot is 200 - 300 ft from the house. Not sure I can safely get boiling water from here to there without hurting myself.

Any other suggestions?

 

[dirkandlorie]

Anyone have any suggestions for a good organic weed killer?

I have a crazy, invasive vining plant that keeps trying to invade my garden from the pasture. There's also some privet and wild raspberries over in that area.... I'm trying to kill it all off

BUT....

1. That area of the pasture slopes towards my pond which is about 100 ft away. I don't want to spray anything that will runoff into the pond.

2. I have my thornless blackberries in a bed adjacent to area I need to spray. I'm actually HOPING that the thornless blackberries will expand into that area eventually so I don't want to poison the soil for years....

I'm thinking about spraying some vinegar over there. I've seen suggestions to add salt online but I feel that might damage the soil for the blackberries. I've also seen suggestions to use boiling water but that spot is 200 - 300 ft from the house. Not sure I can safely get boiling water from here to there without hurting myself.

Any other suggestions?

You can always dig them all out by the roots. Its a big job, ask me how I know lol

 

[cj2024]

A couple of my okra plants looked pale, and some of their leaves were slightly curled. At first, I thought it was a nutrient deficiency, but I discovered that the underneath of the leaves was infested with tiny black bugs. I sprayed them with neem oil this morning. I hope they recover and catch up with the other okra plants. All of my okra plants had those tiny black bugs, but the ones that were stressing had a lot more.

I notice that the blue potatoes that I planted didn't have any bugs on them. I think the blue potato with blue leaves may be related to sweet potatoes. The bugs in my yard never bother my sweet potatoes like they do regular potatoes like Yukon Gold. I may be on to something; it would be amazing if my blue potatoes turn out to be bug resistant like my sweet potatoes.

 

[cj2024]

My miniature supermarket potatoes grew roots. I left them on a bed of moist vermiculite. I wasn't sure if they were sprayed with a root inhibiter. They look viable, so I planted them about 2 inches deep in my perlite tub and covered the perlite with pine shavings to prevent algae growth. I will leave the cover on until they sprout up.

I wonder if they will produce miniature potatoes or larger ones. I left a black plastic window cover on one corner, so I can see the root development. The rest of the clear tub is covered to prevent algae growth.

 

[5Australorpasaures]

Got my 5 varieties of hot peppers started and got the weep holes drilled in the 5 gal buckets that they'll be planted in. Wrapped the bottom of the chain link area with rabbit wire to keep Bugs Bunny out of DW's plot.