a few beds at the iuncg ( mine included )

the top two photos are of the beds i planted this morning including the asparagu sbed...the third is my bed...the rye and jerusalem artichokes are doinfine and the sweet potato vine in the fourth photo is looking robust...i planted a couple of maize seeds there this morning...we'll see about that as time goes by...i have some yacon coming ( i think...the first plants arrived dead as doornails...if the replacements suffer the same there will be none ) and that will be it i think..a spare bed this season...i have a lot going on...the last photo is of progress in the garden...stillmore to do...still in need of a community.

a bed and a half

i soaked some bear paw maize seed overnight and took it out to the community garden early this morning to plant...i swore i wouldn't do this again but a friend sent me the heirloom seed and i thought i'd battle the squirrels again to see what happens...i believe we will lose the war but who knows? the lunchbox orange pepper in the fourth photo was started in march and it is ready to plant...so i tore the bottom off the peat pot and planted it deep enough to cover any trace of the peat pot...any part of the pot protruding above the surface of the soil will tend to dry the roots out through capillary action, drawing water up from the spoil and evaporating it...i did the same for a beefsteak tomato, red bell pepper and a grape tomato plant...those four plus the maize went into the bed with the asparagus...the asparagus has such a massive and deep root system the presence of annuals should not disturb it since they are comparatively shallowly rooted...finished with that i moved to the next bed where two forty pound bags of compost created two cucumber hills for spacemaster and sumter varieties of cucumbers ( one a pickling cuck and the other a slicing ).. a handful of seed in each will be thinned out in a couple of weeks and then we can look for vines....finally i planted three buttercruch lettuce plants..i admit i bought these...i am not a big lettuce grower ( although i will have some at home too ) and ddi not think to start any...store bought will have to do...there will be much more form here as the season progresses...tune in.

rain

rains spaced at regular intervals this spring have saved a lot of watering and have things moving right along...the long awns and bulbous seed tell me that the seed head in the second photo ( once again i have had to screen out the vegetation in the background out with a sheet of paper to get the camera to focus on what i want to post ) is wheat...but no in the bed of wheat..this is a volunteer from last season...there are a number of them...and, if they survive the starlings, i will be adding them to the harvest...the third photo is winter rye by way of comparison...there will be grapes ( fourth photo ) and their tendrils are being grabby any way they can to support the vines ( that is actually one of the vines that was mistakenly cut the living vines are being supported by...nothing really goes to waste out there )...the potato patch and the wheat bed are both very green and robust...and there is excellent growth in the teosinte bed...the bogota market mashua is doing fine as well...as long as the rains continue and don't turn violent there will be no need to water out there...that is good news...more from the yard and the community garden as the holiday weekend continues.

late may in the iuncg

the planting that was supposed to happen today was cancelled and i did not get the message so i went out o the garden after work all anticipation which gradually changed to aggrieved irritation which ha since abated after a late but well intended email...not wasting a trip i staked up the third year asparagus plants which have grown tall enough to fall over...they are about to bloom and i am hoping for a bumper crop of "berries" to seed around...the rye and jerusalem artichokes in my bed are coming along...the rye has large and well developed seed heads that will add to the grain harvest for the "bread from scratch" project...parker! showed up for the planting as well but was forced to content herself with serenading the plants that are there...the garden has some crops going on but there is considerable space left for more...it is almost june..time to get going or ti will be too late...the next to last phot is my truck bed and the last is a jerusalem artichoke that has taken root in the plant detritus that lives there from year to year...i told you they were relentless.

if shade won't come to the ramps...

...then it's high time to move the ramps to the shade..so i did ...i dug up all the second year ramps...put them in individual containers and moved them to the north side of the house where i know they will have shade...i used the acidic leaf humus based soil that was in the beds under the trees to pot them in so they should be fine ...i will be building a bed on that side of the house specifically for the ramps and there they will stay...the ones that have died back above ground are still viable bulbs so i will dig them and hold the in pots until the bed is finished and i can replant them in a more permanent location..the sunny beds they were in will be given over to tomatoes and cucumbers and squash and whatever else comes to hand...there will be no wasted space.

grapes!

the grandfatherly grape root stock may be weathered and the vines going up the elm tree may have been cut which is sad but a fact...however the vines in the spruce tree clearly were not cut and they have burst out of the tree and are leafing and latching on to any support they can find ( tubers and tendrils...abiding geekness ) and not only are they leafing, they are blooming...there are grape flowers in abundance...and where there are flowers there are grapes..it may be a truncated harvest this year but it will be a harvest...perhaps enough for a batch or two of jelly...grape jelly from the backyard vines to go with the "bread made from scratch" project results..Jean gets first crack at it but i will share after that.