The Dawg Patch

[GoDawgs]

It's been a long garden week. Yesterday I got the okra area worked up and prepped six holes. That's about all the okra we need. Okra will be planted tomorrow.

Today was another diggin' day. Planting dates approach as the moon waits for no one. On Wednesday I had started forking up a bed for sweet potatoes and got one pass done down the middle before I ran out of energy. A lot of Bermuda grass on each end to slow down progress.



This morning I went down both sides of that bed and hilled it up so it's ready for planting sweet potatoes on Thursday. Then this afternoon I forked an adjacent row, put in support posts and Pickles helped get the fencing attached to the trellis for climbing 'Alabama Blackeye Butter Beans' and 'Cherokee Trail Of Tears' beans. DONE! Those will be planted Wednesday. I still need to take the Mantis down between the trellis and sweet potatoes but I wanted to get the main items done first. Pretty can wait.



This morning I discovered that the deer had come munching last night. Somebody strolled down the center path and took a taste of 5' of the young plants in pea bed #2, the one that got planted late due to wet weather.



This afternoon while I was watering everything I discovered that the "somebody" also nibbled here and there on some carrot tops. Apparently GoDawgs Spring Salad Bar is open for business.

Oh well, there's enough for everybody...unless "somebody" invites their friends!

[GoDawgs]

This week is the final push to finish getting the garden in. This morning I planted 3’ of Cherokee Trail of Tears beans and 13’ of Alabama Blackeye Butterbeans at the bottom of the big trellis we put up yesterday. I have more CTOT beans somewhere but I can’t find them! The ones I planted were 10 beans I did a germination test on several days ago. They all sprouted so I dug them out of the trash can and planted them!

Then I put up a 4’ wide trellis at the end of the summer squash bed and planted green Yard Long beans under that.



Nothing had come up in two cuke hills and the one Black Diamond watermelon hill so I got those reseeded. Then since the Duke bush beans never came up (most likely rotted in a ton of rain and cold weather) and the soil is warm again, I replanted one side of that bed with Blue Lake bush beans and the other side with Kentucky Wonder bush beans. I got those seeds at the feed & seed so as not to waste time trying to order anything online.

The bed with the Spring Treat corn got scuffle hoed so it’s ready to mulch but I might hold off doing that until it gets it’s first good fertilizing. That way I don’t have to pull the mulch back and then push it to the corn again. One less step.

Okra seeds are doing a two day soak and they’ll get planted in the six prepped holes tomorrow. Three holes of Cajun Jewel and three holes of Choppee. That's all we need.



The Choppee did well last year so it repeats this year. The Cajun Jewel is new, a more compact type of okra. I was hoping that the compact habit would let me grow sets like I did with the old and discontinued Cajun Delight. Nope. They got as leggy as the Choppee so direct seeding it is for both. You never know until you try.

Tomorrow I need to prep and plant another bed in Japanese Hulless popcorn and prep two beds for zinnias and Tithonia torch flowers.

Thursday will be the final planting day when the sweet potato slips get pulled and planted. At that point, spring planting will be done.

[PlainJane]

An unbelievable effort. Glad it’s the home stretch!

[GoDawgs]

An unbelievable effort. Glad it’s the home stretch!

Me too! Once everything's in, it's a shift to maintenance mode.

Tomatoes and peppers are coming along nicely but nothing to talk about yet. I might have to figure out some kind of netting protection for the mini Whippersnappers and Red Robin. The mockingbirds keep pecking and/or stealing them as soon as they're almost ripe! Haven't been able to try a Whippersnapper yet!

[brownrexx]

It's interesting to see how different your soil color is from mine. Your looks like more of a gray color and mine is a very dark brown color and even blackish in places. I also have lots of rocks and you do not seem to. If I dig down below my improved soil, it is pure reddish clay.

[GoDawgs]

Yeah, it's pretty sandy soil and about all the amendment it gets is what compost or bulk-bought potting mix I add to the planting holes and the turned-in leaf mulch. I couldn't afford to bring in a ton of stuff to amend the whole garden!

A long time ago we put in a fence around the garden. Digging the holes for the corner posts we went 18" down at the bottom of the garden and found no clay. But at the top we got about 8" down and hit that hard as a rock old yellow clay. You could slam the post hole diggers down into it and just chip out a little at a time. We took turns on the post holer and it took forever.

This is kaolin clay country. Lots of kaolin mines around here. It's a white clay used in the paper industry (nice white paper), porcelain making, the cosmetics industry and, yes, Kaopectate. Outside the kaolin area, there's lots of that brick red Georgia clay and fortunately there's none on this piece of land.

[brownrexx]

Our clay turns to a concrete like substance when it is dry. When we bought this property we had to buy a gas powered post hole digging auger to dig holes for our trees.

My garden has developed after many years of roto tilling and adding organic material including a big load of mushroom soil a few years ago.

Here is a pic of my one garden after roto tilling. The chickens LOVE when we do that!




Here is my big garden after tilling.

[GoDawgs]

Ah, good old mushroom soil! From the Kennett Square area? I wish we had that here in bulk rather than in expensive bags.

That's a nice size garden you have. Like your pretty chickens, the mockingbirds love when I dig up stuff. They wait until I'm done and go sit on the bench and then swoop down to see what's for snacking.

[brownrexx]

Actually @GoDawgs my mushroom soil came from close to Reading which has also become a mushroom producing area. They dump their spent mushroom soil outside of the mushroom houses and we get it for free. They allow hubby to operate their giant loader and fill our pick up truck. He really loves operating the loader so he is willing to go get this any time I want and it's FREE. How nice is that?

[GoDawgs]

FREE is ***ALWAYS*** good! And DH gets to play with a big toy. I'm jealous.

[GoDawgs]

It's been a long day, my legs are tired and my feet hurt but by golly, the garden is IN!

All of a sudden we're having cool nights. Down to 43 this morning with a few more of these mornings coming and that's not good for beans trying to germinate. Pickles helped me get the plastic on the bean bed tunnel and by 11am the soil temp had gone from 60 to 75. I left the sides up so it didn't get too hot and lowered the sides at 7:15 tonight. This is the bean bed with the Spring Treat corn bed in front and the Silver Queen corn area behind..



Then I put the three wall 'o waters I had on three of the planted okra hills and black buckets over the other three hills to get that soil temp up.



The zinnias got planted in this bed and the tithonia in a different bed. I alternated the red zinnias with the yellow. Some say a solid block of one color is better. Meh... I like 'em mixed.



Then I dragged out a pallet, filled two pots and planted the Thai Red and the St. Kitts/Nevis roselles. I did the Thai last year and want to compare the two this year. That's the trombone squash in the foreground in the middle of the now-defunct asparagus patch.



The last chore of the day was pulling sweet potato slips and planting them. I got twelve slips but am only planting half as I'm giving the other half to a good friend. We got all the sweets we wanted from five hills last year so six should be OK this year. If more slips should grow, I'll stick in two more.



I've already got my shoes off. Time to crack a cold celebratory brew and let the recliner work it's magic. The day is done and so is the garden!

[Whwoz]

Congratulations and enjoy your rest

[PlainJane]

Your garden is such an inspiration. Just amazing!
Kudos to you and Pickles.

[GoDawgs]

Thank you. You guys are too kind! But sometimes there is a hitch in the old giddyup.

A few days ago I did a germination test of four varieties of seed from my freezer stash. One of those was Cherokee Trail Of Tears climbing beans I had saved in '17. All ten seeds germinated so I folded the damp paper towel back up and tossed it in my desk trash can.

Fast forward two days and it's planting day. I go to get seed out to plant and I cannot find the CTOT seeds! I checked every pack in the two freezer boxes, desk top, kitchen counter, everywhere. No seeds. Then I remembered the ten heavily sprouted seeds in the towel and pulled them from the trash. They were so sprouted that the sprouts on some had actually pushed through the wet paper towel. The will to live! So I planted them. Better some than none.

The planted beans popped up the next day! Wow!



I imagine that one day I'll run across that missing packet of seeds in the most unlikely place. Please excuse me while I go tighten a few gears in my brain.

[GoDawgs]

A few minutes ago I went to the refrigerator freezer to grab a hotdog to nuke. I happened to notice a small ziplock bag sitting in front of a box that holds the hotdogs, sausages, etc. IIn it were the four packs of germ test seeds. GAH! I have no idea why I put them there instead of putting them away in the seed boxes in the big upright freezer where they should have gone. Harumph.

Well, there's just one thing to do. That's to put up another trellis on the end of a bed and plant more Cherokee Trail Of Tears. Onward and upward, hopefully!

[MsCowpea]

Your garden looks wonderful. And the surrounding area with the big fields looks so peaceful and uninhabited. Must be a quiet place.

[GoDawgs]

Thank you, Pea. The garden is where I do my best thinking. It is peaceful except early morning and early evening when there is some traffic (not much) on the road that runs in front of the place. But I love looking at the fields. They surround us on three sides. The owner of those fields just brought in 23 cows about ten days ago so I get to watch them too.

Despite mornings around 43 there has been progress with stuff coming up. Over the past two days the yard long beans, climbing blackeye butterbeans, Blue Lake bush beans and a couple of the Cajun Jewel okra have started coming up. Still no sign of the Roma bush beans, popcorn, Black Diamond watermelon or Choppee okra.

Starting Tuesday temps will be climbing each day and by Saturday we'll be back to the upper 80's again with lows around 65.

This morning I cut some stakes and pounded one next to each of the ten peppers. It will give them something to lean against when the wind comes across the pasture and something to tie them to if necessary. The peppers have carrots along side and front left is the bean bed with Contenders and somewhat skippy Golden Rod. I need to find a better yellow bean.



Today I read an article about staking and pruning summer squash like you would tomatoes. Grow 'em vertically. The theory is that keeping the leaves off the ground helps prevent disease. One also cuts off all leaf stems below the lowest fruit and they are cut off right at the main stem where they are not hollow anymore.The main stem sans leaves should be easy to wrap against borers. I'm going to play with this and this morning put a stake next to each of the two summer squash.

In case anyone is interested, here's the link:

https://www.theartofdoingstuff.com/youv ... all-wrong/

The peas got way tall this year! They've grown above their fence and the wind we've had lately has blown the tops over, not to mention that extra weight making their fence lean into the aisle. The wooden fence supports just couldn't do the job. What a mess! I pounded in three t-posts behind the fence, tied the fence to the posts and ran some baling twine post to post in front of the vines, trying to help them get vertical again. Some success but not much.



Today was the second day of pea picking and it's a pain trying to see what's ready. It will be slow going. Meanwhile the usual old powdery mildew is starting to fire up the vines at the bottom. This evening on this pea bed I'm going to try a light vinegar spray mentioned in the squash article. On the other pea bed I'm going with a baking soda based spray. Either method is supposed to alter the pH of the leaf surfaces to where mildew can't grow there. We'll see.

[PlainJane]

Interesting about the summer squash; I look forward to your feedback if you try that.
Ditto with the sprays on your peas, as I hate the bottoms of mine when they start to mildew.

Here’s to peaceful!

[GoDawgs]

Interesting about the summer squash; I look forward to your feedback if you try that.
Ditto with the sprays on your peas, as I hate the bottoms of mine when they start to mildew.

I sprayed this evening. The tall peas in the photo below got the vinegar mix, 1/2 TBS per quart of water. The bottom 2' of the plants are mildewed so I'm trying to keep it from progressing any further up the plants.

Pea bed #2 is blooming but only half as tall because they were late getting planted. The bed was too saturated with rain. The plants in Pea Bed #2 either have no powdery mildew yet or just a touch at the very bottom. They got the baking soda spray, 1 TBS per quart, so we'll see if if mildew has gotten nipped in the bud. Maybe I should have done one side of the bed with vinegar and the other side with the baking soda. Oh well...

[Whwoz]

Interesting link there GoDawgs, looking forward to hearing how it goes for you as well.