the trees are waiting

wandered out to the campus garden early this morning to have a look around and found it about as quiet as i had expected...

there was supposed to be campus wide earth day tree planting going on yesterday...the trees arrived..clearly the planters did not ( i had to work which is my reason, although doubtlessly some would term it an "excuse" )...well..the weather was inclement in the morning...perhaps there was a late start...i wonder whose bed they plan on shading...

the asparagus isn't waiting around for anyone...it is booming along...

some is ready to harvest...

some are just breaking surface...

and some are putting their energy into height rather than diameter and are already so close to "ferning" that i do believe they will be left to feed the roots rather than humans...

over in my bed along the periphery things are somewhat quieter..again it is an expected quietude...

the smaller of the transplanted alfalfa plants seems very happy in its new location...green with new growth...moving on from the move...

the larger is still clearly shocked...there is still green however and i am hoping to see a recovery and some new growth in a week or two...

i just planted the spuds last friday and i did not think there would be much of any activity there and i was not disappointed...the spuds were all chitting when i planted them and a couple of the blues have broken surface....and that's about it..nos signs of leaves...or even a tinge of chlorophyll...they will be along in the next few weeks as well...the population will expand as weather warms.

running late

there was a distinct chill about when i set out for the campus garden this morning...i am late with a chore there and i plead a hectic work schedule that has nor eliminated free time but has left it at a premium and at exactly the wrong time of the asparagus season...

clearly the asparagus is done feeding the roots for the year and the growth that has died back has to be cleared to make way fro the spring irruption...

before i cut the asparagus back i harvested quite a few "berries' from the plants...already cold shocked they are ready to scatter ...

i cut back the plants...however i did leave a few of the berries in the bed to fall where nature puts them and, hopefully, generate a few more plants...asparagus is a perennial but, like all the living on the planet, it does have a finite life span...twenty tears is a good life in asparagus terms so we need renewal...

i spread a layer of compost ( which was steaming in the cold ) as a layer of insulation for the asparagus crowns...the ground is too frozen to admit landscaping staples so straw will have to wait..or may not happen at all...

so i believe we can close the 2018 garden season now...except for on last event...

when i got home i took four of the "berries" i had harvested and sowed them into a bed in my yard that i have already established asparagus in to, hopefully ( gardening is a hopeful, if not optimistic, undertaking ) establish more growth here as well...if the weather warms at a time i have time there will be a straw dispersal and another post.

cool off

the weather has cooled a bit but not the growth...the winter wheat that had me so concerned last october is filling in and thriving...there no such thing as a post-agricultural society ( that quote came from somewhere but i cannot recall whom to attribute it to...i will clarify when i run across it again ) and there is something attractive about a thriving staple that may or may not be genetic but certainly is cultural...i'm far less immune to the impression than a lot of folks and it's gratifying to see it do well...speaking of doing well the next two photos are of zea diploperennis...there are three up from seeds and last year's roots have put out a total ( so far ) of thirty-six shoots...eight more since my last visit...there are now six asparagus spears up if you count the one the ground crew mowed ( again this year )...i hacked back the university lawn from that corner so hopefully we can avoid this sort of pointless misunderstanding in the future...there are now twenty-eight jerusalem artichokes up..no more room is available in that particular plot...rouge will be culled...more on that as spring progresses...one of the chinese yams is up and i will be cutting and callousing potatoes for the campus garden soon...i will have to turn under some wheat ( but that was the whole point of the nitrogen fixing program ) but i will be intercropping potatoes and wheat where there is room..the wheat will be done before the potatoes so there will be no harvesting conflicts..i am not so sure about growth disputes though...well..this is an experimental garden

father's day jaunt

the bad news was the mosquitos early on a sunday morning...they were really the only bad news...the mowed asparagus had already produced another spear to feed the roots for the rest of the summer and i wouldn't be surprised ( but am not expecting ) to see another one pop up...so i will desist from back-filling the soil i scooped out around it and replacing the mulch until the developments are final... i got some half-inch dowel rods for father's day so i brought a couple along and staked up two more asparagus plants to keep them from toppling over...there's one tucked up right next to the gamagrass that's more of a bush than a fern...it won't need a stake so i think that's done for this season...i put one of the yam vine trellises into place a few days ago and the vine has reached the top...all i have to do now is convince it that the mason's twine will be a fine route to take to be in the sun and distribute aerial along when the time comes...the other yam is being difficult about even using the trellis...preferring instead to wrap itself around the winter wheat...this is a poor choice as the winter wheat is beginning to ripen and won't be around a lot longer to serve as something to climb on...who knew training vines could require so much attention? last year's just took to climbing the trellis straight away...i put up some shiny new bird tape across the top of the winter wheat and festooned some in a few new places just to throw the starlings a curve...some gardeners i know swear by bird tape as a simple non-lethal approach and i think a scarecrow might be overkill for such a small amount of grain ( even though it has been suggested and i am not above manufacturing one if necessary...what would the university think?)...so things are still moving along...half a dozen cowpea plants are up in the old turnip bed and the wounded asparagus is on the mend...maize and teosinte doing fine and nothing will stop the jerusalem artichokes or gamagrass beyond a complete catastrophe...rutabagas go in next month and then the experiment in nitrogen retention and organic matter production with cowpeas and winter wheat ( and the whole ground cover/ erosion thing )...couple that with the larger garden in my backyard and it will be a busy season...i'm having fun.