June 8th Update

 Still no rain worth counting. We may have had an two inches since last post. We are at least 11" down for the year. 

A graph from local station showing where we are in 2026 compared to last four years. We desperately need the rain. 

I have taken photos since last post so I thought I would do some comparisons. First from last post I planted the green beans. All photos about 2 weeks apart. Those are the potato bags I bought and used some potatoes we had that sprouted eyes, so why not. I had to add extensions to the bags but more on that later. 

The planted sweet corn has really been taking off and I planted a few watermelon seeds in between where a couple plants didn't come up. 

Onions are still going well. Hard to mess them up.

I had that one bed that I needed to clean out of weeds and get planted, and I just so happened to have a few plants from the island of misfit plants to go in. One that I am interested in was one of the leaders on another tomato plant that I put into a jar of water for a couple of weeks. It didn't look too good going into the ground but I planted it deep so fingers crossed it works out. 

Some of these went in where a brandywine died off from unknown circumstances. I just can't get them to grow here. I have one remaining and it's hanging on. 

Here is said sad plant that I planted. 

And here is the former weed bed planted out. 

The rest are tomatoes that we are starting to get some cherries off of. 

Here are the potato bag extensions that I made. I was going to but and cut some plywood boxes to extend the bags as they are not big enough to contain the plants themselves. Instead a found this siding underlayment and gorilla tape. I just rolled it up inside of the bag and taped it off. I added more dirt and they seem to be holding in place. 

Here's a couple overall views. I finally got the edge border down, then put down all of the cardboard we been saving and doubled up on the landscape fabric where I didn't cover with cardboard, then mulched everything. I was a long morning for me to get it done. 30 bags of mulch is what it took. I also picked up some nice bushes that I installed at the front and some daylilies that will be for another post. 

There's the girls' coop on the right.

I'd like to have another 8 beds for next year. 

WOF of the week. We'll go with waste of feathers. We've been letting the girls out more and more so I caught a couple cruising around. 

Sorry if this seems cut up but I will try to post more often. 

Harvest Monday; July 24, 2017

Happy Harvest Monday!

It has been overwhelmingly hot here the last few weeks. So much so that the plants have been taking a beating. Tomatoes are so to ripen and some of the plants are not looking too good, peppers are doing so-so, but cucumbers are doing great. Go figure. I know I haven't been on here for a few weeks so I got a lot to catch up on.

Picture of a harvest.

What a mess.

Weed mess. I didn't get out to the garden last week and it shows. 

Morning glories. 

Volunteer sunflower.

Cuke got squeezed in the fence.

Amy took some pictures of our helpers. 

Green peppers abound but not big enough to pick.

Planted some green beans in the beds, hoping nothing eats them. We want to try to can some more.

Watermelon doing great. Hope we get to eat it within the next few weeks.

Hope all is well with everyone. Sorry so short but work comes calling. Harvest Monday is hosted at Our Happy Acres. 

Harvest Monday; August 22, 2016

Yes, back on Harvest Monday. See Dave at Our Happy Acres!

Garden- wise, beyond peppers and watermelon, everything is pretty much had it. I know this is a repeat of every week but this simmer has been brutal for us gardeners (another repeat.) As I mentioned in the previous post, we took a small trip to the mountains and I just reviewed the garden when we got back Sunday. I also caught up my spreadsheet, here.

As I said I did a quick tour Sunday evening. 

Hope you can see four watermelon. That's whats there. 

Hot peppers and banana peppers seem to love this weather. My bell peppers all have bad areas on them. 

Marigolds. I have touched on them previously. I have done nothing to these. Maybe that's what I have to do with everything. 

Overall. Pretty sad. Got my work cut out for me next weekend. 

Our vacation wasn't a full week but a nice break from everything that seems to go in our daily lives. We are always busy with something. My oldest said such as much until he bought his house. Now I think he understands. Anyway we had a nice time and in looking at the pictures I see a few more upcoming posts so stay tuned. I will leave a few here. 

The house we stayed at had hummingbird feeders and I counted 10-12 at one time, fighting each other to eat. And boy do they eat. And very territorial. Actually kinda mean.

Biltmore. About 179,000 square foot. You want to clean it? 

70'-0" tall banquet room with organ. Note the carvings on the balcony. Everything in this home is hand- carved. Everything.

Atrium. Now that's a greenhouse. 

Part of the gardens. There's 30 acres of them. Needless to say this was at the end of our day at Biltmore and we were tired of walking. 

View from the top of Craggy Gardens in black and white. Sometimes I like to see black and white photos as I think they lend a different perspective. 

I took this from the deck of the house Sunday morning before leaving for home. We stayed in Little Switzerland. Notice the fog in the valleys. Yes, we hit a little of that heading home. 

That's it for now but as I said I have some great information for posts. Stay tuned.