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Post by whollygoats on Mar 23, 2017 0:04:46 GMT
Damn...Forgot to plant the strawberries.
Ah, well, I noticed that the iris in the balcony rose garden were worse for wear, thanks to the chook posse, so I took action. I drug out another length of temporary fencing and erected it to surround the balcony rose garden. That's now done.
Then, I found my iris food and put that down, followed by dousing each of the heavily pruned roses with a fistful of bonemeal. Now I need some rain...I'm sure I won't be disappointed.
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Post by whollygoats on Mar 23, 2017 20:03:25 GMT
A spare dry day...and I got all twelve strawberry sets in the ground....YAY. All planted on the western front.
Of course, I had to do some weeding to plant them, but, hey....
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Post by Sarah W. on Mar 24, 2017 15:16:42 GMT
Gardening is a happy thought. Here everything is still brown (and soggy), but the tulips at my parents' house were about an inch tall when I was home last weekend, so better things are coming. Hopefully we'll have crocuses (croci?) soon.
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Post by whollygoats on Mar 24, 2017 15:37:14 GMT
Yeah...I've early miniature daffodils all over the lot. The standards have yet to bloom. Crocii are done.
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Post by Mari on Mar 24, 2017 20:36:54 GMT
The previous owners had planted lots and lots of bulbs. I've had daffodils (min and standard), bluebells, tulips are coming up and lots of crocuses.
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Post by tangent on Mar 24, 2017 23:18:53 GMT
The weeds in our garden have noticed that spring is here.
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Post by whollygoats on Apr 6, 2017 23:11:22 GMT
Yeah...The annual battle against volunteer maple starts has begun.
I had to go to the hardware store to replace the front porch lightbulb (the new LCD is rated to last 10 years). While there, I picked up several packets of seeds.
I put down some annual morning glories at the east end of the balcony, with hollyhocks across the China Beach path and at the west end of the balcony. I'm trying to augment some delphina which survived the year in pots near Cecile Brunner, so I added more delphinia seed and topped them up with a scattering of alyssum. The remnants of the alyssum packet went in to the abused pot next to the back door.
Once again, I lost the daphne I'd planted next to the grape arbor near the back door. I'm sure the chickens did it in. *sigh*
I'm losing the sword fern at the corner of the garden shed to them, too. *sigh*
I'd cage it, but as it is, the entire back yard presently looks like Camp Manzinar, 1944.
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Post by whollygoats on Apr 12, 2017 22:25:45 GMT
I had picked up four smallish pots of raspberry canes and I have now finished putting those in.
Now that it looks as those the final frost has passed, it allows me to consider putting in some of my herbals. I even saw great leafy basil at one of our markets.
Given the right conditions, I might be able to rustle up my first shearing of my pesto crop upon my return home.
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Post by whollygoats on Jun 23, 2017 14:24:59 GMT
Perfect weather in Richmond and wider Puddle City today....excellent prospect for gardening.
I was up at 4 am, having napped twice yesterday, so I'm still on the circadian reset programming...which is fine; I'm retired.
So I'd had brekkies and got out at first light on this first full day of summer....the day just past the peak. It's all downhill from here to....need I say it?
Anyhoo...I kept getting missives from Swimmer that the garden was suffering from inattention. I pictured blasted and dessicated plants, starved for water. What I found was lush overgrowth of understory misplaced plants and lots of flowering that required deadheading. So, I spent my morning doin' the deadhead scene; iris and roses mostly. I have some russian thistle which will require intensive excision, but the rest of the low stuff can be puttered at for some time. I have an invasive Empress of China tree start that needs to be attended to on an immediate basis, too.
The grape is doing fine and now providing treats for the chooks. I don't know why they have not discovered the fenceline grape tendrils, but I'm picking from there for their treats.
My honeysuckle and my star jasmine are both in full bloom, so the fragrances are rampant in the back yard, particularly on a warm evening. The first bloom of the roses is gone, there will be at least two more. I see I will have to do some innovative caging to help a couple of struggling floribunda roses stave off the attentions of the chooks. They're picked clean. *sigh* Another rose is showing entire branches wilting...dunno what that is about, particularly since that was one of my hardier bushes, the 'Iceberg', a robust white floribunda.
I have raspberries in the back yard and strawberries on the front slope and they are both fruiting!
Life is good here at Ravenswood.
The yellows are about to slam the summer garden at my place.
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Post by JoeP on Jun 24, 2017 11:05:35 GMT
I was up at 4 am, having napped twice yesterday, so I'm still on the circadian reset programming...which is fine; I'm retired.Does that mean you were tired and then tired again?
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Post by whollygoats on Jun 24, 2017 15:20:47 GMT
I was up at 4 am, having napped twice yesterday, so I'm still on the circadian reset programming...which is fine; I'm retired.Does that mean you were tired and then tired again? Yes, it does.
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Post by whollygoats on Jun 27, 2017 19:38:41 GMT
I planted six basil plants.
I planted five tomato plants including Cherokee Purple, Oregon Spring, Amish Paste, Roma, and Pink Berkeley Tie-Die.
I'm about 3 weeks to a month late.
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Post by whollygoats on Sept 14, 2017 19:51:37 GMT
It looks as though my second shearing of the basil herd is upon me. I got some 54 lumps out of the first shearing, IIRC.
The Rudies are blown and are dying back.
The roses are deadheaded from their second bloom and in the process of producing their last hurrah, the third bloom of the season.
I have tomatoes with fruit set, but I'm still waiting for one of them to ripen.
My hoominnip plants are all doing reasonably well. The buds are filling out nicely, even though the plants are not that large.
I did some pruning to bring the limbs on the trees in the parking strip at the street to above the eleven foot limit over the street.
I really must work on the Eastern Front...I've been waiting for decent (cooler) weather.
Weeding, weeding, everywhere....
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Post by whollygoats on Sept 14, 2017 21:34:16 GMT
Hmmm...This time, 48 lumps and a pint in a tub. But, I have not yet shorn the last of the basil herd. There is still one pod, growing on the edge of the 'mater bed, which has not yet been shorn.
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Post by Moose on Sept 14, 2017 21:38:07 GMT
Is it too late to plant winter veg?
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Post by whollygoats on Sept 15, 2017 5:00:32 GMT
Is it too late to plant winter veg? Are you planning on growing kale? A friend here is planting lettuces and leeks. I think now is the time for cabbages and kale, too. We might get another round of radishes and carrots, but you are father north and your growing season is probably a mite more abbreviated than ours.
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Post by Mari on Sept 15, 2017 16:52:23 GMT
I'm having a garden designer over tomorrow. I'm really curious to see what he'll come up with (with my input of course).
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Post by Moose on Sept 15, 2017 22:01:02 GMT
I'd like to try growing cabbage Garden designer sounds fun! What sort of thing are you thinking?
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Post by Mari on Sept 16, 2017 13:19:45 GMT
Actually not that radical. My current garden is all pretty much straight up and I'd like for our garden to feel a bit more exciting and romantic. Also, our front yard is boooring with really ugly pots as a separator between the curb and our garden. I hate it. The designer is going to design something functional but with the future and my favourite plants in mind. It's expensive, but since I've always wanted to have a nice garden to enjoy, I think it's worth it. The designer is much more capable of making my ideas look like a whole picture. I doubt I could get it that way.
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Post by tangent on Sept 16, 2017 15:02:34 GMT
Maybe that's something we should think about for our back garden. It needs something doing.
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Post by Mari on Sept 17, 2017 9:01:49 GMT
The good thing is that once it's done, you never have to do it again, unless you want a radically different look at some point. Besides: if you ever want to sell your house, it can be a selling point.
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Post by whollygoats on Oct 2, 2017 22:10:25 GMT
I have been working in the eastern front, driving back the invasive plantings around the rosa rugosa, and clearing a walkway.
The first sign of actual autumnal activity is the katsura tree in the parking strip (the narrow defile between pedestrian walkway and curb [kerb]). There are yellow leaves in the canopy, but even more telling are the dried leaves accumulating on my windshield. 'Fall' has begun.
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Post by whollygoats on Oct 4, 2017 17:54:26 GMT
Completion! The plains at the brow on the eastern front is done! Now, if I can empty a pot or two of their iris, I can group them in the recently cleared space and later interplant with rudbeckia and strawberries.
I still have clearing of invasive weeds back closer to the front of the house, but that is modest compared to the turning of the bed I just finished. It is now largely tracking down and eliminating newly started nightshade. I see that the squirrels have been using the area as a stash, as I noted three separate starts of black walnut (a fairly unique tree species in this region, but one which has an mature example present some two hundred feet to the north, on the next street over) that I'll need to remove before they get too established.
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Post by whollygoats on Oct 4, 2017 18:03:49 GMT
So, Moosie...Did you get your cabbages in yet?
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Post by whollygoats on Oct 7, 2017 0:57:20 GMT
Harvest time!
And....The crop is in, processed and hung to dry.
I had some buds that I'd inadvertently snipped from the colas, so I put them under a desklamp last night and sampled them today. Not too bad.
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Post by whollygoats on Jan 31, 2018 22:52:10 GMT
Wow...I haven't been to this thread in some time.
With the chooks gone, big things are afoot.
I've been scraping muck off the Ho Chi Minh Trail and the Mekong Delta brick patio. The second teak loveseat was extracted from the vines of the star jasmine on the grape arbor, cleaned off and placed where the chook egg nesting baskets had been on the garden shed porch.
The steel wire grids, orginally placed for chook deterrent is being lifted, straightened, and prepared for some kind of space-saving storage, or recycled out.
My iris will have a great deal less competition from trampling chooks.
The garden shed looks to be a major task clearing it away.....*sigh*
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Post by Alvamiga on Feb 1, 2018 12:54:19 GMT
8 October-31 January
"In the garden today... IT'S TOO COLD! I'M STAYING IN!"
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Post by tangent on Feb 1, 2018 13:18:53 GMT
Me too!
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Post by whollygoats on Feb 8, 2018 4:04:37 GMT
WHOOOOOO-HOOOO!!!!!
A perfect sunny warm spring day to start my annual pruning. My neighbor, who owns the duplex to the west of my property was out, so we worked together at pruning my tree away from over his property. I also started in on the grape vines running along that fence line.
Then, I stepped away from the garden and took a drive out to where Swimmer's farm land is, specifically to pick up four roosters she'd purchased for her nun friends. A glorious afternoon tooling through the rural countryside.
More pruning tomorrow....I'll have to drag out the ladder. I already have both extension pruning shears (one with lopper) out.
Then come the roses.
It's pruning season now.
It's also tree planting season, should you be considering such.
If you cold frame, now is the time to start prepping your framed soil and getting your seeds selected. Soon peas will need to be planted.
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Post by Kye on Feb 8, 2018 12:24:02 GMT
There's a big vegetable garden next to our church. Right now the ground is frozen solid, there's a couple of centimetres of ice on top, and about a metre of snow on top of that. Sigh. I wish spring weren't so far away.
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