Yesterday it was a balmy, breezy 70 degrees, today we're covered with ice (including my tiny Hens'n'Chicks pictured here). I can't pretend I'm sad--I like Spring in Spring, not Spring in Winter and Fall. And I'll always find some magic in dragging Sweet Husband and the pups out for a walk in a quiet, sparkling night encased in ice.
I can home last night, and was almost completely overwhelmed by the smell of something really sweet--like honeysuckle or a really strong smelling Easter Lily. Since--living with two dogs--our house does not usually smell like flowers, I was very confused. I sniffed around the kitchen...not coming from there. I sniffed in the laundry room...not there. I sniffed outside (we've had the windows open since it's been so incredibly warm these past few days)...not there. I had just about given up when the light bulb went on....
My little Meyer Lemon tree (previously discussed here and here among other places) is blossoming. So far we haven't been able to get any lemons--in part due to the fact that the Wee Welshman likes to eat the baby fruit before it gets big--but I have the tree in a bit of a sheltered location this year, so maybe....
First frost today--22 degress, brrr! The poor Morning Glory didn't stand a chance . . . .
This is part of what I like about growing things--it seems like something unexpected always happens. Here, as the moon flowers died back, these little spikey balls--which I'm guessing are some sort of seed pods--formed. Frankly, I think they're almost as cool as the flowers were.
All summer we've had a huge, ever-growing morning glory vine with no flowers. But the other day Sweet Husband and I were outside and noticed that, not only have a few flowers opened up, but the vine is absolutely covered with buds. If we don't get a frost in the next few weeks it should be a sight.
I was walking out the door on my way to work this morning when I saw these two on the side of my house.
At first I kind of thought, "Eww!" But on closer examination, I noticed they were spooning. Awww . . . .
My very first tigger melon was ready this weekend. It turned the nicest color, but the flavor was a little funky--kind of like cantaloupe and pepper.
After my moonflowers bloomed once, they died back quite a bit. I thought that was the end of the show, but hadn't had time to replace them with something new. Good thing!
Left to their own devices, they're gotten huge--we've had tons of flowers with many more on the way.
. . . to anyone who can identify this spider. He's living in my melon plant and I don't know whether I should kick him out or not.
Raindrops collecting on one of my newly repotted banana trees.
The cucumber wilted away in the heat, but my bargain bin tigger melon is starting to make fruit. And now that everything else is gone, it has plenty of room to sprawl out and make itself comfy.
So, this year was not the greatest.
The bad first: I didn't get more than a handful of Midgets, and I only got one or two each of the Hillbilly Potato, Amana Orange, and the Cherokee Purple.
The kind of good: Despite the heat, the Yellow Pears did . . . ok. But the real hero of the summer was the Aunt Ruby's German Green. Even though it's been hotter than hell and I gave up on watering over a week ago, I walked outside and found three huge Greens this evening. And they were so pretty and tasted so good. A definite winner.
I've been a poor blogger lately. Every once in awhile--and especially at the end of August when it's 100 degrees and everything is brown and brittle--the world seems a little tired and I have trouble working up much enthusiasm for...well, for anything really.
In the meantime, however, two monarch caterpillars discovered my milkweed. They only stayed for a few days, but they stripped it's leaves. It's rough out there--I was glad I could give them a meal on their way to...wherever they were going.
When I look at the condition of my tomato plants and make note of the date, I have no reason to complain. By the end of July, the wear and tear of summer in the garden is discernible in the texture and color of the leaves. Even healthy plants have a leathery look and feel to them. Certainly, the unrelenting highs above 100 degrees last week did my plants no favors. But even if that were not the case, by this point in the summer Kansas tomato plants have seen better days. If mine could be reincarnated as rock stars, they’d all come back as Keith Richards.What’s different this year is that the tomatoes are ripening later than normal. While I have loads of fruit on the plants, the tomatoes seem slow to ripen. I speculate that it’s a combination of the late planting and protracted periods of excessive heat and drought. It’s hard to remember that in May we had a couple of weeks of rain accompanied by low temperatures that kept the soil in many area gardens too damp to work. As a result, many area gardeners did not get their hot-weather crops planted until late May, which was two to four weeks later than normal. Had we received sufficient rainfall in June, this would not have mattered, as tomato plants can quickly make up lost time in early summer. However, hot and dry conditions handicapped tomato plants' early growth. By now we should be carting vine-ripened tomatoes into the house by the bushel instead of just now easing into the harvest.
The dilemma here is that we need to keep our haggard plants going to support the fruit that’s still growing on them. By this time in the summer, I’m often done with watering. That may not be an option this year.
If that's the case, this year is screwed.
To be fair, the yellow pear plant has been pushing on stalwartly, producing it's first tomato on the first day of summer, and a handful about every week since. However, we don't even have one orange tomato yet, and the (5) tomatoes that have come off of the other full size tomato plants have been split and cracked so badly that I've had to pick them early to save them from the bugs. And my little midget that was so prolific last year is shriveling to nothing in this heat.
It is indeed a bad year for tomatoes....
This little guy started to grow before the tomatoes stole his sunshine--the pepper plants are both so shaded now that he's unlikely to have any brothers and sisters for awhile. But isn't Jimmy pretty?
(Update: And he tasted really good--sweet, but with just the right amount of heat.)
I planted my little plot of soybeans to enjoy some fresh edamame, but my methods were a little faulty. Instead of picking them when they were young, I kept waiting for them to get bigger. Only, instead of getting bigger, they just got browner.
But all is not lost. I cracked open one of the brown pods tonight and, low and behold, there were nice little hard beans inside. Soup beans.
Some were more dry than others, but I put the not-so-dry ones in the oven for a bit to finish them off. My little bucket 'o' beans is getting fuller.
There was an article in the LJWorld the other day by the wonderful Miss Mellinger (of jinxing tomatoes fame) asserting that it's not worth the time and trouble to shuck beans for soup, given that they are so cheap to buy at the store. I see her point, but I think I have to respectfully disagree. Sitting outside, gleefully popping open the pods, and scooping out the verdant little beans was probably one of the high points of my weekend.
A few weeks ago I was at the farmer's market and saw someone with moonflower plants. At the time I had just dug up my potatoes and had free space so....(listen to me pretend I need an excuse to buy plants). As you can guess from their name, moonflowers only open at night.
I took the picture on the left at dusk, and I took the on eon the right in the dark using a long exposure. In small quantities I don't think you get the full effect, but if you had a nice large planting and a full moon they would be spectacular.
Bad: The lawnmower guys haven't been here since before the 4th of July. I know it's hot guys, but sheesh--it's starting to get down-right pasture-like.
Good: The lack of lawnmowing has allowed my morning glories to begin to grow . . .
. . . and this funny flower outside our fence. I'm curious to see what it is.
(Update 7/24/06: They finally came and mowed! I'm almost surprised they didn't have to brush-hog. And despite the fact that they let the grass get to knee level, I'm pretty pleased with them--although they did cut down the mystery flower, they trimmed around my morning glories. Thanks lawn mowing guys!)
....I hacked away at the tomatoes; they're kind of taking over. I've never really thought of plants fighting for space before, but my sweet tomatoes are definitely doing some pushing and shoving.
....I noticed I have beans. The beans are almost as vigorous as the tomatoes. Next year I need much taller trellises.
....But I found a few beans that were all dried and ready for picking.
....All told I got five Hidatsa Shield Figure Beans. I'm on my way to a nice winter pot'o'soup.
....I picked the first "Aunt Ruby's German Green" Tomato.
....And we made a grilled pizza. We had red tomatoes (from the store) and yellow pear and German green tomatoes (from our garden). Combined with some lettuce, onions, garlic, and fresh mozzarella--mmmm!
The pretty Asclepias (aka Milkweed) that I planted in April has been a wonderful little burst of color by the back door. But, somehow I'm not sure if it's growing correctly. It keeps getting taller, but it's very spindley. It doesn't seem like it would be sturdy enough for a butterfly cocoon--which is part of why I chose to plant it. I wonder if maybe I need to plant more of it to make it a bit thicker and more protective?
Did aliens do this to my tomatoes? Some kind of bug, perhaps? There's nothing obviously wrong with the plant. No bugs that I can see. And the Yellow Pear is almost touching the Hillbilly plant (although they are in different pots, and thus different soil) so I would think if it was a bug they would both have it. Any ideas?
(Update: I did some lunch time research and figured out that it's a water problem. Apparently these tomatoes were at a critical stage when I left them to fend for themselves over the Fourth of July. I'm sad to lose a few, but relieved to know that I can easily fix the problem for future tomatoes.)
There is a certain type of gardening book that I just shouldn't read.
I'm speaking of the kind with the big glossy pictures of English cottages covered with roses, herb gardens inside little stone walls, gorgeous green lawns with crisp edges. Or the kind with perfect, jewel-like courtyards tucked up on city balconies, eclectic potted gardens on rooftops--in short, wonderful.
Why should I avoid these, you ask? Well, because they're very inspiring. They give me all kinds of ideas about what to plant and how to structure things. And then I step outside . . . and realize that I have neither a tumbling down English cottage, nor an eclectic little rooftop terrace. I have two untidy forsythia bushes, one of which seems to be dying; some scraggedy, raggedy, patchy grass; a view that looks straight into our neighbors living room; and six beautiful, bountiful tomato plants. With the exception of the tomatoes, it's a little disheartening, and looking at other people's perfect gardens only makes it more so.
And we're always saying, "Oh, we don't want to do too much--we'll be moving next year," but we're getting ready to start our third year at this house with no end in sight. Even setting that limitation aside, there's still always a fine line between the garden I'd like to have, leaving enough space for the dogs to romp, and not pissing off the lawn mowing guys by having too much for them to mow around.
But after reading pretty gardening books into the wee smalls last night, and then stewing about it all day at work, this evening I just had to do something--anything to improve my little plot. So I pulled out our little weed-eater and edged the grass. Then I started thinking about Sunflowers.
I planted some Sunflowers this year, but the mowing guys accidentally killed them before they got much past the seedling stage. I meant to replant them, but just couldn't think of a good way to protect them. By the time I thought of it again, at the first of June, it seemed like it was too late.
Today though, I was on a mission. I decided that, even if they're just hitting their growth spurt in October, I wanted Sunflowers. So I dug out a little bed close to the woodpile, outlining the edges with wood to hopefully mark it out well for the mower guys. It took almost 20 minutes to chop out a little 2x2 bed in the weedy grass. I gathered up all the Sunflower seeds I had left and evenly spaced them, thinking that way I'd definitely get more than I need and could thin later. Satisfied that I had at least made things a little better, I went to pick up some tools.
When I came back the Wee Welshman was happily sniffing out the seeds, carefully picking them up out of the dirt with his teeth, and crunching them straight down his fuzzy little throat.
There is a certain type of gardening book that I just shouldn't read.
After a long week at work, running my hands through the crumbley, warm, black dirt looking for potatoes was very soothing. There were 23 (counting the one I had for lunch the other day). Some are a little small still, but, as Best Man Friend said, they are going to be some very good eats.
And we have midgets as well--not ripe, but they will be soon enough.
Not to mention we're going to have a feast of edamame later this week.
And Sweet Husband pulled up our very first homegrown onion.
It was a good day....
The leaves of my potato plants are beginning to yellow and wilt, so I decided it was time to check and see if there were potatoes forming. I rifled through one end of my earthbox quickly and pulled up these three potatoes. As you can see, one was nice and big, but two were pretty small still. I think I'm going to let them stay in the ground until next weekend to see if they'll get a little bigger.
We found a spry looking basil start (Sweet Basil, not Thai--because Sweet Husband doesn't like the licorice flavor) and then started admiring their pepper plants (which are much taller and more productive than ours, despite being in 3 inch pots). Next to the peppers were a hodge-podge of left over plants for 99 cents apiece. Our lettuce went to seed a few weeks ago and the watermelon I planted got washed away, so we had 2 square feet free. Nonetheless, I was stalwartly about to walk away when Nice Older Sunrise Lady came over and told me they were all half price.
That's 50 cents each, and, well, I've never really needed much encouragement to buy plants, now have I?
I picked a Tigger Melon and a Slicemaster Cucumber. They're both supposed to be grown in hills, but that just wasn't going to happen with our space limitations, so I trellised them. It will probably mean coming up with a creative support system at some point later this summer. But, hey, they were a buck!
Aunt Ruby's German Green Tomato
Yellow Pear Tomatoes
Hillbilly Tomatoes
Jimmy Nardello Pepper
Hidatsa Shield Figure Bean
Soybeans
Lemon Tree (much recovered from its winter inside!)
Onion
Hanging Basket (a reminder why I should quit buying these--no matter how tempting they are....)
Hens and Chicks (a reminder why carefree plants are the greatest....)
....are slightly stunted. They still taste good though.
The potato plants are also coming along really well, although I wish I had a taller container to plant them in. I read, and experienced potato growers confirm, that the secret to getting lots of potatoes is to keep adding dirt as the seedlings grow. The more of the plant you can get underground, the more room there is for potatoes to grow. The trouble is, the tallest container I had was only about three feet tall, and it's already full. But even if we only get a few it's still been fun!
I'm not sure if I've mentioned it or not yet, but my roses did not survive their winter sojourn in my attic. My heart did a little nose dive when we pulled them out and they were all brown and brittle. When I cut them back almost to the ground and there wasn't even a speck of green, I knew they were past the point of rescue.
I've kind of fallen in love with my little eclectic, hippie vegetable garden, so I haven't really had time to miss the roses. But all of sudden everyone else's roses have started blooming and it's made me a little sad not to have my own. They were a lot of trouble, but they were the kind of trouble I don't really mind taking.
For a few seconds this morning I thought about getting a bush and just planting it outside of our house. It would have to be something much less fussy to be sure; something that could live without much care when we move, because you never know if the people who move in next will be gardeners or not. And it would be pushing the "no gardening" clause in our lease...but I suppose that hasn't stopped me yet!
But maybe the better answer is just to enjoy other people's roses, and wait until we're more settled to get more of my own. The Reinsch Rose Garden is about 2 miles from where I work, and is supposedly gorgeous, the Laura Conyers Smith Garden was great last year, and (although it's a bit of a drive) the Capaha Rose Garden in Cape Girardeau, Missouri, is also one I'd like to see.
I'm such a little rose junkie, right now I'd be happy with just a sniff.
Normally, I love Gwyn Mellinger's columns, but if it frosts tonight I'll never forgive her. Last week she wrote this article--"Beware of late-April frosts when planting in Kansas". Can you guess what there is a danger of tonight?
She jinxed us! And she's so gosh-darned logical about it too.
"[H]ot-weather crops nearly always catch up with those planted a week or two earlier. In mid-June it will be impossible, all things being equal, to tell the difference between a tomato planted April 20 and one planted May 5."
It may be true, but that's far too sensible. How anyone can be so patient is beyond me.
In closing...
Please don't frost on my tomatoes.
Please don't frost on my tomatoes.
Please don't frost on my tomatoes.
As I was potting and repotting and planting today I realized that this is the fifth clearly separate incarnation of a garden at this house. Five separate arrangements in less than two years. Yikes! But I'm sure I've learned something or other along the way. If nothing else I've learned how to garden in a small space with dogs--containers! 
At any rate, today I filled the last spot in the big planter with Hidatsa Shield Figure Beans. I also went ahead and caged the tomatoes and peppers. As I was literally wedging the cages in I momentarily started to doubt the wisdom of Mr. Mel Bartholemew (of Square Foot Gardening fame). One tomato per square foot seems awfully tight now that the cages are up to denote the full size the tomatoes will be. But then I remembered that Nice Father-In-Law had his tomatoes on something close to a square foot plan last year and they did well, so hopefully all will be well with mine also. 
I also went to Sunrise and got herbs for my spare pots. I got some small starts of Munstead Lavendar, Oregano Thyme, Curry and Bronze Fennel. I'm trying to keep experimenting (as well as go easy on my budget) so I decided to try a few plants from seed. 
I planted Alaska Nasturtiums around the bases of my tomatoes by the door, Italian Pesto Basil, Fine Leaf Chives, Dukat Leafy Dill, and Cilantro.
In the interest of continual greens, I planted a big pot of Apollo Arugula. I also got a Silky Asclepias for outside the backdoor. I was intending to plant Marigolds there, but I saw a sign at the nursery that said Monarch Butterflies are drawn to Asclepias so I thought it's be fun to try.
I made room for the Marigolds in an old hanging basket, instead.
Oh, and I almost forgot, I planted some strawberries too.
Phew! What a busy day!
After work last night I snuck into Sunrise just before closing and got tomatoes.
Lots of tomatoes.
I was planning two--maybe three. I came home with five. My eyes are bigger than my planter box.
Unfortunately, someone got to the Midgets before I did. The Sunrise Lady (as opposed to Older Sunrise Man or Younger Sunrise Man) said that mice nibled up her seeds before they could grow. I think she could sense my concern, however, because she immediately said she had planted new ones and they'd be ready in a few weeks. For a brief moment I considered offering her the day services of the Wee Welshman to scare the mice away, but then I realized, Moe chasing mice would do more damage to baby Midgets than mice alone ever could.
At any rate, I saved a spot for them, and got tons of cool heirlooms to boot.
Starting at the top left and working clockwise, I planted Hillbilly Potato, Amana Orange, Cherokee Purple, and Aunt Ruby's German Green.
I was planning to plant flowers in the two pots by the door where the roses lived last year, but hey--flowers are for sissies, real women plant tomatoes.
So I put a Yellow Pear to the right side, and the Midget (assuming the mice at Sunrise cooperate) will get the space on the left.
Oh, and I planted some peppers too--a Jimmy Nardello Sweet Italian Frying Pepper and a Mandarin Bell Pepper.
If I were a bit more clever I would have the little "Map" cartoon character from "Dora the Explorer" bouncing all over the screen, singing, "I'm the map! I'm the map! I'm the MAP!" As it is, this took more phinagling than I'm willing to admit to, but it's much better than the numbers.
"In the past, when your mother was with child, she developed an unusual appetite. She took one look at my beautiful garden and told your father that what she wanted more than anything in the world wasGreens, greens
and nothing but greens--
Parsley, peppers, cabbages and celery,
Asparagus and watercress and
Fiddleferns and lettuce!He said, "All right,"
But it wasn't, quite,
'Cause I caught him in the autumn
In my garden one night!
He was robbing me,
Raping me,
Rooting through my rutabaga,
Raiding my arugula and
Ripping up my rampion
(My champion! My favorite!)
I should have laid a spell on him
Right there,
Could have changed him into stone
Or a dog or a chair...But I let him have the rampion-
I'd lots to spare.
In return, however,
I said, "Fair is fair:
You can let me have the baby
That your wife will bear.And we'll call it square."*
For the record--just in case it should coincidentally happen--I'm not to the point of giving the pups to a witch to lock up in a tall tower to get some, but goodness I'm enjoying munching on my baby spring greens!
(*From Into the Woods a Sondheim musical.)
Saturday evening I recruited Sweet Sister to help me plant s'more.
We put 9 Envy Soybeans in 08. I couldn't find a reference for the proper spacing of square foot soybeans, but I figured it would be easier to have a few too many to start and then pull them up later.
We also planted 2 Picnic Watermelon seeds in 09. I know I won't have room for both of those, but I didn't want to put all my eggs in one basket (i.e. all my faith in one seed) so one will have to come up once it becomes evident that one is growing better.
Along the fence we sprinkled in a mix of Clark's Heavenly Blue and Scarlett O'Hara Morning Glories. I was just going to plant the Clarks because they were so beautiful last year, but the name Scarlett O'Hara caught my whimsy.
Lastly we hodge-podged in some Mammoth Gray Sunflower seeds in the same spot as last year. This is about the same time I planted them last year--although the warm weather makes it seem much later--so hopefully these will do as well.
I finished filling my new raised bed with soil this morning, and even got a few things planted. I've divided up the bed into 12 square foot sections. For reference, I'm numbering them like this, when I face the bed coming out of our house:
12, 11, 10, 09, 08, 07
01, 02, 03, 04, 05, 06
Today I just started some cool season stuff. It took a large amount of will power not to bring home a few of the beautiful baby tomato seedlings that are already out in nice neat little rows at the nursery, but hopefully in a few weeks....
This is what I planted:
2 Leeks in 07
9 Onion sets in the rest of 07 and the top of 06
8 Oxheart Carrots in the bottom of 06
1 Packet of California Spicy Greens mix (Arugula, Endive, Mizuna, Red Mustard) in 05
I also planted some "Red Norland" potatoes in the Grow Box. I found that it didn't work well for tomatoes last year because I couldn't keep slugs out of it, so I drilled some holes in the bottom and made it into a regular planter.
Eh, and I almost forgot--the joy of gardening with a wee terrier.
I have 12 square feet. Now to decide what to plant....
My calendar today says "Day of Trees (KOR)". To the nearest I can guess, I think that means today is the Day of Trees in Korea.
If you feel like celebrating, this is how easy it is to plant a tree. A year ago, on a whim, I sent a very small donation to the Arbor Day Foundation. They sent me back twelve sticks with roots. I only had a place to plant one, so I stuck it in a pot where it lived all of last summer. I didn't want to bring it inside for the winter, and I knew it didn't have a very good chance of surviving outside in a pot, so I literally stuck it into the ground. I may have watered it a few times, but other than that I left it to fend for itself.
And here you can see -- well, if you can see it, it's still kind of a stick -- my little tree has survived the winter and put out new buds and leaves.
After trying numerous plants in the mucky little spot under our kitchen window, I decided we'd give this a shot. It's a compact version of Forsythia called Forsythia Sunrise.
They're supposedly "very forgiving". Between the dogs and the clay they'll have to be.
And we have daffodils....
I planted 50 of these last year (that would be fall of 2004)--so far only about 10 have popped back up. I'm having some, not insurmountable, problems with them.
The flowers are pretty, but their leaves come up midwinter and get horribly raggedy. The first winter after I planted them I made the mistake of thinking the leaves were weeds, and I cut them back. Probably why so few have bloomed again, although our heavy clay soil could have something to do with it too.
Right now I have them mixed in with a bed of tulips, per a suggestion from the bulb catalog, and they pretty much just get hidden. They're just too tiny to compete.
I think, if we stay here, I'll dig them up and put them in a tiny clump by a corner of the fence. And if we live somewhere else, maybe I'll dig them up and put them in a tiny clump by a corner of the fence somewhere else.
I wasn't sure if my bulbs were going to come back this year after my massacre late last Spring. But I've got tons of leaves popping up, and today I stepped out to find this pretty little white Crocus.
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