baby pumpkin

Baby pumpkins are forming! We'll see if they set.

Skippy's shady spot

My husband made Skippy a shady spot to hang out in. I call it his "crate". He loves it. Its the only spot in my garden where he is allowed to dig. He digs out a nice cool hollow in the damp earth and lies down in the shade on a hot sunny day. And I can sit next to him and use the top as a table. Not too bad.....

tied up asparagus

I was asked about how I "tired up" my asparagus. Here's a picture. A couple wood posts and some string around the edge of the patch. As I look at other asparagus patches, they seem to stand up better on their own than mine. Mine flops over onto the broccoli. Maybe because its young (3 years old). This does the trick. I'll remember to bring some fertilizer to it tomorrow. And I suppose it could use a couple inches of compost layered on top. Please let me know any advice for growing asparagus.

espaliered pear trees

I have two espaliered pear trees in my community plot. This week I pruned them and tired up some stray branches. My new pear tree has 5 little pears that set. The older Bartlett tree again had no fruit - like last year. It has crossed my mind that maybe its because I am pruning them wrong. Could this be? Maybe I should prune earlier in the year.

apple tree

This is the back of my side yard - behind the vegetable garden. Center view is my little Fugi apple tree. This year is has at least a dozen apples!!! More than ever before. :)) We trimmed a big branch off off the maple tree in the backyard and I guess the apple appreciated it.

I like to cover the young apples to keep away bugs and squirrels. I've used stockings in the past, but don't have enough old stockings for such a big crop. I'm looking into other options. Any suggestions??

Same question for my pear tree at my community plot. It has a dozen or more pears forming. I'd like to cover them soon.

young cardinal on my cucumber trellis

arial view

The top photo is labeled to show what planted where if you click on it.

flowers in my vegetable garden

A mix of weed, annual and vegetable flowers are decorating my community plot. The blue ones are bachelor buttons (seeds from Botanical Interests) that I planted two years ago. They self-seeded this year and are big beautiful plants already.

The white flowers are bladder campion weeds. There are also marigolds, violas and johnny jump-up's. The potatoes and fava beans are budded and will pop open any day now. Lemon thyme and a pink old rose are in full bloom.

Other flowers are yet to come. I planted nasturtium seeds this week. The sunflower seeds I planted a couple weeks ago are 2 inch sprouts now - on their way up to 15 feet or so. I also have zinnia, cosmos, Canterbury bells, anise hyssop, borage, prairie aster, purple cone flower, trilobia, lavender and day lily plants growing.

harvests

I have been harvesting lettuce every day for our salads for a couple months now. I just started to pick my arugula today. Yummy! Also the garlic is stating to send up shoots, so I picked the first few scapes this weekend. Time for a nice garlic scape pesto.

My alpine strawberries are great this year. In past years some critter has eaten them before me. This year I am picking lots. Yummy for strawberry martinis!

baby rabbit update

The baby rabbits ate the tops off my kale, so I planted my leftover kale seedlings in between the munched plants and then put hoops and row cover over the patch.

Bunnies also ate most of my pea plants - I'm not so sad as this crops was not doing well and I wasn't expecting much in the way of a pea harvest. I planted cucumbers on one pea trellis already and will plant beans soon on the others.

The baby bunnies like my peas, kale, parsley, dill, violets, and other weeds. They're not touching my basil, cucumbers, arugula, thyme, sage, or oregano.

I have lots of dill that self-seeded this year. The bunnies were eating this gradually. This evening, I moved it all to one location and covered the patch with hoops and row cover.

I'm glad to note that the bunnies are not finding a way into my cold frame (yet?) this year.

Baby bunnies are a recent addition to my suburban yard - they've been here only the last 2 or 3 years. I'm thinking it may be time to adjust my fence to keep them out of the vegetable garden as I love to see them everywhere else in the yard. Only the tiny babies get in to the garden. They squeeze through 1.75 inch fence spacing! For only about one month in the spring they come and go through it and nibble as they please. Soon they will be too big. Skippy chases them away when I spot them and ask him to go out.

BVG community garden bulletin board

Here's what's on our garden bulletin board this week.

baby birds and rabbits

My backyard has squeaking and peeping sounds all the time now! There are chicks in the sparrow and wren houses. And a hungry fledgeling robin is often in the yard.

I'm working now on my back patio and a fledgeling robin just landed in the chair next to me. Very sweet.

The wrens are bringing food to their house, so maybe they have chicks that have just hatched.

And I got out a ladder this afternoon and took a peek into the cardinal nest. She has one speckled egg in there. I figure this is about day 11 of incubation, so the egg should hatch very soon. That will be exciting since that nest is so close to the patio.



I also came across a couple baby bunnies today. They were in my garden nibbling on the violets and dill. After I took a few photos of them, I mentioned it to Skippy and he ran out to check on them. That got rid of them.... but not before they ate all of my kale!

garden work

My accomplishments in the garden this weekend:

weeded
planted sunflower seeds
squished potato bugs (yuck!)
tied up asparagus fronds
watered
filled the bird bath
transplanted spinach seedlings
transplanted peppers seedlings
admired 3 rows of 1 inch tall popcorn seedlings
transplanted leftover tomato seedlings into paper cups (to give away soon)
gave away cucumber, squash, pumpkins, tomato and pepper seedlings to my parents

pea plants

Not my best year for peas. I'm trying to grow shell peas. I planted three different varieties (Cascadia, Oregon Giant and something else). (I even used pea innoculant on all.) Usually sugar snap (Johnny's Sugar Sprint) do very well in my garden. I've tried shell peas several times before and they have never done well. Not sure why. Maybe shell peas need more sun?

Next year I think I'll go back to Sugar Sprint and just let the pods get big and shell them. We really like fresh shell peas!!

lots of thyme

I have a BEAUTIFUL patch of thyme - finally. For years I've tried one variety after another. I think this is one my mom gave me, though not really sure. It has survived a couple of winters now and is expanding. My gnome tends it. I can now harvest thyme with abandon. Ahh! I don't know anything that doesn't taste better with a bit of fresh thyme.