Frost In June, Seriously?

I am not thrilled to see the frost in the garden this morning.  It's June for Pete's sake!  It is a very lucky thing that I didn't get around to planting my tomatoes and basil yet.

Some spots have frost, others do not.  Clouds of vapor hang in the air in spots.  This one over the grass is filmy, but wherever water is, the river, ponds, puddles vapor rises like steam from a hot cup of coffee.

Some places the grass is white with frost.. Other places close by look to be frost free.

It must have been colder earlier because the frost on top of the car is frozen, but on the windshield ice is starting to melt and run down the glass.  There is nothing for it but to find the ice scraper and dig out my fuzzy purple hat.  This is a YMCA day.  I hope by the time Ed and I get back home all of this will be like a dream and June weather will have returned.  Maybe the basil and tomatoes will get planted tomorrow!

Still Growing

Mother Nature has finally and firmly taught us that she abhors bare soil.  If we do not plant something, then she will see that plants grow to cover the ground.  Her choice is always pernicious weeds.  To keep our garden soil somewhat clear of weeds we plant buckwheat.  Squash formerly grew in the area behind the mammoth pink chrysanthemums.  Grass clippings were spread under the young squash plants so the bed was relatively weed free when the squash played out.  The squash and clippings were removed, then a quick session with the stone fork left the bed ready for seed.  Compost was applied thinly over the seed.  Timely rain followed our feeble watering attempts with the sprinkling can.  A thick buckwheat cover will prevent weed seed germination.  All that remains to be done here is to cut down the buckwheat at the appropriate time.  I always wait too long as the bees heavily feed on buckwheat flowers.  Few food sources remain for the bees so I leave the buckwheat flowers standing.

More potatoes were harvested today to make space for the last lettuce planting.  We start all of our lettuce in these plastic pots for several reasons.  Lettuce seed will not germinate if the soil is warm.  Our cool basement remains at a temperature lettuce seed is comfortable with.  Dimming eyesight and fumble fingers combine to make planting individual seeds while kneeling on the ground unlikely.  Working at a high bench improves the single seed odds but we still need to thin before transplanting out.  Thinning at a high bench beats thinning at ground level every time.  This is another example of modify and adjust.

Dividing bearded iris still frightens me.  Breaking them apart and cutting the leaves to a short fan seems deadly to me.  Shallowly planted so that the rhizome burns daily in the sun also seems unwise to me.  Reluctantly, the described process was followed and this shows their condition today.  Bright sturdy generous new growth has these plants well conditioned for next season's display.  I simply must toughen up.

Here is a picture of a dismal failure that directly followed my mistake.  Tomato seeds are started indoors here way too early.  Transplanted into one gallon pots, the plants were outside growing on early warm days.  When severe weather threatened, the pots were moved indoors.  After our June 1st frost free date, the plants were set out in the garden.  This is when it all went wrong.  I know that soil splash on tomato leaves is deadly.  When the pots were inverted to shake the plants free, the covering straw mulch failed to hold all of the soil.  Some soil rained down on the undersides of the leaves.  Trouble was expected but we had no idea how to prevent it.  Slowly the leaves blackened starting at the bottom of the plant.  We still enjoyed a bountiful tomato harvest but fresh tomato season has ended one month early for us this year.  A plastic lid has been found that can be modified to slip around a stem.  Allowing the plant to slip from the pot onto  that lid might contain the soil away from the underside of the leaves.  We also need fewer plants.  Sixteen tomato plants supply way more fresh tomatoes than two people can eat.  We have had enough  bacon, lettuce and tomato sandwiches until next year..

Now This Is Spring In The Garden!

We did have frost this morning, but the rest of the day was perfect for being in the garden.  It's sunny, but not too hot.  Ed's lettuce that got zapped by hard frost before is making a comeback.  Even the plants that I cut back hard are making a comeback.  The plants are making new little leaves.

Ed's tomato plants are big enough to spend the nice part of the day outside. Soon they can be moved to bigger pots.

Ed spent the day working on a project he had hoped to finish last fall. Today he moved the clove currants. Tomorrow I think he will have the bed finished!  That  will be a great feeling.   Actually every thing that we can get done makes such a big improvement  a wonderful feeling of accomplishment comes with the effort!

Ed's bloodroot not only came back this year, but it multiplied over the winter.   We have to keep an eye on it. The plants flower and go to seed very quickly. Ed's watering after the plants went dormant paid off.

The frost didn't make much of an impression on my squirrel corn and in spite of its name it didn't get eaten either.  The plant looks great!

We have some gorgeous blue Siberian squill growing in a place where we did not know we had planted it.  It will take some patience to separate it from the weeds but who could not love those gorgeous blue flowers?

I saved the best surprise for last.  I had circle onions also known as curly chives for years.  Somehow in the last couple of years we lost them.  I was sure they were gone for good, but today I walked by this plant and stopped  dead in my tracks.  There way down at the end of one of the garden beds, growing in the stone path was a curly chive plant.  How it could be growing there so far away from where they had been planted before is a mystery to me, but I am thrilled to have noticed it.  Imagine if it had been pulled as a weed by mistake.  It will be moved to a nice spot and well marked.  Now that we have been reunited, I don't want to lose them again. Maybe if I'm lucky they will send up a nice purple flower for me come July.

October Tomatoes

In recent years our tomato crop has ended just as it was getting started.  The name late blight is a misnomer here as the crop is ruined by it just as the first tomatoes are starting to ripen.  This year this scourge past us by and we have been enjoying fresh tomatoes for more than two months.  The remains of our plants appear dreadful but the plants continue to produce ripe fruit.

Two separate events conspired to kill these leaves.  Some unknown to us wilt first appeared on the lower leaves of the two plants next to uncovered soil.  Once underway it spread to other plants.  Pruning out the diseased leaves was likely futile as the nasty spores fell from the sick leaves on to the healthy leaves when disturbed.  This wilt does not harm the fruit but it does make sad looking plants.

Our September frost was light and patchy.  It ended the top leaves of the nearby squash and took out the mid section of the tomatoes.  Here the frost pours downhill and swirls around obstacles killing here and there while leaving some places untouched.  The frost was not severe enough to damage the actual tomatoes.

These unusual events have allowed us to compare the four different varieties of tomatoes planted.  These Ferline's are the best of the lot.  The tomatoes are rather small but are the most trouble free.  Their catalog description identifies them as having been developed to be disease resistant.  We find that description accurate.  Italian Goliath's came in second here.  They are the most robust plants and their fruit is larger but we have experienced some problems with diseased tomatoes.  Better Boy comes in next to last.  The large tomatoes split at the top providing a route for rot.  Uneven water supply causes these splits but since we do not have any control over the rain or lack of it, we simply discard either the top half or the entire tomato.  These large slices do completely deliciously cover a sandwich.  Siberian was a loser for us.  Plant growth habit featured multiple tops that could not be controlled  by pruning.  These tomatoes were small and unpleasant.  This variety will not appear here next year.  We will need to find a replacement.

The end of the season can be a sad event.  Our tomato harvest spanned more that two months and was bountiful.  We will with no regret wait for next year's harvest for our next fresh tomato.

Beating Back The Wild Things

It's a plain fact that we are being overrun here.  All the rain has served to keep us out of the garden and it has given the weeds the opportunity to run wild in the garden.   Somewhere hidden beneath the grass and other weeds are Ed's beautiful planting beds and  stone paths.  Ed worked on this area today.  He plans to replant peas here.  We have the seed and sometimes we can get a late crop of peas if the weather cooperates.

I chose  to search for desirable plants in this bed .  I uncovered some dianthus, wood betony, closed gentian and a hollyhock.  I caught sight of Ed's rose, but I did not get it uncovered yet. Digging out the grass is slow work and looking for hidden treasures slows progress down even more.

It's not only the weeds that have gone wild.  The trumpet vine has completely engulfed the golden glows.  A few small golden flowers have managed to break through the vines to catch some sunlight anyway.  Other plants in the area of the trumpet vine have not been seen at all.

Trumpet vine tendrils are marching across  our gravel parking spot.  New runners are popping up in the gravel at some distance from the original plant.  One can't help feeling that parking there for too long will result in a car covered with vines.  However, I can't deny that I love to watch the hummingbirds  zip around the trumpet vine chasing each other at dizzying speeds.  As long as the red flowers that they find so attractive are blooming, this vine gone wild is safe.

Still there is great beauty in the garden.  This Salmon star lily and its tantalizing fragrance is so attractive to a hummingbird moth that I was actually able to get this great picture.  We feast on fresh summer squash, basil, lettuce and the now ripening tomatoes.  Today in the garden was great!

Blasted Baby Bunnies!

Take a look at my carefully caged tomato plant. If you do not recognize a tomato plant stripped of its leaves, the branched stalk in the foreground is the tomato plant. I used to like baby bunnies. They are so soft,so furry, so adorable ,so cute. Let me tell you cute wears off! My poor tomato plants have had a tough year as it is with frosts, rain with no sun, and now baby bunnies. The evidence is irrefutable. Baby bunny berries don't lie. Plus I have seen the bunnies shoot through the wire cages like they did not exist. Never thought a 2in. by 4in. hole would be no barrier for rabbits.

Those blasted baby bunnies are stripping leaves from my scented geraniums to make their little nests which makes them even less cute . Most rabbits settle for nests made from grass, but not these little bunnies. Rose and peppermint scented leaves seem to be necessary to make them happy.

Time is on my side I guess. Soon these baby bunnies will be too big to fit through the cage wire, but I can see myself now waiting in line at the farmers' market to buy a decent tomato.

Plant Eviction

It's after Memorial Day and the catnip plant in this bed has lost its lease. It's beautiful mound of leaves has been cut and are spread out on a sheet to dry in preparation for their next assignment as stuffing in catnip mice. The roots are headed to the compost. Beans and tomatoes are the new tenants for this garden bed.

Oh yes, about that other plant, a hollyhock that will bloom this year. It gets to stay.

Now the beans and tomatoes are tucked in their bed. The straw mulch is on my cherry tomatoes and yellow pear shaped tomatoes. I love to mix them in a salad for the color combination!

Inside the cage are asparagus beans on the end wire and yellow, Italian, and green beans in the center. We'll have to access the plants from one side because of the hollyhock, but I love flowers mixed in with the vegetables.

Ignore the man behind the curtain, I mean on the right of this picture. He's the magician that makes this garden happen.