last day of the year

i was downstairs doing a bit of straightening up in the plant room since i have the day off...

it was obvious that, despite water, warmth, and light, the cowpeas found the basement an alien and inhospitable environment...so what was left of them found their way to the worm bin...however...

i found a number of spuds chitting away merrily...so i reworked the cowpea container and another one...

and planted them...

there was a stray ear of winter rye in the bin with the potatoes...

so i threshed out the seed and planted some in each container...i have no real idea exactly when that rye was brought in...could have been 2020 for all i know...experience tells me the potatoes will not hesitate to grow down there ( they will, i am also informed, hesitate to produce anything much in the way of tubers...still, they were doomed if i left them in the bin so they have an opportunity here )...the rye is an unaswered question...we will see.

event time...

...tells me there was snow yesterday...

and that today most of it is gone...

except for some icy residual left in places like the rye...

and wheat beds...

it also tells me that, despite a lingering hint of green, it is time to take down the asparagus...

so i did...

and mulched the crowns with a bit of straw and compost...i will be feeding them more heavily in march...

there was a single berry left on one plant...so i planted it...and marked it with a bamboo...we will be looking in on this come spring...stay tuned...

there's still green out there...aerial bulbs from the walking onions are sprouting...there are green berry leaves in the bed yet...probably will be all winter...

and their nascent roots are spending late december looking for some soil.

solstice, green, exclamation point

the solstice was earlier this morning so it is "offically" winter in the back yard...

although the "uneasonably mild" temperature might mislead you...

there has been precipitation this month it's true...however it has all been liquid...oh there's been a few snowflurries in the air...but only flurries...as of today we have, if i am not utterly mistaken, broken the record for tha latest measurable snowfall hereabouts which was 20 december...that stands no more...

and the only precipitation in the forcast is more of the same...

the national weather service seems excited about it

it is reminiscent of last year when the snows came late and then february seemed to bring snowfall daily...which was too late for the winter wheat...ans this year's wheat is looking somewhat thin as well...snow is a necessity for winter wheat...

the rye, seemingly more cold hardy ( perhaps because it is less "improved" through artifical selection? ), is in much better shape...

and while we are talking cold hardy, i will admit more brown has crept into the asparagus since the last post...still a lot of green though...not time to cut it back just yet...plants live in event time, not bureaucratic time...just saying...

there is brown out there...some dessicated bean pods left purposefully ( like some of the teosinte seeds out of the 2805 i harvested that i scattered around ) just to see what comes up next spring...

and mooseberry is mulched for winter...yet there is a lot of green still evident as well...

the yucca out by the mailbox for instance...

and some herb ( i am not the herbalist here...zea and allium are more my style and we will get to the allium in a minute ) in that planter on the south side...

onions...

garlic...

and even though they are not blooming or bearing fruit the various berries have left the chlorophyll fully on display even at this late date...we will see how the winter goes and how the wheat does and when the asparagus finally calls it quits...it has only just started and there are already concerns...there are always concerns about the vagaries of the weather and as they become more anomalous in terms of past "normal" they will probably increase...we will simply have to give it time in order to find out...that i am not sanguine about outcomes should come as no surprise.

early december

it is fairly quiet out back...which is no real surprise given the time of year...still, things have not come to a complete halt...

it has been cold ( even though it is very mild today ) however no lower than the mid 20s ( fahrenheit ) so the winter rye is looking robust...

the winter wheat strikes me as not being nearly as happy...and since there seems to be a lack of snow, not just here but nationally, there may be another dismal yield unless things change...

on the allium side of things the garlic is up and running...actually has been since september...

and the walking onions seem unpreturbed by almost anything...

the mooseberry ( frostbite falls! ) is gradually giving in to the seasonal change...

the native berries are stubbornly hanging on as well...although more berries this year are very unlikely...

the hawthorn tree, conversely, is right on time with its berries...the birds will be having christmas dinner out front...

and while we're talking berries, there is still one last one on the asparagus...

which, incidentally, has just recently begun to die back at the top...still lots of green out there and i am not nearly ready to cut it back just yet...no bureaucrats in the back yard...just event time