Posted on August 8, 2021August 11, 2021More from today After their 30 days of cold stratification in the fridge, three butterfly milkweed are sprouting. Female Sachem skipper on ironweed. Briar is bored by garden examination. She likes the buffalograss to lay on though. Bigger view of ironweed. Briar was warm after the midday walk so I gave her an ice cube. I pulled some Euphorbia from driveway and have put it in potato bag dirt over cardboard. See if it could work as a ground cover since it seems to be native.
Posted on August 8, 2021August 8, 2021Silver-spotted skipper The ironweed (seeds from home, thanks Mom!) has attracted a Silver-spotted Skipper.
Posted on August 8, 2021August 8, 2021Sprouting and preserving The sterile wheatgrass cover crop is sprouting! You can see the slower germinating buffalograss seed hanging out. I have especially put a lot in the narrow places where the water runs off from the raised beds. The grass with the red zinnias. Both chimayó and jalapeño peppers. Neither super hot. Everything from the garden except for garlic! Yum! Salsa verde complete! Picked green beans for dinner while waiting for salsa to finish simmering down. The Chef takes over for canning, my department is just vegetables, thank goodness.
Posted on August 1, 2021August 1, 2021Red opening Zinnia in rainbow garden is opening!! Nothing close yet in purple or orange but it’s progress.
Posted on July 29, 2021July 29, 2021Seedling surprise The seed packets said Texas mallow and it grew a very fine leopard frog!!!
Posted on July 22, 2021July 22, 2021Getting there on post-geothermal landscaping and other Wednesday news You can see where I plan to put Peruvian ground cherries (the tomato cages) and honeyberries (white flags) on the last raised bed in the side yard. Those four plants were dug up when the geothermal HVAC was put in. Ready to be planted! The buckwheat seeds I planted around them. I’ll take another pic in a day or two as it got too dark by the time I got done planting and watering them. Earlier in the day I noticed the bisbee gray cowpeas are producing nicely in backyard. One lone seedling of a Texas mallow is coming up! A native cucurbit with a very tiny gourd. Not edible or at least not good according to various sources. But it’s an adorable vine and quite pretty when a bunch grows in one spot.
Posted on July 15, 2021July 15, 2021The tomatoening UF ‘W’ hybrid tomato Purple Cherokee tomato The ever fruitful black vernissage tomato Not tomatoes: Peruvian ground cherry!!! Chimayó pepper ripening, thanks for the seeds Judy!
Posted on July 8, 2021July 8, 2021First zinnia A volunteer from last year. The front yard ones in the rainbow beds are still small, though growing.
Posted on July 3, 2021July 3, 2021Growth in rainbow beds during rain – July 1 This rain barrel normally catches rain during light storms but Thursday afternoon’s downpour was too much. This barrel’s gutter downspout is often very aggressive and sure enough it hit the rain barrel perfectly. After the downpour (and after work), I got bits of sedum to press into the mud. Hopefully they can root since it’s supposed to be in 80s for a few days longer at least. If you zoom in, you can see I put two rows around each of the rainbow beds on the side slope. You may also note that the zinnias are doing well!! The back bed got smoothed down more by rain. See my previous post for how I continued shaping it on the next day (Friday). So glad I’m almost done with the major earth moving.