busy morning

the weather is warming and it is time to do some planting so early this morning i headed over to the portage community garden, where the spuds are doing well...the blues are even just coming into leaf...but they aren't in the photo because the leaves are so dark they are difficult to tell from the soil...they are there all the same...

i put heirloom maize seeds in to soak yesterday and today i took them out to the garden...

and planted them a foot apart in a low hill of compost along the north side of the bed...once they are a few inches tall i will plant pole beans to use the corn stalks as trellises and have two thirds of the three sisters...

i planted fifteen pea seeds in a fairly dense patch...they seem to like togetherness...by the spuds...

i also planted celery ( not a favorite but there was external pressure ) and some kohlrabi...the bed is filling...there will be a few more additions as the season moves along...perhaps some tomatoes and peppers...finished there i headed home...

where i dug these beds for the fifth time and added more compost...

and worm castings in specific areas even though i found a multitude of worms while i was turning the soil...

then i planted more peas, bush beans, borage ( to attract bees to the squash ), and zucchini...then i turned to more important matters...

many ( though not all ) of the tesointe seeds i soaked six days ago are more than ready to go in...

and this is where that "specific" comes in...i took a handful of worm castings,and a teosinte seedling and carefully planted them shoot side up...altogether today upwards of a hundred transplants, seedlings, and seeds went in for the season's start...there is more maize, teosinte, and transplants lurking in the near future...not to mention the cyclic spud planting...there are still seed potatoes to cut and callous...we have plans.

various legumes

difficult to misidentify a bean when you see it and the bush beans i planted in the back yard about as week ago have broken surface ( no sign of the ones i planted on campus just yet )...i will plant a few more in a couple of weeks and do so until i run out of seed...

zucchini has appeared as well...i planted them in profusion and if they all prosper there may be an inundation of fquash...there will also be the three sisters in my yard...

because there is maize up and progressing along with the beans and squash...they are not planted together...there will be no beans vining on the maize or squash spreading across the corn hills...they are all there none the less...

the "wild and weedy" maize ancestor teocintli is represented by two varieties...just for fun...

if the temperature stays warm enough to move the leaf cutters towards hatching they will find the alfalfa just coming into bloom...that would be an indication of symbiosis, no? thinking so...

and i do have a pollinator report...flower flies...

and solitary bees are working the blooms on the native berries to help feed the birds..small pollinators do a lot of work out there and are easily as important as the social bees... and i saw my first social bee ( finally ) of the season yesterday on the winter vetch...i imagine i will find them on the bean blossoms later in the season...they like legumes.

late august in the back yard

something more than a half inch of rain overnight ( and it is still raining some ) isn't unheard of here in august however the alternating patterns of heat and wet/cool ( last week we got two and a half inches of rain[in my yard anyway]overnight...that is a bit more anomalous ) are not the norm...i have been mowing the lawn at least weekly which is not a usual august activity...usually hotter and drier by far...i have not been doing much watering of late...

alternating patterns of weather are not impacting day length though and some of the plants are taking a cue from that in terms of where their season is...the mashua is beginning to show signs of fall colors and will need to come i before a hard freeze...probably after a frost kills back the plants...

there is maize ripening on the stalks...

there is also maize being eaten on the stalk...how much will actually reach fruition is a matter to take up with the birds and squirrels...we know this was a possibility when we planted...predation is not unexpected...

blossoms continue to transform into beans...

there are tomatoes in varying stages of maturity...

and the hot banana peppers are getting hotter...

the jerusalem artichokes are still blooming and there will be tubers soon enough...

the zucchini is in flower and producing late season squash as well...

the ramps have seeds cooking away...

some are done and i have begun to collect them as they mature..they are small...

and closely resemble onion seeds which is no surprise considering they are both from the allium family...cousins...

the growing numbers of tiers of support roots...

and zea mexicana ears turning from green to maroon and brown are signals that at least some of the teosinte is finishing up...the northern tepehuan has a much longer season and i don't expect ears before late next month and no seed before october...

i have begun to harvest mature zea mexicana seed from some of those maturing ears however...i will test for viability in the spring...

the frog in the corn seems to still be at home there...whether this will persists as the corn begins to die back is uncertain...the benefit of blending in may turn to a cost of standing out...he may pull a houdini...