backyard and basement

the eight rows of einkorn are doing well...three leaves apiece at least and a few niore months to go...

the winter wheat in the bed has recoverd some...however it is not nearly what was planted last autumn...it is time, i think, to give that bed a break...some winter barley perhaps...conversely, the wheat i planted on a compost heap is booming right along...a line of evidence buttressing the "midden heap" theory of the origins of agriculture?

there is some volunteer rye by one of the locust trees...

more asparagus is appearing in the east bed...

ther ramps are doing well though none seem prepared to flower this year...no seed? well on can hope they bunch...we wil know come september...

the mooseberry bush is every bit as verdant as the alfalfa...

meanwhile, down in the basement , the teosinte's silks have become a bit more pronounced...

and the effort to bloom is progressing...to what result i do not know...i am not sanguine about seed...this is not a natural environment...still..dna will try...

and my seed potatoes arrived today...red, blue, and yukon gold...due to limited space i am considering foregoing cutting most of the tubers this year and simply using them as drops...a weekend project since they are going into the campus garden and i want to be able to park at the garden...more on that later.

interfering in the lives of plants ( and the plants are resisting )

what passes for work these days ended early so i drove over to campus on the way home...

in the asparagus bed i found thirty-six spears in all...

in all shapes, sizes, and stages of development...

including some well on the way to "ferning"...the aspragus seems to be happy this spring...

so i took a handful home...

over in my "offical" bed i found two garlic plants up and running where there had been none before...seemingly we will need to apply patience...

the alfalfa looks very verdant...

and a critically important correspondent to this blog will remain pleased that the alflafa is still thumbing its green nose at limits...

and while we are talking disregard for limits, the alfalfa has seeded itself outside the bed in the garden lawn...there is a danger of mowing in this reckless behavior...

while i was running a weeding hoe through the bed i disgoreged a volunteer spud that was obviously working towards a season...

so i pulled back the fabric on the back side of the aspragus bed and scooped out a hole in the soil ( competent photographer that i am i managed to include the camera strap and my shoe in the only photo of the hole i took )...

and gave the spud a less hazardous home for the season...a day off tomorrow may see me in the other garden...or maybe not...i need to scout out a place for a strawberry bed in the back ( and then build it )...there may be a post in that...

they arrived bearing fruit and blooms...and i am thinking there will be stolons soon enough.

two communities

yet another day off from what passes as work these days saw me motor out to the campus garden to see what was what...and what was, was...

asparagus...some of which continues to "fern"...

most of the thirty-five spears i counted were not close to that far along...

except these at the west end of the bed...they are the youngest of the asparagus plants and still have another year before they reach five and are harvestable..so we will be letting them "fern" and cycle though another season on their own...i did bring three spears home and will continue to make more frequent asparagus runs until june anyway...

i did not expect to see any garlic in my official bed...and did not...i did water the bed again as the temepratures are due to rise and we wil look in on the garlic next asparaus run...

what i did find in the bed was alfalfa and alfalfa of a vibrant shade of spring green...

and, in what is sure to please an important correspondent to this blog, one plant has already begun to play fast and loose with limits...finished on campus i wandered over to the portage community garden...

where, again, my expectations were low...

i planted this bed two days earlier than the bed on campus and, when i had a closer look, i did find two of the cloves had broken surface with shoots, so the season there is underway...one imagines we will find garlic up on campus next trip out.

somewhat unexpected

given the reasonably unnatural environment in the basement...

i did not actually expect to see the tesointe i test germinated and planted downstairs under the lights to be trying both to flower...

and produce silks...still...here is where we find ourselves...it has been 128 day since i planted it and that is just about right for seed production ( perhaps a bit of a longer season due to the environment )...my expectations are low ( as should yours be ) however it is an index of the resilience of the plants and the relentless drive of dna to reproduce itself...this could be taken as a good sign for the viability of the seed i will be using for the outdoor season...we will see.