Fall Planting

I'm not really into planting bulbs.  I have enough lilies about to keep me in bulbs for the year.  I never got into tulips and the like.  I guess they are just too ephemeral - a quick splash of color in the late spring, followed by months of withered leaves.  I think I prefer plants that take their time and stay around a while (I still have stella d'oro lilies flowering!).

The only bulbs I plant are garlic bulbs.  Today was the day.  We filled one of the deep beds in the raised bed garden.  I covered it with a bunch of mulched leaves.  It will be about 9 months before we get garlic - but what a great scent once we pick it (assuming you like garlic).

I have turned over most the empty beds and hit them with a dose of calcium / calcium sulfate pellets.  I swear by the stuff.  We had a lot of fruit on our plants this year, and no blossom rot in our tomatoes!

As always, we have one tree that hasn't dropped it's leaves.  It is the same every year.  Luckily, there is still a little room in the compost bins for it's leaves.

I have to cut back the peonies and four o'clocks.  I also need to rake out the shade garden and hosta beds once they are thoroughly withered.  Not much yard work left.  We are moving into the quiet time around here...

Changes

I have been traveling a lot lately, and need to catch up on yard work.  Our autumn is nearly over, the majority of the leaves are off the trees and in the compost bins.  Morning frosts have shut down almost all the garden plants (except for the spinach, collards and arugula).

We have had cold and windy days with scattered rain.  I cleaned out the gutters, collected seeds pods from the green bean plants for next year, pulled the bean, zucchini, and peppers plants (into the compost bins they went), trimmed some bushes, put away lawn furniture, did a mowing (the final one for the year I think), trimmed the grass, ran the string trimmer dry, cleaned up the porch, brought the potted herbs inside.  Just getting ready for the coming winter.

We have been running the pellet stove almost continuously.  It is getting colder, and the days are getting shorter.

I really sense the change this year as I recently came back from New Zealand and Australia.  It is spring in those southern parts of the world.  Time to enjoy the warmth there...

Auckland Harbor and the Botanical Gardens!  Cherry blossoms, quiet paths, spring flowers...

 

Sydney, Australia!  Opera House, Botanical Gardens, colorful flowers, tropical birds... 

You Say Potato, I Say Tomato

Thursday night brought a lot of rain.  Localized flooding ensued.  The East Branch of the Owego is just 1/4 of a mile from our place.  The low-lying fields by the river were flooded . . .

Our creek was running high, but we had no flooding at our place.

The heavy rain knocked the plants in the garden around.  I had to re-stake the tomatoes, but we had no drops.  I finally got to pick a few . . .

Our plants are so laden with tomatoes that they a drooping right to the ground!  This is a calm before the tomato picking really gets going!

I decided to harvest the potatoes.  We had 16 plants (the results of 4 individual potatoes).  I figure we got about 50 pounds of potatoes.  Wow!

We have to let the potatoes dry out a bit, then we will pack the dusty potatoes away in bins and keep them in a cool, dark place.

We need to figure what we'll put in the potato beds for some fall crops.  Any suggestions?

All In

I guess gardening is like gambling.  You look at the odds, place your bets, see what you get.

We finished putting our plants into the vegetable beds last weekend.  Around these parts, we don't put our 'warm-weather' plants in until Memorial Day.

We expanded the garden this year.  We have about 200 square feet of beds.

We have potatoes (two varieties of red potatoes), carrots and garlic.

Green beans, spinach, herbs, bell peppers, scallions and hot peppers (red hot chili and cherry peppers).

Sugar snap peas, kale, basil (sweet and lemon), roma tomatoes.

Roma and golden pear tomatoes.

We also have thyme, lavender, sage and mint in various perennial beds.

We made our bet - we are now waiting to see how we did!

Deer Fence

We had a little trouble with deer last year.  They did some damage to a few of the tomatoes, and hit the green beans and radicchio.  They even ate some hostas and other flowering plants.  Their numbers are on the rise. I don't want to lose any more vegetables - especially as we expanded the beds this year.

The obvious solution is some deer fencing.  The problem was that I don't want to sink fence posts in the yard.  I hate the permanence of fence posts, and our 'soil' is nothing but rock and hard pan (the joys of being in a valley which had its origins with ancient glaciers).

My solution was to put metal fence posts into cinder blocks and secure them with concrete.  If I decide to move the fencing, I just pick up the blocks / posts.  I chose 5 foot posts and 5 foot deer fencing.  The fence wraps around three sides of the vegetable beds (about 100 feet of fencing).  I ran plastic coated wire around the tops of the fence, and secured the deer fencing (actually it is heavy-duty plastic netting) to the wire.  It took about three hours to put up the fencing (excluding time time to let the concrete cure).

I had to figure a simple way to make an opening in the fence.  I was thinking about some form of swinging gate, but realized the netting / fencing was pretty supple.  I just supported a portion of the netting on split rings, and allow it to slide on the wire.  It is secured on the side with clips  . . .

. . . but it can be easily opened to allow us in to work the beds.

The fencing is 5 feet high.  It won't stop the most determined deer, but it should be enough!

Wish us luck!

A Frosty Start...

Though we have had warm weather recently, a cold front came in late Sunday and had its way with the gardens.  The temperatures dropped below freezing last night.  We had a hard frost.  The grass was all covered in white.

The beds were frosty.  The potatoes were covered in white ice crystals.

Unfortunately, they did not make it through the thaw.  We lost them and the green beans.  The beans we will replant.

I hope the potatoes come back on their own . . .

One good aspect of the frost - the knotweed took a good hit.  I won't need to cut them back this week.

Good thing we didn't plant our warm weather plants yet!

Garden Progress

The gardens are really starting to come alive.  We have had great weather, and I have made the most of it.  I decided to replace the old arbor.  It was very rotted and had been pretty chewed up by carpenter ants.  I pulled out the silvery lace clematis and put in a smaller arbor.  We'll put is a new clematis soon.

I moved 2 yards of soil into the new beds.  These larger beds are for tomatoes.  The tomatoes and other warm weather plants will be going in the ground in a few weeks (still on the lookout for frost in these parts)!

The spinach I put in last fall made it through the winter fine.  We'll be harvesting some this weekend!

The kale has sprouted. So have the onions, carrots, sugar snap peas, and a few potatoes.  The green beans are very slow to emerge.  Time to start thinning some seedlings!

The trees are really starting to leaf.  Beautiful.

For those who follow my feeble adventures in the garden, you might remember that I pamper a lone trillium.  We have been caring for a single plant in the shade garden.  It is back this year - and it looks like it will bloom!  Wow - it took us 6 years to get to this state!

I'll do a little soil amendment work to some of the vegetable beds, break bead on weeding, mow the yard again, and finish the deer fence around the vegetable beds (we had a little problem with the deer last year - I hope the deer fence we use will work).

I hope you get outside and enjoy your gardens!

The Gardens are Going!

I'm back from a long business trip in Germany.  It was cold there.  It seems spring was as slow to come there as well as here.

Yesterday, I wanted to get some work done in the garden.  I decided to move some soil into one of the new raised beds so I could get the potatoes in.  We had snow flakes coming down while I was working.  Crazy!

The weather changed overnight, and it was beautiful and warm today.  I decided to turn over half the raised beds and put in the cold-tolerant plants.

I put in potatoes and carrots.  The garlic I planted last fall is coming in well!

The rhubarb is starting to come in.

We also planted our green beans, snap peas, kale and scallions.  I was happy to see the spinach I planted last fall made it through the winter and was coming in nicely.  We might have some fresh spinach in a few weeks!

The perennials are sprouting.  The daffodils and bleeding hearts are coming in.  Some of the hostas are also emerging!

Spring is coming in fast.  It is about time!

Spring has Arrived

The week started unsettled.  One minute it was sunny with a few sprinkles, next we had snow showers!

Even after the cold snow showers, I knew spring had arrived.  I saw worms squirming around the next morning.

That must be one reason the robins have come back!

The warm weather has found me out and about the yard.  There have been piles of sand and dirt by the driveway from the winter plows to be cleared, lots of fallen sticks about, remnants of snow to shovel off the decks.

We decided to expand the garden.  I put in more raised beds.  We also decided to put weed cloth all around the beds (more on that in a later post).  We'll have 2 beds for potatoes, a bed for garlic and carrots, 1 bed for basil, 4 beds for tomatoes, 2 beds for beans, spinach and kale, 1 bed for herbs, and a bed for chili peppers.

I moved the last of the wood pellets inside.  Our days of running the pellet stove are numbered.

It felt so good to be outside.  After several hours of work, I was tired. I sat by the creek for an hour enjoying the sun and watching the birds.

Welcome Spring!

Leaf Farmer

The maples are at peak and are dropping leaves in droves.

I am a leaf farmer.  I rake the leaves and put them into our compost bins.

Last year's compost is dark and rich.  Soon the last of it will be spread onto the garden beds.

The winds are predominantly from the north.  Our days barely hit 70 degF now, and we have to run the pellet stove to take the chill out of the house as we rise in the morning.

I hear the call of waterfowl.  Migrating mallards were down in the river today.

The scenery changes fast now.  I wonder what tomorrow will be like . . .