Monday, April 13, 2009

The waiting garden

It's raining still. It began on Saturday night, stayed all Sunday, and it's still hanging around this morning.
Before the rain started, I managed to put out two more tomato plants, a Black Russian and a cherry type; Maskotka.
Then I decided to put the Jalapeño M plants out as well. They seemed happy on the 65F degree weather, with a gentle breeze and a beautiful sun. I haven't checked on them since but I have the perverse feeling that they are dead.
I also put all the potatoes that I had in peat pots out on tubs. Then I moved the garden bags where I am growing some more potatoes.
I also filled the upside down tomato planter that I bought and stuck a Jet Star tomato plant in it. This is my wife's tomato plant. "I just want a plain red tomato" she said.
So far, I have the following tomatoes outside in home-made, self-watering containers:

Market Miracle
Amateur's Dream
Black Russian
Urbikani
Maskotka
Brandywine

The onions and the garlic are doing great. My radishes all recovered from the snow and ice storms. My lettuces are coming on strong and I now have Minnesotta Midget canteloupe plants emerging.
I really wanted to plant my beans and peas this weekend but I did not get to them. It turns out that my wife and children want my attention as well and so I can only allot so much of it to my plants.

The book by Michael Pollan, Second Nature, is really good. I really like his take on weeds and weeding.

Still no pictures. I took a few pictures on Saturday but I was not happy with them. I want beautiful pictures like the ones here and here.

Last, I took the rain barrel I bought last year and put it under one of the water spouts. My 3 year old thought it was a good idea to take a hammer and bash in the bug screen on the barrel. I kept thinking of the best way to fix it and I finally got it: grease splatter screen. I will use that until I find the right size mesh somewhere to fix it permanently.
I also put a brand-new trash can under another one of the water spouts to collect water for the flower beds. They should both be full by now.

Hopefully, I will get to put the Irish Eyes sunflowers out today when I get home.

2 comments:

  1. I hear ya, David, the rain is moving my way! Finally, I am getting some action on my seeds and I am dreading that they might drown! Hey, I guess you have to make a choice family...or garden...family...or garden. I would think the family would win!

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  2. I know one of these days they will love to garden and then it'll be a family affair. Right now I am afraid they see gardening as "Daddy time" :-)

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