What did you do in the garden today?

[sumi]

My vegetable garden is cleared and dug over about a foot deep The digger driver decided to help me a little bit and it's much, much appreciated!

As for the rest of the back, a good garden fork is on my to-buy list too and this broad fork you guys are talking about sounds great. I need to check that out and see if I can find something similar here...

 

[Lazy Gardener]

Sumi, even if you do buy a broad fork, (and I highly recommend it. I don't know how I've lived all these years without one!) I also recommend that you invest in a simple garden fork. It can get into tight spaces where the broad fork is too big.

If you can't find a broad fork locally, any welder can build one. Pretty straight forward construction. And, i bet the price you'd pay to have it built would not exceed the purchace price of one "off the rack". They are highly overpriced to start with. The guy who built mine is still a student. It would be a good "learning project" for any student at a tech school.

 

[sumi]

Thanks! I'll ask around and see what I can find. I had a regular garden fork, but found it snapped in half the other day. DS swears he knows nothing, of course... So I need to replace that one anyway and figured I'll look into this broad fork. My wrist is still giving me trouble, 18 months after it got injured, so anything that helps make the garden work lighter and easier is much appreciated.

 

[Lazy Gardener]

Rain, rain... go away.

LG can't go out to play.

I did go out in the rain to get scion wood from friends and family. Downright nasty. Then, since I was already wet, and still needed to feed the birds, I dug the seedlings out of the garden. The apple seedling looked ok, and had a fair root system. The pear seedlings, bought and planted in the garden last spring were pathetic. No root growth since planted last spring. I wonder how the nubby little roots on the bottom of the "sticks" even supported any growth last summer. I tossed the apple seedling in a pot, put the pear seedlings in a WB full of soil, and brought them inside so I could graft out of the rain. Will attempt to do so tomorrow. One more day won't kill those pear seedlings, and the apple seedling will remain potted until hubby cuts the 3 trees that need to come down to make way for the pear trees. At this rate, it won't hurt them to live or die (Their choice!) in pots until end of summer.

 

[Hinotori]

I've taken to potting bare root trees in good potting soil when I get them. Seems to give them a better survival rate since that's what the nurseries do.

I'll plant them in the ground when the rains come back in the fall, or next spring.

 

[CrealCritter]

What did I do in the garden today? Nothing at all, but I did look at the mud hole I call a garden.

 

[wyoDreamer]

I need to pull the plastic cover off the garden that I used to extend my tomato harvest last fall. The edges were frozen down all winter. And now, we have the potential for snow on Saturday night ...

 

[Lazy Gardener]

I can't like that post, Dreamer, but... I hear your pain. I worked outside in the garden, in the chilling rain for about 2 hours yesterday, ripping and tearing out old infested raspberry canes. I'm now wondering about the feasibility of burning them in a trench to recycle them into biochar. The down side of that would be the smoke produced. But... it would be of short duration and no worse than that produced by the folks who burn their leaves every fall, and their grass every spring.

It took me the entire rest of the day to get the chill out of my bones.

 

[Lazy Gardener]

I'm trying yet an other experiment. "They say" that you can't use potatoes from the grocer as seed stock, b/c the potatoes have been sprayed with a herbicide to delay sprouting. "They say" that even if those potatoes grow, they won't produce a viable crop. I think @Beekissed has had experience with this. So, my experiment: I've had a nice potato on my windowsill for the last 2 months. It's slowly sending out sprouts. As those sprouts get the beginnings of leaf points and root nubs, I'm gouging them out of the tuber and planting them in a 6 pack. My thought: Perhaps by removing the vegetative matter from the sprayed potato, and giving them extra time, they will produce a viable crop.

 

[wyoDreamer]

A friend of mine plants sprouted grocery store potatoes all the time. Her crop is usually about 1/2 the size of mine, but her "seed" source is cheaper also. The problem with grocery store potatoes is that they may not be a cultivar that grows well in your climate.