Garden And Yard, Part 1

1.  Well, it seems I can finally plant my tomato seedlings outside today.  Mid-April was warm and the forecasts suggested it would stay that way  but weather has been more variable the past decade and the Washington DC area is historically difficult anyway.  

Not to get into details about that, but basically DC is at the border between the last cold fronts from Canada and the early warm fronts from the Gulf with some swirling winds through the gaps in the Appalachian Mountains.  

Really mixes things around.  A night with an expected low of 50 suddenly drops to 40.  But it looks like the Gulf fronts have won and the lows will stay at 60 minimum.  Not much a difference to we humans in our homes, but it sure matters to a tomato seedling.

Tomatoes are actually semi-tropical plants.  And below about 55, they don't do well.  They can get permanently set back in growth and production.  Ever read that you shouldn't refrigerate tomatoes?  That's why.  It shuts down their enzymes and that's where the flavor is.  And as seedlings, they don't recover.  Oh, I don't mean they die; they just don't thrive.

I used to try all sorts of things to plant tomato seedling outside early.  Black plastic on the raised beds to warm the soil.  Surrounding the seedlings with plastic tubes of water

The idea is that the water warms in the daytime sun and keeps the seedling warm through the night.  It's a pain.  Each tube has to be filled individually and then after a day of warming the water, you have to plant the seedling down through the top.

I did that for 20 years, thinking I was getting a good head start on my planting and would get a nice ripe heirloom tomato a couple of weeks earlier.  I adore heirloom tomatoes!

Then, one year, I did that for half the tomatoes and delayed planting the other half until the soil warmed above 55.  The tomatoes planted later did better than the earlier ones...  Lesson?  You can't really warm the soil before Mother Nature does it herself!  

Waiting 3 weeks until the time is actually right to plant beats trying to get around the natural course of the seasons.  

2.  For different reasons (Aphids and Fungus Gnats) I think I will give up trying to grow lettuces under lights in the basement.  In the basement, they have no natural predators (other than me) and they multiply faster than I can manage.  

I try to stay organic and the best organic controls are Neem (a tree bark product) Safer's soap (soap dehydrates insects and plants don't mind mild soap much), and yellow sticky-paper (yellow attracts them and they can't get loose when the land.  I had a dozen 3"x5" of those around my basement lettuce and pak choy.  I lost the entire crop twice last Winter.

I'm not exaggerating when I say I caught 1,000 of them on the sticky paper.  But there is no end to them!  There are always a few who escape and lay 1000s of eggs in the soil and then "there we go again".

And that's just one sticky paper!

I have the trays replanted out on the deck.  I never see a ladybug of other predatory insect there, but I don't see any aphids either.  But the lettuces are growing nicely and I'll replant the Pak choy soon.  I cut the celery down to an inch and they are growing new stalks quickly.  The Red leaf lettuce is doing especially well, but I don't have a picture (it was all blurry).  So here is last year and they are all doing about as well.

3.  I planted a dozen snow peas behind a trellis 3 weeks ago. 9 came up.  So I decided to plant more in front and fill in the missing back ones.  I soak the seeds overnight and then fold them in a damp paper towel in a plastic bag.  Most germinate and that lets you know which to plant.

Planting dry peas gets me about 50% seedlings.  Planting pre-germinated peas gets me about 80% seedlings.  BTW, the pea trellis is 6' wide in the middle of a 10' wide raised box.  So I'll be planting two grids of corn on either side (both bicolor, but one early-maturing and one later).  And I will soak the corn overnight too.  That helps.  But I don't have to wait to see a root.  The soaking itself is sufficient for corn.

4.  I have actual meadow flowers finally growing in my 4 year old meadow bed!  I knew they tended to take a couple years to establish good roots, but I was beginning to worry.  But suddenly this year they are growing upwards fast.  I know which ones they are because I stuck the labels in the ground AND stuck landscaping flags next to each.  So I will be sneaking around them with clippers to cut the grass back and give them less competition.  

As far as I can tell, 33 of the 36 meadow seedlings I planted are growing.  I am THRILLED.  Some are a foot high (after staying near ground level last year).  There is tall grass throughout the bed, but most of these meadow flowers grow 3-5' tall, so they will overcome that.  Well, they survived at 2" last year, so they should do better at 2-3' this year.

5.  The pollinator bed should also do well.  I transplanted a dozen Black-Eyed Susans last Spring and I suddenly see dozens growing there.  And I have 38 seedlings (several each of about 10 different kinds designed to support a wide variety of butterflies for adult nectar and larva-feeding).  Also good for hummingbirds and bees (bumble, honey, and native).  I did some research...

6.  2 years ago, I planted Maltese Cross and Tithonia flowers in an empty spot.  The Tithinia frew to 4' rapidly; the Maltese Cross about 8" high.  There is one Tithonia regrowing (can't win them all).  But I have a dozen Maltese Cross 2' tall now!

I will transplant them to the fenceline flowerbed this Fall.  They are self-sowing too, so I'll have more in a few years.  Aside from the meadow bed and the pollinator bed, I am trying to establish a cottage flower bed of self-sowers.

7.  I have more flower seedlings growing inside (and oddly not bothered with aphids), but that is for tomorrow.

 

Indoor Seed-Starting

 I got back to planting seeds inside.  Last post, I had cleaned up the spill from "somecat" jumping on the stack of soil-filled trays and knocking half of them over.  What a MESS!

So I took the filled ones and planted 2 trays of seeds.  "Just 2" you ask?  Yeah...

It was all the stuff I had to do before planting them.  Well, if you go to a fast-food place, they don't start preparing for the assembly-line when the store opens.  They have to have everything ready to use for the first customer, right?

I started by sorting out my plant labels (I don't make new ones every year).  First, veggies vs flowers.  Then various types of each.  Flower labels are easy.  Annuals vs perennials.  Then common ones (Marigolds and Zinnias, etc) vs "fancy" (the ones you don't find on Walmart racks).  I bundled the categories with rubber bands.

Then I had to soak some of the filled trays with water.  The dry potting soil I mix myself takes a while to get wet (really).  

Then I had to check my list of starting dates.  I am behind a couple of weeks (as usual).  So I needed to plant seeds that should have been started earliest first.  It is 4 weeks til "last frost date", so I planted the -8 weeks to -6 weeks last night.  And I planted the common ones, just to get back into practice again.

Later today, I will catch up to -4 weeks and be current again.  

After that, I will tackle the more "exotic" flowers.  Those are trickier.  Those seeds can have some real odd requirements.  Some need to be planted deeply, some need to just be sprinkled on the surface.  Some need to be planted in soaked soil and then be left dry for a week.  Some need constant water.  Some need strong light, others want none at first.  Some need cool temps to germinate, others need Summer warmth.

There is a reason those flowers are not "common", LOL!  I move trays around the house a lot.  Some get set above warm floor vents, some get set in the colder garage.  Some get direct light on the planting stand, some have a towel other them for initial darkness.  It takes some time, but it is a hobby and obsessive attention to a hobby is self-justified.  😎

There is a reward though.  The "fancy" ones are fairly cheap as seeds but expensive to buy as seedlings.  And the ones I am trying to grow are ones that support beneficial or lovely insects (butterflies, bees, ladybugs, etc) for food or egg-laying.  And many support hummers and other interesting birds (some migratory).

So tomorrow, more seed-starting.  And some are nearly impossible to grow (for an amateur like me).  I have an order of 38 pollinator and meadow flower plants due to arrive in late April.  Sometimes, you just have to buy what you can't grow.

Yard

The bad news is that I had to have some landscaping cut down earlier this month.  Dead trees, dead shrubs, etc.  There was a dead tree too large for me to handle and remove, so I decided to have some other problems removed at the same time.  Used to look like this...

Those are all gone now...  Drought and windstorms.

The good news is that I can re-landscape the front yard.  Sometimes, it is good to have changes.  Choosing new things to plant will be fun.  They will be more heat and drought tolerant.  I also plan to reduce the lawn area.  I have a mulching mower, so lawn-clippings just stay on the soil a decay.  But grass wants what grass is - itself, so I don't fertilize it madly like some people do.  I give it a "bit" of organic slow-release nitrogen (corn gluten) every couple of years.  Well, some nitrogen escapes over time and the grass needs some replacement.

The mulching mower also shreds the fallen tree leaves.  That adds some bulk to the soil.  When I moved here 36 years ago, the soil would crack open like a dried-up river bed.  After all those years of leaving the grass and leaf clippings in place, the soil is softer, more fertile, and the grass doesn't even go dormant in the Summer.

But a large clear lawn is not my goal.  Sure, I want what there is to be healthy, but I don't need so much of it.  Every few years, I tend to add more islands of flowerbeds and a few shrubs (framed to make mowing easier).  I have to build 3 new ones now where the dead shrubs used to be.

Ideally, the entire front yards would go from "framed islands" to the whole thing with paths.  But I'm getting older gradually (is there any other way?) and maintenance becomes harder.  Well, wherever there are framed beds, I don't have to mow there.  And if I keep paper covered with mulch deep enough in the frames, I don't have to weed there either.  

So I guess I am planning how to make my future (less active) life easier.  Eventually, I won't even need a riding mower.  The self-propelled electric one will do all that it required.  My next car will be all-electric too.  Eventually, I will just have a landscaped yard with paths among the trees, islands, and shrubs.  

Catching Up With The Yard, Part 2

I mentioned that grasses were taking over some areas of the yard.  And those were flowerbeds.   Well, I "got behind" this year.  I wasn't healed from the ladder fall until about June (and will never be fully, but let's say I might be about 80%).  I can do most things OK.

But I have catching up to do.  I slacked last year a bit and then couldn't do much until June this year (and I have done a LOT of cutting-to-ground-level and digging this year.  So I'm doing basic stuff this late Summer and Fall.

Two losses were the meadow bed and the pollinator bed.  The meadow bed wasn't all THAT bad.  Lot's of Queen Anne's Lace, some Black-Eyed Susans and a few surviving wildflowers.  But both failed, so it is time to start again.

I cut all the tall plants near ground level with a hedge-trimmer (worked great) and then used the mower at the lowest level.  There is probably enough fallen plant material to smother the grasses.  Or maybe not.  But as they decay, it will sure be good for the soil.

But I have a plan.  The Meadow Bed will become a mix of native and adapted flowers that do well here.  Mostly Black-Eyed Susans, Purple Coneflowers, Queen Anne's Lace, 

And some various self-sowing flowers (Tithonia, Calendula, and Butterfly Weed) that seem to attract pollinators.  

The pollinator garden will become more of a source of beneficial insect growth area.  A plastic tub will serve to host milkweed for monarch butterflies and others will help other beneficial insects.  I'll be deciding next month about what to plant for them.  There are lists on the net.

But the first thing to do is try to smother the more wild grasses that invaded the beds in the first place.  I've collected enough permeab;e black weed-smothering fabric to cover everything.  I tried solid black plactic over the Spring Bulb bed, but THAT did was create pools of rainwater for the mosquitoes.  Some pereamble it must be.  It WILL smother the grasses eventually.

I made a mistake trying to plant the specialty beds several years ago.  I SHOULD have covered them first for a year to kill the grasses that survived the rototillering.  But I was impatient.

Had I done that then, I would have 3 year old mature meadow and pollinator beds now.  You live and learn.  And such beds were new to me.

I have all THOSE above flowers growing now around the yard and in a nursery bed.  I'll be collecting the seedheads as they mature and dry to spread around in the 2 beds.  I think I will spread all the various seeds around about equally.  Some may grow better than others, and I would rather see a general spread of flowers adapted to my area all over than have barespots.  I can always diversify in a future year.

Catching Up

Wow, 2 weeks since I posted here!  Well, I've been busy. 

1.  My lettuce trays on the deck "bolted" in the August heat.  Time to replant.  I have a large shallow plastic tub I use for mixing potting soil for Spring plantings.  Fine for dumping the soil in the trays and mixing it around to add new slow-release fertilizer, too.  

I did that on the deck.  No rain forecast for 2 days, so time to let it dry a bit for easier mixing.  Naturally, it rained.  And then more forecast for the next day, so I covered it wit a piece of plywood that almost reached the edges so I added a a big trask bag to reached over the sides.

The rain got in there anyway!  So I tilted it and siphoned the water out.  Muddy water doesn't siphon well, so I had to keep fussing with the tube.  I got most of it out.  And realized I had a dry tray inside, so I added that to soak up the rest.

That's not exactly rocket science, but it does take time.  I covered it better today.  The remnants of Hurricane Ida are coming straight through here Wed and maybe dropping 2-3 inches of rain on us.  The last thing I need for the trays is mud.  It compacts as it dries and I want to replant soon.  I miss my bright red leaf lettuce in my salads!

2.  I bought a battery-powered mower in 2018.  It's pathetic.  I went by Amazon ratings (no offence to Amazon) but I sometimes forget that their ratings only apply to customer ratings about things Amazon sells.  So if they sell average stuff, the best ratings are still about average stuff.

The Greenworks mower I bought has batteries difficult to remove (I devised twine loops to pull them out),  the batteries die after 10 minutes, the power is so weak that the mower cringes at 4" grass being cut down to 3", and it is entirely push/pull.  I've hated it for 3 years!

So I went to Consumer Reports magazine website (I have a subscription) and went looking for the best self-propelled models.  Wow, what a difference!  The one I bought in 2018 was rated poor.  

The best Top 3 ones at CR were about the same.  I bought a Ryobi "40V HP Brushless 21 in. Cordless Battery Walk Behind Self-Propelled Lawn Mower with (2) 6.0 Ah Batteries and Charger", model RY401014US (if you are curious).

I used it yesterday and it worked great.  Powerful, long-lasting. cut down 16" high weeds in an old bed for renovation (with a bit of care).  I had let a tall-growing weed grow there to smother the others.  I love the self-propelled rear drive wheels.  I WAS disappointed to realize that it didn't self-propel in reverse, but apparently none of them do.  My DR brush-mower does and I made an assumption that forward also allowed back.

But I use it in tight spaces and around trees where the riding mower can't go.  It's the forward self-propel that helps the most.

3.  And speaking of the DR brush mower (brutal thing that can cut down weedy shrubs and wild saplings 1.5" thick, turns blackberry canes into mulch, and is self-propelled forwards and back), I left it with gas in the tank 2 years ago (well, I expected to use it again soon but didn't).  Won't start now.  Have to inject the fuel line with "starter fluid".  Sounds like an old boy scout joke about smoke shifters, sky hooks, and 50' of shoreline, but it is real.  

If that doesn't work, back to the repair shop and and they both slow and expensive.  One thing I hate repairing is gasoline engines.  I can fix a lot of things, but those aren't one that comes easily.  

A neighbor once climbed up on the fence and asked if I was good at repairing things.  I said "yeah, as long as it isn't a 2-stroke gasoline engine".  You should have seen the look on his face; that was exactly what he needed help with, LOL!

I am switching to almost all-battery stuff these days.  They just keep working,

4.  Time for my first car maintenance visit.  13 months and I've driven 600 miles!  Laugh if you want to; I just don't drive much.  But I'm going to have to drive 120 mile round trip sometime in September to adopt my female Tonkinese cat, so I need to make sure the car is ready for a trip.

5.  The garden is producing a meal's worth of flat italian Romano beans every other day.  Not bad for a 5' long 1' wide trellis".  My 3 cherry tomatoes have fruits and I expect to strt picking ripe one in 2 weeks.  The regular-size tomatoes were planted late and are just beginning to open blossoms.  It will be a contest between warm-weather growing and the first frost on late October.  I expect a month's worth at least.  Maybe 6 weeks.

6.  The deck Mums are starting to bloom.  Yellow, orange, and red.  That will be nice.

7.  The Black-Eyed Susans are blooming nicely.

Actually, they are very numerous and spreading.  Well, they are native here. so no threat.  I encourage them.  They bloom for a few months.  My plan is to transplant the Susans in the garden paths to the meadow bed and add purple coneflower transplants (from places I don't want them).  Yellow and purple together look good to me.

Yard And Garden

 Some pictures from the yard and garden...

The daylilies are from a week ago.  They are fading now.  But lovely while they last.

The Black-Eyed Susans are blooming.  It hasn't been raining much and they wilted briefly, but they are native and used to it.  They recovered quickly after just a 1/4" of rain the other day.

The Queen Anne's Lace is also a native and blooms through droughts.  I'm moving to native plants more and more.  With some exceptions...

I mowed the Spring Bulb area and plan to cover it to smother the weeds that have crept in.  Which won't bother the Daffodils and Tulips as they like being dry in Summer and Fall.  The stuff growing at the bottom are the Daylillies but there are weeds among them that I need to pull.

I lost control over this area.  Time for hedge trimmer and lopper work!

Always "something".  I got behind last year, and then there was the ladder fall in January, so I stayed behind.  I'm catching up, though.

The good news is that the Black Eyed Susans are spreading and I can take up many as transplants in Fall (the ones growing in the garden paths) and get the meadow bed re-established with them and some other self-sowing flowers in a cleared area.