PNW May updates :)

GWNN......

my family thinks that walnut seed is the coolest seed EVER!!!

hugs

rose....who has children that want a seed like GWNN's

Me thinks it is cool too, one wonders how long it takes a walnut seed to grow into a little seedling like that.
Janet..... who had a walnut tree once before and longs for another one, but that one was already 30 years old.

Love taking a stroll through your garden, great pictures!

Well Janet, I guess our usernames are causing all kinds of confusion. I like how you explained that yours stands for Great White North (GWN). Mine, I just crossed my name Gwen with the name Jennifer to create a nickname (gwennifer).

GWN wrote:Me thinks it is cool too, one wonders how long it takes a walnut seed to grow into a little seedling like that.

Hmmmm, I don't know how long it took to germinate, but once sprouted it only took a few days to get this big. I read that walnut trees start producing at about ten years of age. So if you want one, plant one now!

Any new SFG'ers in my area lurking out there? We are two weeks past our expected last frost date, so that opens up some new possibilities for our gardens. Here's what you can be doing right now (garden veterans, please chime in here!):

• Transplant eggplants and peppers into your garden. These take too long to mature from seed, so get starts at the local nurseries or big box stores.
  
• Now is the time to sow melons if you're going to try them.
  
• Winter squash can be sown now.
  

Here's some things that could have been started already, but can still be done now too:

• Sow beans (push or pole), beets, carrots, corn, cucumbers, peas, and summer squash.
  
• Transplant tomato starts from the nursery (once again, these take too long to be starting from seed now).
  

Happy gardening!

Good list. On our hill, it's still iffy to put out the eggplants and peppers. However, I have an ace in the hole this year: I'm going to try planting melons (a couple sprouted from seed from Squat Johnson) in a new bale bed in the SE corner of the garden. I'll cover it with a hoop house and see if it's really true that melons cannot be grown in Saint Helens, OR. Wish me luck.

nonna......we are trying for the first time to grow cantaloupe in our new green house too!.. ...so far though our seeds have not germ yet....

hugs

rose

My wild idea is to grow 2 each of the 4 each cantaloupe and sugar baby watermelon starts in the greenhouse along with a couple of exotic melons and cucumbers, the other 2 each cantaloupe and watermelons will be set out in the bale bed. We found the heat generated as the bales deteriorated heated the soil in the middle of the bales way above even the traditional raised beds. With a hoop over, well, we'll see, won't we?

Nonna.....do you condition the straw bale before planting?....wondering if we should try that in our green house with our cantaloupe?

hugs

rose

Nonna.PapaVino wrote:....snip... I'm going to try planting melons (a couple sprouted from seed from Squat Johnson) in a new bale bed in the SE corner of the garden. I'll cover it with a hoop house and see if it's really true that melons cannot be grown in Saint Helens, OR. Wish me luck.

LUCK

Rose, the bales we're using are left over from several years ago when we had a small herd of cattle. Cows long gone, but very old hay bales in the barn. Any conditioning has been taken care of by the years and a couple of feral cats that lived in and around the barn. The set up is with six bales, two each on south and north sides, and 1 each on the east and west side. Like last year's bale bed, the fence supports the south side, and posts driven in on the east side supports that bale (garden slopes from west to east). So far, the center of the beds is half full of soil, ant hill compost and cattle compost. It's awaiting installation of hardware cloth stapled to two poles and placed in the cavety of the bed, then six inches of Mel's Mix will be added along with PVC pipe hoops and painters' clear drop cloth. When I'm sure the soil is warmer than usual for this climate, I'll put in the watermelon and cantaloupe plants, along with Sikkim cucumbers and Rich Sweetness melon--neither of which I know anything about except what Baker Creek listed in their catalog. Experiment, you know.

thanks nonna

it will be fun to watch how well it grows for you

im really thinking it would be a good idea for us to put a bale into our small green house and plant our cantaloupe in it.....it will raise up the area that we are planting in.....provide some heat for the MM and well...just sounds fun!....how many plants do you think could go into one bale?....our green house is 5x6.....so im thinking one bale of straw for the mellons and we will build some kid of trellis for it....and then we will have a tomato or two in pots and a few pepper plants as well.....

hugs

rose

First, you'll have to decide how to keep the bale together. Baling twine has a tendence to fall off as the bales begin to decompose. Then you'll need to dig out holes into which you'll pack the planting mix, and set with the plants. Last year, we put a winter squash at the junctures of each of the bales: six plants (the middle was planted with corn and beans). Just guessing, but perhaps 3 plants in holes straight down the center of the bale, or four if you were to stagger the holes. If you place your bale with short side on one greenhouse wall, and a long side on the back wall, it would solve part of the keep-it-together concern. Where would the trellis go and how would it be attached? Our bale beds utilize the existing fence made from metal horse fencing, which acted as trellis last year. Cattle panels would have been better for tending squashes from outside the fence as horse fencing grids are a bit too narrow to work through easily.

good question about the trellis....

right now our green house is sitting on our back patio.....we want to move it though to go between our dog house and shed.....then it would be sitting on open ground....its kinda of a rocky area....hard soil and such...but i though hubby could stick some kind of poles into the ground to support a trellis....i was thinking about growing the mellons on the back wall....they could also vine down the bale and onto the ground area.....i though we would put one or two tom's on one side of the green house and the other side would have a couple of pepper plants......the pepper plants would be up on a bench or small table....but up off the ground so that the mellon vines could have room to spread out.....i think the toms will get to tall...so they will stay in pots on the ground.....maybe hubby could also run some wire or trellis line around the perimeter of the sides of the green house too...and we could train the vines on that too.....

hugs

rose

oh and maybe hubby could build me some kind of frame/box to keep the bale in

hugs

rose....who loves her hubby!....he is so handy!

Initially, the bale can support itself, so an easier way to keep it together might be just to surround it with some wire fencing. What if your Amazing Handy Hubby could construct a simple combiination bale wire holder and trellis from free wood (pallet wood comes to mind) a U-shaped arrangement for back of bale, long posts upstanding, one the length of the bale fastened between them, with a second, bracing 'foot' extending forward from each long side of the U. The bale would sit on these feet, and the upstanding long posts could be strung with additional fencing stapled to the long posts to provide support for the vines. Like I mentioned, getting a fencing material with large grid is helpful, should you want to reach through it. I like cattle panels, but being 4' x 16', they are almost impossible to get home without a flatbed truck unless you cut them in half. I really love your idea for growing in the greenhouse. I'm toying with a similar idea in ours for fussy hot-weather-loving melons, cukes and okra. I'll remove the central benches and set up boxes on the floor. Thinking seriously on the cement mixing bins mentioned elsewhere on the forum.

snip I like cattle panels, but being 4' x 16', they are almost impossible to get home without a flatbed truck unless you cut them in half.

Tractor Supply said it couldn't be done and didn't want to load my truck. But I showed them. Also used tie downs fastened to the low hooks inside the truck bed. Just no sharp, fast turns.



Kay

walshevak wrote:Tractor Supply said it couldn't be done and didn't want to load my truck. But I showed them. Also used tie downs fastened to the low hooks inside the truck bed. Just no sharp, fast turns.

Kay

You must have unloaded that load very carefully....

Yep, your way to transport a cattle panel makes too much sense....PapaVino has fancy canopy over the new truck's bed. He elects not to remove it. Besides, the local lumber store delivered four of them and the garden timbers on their flatbed for less than ten bucks. Sounded like a deal to me. Nonna

Daniel9999 wrote:

You must have unloaded that load very carefully....

I opened the tailgate BEFORE undoing the tiedowns. Can you say sprong. Had my full body weight against the end before releasing the last tie down. Then just slowly walked out until they were flat. BTW, there are three in that load. Tractor Supply does not deliver, not even the 5 miles to my house.

Kay

That is EXactly how we brought our panels home, we have a small trailer and brought them home bent up like that.

I bring them home bent in a U, but sideways in the truck bed.

Can anybody recommend a place in the Portland Metro area to shop for large ceramic pots/planters?

Cucumber seedlings don't like hail.

My red leaf lettuce is huge and should have been cutting off it a while ago. This gardening has been a lot different and I am enjoying it. Wanting my tomatoes to start producing. My lettuce from seed is getting close to where I can start harvesting, my brocli and cauliflower are good size plants but I have not seen any buds. Com is flourishing, peas are flourishing and beans are trying to decide if they want to come back or not.

Does anyone have suggestions on helping watermelon and banana squash flourish. The banana squash is a big one for the family they are big on pumpkin pie.