Photo dump & other notes

 I realized I had too many pictures to wait through two weeks.  So here's a quick photo dump.

tomato zoo:  'German Johnson' caged "pink" tomatoes

foreground: oregano and chives

All these lettuces were sown at the same time.  left: 'Green Ice', center: 'New Red Fire', right (sparse): 'Rouge D'Hiver'

'New Red Fire'

'Beit Alpha'  cucumbers

left: 'Calima' bush beans; right: 'Lilian's Caseload' peas

'Seaside' spinach

I hope to soon be able to sit on this bench and snack on ripe cherry tomatoes that I plan to train up on the wagon wheel.

'Supersweet 100' cherry tomatoes

When the potatoes first started coming up, it wasn't obvious which were 'All Blue' and which were 'Yukon Gold'.  Now that they're bigger, it's easy to tell.

'All Blue'

'Yukon Gold'

The beets are sprouted.  I sprayed them with neem oil before I left, but I'm afraid in two weeks' time, when I return, they might be full of insect damage.

'Babybeat' beets

I also felt I had to spray the rose bushes with Sevin (carbaryl) because Japanese beetles usually start showing up around the first of June, and I wanted to give them a fighting chance.  I hate to do it, though, and frankly, it might have been a waste since the blooms aren't yet open, and that's what the beetles attack.  I don't like spraying Seven when honeybees are about, and I could hear lots of buzzing in the thyme flowers on the floor of the rose bed.  

When I got a closer look, I realized it was not bees, but flies.  Large flies.

While flies also pollinate, I didn't feel as badly about them encountering a contact insecticide as I would have honeybees.   But...

I didn't know what kind of fly these were, as I don't think I've seen them before, and certainly not in the large numbers there were.  I set Google Lens to identifying them, and when I learned that they are in the Tachinid family, I felt badly again.  The Tachinids I'm used to seeing are much smaller.  Tachinid flies are quite beneficial besides their pollinating ability, as they parasitize caterpillars, so they could be a big help to control vegetable pests.  On the other hand, if they parasitize butterfly caterpillars, I wouldn't like that.  So I don't know how to feel about the whole deal.  Maybe I'll just call it a wash.

I'm amazed at the two Golden Muscat grapevines.  Early this spring I had to dig them out of the garden proper where they were taking over.  To do so, I had to disentangle them, so I chopped most of the tops off as well as most of the roots. There was about the same amount under gound as above ground - no more than two feet in each direction - when I put them in.  I just stuck them in the ground in the wildflower bed at the base of two birdhouse poles, watered them in, and left them to their own salvation.  Not only did they salvage themselves despite the dry March and April we had, they seem to be undaunted.

Overnight one night, somebody's baby fell into the basement window well.  Its mother may not have told it the cautionary tale of Peter Rabbit.  Although it was small, possums can scratch and bite (and hiss and growl, which are very unnerving, but not harmful), so it was quite the undertaking to get it out without injuring myself or it. I tried to prod it to walk up a board, but it was having none of it.  It rutted up some dead bald cypress leaves and stuck its head under them.  I assume, like a human baby, it thought if it couldn't see me, I couldn't see it.  

I tried to hoist it up using two thick pieces of tree limb, but couldn't keep it balanced on them. Finally, I lowered a bucket down over top with a quick flip to turn it upright, scooping the creature inside. Luckily it wasn't quick enough to get out before I lifted it out to the yard.  It moved quite slowly, probably worn out from its travails.  

Poor thing was rather lost when I turned it loose, and rather than running, ambled around in circles a while before it slowly struck out for somewhere else. I hope it found its way home before a large bird of prey spied it. (I once saw a bald eagle eating a possum at the edge of the yard.  It didn't leave much behind but fur.) 

Won't this baby's mom be surprised if it does show up!  "How on earth did you get out of that trap?!" Stories will be told for generations.

See you in a couple of weeks after I've spent the hours necessary to get two weeks' worth of weeds out of my garden and clip out dead flowers.

Beautiful weather after the rains

Lush and green, flowers blooming...it's lovely out there.

New growth on the tomatoes looks strange to me.  Curly, like there's been herbicide damage, which there hasn't.  I assume they're responding to the weather, but I don't recall this ever in the past.

The potato-leaf 'German Johnson' variety shows it clearly.

'German Johnson'

And the 'Speckled Roman' are showing it all over, even on the old growth.  I haven't grown these before, but it just doesn't look right.  

'Speckled Roman'

I'm very interested to see if they look different later in the year, and whether there's any resulting effects on the fruit.  I sure hope not.

The walking onions are heading.  I don't use these in cooking, because I don't care for the flavor, and they're tough.  Also, they're really hard to control.  They pretty much become a weed.  They're taking over my compost hill.  In this spot in the garden, I keep them limited by pulling.  I like to keep some, because I think they're interesting to look at.

'Egyptian walking onions'

Arugula, which grows fast, is coming out.  I've learned to sow the seed after lettuce has come up and begun to get good growth on it so I'll have comparable sized leaves from each for salads.

I haven't grown beets for several years.  I'm excited to see how these 'Babybeat' plants turn out.  I'm planning on having beet greens to mix in salads, and I hope the small beetroots will be tasty.

A few 'Primo Vantage' cabbage plants that I didn't pull completely out of the soil are leafing out.  I don't know if there will be any useable heads from them, but I'm leaving them grow to find out.

Small Persian melon plants look quite happy after transplanting.  I've surrounded them with marigolds to hopefully mask the aroma and discourage raccoons.

'Savor', my favorite, on the other hand, are not doing well.  They didn't do well in the propagation chamber, so I'm assuming the seed wasn't still good.

'Seaside' spinach is looking very good.  I'll be planting this again in the future.  It has a nice mild spinach flavor with a substantial leaf.  

Roses are beginning to bloom.  Always exciting.

'Pat Austin'

'Zepherine Drouhin' climbing rose

I'll end with pretty flower pictures until next time, which will probably be in about three weeks when I return from a trip to Wisconsin.

A little rain goes a long way

We're not getting as much rain as we need, but we're getting enough that I can stop watering for a bit.  Things are really taking off.  

The 'Calima' bush beans are up.

Wasabi radishes are filling out.  I hope they decide to make an actual radish this year.  Otherwise, they won't be planted again.  Well, they may not even then, depending on whether I like them.

This is the first year I've planted roma style tomatoes.  'Speckled Roman' looked beautiful last summer in my sister's Wisconsin garden, so I thought I'd give them a shot.  The plants all look like they were hit by herbicide.  They weren't.  Maybe they just don't like it here.

'Tender Sweet' carrots are up and very weedy.  They get lawnmower clipping trash sprayed on them by a careless lawn mower, and I have a heck of a time pulling out little grass seedlings.  After my first year of carrots that did beautifully, I haven't had much luck.  Thinning carrots is a difficult job, so this year I tried very hard to sow the seed sparsely.  It looks like I managed it ok.  Maybe too sparsely. Hopefully the carrots will grow nicely and be both tender and sweet.  I recently planted another patch of 'SugarSnax' carrots, but they have yet to germinate.

Newly emerged potato plants were hit by a freeze, but they've come out of it just fine.  I planted 'Yukon Gold' and 'All Blue' this year.  This is 'All Blue':

I'm looking forward to finding out how the blue ones compare in texture and taste.

I have several varieties of lettuce, most of which got off to a poor start due to the unexpected cold weather early on.  The 'Green Ice' and 'New Red Fire' varieties were sown at the same time, and they've certainly responded differently.

'New Red Fire'

'Early purple Vienna' kohlrabi plants are getting established, but they're not nearly as big as the ones I still have in pots to give away.

My favorite cantaloupe - 'Savor' - seeds germinated and grew poorly.  I transplanted three anyway, but I'm not expecting much.  It was last year's seed, so maybe it doesn't store well, even in the freezer.  Or maybe I should have direct seeded like I usually do. I'll order more for next year.

In the meantime, I ordered some small Persian melons to try.  The catalog promised very sweet fruit, so I'm hoping they'll be at least nearly as good as 'Savor'.  I set them out a little earlier than I might otherwise do, but I need to get things established well before I leave later this month for two weeks out of state.  

Small Persian melon

Tomatoes are caged, peppers are planted, oregano is starting to get out of control, and chives are blooming.

I have never met so many mole tunnels in my life.  The whole garden seems undermined.  I've been trying to drill holes with the water hose and flood them, and put mole bait in the tunnels they reuse.  I planted a row of basil along my tomatoes, about 20 plants, and I hit a tunnel setting in all but 2! 

My poor zinnia patch looks like it was bombed from my attempts to rid it of moles.

I planted some 'Giant Rattle' annual poppies for the first time this year, and the foliage is looking like the giant part isn't a lie.

I still don't know what variety this iris is, but I love it.  The blooms are huge, and so lovely.  

And now I have another iris whose name I don't know.  I know the plants I ordered for this bed did not include a rich purple one, so I can only assume the seller got one mixed in of another name, but I'm not complaining.

I would like to know its name, though.  I suppose I can just give it one.  Or find a dark purple iris that looks like it and call it that.  It looks like one from the company I ordered from called 'Titan's Glory', so that's probably what I'll call it.

'Victoria Falls' (pale purple), 'English Charm' (two tone orange), 'Penny Lane' (brilliant orange), pink Gladiolus bizantinus, and oriental lilies yet to bloom

This year there's only one stem of 'Penny Lane'.  I hope that doesn't mean it's giving up.

'English Charm'

'Jade Eyes' white allium, 'Tangerine Gem' Spanish poppy, 

and orange-scarlet oriental poppies

honeybees buzzing an oriental poppy

'Tangerine Gem' Spanish poppies

purple blooming 'Orange Balsam' creeping thyme 

covering the ground in the rose garden