The Dawg Patch

Texgal
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Re: The Dawg Patch

#421

Post: # 44878Unread post Texgal
Tue Apr 13, 2021 9:36 pm

Excited to see you’re trying Yod Fah too [mention]GoDawgs[/mention] . I got my seeds in today and was scouring the internet for info before coming here. Probably late for me in 8b to start them but I figure I will as experiment and make notes on what not to do, lol. Enjoy your reports, keep up the great work! It’s fun to see what you’re up to.
~ Emmie ~

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GoDawgs
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Pepper Planting Time

#422

Post: # 44897Unread post GoDawgs
Wed Apr 14, 2021 12:45 pm

Thanks, [mention]Texgal[/mention] for the encouragement! And also for the reminder to cut more Yod Fah as I saw some ready this morning. I have to hang my head in shame and admit that I never cooked the first ones I cut. :o They got pushed to the back of the refrigerator and out of sight, out of mind. By the time I found them they were all limp. :oops:

A few weeks ago I posted about topping pepper plants to make them bush and thus produce more. They're starting to push out new branches from the leaf axils and new leaders.

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Yesterday I got the planting holes prepped and this evening after it cools down, the peppers will be planted out. The sweet peppers include 2 Gypsy, 1 Red Marconi and 1 Margaret's. On the spicier side are 4 Jalapeno, 1 Prairie Spice and 1 Rooster Spur.

This morning I finished forking a bed for corn and right before lunch planted 'Seneca Sunrise', a 67 day corn, in 7 circles. This time I planted enough seed so that after germination it can be thinned to 8 plants per hill. This evening I'd like to get the second corn bed planted with Early Pink Popcorn, a 100 day variety and also new to me.

The tomatoes under the lights are ready to be hardened off and planted out. Some of them are touching lights raised as high as they can go so out to the porch the tallest ones went. They're on the bottom shelf where the ballisters from the porch railing can give them some filtered sun.

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I need to round up some replacement pallets that the tomato buckets will stand on and also cardboard boxes that can be flattened for covering the ground under the pallets. That works really well to keep out weeds and ants. The local liquor store is always glad to give cartons away so I need to call them this afternoon and see what they have.

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bower
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Re: The Dawg Patch

#423

Post: # 44928Unread post bower
Thu Apr 15, 2021 6:39 am

The Chinese broccoli I've been growing for a couple of years is a white flowered Kailan, but otherwise should be similar to the Yod Fah. They are a little bit sweeter than a standard broccoli and a notch more tender stems as well... just mouth watering delicious.
I hope the Yod Fah is anywhere near as good! :)
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GoDawgs
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Pepper Planting and Corn Quandry

#424

Post: # 45014Unread post GoDawgs
Fri Apr 16, 2021 3:33 pm

Spring is moving along. The moon is right for above ground things so the ten peppers were planted out two days ago. They’ve been hardened off well and don’t seem to mind nights of mid/upper 40’s for the next several days. Planted out were 2 Gypsy, 4 Jalapeno M, 1 Margaret’s (a freebie), 1 Prairie Spice, 1 Red Marconi and 1 Rooster Spur.

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Yesterday I cut off all the frost burned foliage from the brassicas and other than the most recently planted out things, most will do fine. Those are various stages of cabbages towards the left with two each of collards and kale to the right. The collards and kale laughed at the low temps and didn’t suffer a lick of trouble.

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On the other side of the garden are the broccoli and cauliflower plants, a bed of Wando peas and the garlic. There are a few cauliflower buttons forming but not many leaves left to cover them so I’ll have to rig up something to do that. I cut the first two broccoli heads last evening.

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Below those beds is the bed where sweet potatoes will be planted (with a few unintended garlic plants), the second pea bed and the bed where I planted the Seneca Sunrise corn two days ago.

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Since the temps have also cooled the soil from 70 down to 60, this morning I put a plastic tunnel over the corn bed that was just planted to see about raising up the soil temp and speeding up germination. I’ve never done that before so we’ll see. This morning I got the popcorn bed ready but will hold off seeding that one for a few days.

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GoDawgs
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Tomato Planting Prep

#425

Post: # 45121Unread post GoDawgs
Sat Apr 17, 2021 7:23 pm

Today's project was to put in place the pallets that the tomato buckets will sit on. Because they rested on the sideboards of a raised bed last year and were up off the ground, they didn't rot and were fine to use again this year.

I needed lots of cardboard to lay under the pallets to keep grass and ants at bay so yesterday I scored a bunch of flattened cartons and beer flats from the liquor store in town. The owner had two shipments come in and she was glad not to have to deal with the empty cartons. One person's trash is another's treasure! I took them all. This morning I first ran a string for the 4x18' area and got the cardboard laid down.

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Then Pickles helped get the pallets in place and I inserted brick pavers under them to keep the pallets off the ground. A second row of pallets just like this one was set up next to the house.

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Last week Pickles had spotted these pavers on sale at Home Depot for half price so they were 4/$1, a real bargain! Enough were bought for the pallet project and extra for future needs that might pop up.

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The next step will be to wash and sanitize all of the tomato buckets. Then Monday we'll go fetch a pickup load of the potting soil, fill the buckets, arrange them on the pallets and plant out the tomatoes. That will be a big checkmark on the spring garden to-do list!

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goodloe
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Re: The Dawg Patch

#426

Post: # 45148Unread post goodloe
Sun Apr 18, 2021 7:43 am

Good looking setup! Do you use fresh mix every year to fill your buckets?
I have 2 seasons: Tomato and pepper season, and BAMA Football season!

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GoDawgs
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Tomato Planting Prep

#427

Post: # 45260Unread post GoDawgs
Mon Apr 19, 2021 4:07 pm

[mention]goodloe[/mention] , yes, it's fresh every year for the buckets but it doesn't go to waste afterwards. Some of the beds always need more soil in them and some of it goes for potting up perennials that are being dug up for spring relocation, etc. In the end it's less expensive than bringing in somebody else's "top soil" which may not be right. I think that's how the nematodes got here. Never had them until I started building raised beds and had some soil delivered.

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GoDawgs
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Re: The Dawg Patch

#428

Post: # 45261Unread post GoDawgs
Mon Apr 19, 2021 4:11 pm

Today was "wash and sanitize the tomato buckets " day. Twenty three of them but they've been washed and spritzed with a 10% bleach solution. Tomorrow we'll take Pickles' pickup and go get a load of nursery mix soil compost, lime etc added in) from Bricko Farms. It's an hour round trip but you get a 1 cu yd scoop for $40 cash, $5 extra if you pay by credit card so cash it is! Once home, the truck will be backed up to the garden, the soil shoveled off the truck into the pots and the pots moved via hand truck to the nearby pallet row. Easy peasy. I think we'll hold off until the weekend to plant the tomatoes in them.

Various this and thats are going to seed. This is a hybrid daikon radish but I want to collect some seed for fall planting just to see what I get. Dainty little flowers.

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And the fall collards are going to seed. I won't collect any of that as I have plenty but the bees love the flowers so that's why I let them have at it.

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One mystery is the absence of the cabbage butterflies. They had started appearing and then we got that three days of freezing weather and I haven't seen any since. I wonder if that cold killed a bunch of them.

Still dry, dry dry. Possible rain this weekend. Harumph... believe it when I see it. So I keep watering. At least the Yaya carrot seed started sprouting today!

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GoDawgs
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Re: The Dawg Patch

#429

Post: # 45456Unread post GoDawgs
Thu Apr 22, 2021 7:19 pm

Today was a good day. I got another bed forked up and then those clumps busted up with the Mantis. After consulting the garden map I realized that bed was a brassica overflow bed which wasn't needed and now open for something else. We'll have Silver Queen corn after all; not 8 rows but a nice taste of it! Woo hoo! The bed has been raked and hill locations marked for planting this weekend.

The potatoes did get a bit burned last night but they'll be OK. They're big plants with lots of undamaged leaves under the burned canopies. Found one more CPB egg mass.

Got all the tomato buckets labeled and spaced out evenly on the pallets. They're ready for planting on Sunday. I noticed that the onions are starting to bulb up. Few signs of bolting so far so that's good news. And the garlic is really taking off, getting tall with good color.

After closing up the pepper tunnel for one more night it was time to head to the house. Yep, a good day.

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Re: The Dawg Patch

#430

Post: # 45557Unread post GoDawgs
Sat Apr 24, 2021 7:03 pm

We finally got rain today, 1.5" so far and maybe more this evening. It's badly needed as we've only had .08" all month. Fortunately all the rough stuff is in the southern part of the state.

Thursday morning it got down to 35 after all that wind the previous day finally laid down. The new Jerusalem artichokes and Seneca Sunrise corn were just poking up so I put more soil on top of them to cover. They did fine as did the peppers which were in a plastic tunnel:

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The potatoes, however, took a bit if a lick as they were too big to put a tunnel over. Later in the day I noticed that it was basically the canopies that were burned but there's plenty of green underneath so they should be fine.

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The Red Pontiacs (on the left) were burned more than the Yukon Golds. Go figure.

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It was a good afternoon to start more seeds. I did six more varieties of micro tomatoes, all different from the ones that I've been growing inside all winter and one pot each of yellow squash and zucchini. More will be direct seeded in a few weeks. Got some herbs started; two kinds of basil (both were freebies, one's a purple), two kinds of dill and four sage plants. Finally flowers; a six pack of mixed asters, a six pack each of two kinds of marigolds and a six pack each of a yellow and a red zinnia. They're all up under the lights where that little bit of warmth helps them germinate a bit faster.

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Tomorrow is tomato, eggplant and corn planting day. Once the tomatoes move off the porch and into their buckets, I can repot the winter micro tomatoes, take them out to the porch and let them see what the real world is like.

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Tomato Planting in the Dawg Patch

#431

Post: # 45637Unread post GoDawgs
Mon Apr 26, 2021 12:20 pm

Yesterday was planting day for tomatoes, eggplants and Silver Queen corn. These are the tomatoes up by the house that Pickles planted out and mulched. They're mainly the ones used for canning and slicers, ones we like to do every year. The two eggplants are on the near end and later there will be a few buckets with zinnias and dill on the pallets.

Varieties include one each of Early Girl, Red Siberian, Rio Grande, Creole, Marianna’s Peace, Rosella cherry, Bella Rosa, German Johnson, Homestead and Mom’s Paste.

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These are ones down in the garden and most are either varieties I'm trying for the first time (mostly Russian and German ones; Carolyn seeds thru Farmer Shawn) plus a few from last year that I felt deserved a second chance. Last summer they were in too much shade and hopefully that's been corrected this year. I forgot to mulch the pots but will this afternoon.

Varieties include one each of Koroleva Rynka, Honigsüsser Erlöser (orange heart), KBX, Süsse Friesin cherry, Inzhir Rosovyi, Vladyka (pink heart), SOTW, Early Annie and “Fake Annie” . That last one is a potato leaf variety, one of two Early Annies grown last year that was way different from the other regular leaf one right out of the seed pack. So we named it Fake Annie. :D

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The Silver Queen is in a bed this year for the first time and was planted yesterday in seven circles.

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The Seneca Sunrise corn planted in a different bed on 4/14 is coming up fine. 16 seeds were sown per hill and will thinned to 8.

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The next planting window is May 4-6 when we'll be planting various beans, cukes, squashes, melons, sweet potatoes and okra. At that point the garden will be basically “in”.

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PlainJane
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Re: The Dawg Patch

#432

Post: # 45648Unread post PlainJane
Mon Apr 26, 2021 4:03 pm

Looks great, and so we’ll organized. Kudos!
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Re: The Dawg Patch

#433

Post: # 45730Unread post GoDawgs
Wed Apr 28, 2021 9:39 am

Yesterday I stopped at the feed and seed to pick up five 6' t-posts for a trellis. The owner said they were out and only had 6.5' and 5.5'. Hmmm, I told him I needed the 6' and there was silence. Then he said "Well, let's go look. There might be a few 6' left." So we went out to the rack of fence posts. No 6' BUT there was a pile of what he called "oddballs", posts that were maybe bent or had the plate missing at the bottom. How much? He thought a minute and said $3 each. That's about half price! So we found five 6' posts that weren't bent and were just fine except for just a hint of rust here and there. Good enough for what I want. Sold! I think I need to get a few more at that price before he forgets the deal ha made me!

The garlic is coming right along. The new-to-me Lorz Italian is the tallest. They're in the front left corner of the bed. The short ones toward the back of the right side are a mixed, smaller leftovers from last year. Definitely for cooking this year and not saving.

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Three of the six Jerusalem artichokes are coming up. There were six nice tubers in that 1 lb I ordered. It looks like something dug up and removed one. At least they came up. Last year they tried but failed.

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This is the new bed Pickles made last year where she planted some Conover's Colossal asparagus I grew from seed. They're coming along. Yesterday she planted in that bed 12 more I grew this spring.

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And these are two Russet potatoes Pickles started in a 15 gallon bucket. Maybe this year they'll be successful as none she's ever tried before have just rotted. Maybe they were killed with kindness (water). Less water this year.

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Today I need to do some bed prep for that May 4-6 planting window.

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GoDawgs
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Thieving Whatevers!!!

#434

Post: # 45905Unread post GoDawgs
Sat May 01, 2021 7:08 am

^^&$@%))((^&^^%#%$@%!!!!!!!!!!!! Something stole my Jerusalem artichokes! :evil: :evil: :evil:

The three that had come up about 3" were gone yesterday morning. Nothing but a small depression where they had been. No evidence of frantic digging, just a depression in the soil. I can't imagine what critter got 'em. And the ironic thing is I mulched them late the day before and thought that since one had already disappeared I should put a small netting tunnel over the rest. As I walked up to the bed ready to deal with that yesterday I made the discovery. I tell ya, I'm DONE with JA's. That's the second $15 gone down the drain. No more unless I find some at a grocery. Very fat chance of that out here in Cow Pie County.

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Re: The Dawg Patch

#435

Post: # 45907Unread post PlainJane
Sat May 01, 2021 7:22 am

Dang. Sorry!
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GoDawgs
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Getting Dawg Patch Ready For The Final Push

#436

Post: # 45988Unread post GoDawgs
Sun May 02, 2021 9:43 am

This past week was a long one dedicated to getting ready all areas to be planted this coming week after which the garden should be "in". The last beds were forked, fertilized and raked. Pickles tilled up and prepped her sunflower row and planted out more asparagus. We put several more trellises up. It will be really nice to just go out and plant seed and not have to put up trellises or loosen soil. Just plant.

Yesterday I resowed the Napoli carrots; three year old seed that had apparently expired. Since temps are getting up there I used the board trick someone (can’t remember who but thanks!) recently posted about.I had forgotten about it. Should have done that the first sowing. Pre-soak the seed, run a furrow with a hoe, water furrow well, fill furrow back in, draw a 1/8” deep planting line, plant the seed, lightly cover with fine potting soil. Mist the planting well and cover with a board for about 4 days to hasten germination.

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It’s Trellis City this year. These are the two that were put up a few days ago. The one on the left below the last bed will have the Zuchetta Rampicante on half of the trellis with a pole bean (to be determined) on the other half. That should be interesting. :o This is my first try at doing squash on a trellis. The trellis on the right will be for sweet potatoes. The one in the middle is one of two pea beds.

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The long sweet potato trellis was born of an experiment two years ago when I planted one leftover slip under a small 4’ wide trellis and had great results. Having the sweet potato vines go vertical will free up ground space elsewhere in the garden. It’s just a matter of periodically weaving the vines into the trellis as they don’t reach out and climb by themselves like beans do.

Another feature are collars around each plant to keep waterings from running down the raised ridge. The collars are basically the top 3” that I cut off of one gallon pots. It works really well especially in that critical first week or two when the slips have been planted and need to be kept moist. I planted the sweet potato slips out last night so they’re on their way.

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The Seneca Sunrise corn (to the left of the pea trellis) is coming along and has been thinned to eight per circle. The first Silver Queen poked up yesterday in a different bed and mid week I will plant the popcorn bed. The three will come off at different times so no cross pollination.

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The peas are flowering! It won’t be long until picking time, maybe two weeks or so.

And finally, it’s Rhododendron time here. I think it’s ‘Percy Wiseman’ but it was planted long enough ago that I forget. I still love it!

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Re: The Dawg Patch

#437

Post: # 45993Unread post Amateurinawe
Sun May 02, 2021 10:48 am

All looking great!
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The Porch Parade

#438

Post: # 46293Unread post GoDawgs
Thu May 06, 2021 8:44 am

After Tuesday's planting, the garden is about 98% "in". The only two things left are the popcorn and the summer squash. They'll go in on the 11th. I have a yellow and a zuke started in pots so they'll get planted out while pretty young. Then a bit later the same will be direct seeded so that there will be somewhat of a succession planting.

The front porch plant tables are going through another transiition. It's always a parade of stuff hardening off and table contents change all through spring. I think I'll do a posting of those photos showing the change but not today. Today will just be current occupants.

This morning the two tables have more mature stuff. On the near table there are the two sweet potato vines that didn't get pulled as slips with a small hardening-off tomato in a cup stuck among the vines to hold it up. There are also the four repotted micro tomatoes, a few more older micros and a table of herbs.

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Behind the four micros on the near table are two flats containing Little Gem romaine lettuce and Toy Choi pac choi. These are Pickles' puttering and some of the pac choi is about ready for stir fry. The romaine needs a bit more time before it becomes salad. If it works well, we'll try succession planting and see if we can have the lettuce and romaine most of the year.

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This is the Groovey Tunes micro that has only produced two tomatoes so far. Now that it's repotted and outside I hope it proves to be something other than a pretty plant. I didn't even taste the two it made as they were used to save seed. That might have been a wasted effort.

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The far table has mostly herbs; oregano, parsley, chives, thyme and mint with a big pot of rosemary on the end. The window box parsley is going to seed which will be collected. There are two much newer pots of parsley as replacements. Can't run out of parsley!

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Yesterday we got a lot mulched with leaves. This morning Pickles is on "stick patrol" with the old mower and cart, gathering up a bunch of small stuff that came down during a few recent storms. I need to do another potato inspection this morning after finding six fat pinkish-orange Colorado Potato Beetle larva yesterday. Morning is the best time to inspect as they come to the tops of the plants to feed and are easily seen. Then there's a bit of hoe work needed here and there... always something to do. Plenty of mission creep!

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Re: The Dawg Patch

#439

Post: # 46445Unread post GoDawgs
Sun May 09, 2021 7:12 am

It was 44 out there yesterday morning and chilly again this morning. But it's cold enough that I'm concerned about bean seed germination. Now am I concerned enough to put a plastic tunnel over the bed to warm it up and get 'em going? We'll see. It's one of those "I should but I don't really feel like it" moments. We all have those now and then. :roll:

Mulching sure helps down here during the high temps which will be here before we know it. Come June these cool days will be just a fond memory. As I mentioned elsewhere I use leaves for mulch since they’re free and there are a lot of them.

Here are three of the beds I got done two days ago. Left to right, Pickles' sunflowers, the bean/squash trellis and the cuke bed.

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Half of the trellis has been sown with pole limas and the other half with trombone squash that I’ll try to get climbing. It should be a happy riot of competing foliage!

Pickles has planted Lady Peas among the sunflowers to provide a natural groundcover. It’s a change from the cukes she usually plants for that purpose. The Lady peas are a lot shorter than the Big Red Ripper peas which actually climbed and brought down the sunflowers one year!

This year I remembered to try planting the cukes in a row off center in the bed. The bed length is oriented north/south so the sides are east/west. Every year, planted cukes start growing towards the east so I finally planted them closer to the west side just to see if that evens out the area the vines cover.

The sweet potato bed got partially mulched as I wanted the hills to get warmer before that happens. I guess this is the Year Of The Trellis. After a successful previous experiment with one sweet on a small trellis, they’re all going to grow that way this year.

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I have some “legacy” garlic in the sweet potato bed. It’s a small stretch that the fire ants got into last year so I let ‘em go and after the foliage died and disappeared I forgot about them. Well, here they are back again! I guess you can’t keep a good garlic down. LOL!

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And finally, some of the fall planted Shimonita scallions were left to make seed for collection and they’re doing their thing.

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There are bulbing onions down the other side of the bed but this is also where the okra has been sown so it too needs heat which is why it won’t get mulched right away. I’m thinking about putting black plastic buckets over the seeded hills for a few days to trap heat until I see seedlings poking through. Sometimes you just gotta make it up as you go along!

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Re: The Dawg Patch

#440

Post: # 46456Unread post Amateurinawe
Sun May 09, 2021 10:33 am

You keep a brilliant garden!
The behaviour of light means you observe me as i was then, and not as I am now.
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