gardening with bureaucrats

the bureaucrats have spoken and we've had this conversation before...still, the sclerosis takes me aback ( no i am not surprised...one expects this sort of thing in an institutional setting ) at times...

the asparagus is still vertical...it is also cold hardy and firmly rooted in event time and could care less about bureaucratic edicts concerning its behavior...

it is nowhere near done...it is still throwing up spears...and it won't be by the end of october either...or , possibly, even november ( we will keep tabs on the aspragus in my yard which will be allowed to run out its season in event time because i am not a bureaucrat...so we will have a control population to determine the extent of bureaucratic fallacy...yes the gardener is a bit techty today and there is more to come )...

the carolina horse nettle might be done by the end of next month...it will be back in spring...in the absence of toxic chemicals it isn't going anywhere...

the alfalfa is a perennial so i had better label it as such...it may not be done next month either...will label anyway...

all the hopi turquoise is done...and out of a dozen plants, many with multiple ears, i harvested five...someone or something has been at the maize...this is a hazard of public gardening ( recall the teosinte incident from last year and notice there was none in this garden in 2022...i may simply grow some grumpy plants next season...say cowpeas or stinging nettles ) and is accepted if not expected...the plants never got much more than three feet tall and since i have never grown this variety i am uncertain if this is the extent of its height or if there was a fertility issue ( another reason to grow the nitrogen setting cowpeas ) i was punted out pf the bed i had worked since the garden moved in, i believe, 2014 a few years ago because my maize was so tall it was "throwing shade" on some collards...no danger of that with this season's crop...so...between bureaucratic intransigence and a somewhat limited harvest i am calling it a failed season...although i did see bees on the alflafa...there is a reason it is there to be labeled.

a table full of maize

some maize...some wheat

drove over to campus this morning...

where the asparagus is continuing its now ninety-nine day upright streak...

and has put up a couple of late summer spears...

late summer also finds the carolina horse nettle still blooming...

and, while the hopi turquoise maize still has a number of green ears...

more ears are telling me they are as done as they are going to get...

and these have a somewhat larger pallet of shades of blue than the first ones i brought in...the soil was beyond damp due to recent rain and cool days so there was no need to water...and beyond that the campus garden, in terms of my involvement, is quiet...

in the back yard the teosinte has more energent ears...however the seed is nowhere near mature...a few more weeks before and serious amount can be harvested...and...

over in the winter wheat bed...

in a matter of four days we find ourselves rich with green shoots...i, for one, am pleased.

next day

a day after sowing there is gemination afoot...seems fresh seed may have been a fair choice.

one plant

this tesointe plant out back is about six feet in height...there are larger specimens ( which are all determined to fall over ), however this one is situated more in the open and more readily photographed...

happily the plant has produced a tiller...

which has flowered...

as has the main stalk...

which means more pollen for the silks on the stalk ears...

and for the ones on the tiller...

this plant has ears with green seeds beginning to emerge from the stalk...

and there are more emerging around the stands...none of which are near ready to harvest...thinking more towards the end of the month or into early october...more as it crops up.

hard red winter wheat

yes, after harvest i simply let the wheat bed go native...however that was about to change...

i cleared the vegetation and dug the bed, then worked it with the waren hoe to disrupt any roots, and raked sort of level...

then i turned in compost and worm castings to improve fertility...

and did some more raking...

this is where things changed a bit...for the last several years i have been planting seed from the previous harvest and having something less than success...i had been blaming lack of snow cover before winter cold set in...and that may be the issue...however i decided to purchase fresh seed to see if it might be a viability problem rather than weather...

i had a pound to work with which was more than sufficent for the bed...i spread seed thicky and raked it in, and since wheat will surface germinate i broadcast more over the top...

that accomplished i gave the seed a fair soaking so it wouls at least begin to think about some activity and replaced the critter net around the bed ( do not want squirrels, stray cats, or dogs roaming through the bed )...now we wait for germination and second and third leaves...by the end of the month i hope.