Warm Weather Ahead

The weather this year for June has been warmer than usual. In fact, the last few days have been mild and muggy. The combination of heat and humidity have done wonders for all my plants. Also, the forecast for this coming weekend promises temps in the 80's, with a possible high of 90 degrees.

As you can see in the pic below my broccoli grew enormous this year. So, I need to begin picking it before the temps promote it to flower. Also, the beans are doing quite well and growing quicker than the before can do enough damage to hinder them. The corn is progressing along nicely, certainly faster than last year at this time in the month. Finally, my bleeding hearts are really "going to town" with plenty of new blooms.

June Update

I spent three hours working at the p-patch today and accomplished quite a bit. The green trimmings from the hellebores were bagged up, taken home, and disposed of. The six-week-old compost was completely removed from the bin and spread around the main plot as well as the corn. I have two extra piles of compost covered and plan to use it in the coming months as more space becomes free (btw, the birds were going to town on my compost worms. Any time I was more than a few feet away the birds would chomp away on my unprotected worms. I hope a few worms survived, as they really help to aerate the compacted soil).

The remaining spinach in the main plot was also removed, as well as more weeds.On anther note, you can see in the third pic that the foxtail lily is blooming. I also planted a lupine (blue) in the center of the plot and hope to see it bloom in the coming months but at this point really just want it to get established.

I planted more bean seeds about a week ago (under remay next to the hellebores) to replace the ones that didn't come up (well, only one sprouted). I'm hoping to see some development any time now. The weather has been quite warm and everything is doing well.

Veggies!

The cool-weather vegetables are coming along nicely. The peas are finally taking off, the broccoli looks great, and the spinach is ready for harvesting. I already planted corn and beans even though the temperatures continue to fluctuate. Fortunately, all of the corn seeds have sprouted and are covered with remay (see pic). I hope this will protect them adequately from cooler overnight temperatures.

Early Summer Plants

foxtail lily

dicentra 'burning hearts'

Summer is Here

Temperatures are reaching 80 degrees in the first week of May this year. This is promising. I hope this means Summer will have record warm weather. I already have Walla Walla onions growing, as well as spinach and Alderman peas. The peas are taking quite a while to take off and are pretty chewed up by birds. I'm still planning to plant corn, peppers, and green beans (I just need to find space to plant them all). Also, my bleeding hearts are coming along nicely, and the foxtail lily too. Sometime in the coming week I will need to trim all of Spring perennials as they are finished blooming for the year.

Spring Color

Spring Update

Well, I have finally got around to publishing an update. A lot has happened in the last couple of months. First of all, my extra garden space (on the South side of the property) is no longer. It seems that a rep from the city doesn't like that folks are gardening near the edge of the hillside and it may be contributing to soil erosion. So, I no longer have an extra 70sf. As for my main plot...the peas are surviving, although slugs/snails are snacking on the leaf edges. I've planted a couple of batches of Walla Walla onions. Also, the various groups of tulips are starting to show color. 

On another note, and pictured below, I finally managed to get my single Cyclamen Repandum corm to produce leaves and blooms. It only took two years :-P