It was another pretty good work day today as the weather-guessers moved the rain back to tomorrow and Monday now. It was also getting a bit on the warm side today with a high well up into the Mid-80's and winds that I swear were hitting 50 MPH.
Now get this the low is suppose to be 28 come Monday. Ain't Spring Fun? I also slept extremely late today all that tilling and mowing yesterday pretty much exhausted me out.
So today I accomplished cleaning up and weeding the raised beds. We harvested our first bunch of Asparagus shoots for the year today and I picked up some new Strawberry plants to help get my beds kick started once again. I thought both strawberry beds had died out this Winter but actually they are both showing signs of life now, one more than the other. One of the beds I had dug completely out last Summer and put chicken wire down to keep the moles out and those strawberries didn't come back as much. I hope I got the new plants added in soon enough to get a good crop out of them this Summer. It's been years since both beds actually produced, it seems each year one or the other has something happen to it.
I also potted 74 tomato seedlings today. They still got about a month to go before I start hardening them off but they needed some larger pots to say the least. We are now pretty much officially out of window space. Some day I need to build that green house I keep talking about.
Finally it was time to get the rain barrels back into place. I know we may get some below freezing nights yet but I don't think we are going to get anything that would prove dangerous to the rain barrels this late in the season. Of course I thought the same thing back in October too only that it was too early yet and got a cracked rain barrel out of the deal didn't I?
If one gets damage you can all say "I told ya so" :)
At least I can say I am not behind this year yet. I still have every possible work day filled tot he brim more or less but I am not pulling my hair out because of the rain.... Yet. In fact we are still a little behind moisture-wise so we could use a bit more.
Now we will see if this cold snap for Monday kills off the Apple blooms....
I say again ain't Spring Fun?
Keep Prepping Everyone!!!!
Have you tried Ox Heart tomatoes? They are an heirloom variety and are quite delicious. I was growing them just under softball size.
ReplyDeleteMatt - Never heard of that variety except as a shape but I immediately gave the name to the wife, who is the tomato approver. Looks like that is where they got the shape name from. I would also guess it's a relative of the Russian varieties I see like that so it would be a good one to try. Never have seen any seeds for that variety though but that doesn't mean much I doubt I have seen even a 10th of the seed varieties out there.
DeleteSounds like a good variety to try that's for sure.
Matt's right - Oxheart tomatoes are awesome! i have planted them for 5 years and this year started our oxhearts from our own saved seed from last year - woohoo!
DeleteMatt and Kymber - They sound almost exactly like the Russian purples I plant each year growth and condition wise anyway. I like that type of tomato no doubt there I will try one if I can find some seeds.
DeleteStrawberries are surprisingly hardy. Four years ago we had a really harsh winter, for us, with minus 19 Celsius temps. We had buried the strawberry beds under 4 inches of straw and they actually came back stronger than before.
ReplyDeleteWe also did the same with the overwintering garlic and onions and lost very little.
We use Amish paste tomatoes for sauces an heirloom variety from www.realseeds.co.uk . Unfortunately due to the insane EU laws they cannot export seed to the USA, though Monsanto et al can send in any crap they like!
We have also got ukranian purple toms as a cooking variety this year.
we use polytunnels a lot with hot beds built into each end, we start the seeds over these. The hot beds average a soil temperature of nearly 40 degrees so everything gets a good start.
Anon - I have never seen my strawberries die back as far as they did this year which is what scared me that they were done for. The other bed well I kinda interrupted their growth last Summer so ya know.
DeleteI bet the Ukrainian purples are the same variety as the Russian ones I plant each year but that's just between us I doubt the Ukrainians nor the Russians would admit it :)
Shhh don't tell Putin he'll want to liberate my Ukranian toms and the Obama and Kerry will be drawing lines in the sand lol. It could be the end of ketchup as we know it!
DeleteI haven't done raised beds in years, kept having problems with slugs. It is a good way to have a really controlled soil if you have a crop that takes special conditions. I have been saving seeds from volunteer tomatoes so I am getting a bunch of no name varieties. This guy is really into open pollinated tomatoes:
ReplyDeletehttp://garden.lofthouse.com/landrace-tomatoes.phtml
Sf - The raised beds are where we start all the early stuff and where the wife does her gardening. If I plant the big garden too early it gets covered in weeds because it will be so wet I won't be able to go out and keep them under control. So we do both around here. Also the raised beds are for the potatoes as even my fluffy big garden will rot em in the ground with all the rain we usually get.
DeleteWe had the same problem with raised beds until we let the chickens at them at the end of every season. All our beds are the same size and we had built mesh cages to keep pigeons ets off some off the crops. So every morning 2 or 3 chickens per cage and leave them till sundown. Result no more slugs or pests and a fair bit of fertiliser thrown in!
ReplyDeleteAnon - The chicken wire I put down was under ground. The moles kept tunneling up into the beds and killing the roots especially during the late Summer dry period.
DeleteSome day I will do the chicken thing again... I only been saying that for like five years :)
We haven't got any moles but then we have two terriers who delight in digging them out and eating them. Once you train them to go after rats and dig out moles your pest control problems go way down!
DeleteI really, really, like asparagus. If wake some morning to find the beds harvested, well, it wasn't me.
ReplyDeleteStephen - Wish you were close I would give ya all you wanted. By about June I will be sick of asparagus.
DeletePP - we have been planting like mad in the greenhouse in the kitchen and the actual greenhouse outside. spring is always a busy time of year! we went and checked our strawberry hugelkulture bed and we think we can see 3 baby strawberry plants! but our asparagus hugelkulture bed is showing no signs of life yet and this will be the third year so if we get any plants, we'll be able to finally harvest them - another woohoo! and Stephen, if you harvest PP's asparagus, you better send at least a couple of them to me! bahahahahah!
ReplyDeleteyour friend,
kymber
kymber - Someday I am going to build the green house on the South facing deck we have in the old house so I can keep it heated easily.
Deletec'mon down you can have all the Asparagus you want. I am even thinking about putting another bed in this year.
Sounds like y'all might get caught in the nasty cold front coming through tonight/tomorrow. Be safe.
ReplyDeleteTB - Yep they are saying a low of 25 now.... And we got trees blooming. I bet I lose most of the blooms again.
DeletePP,
ReplyDeleteYes.....so right, the temperatures are dropping for us to on Tuesday morning. Monday night, I will cover a good chunk of my garden beds with buckets, and plastic to protect them. I love your asparagus!!!! There is nothing better than the fresh stuff. We harvested some, and had it the other night....YUM!
Good luck with your strawberries. The ones from last year lived, I just packed under each little plant some straw and there growing like crazy. No problems with moles myself.
I hope your tree's make it okay.