The Penstemon cobea seedling appears to have damping off and so the seedling is falling over and collapsing. Dang it. I’m not sure why since it’s out in the sun and wind and the pot has drainage holes.
Very exciting good news though is that we have a Texas buckeye (Aesculus arguta) seedling!!!!!!!!! We put seeds out in September 2020, kindly provided by Jeanne. The understory forest begins.
Quality assurance inspectorPaula found a loofah deep underground while digging one hole. How?? Why????Four new trees all dwarf or semi dwarf: Liberty apple, Seckel pear, Kieffer Pear, and McIntosh Apple. We’re supposed to be on the edge of conditions for those apple varieties but with three other well adapted types already planted last year, I figured why not try. I really love McIntosh and they’re so rare around here.
Read this today. Thank you for lending, Mom! I definitely recommend it for anyone interested in learning more about how our oaks can support our animal and insect neighbors.
Buckwheat about to bloom.The two honeyberries that I planted, then moved for geothermal, then planted again, have been very unhappy lately, but some long slow drips with hose have revived one. Hoping the second plant follows suit.
White avens is a native shade plant with cute strawberry-like flowers. It just started blooming. These volunteered.The flowers tend to arch elegantly downwards. They have big showy leaves too. Which I didn’t photograph. 😂I got a dwarf pomegranate at the botany club plant sale. I decided to put it near the tiny apricot tree.A very baby palm tree from Judy!
The Chef took very good care of the garden while I was on vacation and we got very, very, very, very lucky to get rain and no hail in our part of town. I’m poking at my potted plants right now. I’ll do another post later with the ground plants and raised beds and permanent planters.
Echineacea pallida left out all winter sprouted well (seeds from prairie moon nursery) a while back. I put some of the seedlings in the ground when I left and I’ll plant these last ones soon.The Chimayó peppers from Judy grew almost all these adult leaves. When I left each had one small adult leaf.Hungarian heart tomatoes to replace the one that got killed by the late frost. The seedlings emerged in the plant window so I put them outside yesterday when I got back.I repotted this eggplant right before I left. It has grown a lot. The other one I repotted hasn’t grown as much.Finally the culinary sage is starting to sprout! The only one that was up before now has an adult leaf.These passionvines are the ones where I just smooshed the fruit into a pot and left them out all winter.Liatris mucronata has a hilarious long leaf. I had another one in a bigger pot but it seems to be dying.This yucca now has three leaves! I also planted one in the ground when I left, because it was in the relatively shallow sprouting tray, and it is still alive in the ground.Planted the other tray of green milkweed (Asclepias virida) before I left and will plant these ones soon.Volunteer redbud dug from front raised beds. Eventually I’ll put it in the ground here in backyard. I don’t think it grew any taller, so hopefully it’s working on roots.I now have at least three baby columbines in the sprouting tray and one out in the yard. The package said direct seeding in fall was best, even over stratifying manually, so that’s what I did even for the trays. These babies look a lot like clover, especially when smaller, so I’ve had to be careful.
Paula came over and we planted many things, as well as doing some trimming and raking.
The semi-dwarf Arkansas Black Apple arrived. We planted it and pruned it to ensure it will have lower main branches for ease of picking fruit. The hose there burst in the freeze (I didn’t drain it) so we’re using the break to water it. We trimmed up the garlic (this picture), as well as Salviagreggii and mealy blue sage. The potato experiment results say don’t plant potatoes when there’s about to be a major freeze. There was a lot of rot and slime. We put the leftover seed potatoes in that I had saved from two weeks ago. Four varieties of cabbage for Paula’s fermentation needs and Wes’ occasional soup needs. As soon as they sprout, the best seedlings will get covered with a jar to protect from bunnies. They seem to be tasty for bunnies. We also planted assorted other cool weather things (greens and carrots).Better than nothing, Briar says, but why don’t we do something fun instead?
