The current batch of compost is almost ready to go into the garden. As leaves fall and neighbors bag up their leaves, I'll be refilling it multiple times.
/johnny
Posted on 10/04/2013 5:36:16 PM PDT by ApplegateRanch
Did you know you can make cucumber jelly? Cucumbers, lemon juice, sugar, pectin and some ginger to add a little something.
The current batch of compost is almost ready to go into the garden. As leaves fall and neighbors bag up their leaves, I'll be refilling it multiple times.
/johnny
Q:What do you call a dead guy with no arms or legs in the compost pile?
A: Pete.
/johnny
“Was he surprised to see Mom outside growing veggies? I bet he was, but by now, he probably expects the unexpected when he comes home.”
“he probably expects the unexpected when he comes home” Well, he knows I’m not the usual mother who sits and knits, so he knows something will be going on with me that’s different than the last time he was here. I had told him I was learning to grow veggies, but...
when he looked out the double glass doors to the garden, he said, “Oh, me, that is a mess.” I expected that reaction because it was a mess. Plant containers were everywhere so that one had to pick his/her way through the mass of containers. I told him it was too hot for me to stay out there but now we could fix it.
He has this idea the deck should be a peaceful place where one can sit and enjoy the outside. There was nothing to enjoy when he got here.
Now, the deck is nice and many containers are on the ground dirt, freeing up space on the deck. We kept the strawberries on the deck on the right side and close to the roofed deck so it will be easier to cover them when we might have a freeze here.
The good news is he may be coming back in January to make another film in the US. He would be in Miami staying with the man who owns the film production company that is paying for the film. He would be traveling over the country to film whatever will go in that film. When he comes back, he won’t have to work in the garden the whole time he is here like we did this time.
I have staked the tomato plants but they are so spindly I doubt they will produce and that is my fault for not planting half the plant when I planted them outside. The good news for me is I grew those tomato plants from seed and know I can do it. Not having grown anything to knowing I can grow from seed is fantastic.
I have thought all my life I had a black thumb because I could kill any plant. No one has a black thumb - what they don’t have is knowledge how to do it. When I want to learn something, I beat it to death until I know it and that has happened with learning to grow veggie plants. I have been a pest on this gardening thread, questioning growers constantly. I will keep doing that because all of you know so much.
“The current batch of compost is almost ready to go into the garden.”
I put stuff in the composter as we cleaned up the garden area. Since it is cooler, I can start dumping paper filters and coffee grounds in there.
A very uplifting post to read. I love my girls, but sometimes I wish I had a son too-just to help me with stuff that hubby doesn’t have the time or inclination to do.LOL
You certainly have not been a pest, and you write some very entertaining sagas. This thread would be poorer if you suddenly stopped participating.
Since you get so focused and do lots of research, you are already making great contributions, and the newbies that are added almost every week are learning from you too. So we all pay it forward so to speak. Thanks to you and all the others for participating in the discussions.
Fine looking batch you have there. My garlic just came in the mail, so I’ll be needing to hurry up and get it in the ground.
Thinkin about planting it where I had the tomatoes and peppers, so I’ll be digging up those beds and bringing in some plants for the indoor garden.
We are fast approaching the first frost date of Oct. 15. A few persimmons have ripened. These little native American jewels are a great way to finish a meal. Very rich and sweet with such a unique flavor, but I can’t eat more than 1 or two as they are so rich. The tree is loaded this year.
I am saving the seeds to roast and grind for a coffee substitute. Have you ever tried that?
Is that the arm of a skeleton in that pile??? I like your enclosure, is it cattle panels?
Yep. Hog panels wired together. It works well, and I can move it around as required.
/johnny
LOL!
/johnny
Yikes, it looks like someone's left arm..
I am now recovering from the over and over bending/crouching to get the staples pounded down all around the planter. Sometimes you have to do something your body doesn’t want to do - but the net is up and I was determined to get this done.
I would suggest if you do this, leave your 5 lb. Yorkie in the house. She was so interested in my activity, she went in where the net wasn’t stapled yet and walked down the onion planter, bending over some onions. I didn’t kill her but had to work my arm through the net to get her out.
A question about the “T” huge squash plant. There are hard pods growing all over the plant and I don’t see how these hard things could be flowers that will open. Some of them are as long as over one inch. Is it possible for a squash plant to not have flowers and these hard pods are developing squash? Maybe I will have to research this plant to see if it is defying pollination. Have any of you grown this squash?
The “T” squash does flower. The flower comes out at the end of those hard pods. If you click on this link, there is a flower at the end of the pod:
No I have never grown this squash. I grew a zucchinni and a pumpkin the first year I gardened. I hated the squash bugs, and I don’t like zukes at all. Pumpkin I like for Halloween, Thanksgiving and Christmas. No one else likes pumbking.
They take lots of space, and like you, I have limited area. So I leave all the zukes and squashes up to hubby. Sometimes he messes with it and sometimes not.LOL
Now that’s interesting. The zukes and other squashes we have grown flower first, and then you will see the tiny pods forming and the flower eventually falls off or dries up.
You say you got the pods before you ever got the flowers? That’s kinda different.
“You say you got the pods before you ever got the flowers?”
Well, I’ve got hard pods all over it - maybe those will open and be flowers but they really are hard.
Amazing.
—5lb Yorkie— Did I tell ya that we have a new addition to the family here at the Ranch. We got a 1 lb bouncing, biting baby girl Poodle. Wife found somebody that had a bunch of puppies last weekend and one hitched a ride home with us. Raising a puppy at our ages! Picture later.
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