So far this year it's not the same as last year. Last year I had plenty of radishes, spinach and peas.  This year it's lettuce and beets.  I have always said that whatever the weather is for that particular year, its great for some things but not all and the next year its great for something else.

I did get the tomatoes in earlier this year, so we'll see when I start harvesting. Some of the plants have flowers as of today.

Last year I re-tried beets, snap peas and watermelon. The peas and beets were great and I even got some softball sized watermelon.  It appears that rabbits like watermelons???

I also expanded the vegetable garden last year about another 8 feet. The new area is where I am planting green beans 1, 2 & 3. We had some trees cut down that were shading the veggie garden, so I expanded.

Never ending cycle?

 Again, it's been awhile.

Radishes did well this year. Will be picking the last of them this week.

I need to pick spinach on the limited plants I have. The row with the black fabric mulch did way better than the other two but then it was so dry and I didn't water enough, so the best row suffered.  I will invest in more fabric mulch next year.

Tomatoes are planted. Sunflowers are planted. First beans are planted. Waiting for the peas to bloom. Potatoes are in pots. Planted some squash with more coming. Will be planting second beans in the next few days.

Had some trees cut down last fall (two were endangering the house) and two others were shading my garden. All four helped add sun to the garden.

Should have mulched my onions earlier, they're not looking great.

Greatest surprise this year is the foxglove I started from seed last year is magnificent!

Welcome Back?

It's been too long...

This years garden has been horrible compared to other years.  Each crop has been short lived and the squirrels are eating my ripe tomatoes and that's never happened before in the 17 years I have been gardening at this home.

I did finally get a leaf vacuum last fall from a family friend whose husband had passed away.  It works nicely as if the leaves were run over twice by a mower.  It's composted leaves are much cleaner (very few weeds in the mulch).

I still have tomato plants and carrots planted.  I'm not counting much on the carrots.  I haven't been tending them much as I probably should have. 

I conducted a potato experiment this past spring by putting potatoes in a large flower pot and keep burying the plant as it grows. I had three pots and we got one meal of small roasted potatoes.  Very tasty though.  I used Yukon Gold and was pleased.

The Golden Retriever in the photo alongside my profile was 14 years old when we said goodbye at Christmas two years ago.  But there are four other furry friends that are residents in my home.  Maybe one day I will share their photos.

I have two birdhouses in my back yard.  One is under the roof I put out over the back door and the other is on the back fence. My wife built it when she was a kid (her dad was going to throw it out).  I put it up and each house had at least two broods of House Wrens.

Update - May 24, 2011

I was busy in the garden this past weekend.  I picked some radishes but it looks like there won't be anymore.  I thinking they are starting to bolt.

 

Mulched the string beans and the sunflowers.

 

Trimmed most every tree in the yard so I would stop having to duck or hit my head when cutting the grass.

 

Pulled out two nearly dead shrubs from alongside the house.

 

Waited until noon and cut the grass.

 

Started squash and eggplant seeds.

Notes for May 9, 2011

Saturday I used a borrowed plate tamper and flattened my clumpy topsoil that I placed last week.  Spread some grass seed and watered it.

 

Cut the grass in the front yard.

 

Planted a row of string beans.

 

Transplanted volunteer sunflower plants to a row where I want them.  Transplanted volunteer marigolds to flower pots for later planting.

 

On Sunday...

 

Cut the grass in the backyard.

 

Watered the front yard grass seed.

 

Transplanted a sunflower to replace a transplanted sunflower that didn't survive.

 

Transplanted more marigolds to flower pots.

 

Installed the fencing for cucumber vining.

 

Started 40 cucumber seeds.

May already?

I took good Friday off from work and caught up on the leaves areound the house.

 

Had some topsoil delivered on Saturday and moved it Saturday and Sunday.  Fairly sore today but I used a back support belt so I am not hurting just muscle soreness in my thighs.

 

Looks like the spinach this year is a total flop.  A total of five plants in four rows.  Time to plant a row of green beans anyway.  I also need to start the seeds for the cucumbers and the sunflowers.

 

Planted the easter flower bulbs.

Notes for April 18, 2011

Last week on Monday evening, we had daytime temperatures near 80 and so it was just downright pleasant to work outside after dinner in the limited daylight. So I had a plan and I stuck to it. My plan was only to clear the winter wind blown leaves from another flower bed (since they were about 6 inches deep at one end). I pulled the leaves out and ran them over with the mower several times and then bagged them with the mower. I bagged three very heavy mower bags full. While I was clearing the leaves from the garden, I noticed our year old beagle playing around (on the other side of the fence from where I was working). When I looked a second time, I knew I had to investigate what he had.

He had this little two inch creature and was playing/toying with it like a cat. We think its a vole. Under the leaves were all sorts of habitat trails, so I gues I disturbed him/her from their wintering home.

Tuesday it rained and on Wednesday I emptied 1.0 inches from the rain gauge.

Friday I noticed the radishes starting to push up through the ground.

Saturday it rained and I emptied 2.3 inches from the rain gauge on Sunday. I also noticed the radishes were no longer pushing but were now exposed and the "pushed" ground was washed down.

Finally... progress

This weekend was finally productive...

Saturday...

Finally got the veggie garden tilled. Added 50 pounds of bone meal, 50 pounds of lime, 15 gallons of wood ashes and 340 gallons of 17 month old composted leaves.  Rototiller started on the second pull!

Sunday...

 I planted two rows of radishes, four rows of spinach and one row of romaine lettuce.  Since I went a little excessive with the leaves, I ended up having to sift the soil for covering the seeds otherwise the leaves would be blocking the germination.

After planting, I cleaned out the leaves from three flower beds and plan to gather up the leaves with the mower tomorrow.

Peppers are doing better

I was really getting started to get depressed and thought I was going to have to order plants again.  So I changed my methods and all have sprouted.  I was watering twice a day and I started to give up and said the heck with it and only watered once a day and the rest sprouted!  So now I have a pepper seedling growing in each pot!

Things are going slow...

The last few weekends its either been unseasonably cold or raining. This weekend I am under the weather (pun intended). So I am taking it easy on the laborious work still required to get my yard ready for Spring. Yesterday I did plant my onions but I still haven't tilled the main veggie garden. So much for early radishes.


Here are the daffodils that I transplanted along the back fence. Of course some of you might say there are still leaves to rake behind the daffs or a fence post that needs replacing.

Here are the daffs I planted along my veggie garden. The chicken wire in the front is the fence I put up last week to keep my dogs out of the onion patch. As you can see the veggie garden has been mowed and is ready for tilling.



Here are my tomato seedlings and my setup.

And here are my pepper seedlings.

Dismal, I know, but I have seven with growth (out of 12). Two have doubles, so hopefully I can transplant them. One of the cups you can read "NA" which stands for "New Ace" variety.

I am not planning for much today if anything but trying to keep from getting worse. The headache, stuffy runny nose is enough.

Winter holds on?

Winter came back this week, making it uncomfortable to work outside so not much got done this weekend.  I did however get something done outside Sunday afternoon.  Mainly out of necessity.  Two of our dogs have been digging holes in my onion patch looking for the bone I buried (in the form of bone meal).  So I looked in the shed and I did have a couple of partial rolls of chicken wire and luckily I had one that was long enough and fenced in my onion patch.

 

All but one of my tomato seedlings have sprouted (one cell did not germinate at all).  But since I planted two seeds per cell, I have plenty extra to transplant to the empty cell.

 

I am again struggling with the pepper seeds.  I have them in the peat pots and in an old baking pan on top of the warming mat.  I have been watering them twice a day and I have only one germinating so far.  Two years ago when I first used the mat and a plastic six pack, I think I had them all germinating in 10 days (today is day 15).  Which just makes me more frustrated because I have poor luck getting peppers before September.  And I have been trying to grow early varieties (but you can't get them in the store as plants).

 

And the family is busy next weekend (at least Friday and Saturday) leaving me to work outside but if you look at the forecast... I will be working inside again instead of outside in the rain...(I know its still several days away and it will probably change 6 times before Friday, but its still depressing).

week 2 Part 2?

As expected I never did make it outside on Sunday.  There was just too much to do inside that needed to get done.

 

As you can see I have a golden retriever.  We also have two other dogs.  Late last Spring we adopted a beagle puppy from a beagle rescue society.  And right before Christmas we inherited an older corgi mix dog from a friend of the family who had a stroke and could no longer take care of the dog (my wife and I were designated godparents a few years earlier).  So every night is a three dog night (pun intended).  Anyway, Saturday evening I had to chase the two smaller dogs out of my onion patch SEVERAL times (luckily I hadn't planted the onions yet).  Apparently they were looking for the bone I buried.  But of course they didn't find one but they dug a bunch of holes and found only BONE MEAL!  Sunday I kept checking on them and it appears they either got the message to stay out of that garden or they got tired of trying to find the bone?  I was thinking that if they were in it again on Sunday I may have to put up a better fence around the onions.

 

The daffodils are in a strong bloom right now and the forsythia are starting to bud.

 

Next time I am at the farm/garden center to get dog food, I will also get a couple of air filters and a new blade for the mower.  Since I use my mower to mulch leaves, the blade is always worn down enough to make me think that sharpening isn't really an option.

 

This next weekend I hope to turn the veggie garden, plant the onions and mulch some more leaves piled up in various places in the yard.  If I get a nice evening I may get an earlier start but I have some indoor repairs to work on this week as well, and the weather looks to be cooler again so an evening outside appears unlikely at this point.

 

On the agenda as well this Spring...

 

We got a new well installed back in November and I need to get some topsoil to fill in the truck ruts.  That will be the next priority after the radishes and spinach are planted.

 

I need to get on the roof and clean the gutters and replace the hardware store gutter covers which work fairly well but some of them are old and need replacing.  I don't think the gutters are too clogged.  They were once before, and it was then that I noticed that the gutters would drip for several days after a rain.  They aren't dripping like that now.

 

My tomato seeds are starting to sprout.

week 2 part1?

Week two and I am sore already.  Not sure if I will do much (if anything) tomorrow.  Couldn't get started until the afternoon today but I feel good about what I got done.  I bought some bone meal and added bone meal, wood ashes and leaves to the onion patch and turned it.  I bought the onion sets yesterday on the way home from work.  I might plant them tomorrow.  After that I ran the mower over the leaves that fell in the veggie garden.  Pull, pull, snap went the mower cord. So I had to fix the mower first.  I thought that running the tiller after that would be too much.  After that I had my son help me take down the Christmas lights off the front of the house. Then I raked out most of the leaves from two flower beds and mulched them fine and then bagged them and put them in the finely mulched pile (to be used as mulch and fertilizer). Then my body had had enough and I stopped for the day.

New Season 2011

Yes, it has been too long. I have another hobby and that has taken the place of writing.  I have been researching the family tree but the garden has started its call.

 

Yesterday was my birthday and on Saturday my wife and I went to the Philadelphia Flower show.  I have wanted to go for years and finally did.  Now that I have done it, I don't have to go again.  About half was displays and the other half was vendors.  It was crowded especially when people have to take a picture of their friend in front of some flowers etc and you have to walk around the person who has backed up to take their picture. Grrr.

 

Sunday afternoon I did work outside for a little while.  I went around the yard and picked up the branches that fell during the winter.

 

Then I came inside and started the tomato and pepper seeds.  I started three varieties of peppers (New Ace, Fat N Sassy, and Parks whopper).  I planted the seeds in the cardboard/peat pots so I won't disturb the roots when I transplant so I can just plant the whole thing.  The pepper pots are sitting on a seed growing heating mat and under a grow light.

 

I have four different varieties of tomatoes seeds planted (Celebrity, Early Girl, Juliette and Park's Whopper).  They are also in peat pots and under grow lights.

 

Next weekend I hope to get started in the garden and till it and maybe even plant onions.  I have to get the onions first as well as a large bag of bone meal.  I already have three 5 gallon buckets of wood ashes (from an aunt and uncle).  I think I even have some left over from last year.  So I will add wood ashes, bone meal and composted leaves to the garden and till it.  This year I have a composted pile of leaves that I didn't use last year so I may use that instead of the pile of finely mulched leaves.  Speaking of leaves I have plenty more to pick up.  I wish I had one more weekend last fall to clean up the leaves and of course the winter winds brings in a bunch more.  I have some daffodils wondering when I am going to take off their blanket of leaves.  I also have some in bloom up next to the house.

 

I did hear the spring peepers one night last week, so its not too far away now.

Notes for June 28, 2010

Yesterday I picked my first green beans of the season and planted the third.   Picked up storm debris (Thursday evening knocked off the top of a Sassafras tree).   Finished mulching the vegetable garden.  I had to wait until the rest of the tomatoes and cucumbers were well above the ground.   I have cucumbers beginning to form.   Transplanted four volunteer tomato plants into places where others along stakes were not growing as well.  The volunteers were at least twice the size and most of them had baby tomatoes already wehre the "replaced" plants didn't even have flowers yet.   I have cosmos that I planted along the veggie fence beginnning to bloom and some of my sunflowere are about three feet tall.

Notes for June 10, 2010

Last weekend I picked the last of my spinach since it was producing more pollen than leaves (that and I needed the room to prevent shading of other plants).  I also staked all of my tomato and pepper plants.  None are tied yet but at least the stakes are there so I won't damage the roots if I were to put the stakes in later when each plant needs a stake.   Then I started mulching.  I mulched again on Tuesday night since it was pleasant outside and I wouldn't sweat to death.  I got all of the vegetable mulching done that I could.  I have to mulch the rest when the plants are big enough that they won't get buried after mulching.   Yesterday we got some rain and this morning I emptied 0.45" from the rain gauge.

Notes for June 1, 2010

Saturday I finally got out to the garden.  I planted tomatoes, cucumbers and peppers.  I also planted a second planting of beans.  The cucumbers I started from seed and I think I lost only one plant while transplanting the cardboard pots (I heard the stem go snap as I planted it).  I planted about 32 of my own tomato plants and I planted about 24 more of the volunteer plants.  I really had to, the volunteers were about 3x larger than my plants.  I had only one pepper plant germinate so I ordered some online to get the shorter season variety.  I had to do alot of weeding before I could get any planting done.  I ended up working about 4 hours after my body said stop.   I picked some more spinach too.  I finished picking the radishes last week.   Now I have lots of mulching to do.

Notes for May 5, 2010

Yes I know I have been delinquent.  But I have a new hobby and it isn't weather dependent.  I have gotten the genealogy bug and have been researching my family tree.  But I have been doing things outside too.   Last week during the week I did cut the grass (or lower the weeds) after I replaced the lawn mower blade, air filter and the spark plug (my annual maintenance).  On Saturday I did start some additional seeds.  I planted a row of string beans and started the following seeds in peat pots: Sunflower, cucumber, marigolds (three varitities, yellow fo the vegetable garden, small mixed and large mixed for the yard), and zinnias.  The zinnias and marigolds are outside and the cukes and sunflowers are inside.   I forgot to start some purple Morning Glory seeds that some one gave me so I will probably start them this weekend.  On my list for this weekend I will probably also set up my cucumber fences (although I won't be planting for a couple of more weeks, I have the time now).   In bloom right now are the azaleas, rhododendrons and the iris have started.  I even noticed that the two new iris I planted last fall are going to bloom!   The family has adopted another dog and now we have a beagle puppy.  Sunday evening when I went to water the garden, he was helping himself to a drink.  The wife said I definitely have an outside companion.  The golden retriever doesn't like to stay out side too long unless you are just sitting on the porch and he'll sit beside you.

Notes for April 28, 2010

I emptied 1.5" from the rain gauge yesterday.   Last night I did the annual tune up of the lawn mower (if you could call it a tune up).  I changed the blade, the air filter and the spark plug.   Then I thinned the spinach and thinned the radishes a second time.   Then I started digging up the free lancing marigolds and cosmos in my veggie garden for later trans planting.    I plan on cutting the grass tonight.   Satuday I am planning to start some annual seeds, plant a row of beans and start sunflowers and cukes in peat pots.

Notes for April 12, 2010

Friday I emptied 0.5" from the rain gauge.   Saturday morning I made a trip to a local garden center and purchased two small bags of bulb tone and a small bag of holly tone. When I got home, the first thing I did was to pick up the piles of branches that I reaked up earlier this week.  Then I mulched the onions since the stems were on average about 5" long.  Then I planted the Easter tulips and hyacinths and the two azaleas, mixing in the fertilizers and a healthy handful of ground up leaves.  After planting, I actually had to cut the grass in the back yard or as I like to say, I lowered the weeds.   My radishes have germinated nicely and will have to be thinned one night this week.  The spinach has also started to sprout.  Indoors the tomatoes have started to sprout.