Hello all! Mark the bad, bad blogger back again.
First the catch up: De had foot surgery last Friday and has been in the recliner with her foot up since. She's allowed to be up and around no more 5 minutes out of every hour, and has to have her foot elevated at or above heart level the other 55 minutes out of the hour. I took the week off, and have been doing the 'Nurse Mark' thing and working the lawn and garden in between. We have been so blessed to have family and friends bring in the evening meals. I'm a fair cook, but it so nice not to have to worry about what supper is going be amongst everything else. We see the surgeon for a followup tomorrow.
Between meals, hot drinks, cold drinks, ice bag changes, medications, post-surgery boot adjustments, counting out 5 minutes of up-time, housework and general errands, I have gotten some lawn and garden time in. Here is the more-than-a-little-embarrassing mess I started with:
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| There is a garden under all those weeds! |
After a couple of days work I found (most) of the garden that was supposed to be there. I started with a full mowing. It has been so wet for so long it had reverted to the pasture it started out as 25 years ago when we built here. The good news is that gave me an ample source of lawn clippings, most of which I still have available to "harvest".
I weed-wacked between the beds and added lawn clippings. I still have more of this to do. Then (finally) got the tomatoes caged and pole beans trellised.
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| Tomato cages in 10 foot beds made from 9' 4" of a 16' hog panel |
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| The rest of the 16' hog panel set up for pole bean trellises. |
After a bit of weeding I found the rest of what we had planted.
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| Egg plant looks good |
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| Broccoli (or Brussel Sprouts) look great |
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| Brussel Sprouts (or Broccoli) looks great |
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| The lettuce did not really survive the weeding.. |
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| But did better than the spinach. I think some of that is overgrown spinach, but it's all coming out. |
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| The cabbage is doing great |
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| I had some help with weeding the peas |
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| And between the two of us, they look pretty good. |
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| I was certain I had killed my Horseradish when I harvested last years crop. Apparently not.... |
I've got plenty more to do, but at least I feel like I'm back in the game. I am, however, reaping the results of some gardening mistakes, which I'll fess up to in nauseating detail in the next post.
I've been trying to catch up on blog visits and hope to be on top of everything before I go back the 'day job' on Monday. As you all know, however, during gardening season one has to "make hay while the sun shines". I just wish it wasn't my lawn that needs a baler!! :-)
Take care all. Col. 1:9-12,
Mark
I think your (now found) garden looks great! Those darn weeds sure can take over fast, especially with the multitudinous rains you've had. It seems both spinach and lettuce will bolt and commit suicide if the conditions aren't just right. My lettuce has been good this year, but my first planting of spinach bolted before it was 6" high. Grrrr.
ReplyDeleteWe've had trouble keeping our lawn looking decent, too, because of some rain and heavy, heavy dews each night that don't seem to dry at all during the day. Cool weather, but still humid. Which makes for a very damp and clammy feeling environment!
I'm going to cut back the lettuce and just start over with the spinach. De and I are talking about what and when to do a late planting of things to make up for what did do we'll on the first planting. As long as we don't return to "Monsoon Season". We should do alright.
ReplyDeleteYour weeding buddy---I could use him!
ReplyDeleteLove your use of the hog panels BENT for a trellis. I've arched some, but never had that idea of bending them. Will be stealing that idea next year. Thanks!
You need to UPDATE your blog! Hint Hint Hint!
Hi Sue! Updating today with an explanation for my shameful truancy.
DeleteThe hog panels for the beans are actually two cut sections that are joined at the top with UV resistant wire ties. It turned out, somewhat fortuitously, that a single standard length 16' hog panel cut to fit in my 10 foot x 2 ' beds leaves a 6' section for other uses. I cut the one that goes in the bed at the vertical section so the 'spikes' are the 6' section. The spikes go into the ground and I tie the two together with outdoor use (usual black) wire tires. The 4' x 4' beds have for short rows of plants. One just inside and one just outside each hog panel.
You might need some help from a torch to bend the hog panels, but can see the advantages. The resultant trellis would be almost 8' tall, so bring your step ladder come harvest time.