DON'T LAUGH!!

LOVE IT!

Believe me, Goosegirl, llama poo is SO much easier to scoop up by the shovel-full, while ewe poo and goat poo (also known as nanny berries) tends to be quite scattered. Scattered scat? Whatever.

Nonna.PapaVino wrote:...ewe poo and goat poo (also known as nanny berries) tends to be quite scattered. Scattered scat? Whatever.

I love it! Scattered Scat!

TC

Well there is chicken & goat poo in a pile getting ready to use. I only brought home 3 5-gallon buckets full and there is a lot of bedding mixed in. I'm making a manure tea in one of the buckets, which I should be able to use in a few weeks.

Today we put together the cedar bed for the butterfly garden. It is 10" high and now I feel the need to add a lot more MM to top it off. Partly for appearances and party because I'm worried about shade over that edge. The fennel quit, so the only thing I need to worry about burrying is the purple coneflower - unless the tropical milkweed did reseed itself, which I won't know for a few months yet.

The spring bed has both broccolis peeking through the soil and about 5 of the 16 peas. We may have to reseed for a 4th time. Nothing else is showing up yet, but it was rather cold this past week. I added 4 different lettuces: New Fire Red, Grand Rapids, Salad Bowl, and Buttercrunch - all from A.J. Rahn's. So now there is only one open square and it is waiting for the carrot competition in a few weeks. I bought Nantes at Burger last week.

I had so many lettuces that I had to put some in the summer bed, which is in no way ready for planting. It was my first bed last year and in my excitement I didn't wait for vermiculite. It is all compost and garden soil. It needs to be ammended before the tomatoes go in. So we will try to eat that lettuce first.

In kid's bed #1 the peas are coming up in a better percent than mine. The daisy is going to live and today we added some tulips and a broccoli. She also wants some spinach, so we'll get that in this week (hopefully).

The strawberries do not have any blooms yet, but they all have new growth. I can't get over how hardy they are! That flood changed a lot of things down there for many, but the strawberries are bouncing right back!

Here is a shot from the north part of my allotment looking south:



I am now entertaining the idea of leasing the allotment next to mine and making a sunflower maze for the kid. This is not an original idea - I got it from Farmer Valerie's post about the kindergarden contest from last year. Perhaps biting off more than I can chew, but if I can get the plot cleared, the rest will fall into place (I think). Here is how it looks today:



Am I crazy? And I really like the idea of wood shaving for my paths. Thanks bunches for the suggestion! I've begun laying cardboard and will begin searching for a source for the shavings. Yea!

At home on Thursday I put in the Jacks-in-the-Pulpit, trillium, and yellow ladys slipper. The trillium still looks alive, so I'm optimistic. The others were still bare-root, so it will take some time for them to come up. On the other side of the path, I added the first hellebore. I want to find 2 more, but at $13 each, they may have to come one at a time. And the baskets are pull of colorful pansies. Yea!

Hopefully the warmer part of spring will be here soon. The temperature is supposed to be in the 30s again this week after getting near 70 on Monday. Ugh! At least baseball is here! I leave you now to go cheer on my Reds. ttfn

I starting to look great! I got 2 of those lettuces too, the fire red and the buttercrunch? How did you plant those? When I got them, I suumed it was a 4 pack like the romaine I already had but it was just one big square, I wasn't sure if I was supposed to separate it or not.

I am so glad the floods have receded and you can now get back on track. Let's hope those beds are loaded with wonderful nutrients from the river.

Looking for a bit of advice. If it's available, I'm going to lease the plot next to me to do the sunflower maze for the kid. I will do a variety of sunflowers interplanted with some corn. The allotments are 25'x25'. I want to do a spiral that utilizes the whole space and then leave room to play in the center. We've talked about adding a chair and maybe a small table. But is there another shape that would work better? Just a square to make a house? What about growing gourds to make a roof across the top? Could they grow up the sunflowers and corn or do they need their own supports? Or should I leave the top open? And does anyone have experience with growing cosmos next to corn? I think they would add some excellent color! Thanks for any input!!

Nancy, you mention growing gourds with your corn, that's two of the traditional Three Sisters plantings used by the Native Americans: Corn, Beans and Squash (gourds are a type of squash, just not so edible). What about adding some halloween pumpkin plants around your corn maze and, after the corn is up a couple of inches, planting some scarlet runner beans to grow up the corn stalks, especially around the open "hide-out" play area in the center, supports for which could be placed tee-pee style to give some shade. Scarlet runners are delicious beans, if harvested young and steamed. Mmmmmm. They also help fix nitrogen in the soil, which the corn appreciates.

It's been a while. Sorry! First an animal update. No frogs / tadpoles yet. Nor any caterpillars. Yet I did find a preying mantis egg case when I was pulling weeds last week. I saw a bunch of honey bees tonite. I tried to get a picture, but my model flew away before I could get my phone ready. Then I saw this:



I think she was more startled by me than I was by her. She didn't move a muscle while I was near. Is she pregnant or did she just have a very big meal? Hmmm...

Kid bed #1 is doing great. The tulips are finished, the daisy is looking awesome, and the peas are almost ready to climb:



The spring bed is beautiful. The broccolis are doing okay. The seedling even appears to have new growth. These peas also are nearly ready to climb. The 4 squares of lettuce are filling in really well. I think I have spinach coming up. This might be my last year with spinach from seed. I even see carrots! Woo Hoo! No change in the garlic.



The butterfly bed has no change. I tried to pull the old swamp milkweed and discovered that underground things are happening. So I put it back. Hopefully I didn't disturb it too much. I have tropical milkweed seeds going in the house, but they won't go outside until after our last frost date. I will get the nectar plants around that time, too. Here is a shot of a naked bed, except for the purple coneflower in the upper corner. I am including it because it is my only cedar bed and I love it.



Here is a picture of the whole garden. It's come a long way in the last month. I'm still dealing with whatever weeds the river gave me. But I'm so relieved that I still have a garden and that it is as happy as it is. The orange bucket closest is the compost tea. I gave everybody a yummy drink tonite. I'm expecting big results now that they have new compost & a goat poop cocktail.

It looks great! A far cry from being under water. Alot of work but you did a fantastic job recovering. Happy Gardening in 2011 Nancy!

Nancy,
Years ago, maybe late 80s, I saw an article about a kids garden in a Better Homes and Garden Magazine. The used some kind of screening or chicken wire to make a tunnel You could do one like the one in Mel's book. Then they planted vining crops like pumpkins, gourds and squashes to grow up over the top. The kids could hang out underneath. It looked really fun.

Yes, again. I feel sick.

nancy wrote:

Yes, again. I feel sick.

oh my gosh, how close are you? that isnt your garden is it?
Ha-v-v

Oh no Nancy! I hope some of that good stuff recovers from this! And everything was finally thriving! I thought of you and your garden last night as I sat with my boys in our basement listening to the rain and thunder.

I noticed a couple of your beds have stakes driven into the ground on the inside corners. You should do that to all of them and screw the stakes to the inside of the bed to keep from losing your wood again.

Oh how totally disheartening for you. Just when it was all looking so good too. Wish there was more I could say or do.

Gwynn

Oh, Nancy!! I know that plants can be resilient, but I am so, so sorry to see your garden underwater again. Don't give up! Please let us know if there is anything we can do to help.

Ha-v-v: this is the community garden, which is about a mile downhill from my house. My daughter and I are fine - dry, warm, & healthy. It is that on which I am trying to focus this morning. Last time we flooded (a month ago), it was rather cool - the force of nature and all... And all I had in then was peas. This time the flood is pissing me off and is really disheartening. There are storms predicted for the next 7 days, so I doubt it will recede anytime soon. I just feel sick - and not just for me & my babies. There were several other gardeners that had things in the ground this time, too. I talked with a lady when we were leaving that said they had planted 2 different kinds of seeds. And I know Billy, Mr. Ed, Dave, Nate, and several others had been working hard as well. And the poor little snake!

It's one of the risks you take when you garden / farm in a flood plain. I know that. But crap, I'm depressed! Just 3 days ago I was feeding poop tea to everyone and talking to them.

But watching a black lab swim and frolick in the water was kind of cool, too.

Thanks all for your thoughts. I truly appreciate it!

nancy wrote:Ha-v-v: this is the community garden, which is about a mile downhill from my house. My daughter and I are fine - dry, warm, & healthy. It is that on which I am trying to focus this morning. Last time we flooded (a month ago), it was rather cool - the force of nature and all... And all I had in then was peas. This time the flood is pissing me off and is really disheartening. There are storms predicted for the next 7 days, so I doubt it will recede anytime soon. I just feel sick - and not just for me & my babies. There were several other gardeners that had things in the ground this time, too. I talked with a lady when we were leaving that said they had planted 2 different kinds of seeds. And I know Billy, Mr. Ed, Dave, Nate, and several others had been working hard as well. And the poor little snake!

It's one of the risks you take when you garden / farm in a flood plain. I know that. But crap, I'm depressed! Just 3 days ago I was feeding poop tea to everyone and talking to them.

But watching a black lab swim and frolick in the water was kind of cool, too.

Thanks all for your thoughts. I truly appreciate it!

Well those thoughts will stay with you across the miles from here.

Virtual hugs and great thoughts coming your way.

nancy,
Is this your only garden source?

I'm sorry to see everything under water again in the community garden. That's really dreadful. I can't imagine how you must be feeling.
So sorry!

Oh man, we all agonized with you through your first flood, rejoyced when it was over, not...it's not fair! Please know we are with you, anxiously awaiting your first view of the garden when the water goes down. Hopefully it will be ushered in by a dove with an olive branch in its beak. You are in our thoughts and prayers.

Thank you, thank you!! Guess what:







I was able to walk down there tonite. All but 1 of the beds moved or floated away. They have all been found, just not all replaced. The Ohio River is supposed to crest Saturday afternoon and will not go back down until Monday or so. Which means the Little Miami will flood again, too. It's not over yet. We're supposed to get rain for the next 7 days. I'm happier than I was this morning, but knowing there is more to come is not fun.

However, guess what I found when I got home:





Nearly 50 monarch eggs on my milkweed. 50!!! I brought every single one of them into the house to hopefully increase their survival rate. I think 1 monarch did a big 'ole egg dump in my yard because she knew she needed to get rid of them.

So maybe I don't get a spring crop of produce. Maybe I will. But at least God gave me baby monarchs to raise while I wait to find out.

Thank you again for all of your well-wishes. You all are the best!

Yayyyy! That is awesome!! Praying for less rain for you.


Gwynn

Nancy,

I'm so sorry you have to face this again.

Do you get any sunshine in your back yard so you could start a garden there?

This has got to be really hard on you and your daughter.

Hang in there.

Betty