Tomatoes

I know it is too early.  I know that tomatoes should not go in the ground until after the first week of March.  I know that there are two nights of 40 degrees forecast for the next two nights.  But the weather has been so beautiful and warm, and there is no freeze...

So, I planted five tomatoes today.  

Early Girl

Garden Goodies

This has been a good couple of weeks for garden goodies! I harvested Broccoli and Asparagus, the last of the carrots from last year, and I have snow peas and strawberries that look like they are almost ready to pick!

An early Spring

The Veronica Georgia blue that I planted last year is doing great.  I really like this plant. It was a little hard to keep alive during the hot dry summer, but in the cool spring, it really shines. Because it has such a small flower, this plant would do better in a mass planting.  I may purchase four or five small plants again this year to fill out the area.

Lettuce seedlings!

When I out down the seedlings a week or so ago, I read that lettuce seedlings germinated fairly quickly, like in 2 to 4 days.  I diligently watered the seeds twice a day for about a week, but nothing showed.  I figured the seeds were old and I am no expert at sowing seeds.  So with a shrug, I chocked it up to an inexpensive experiment (hey the seeds were free as I harvested them from plants two years ago.

Today, I was out watering the garden; I wasn't even really looking at the lettuce.  I had kind go forgotten they were there - when I looked down and saw a whole bunch of teeny tiny green heads!  Woot!

Prepared Blackberries for Spring

My calendar said that I should put down some fertilizer when buds begin to swell.  Well, no buds have started to swell yet, but with the beautiful 89 degree days, they could any day now.  So, I pulled up all the weeds in the bed and out down some long acting fertilizer.  Now, if only that small chance of rain this weekend would pan out!

Pruning roses on Valentine's Day

Another beautiful day, I decided to get out and prune the roses today.  I started with the two in the side bed.  I have learned that pruning them creates a much prettier, bushier shrub - even though it always makes me nervous to cut them back!

Fingerling Potatoes

I planted my fingerling potatoes today.  I have already planted my red potatoes and Yukon Gold potatoes, because I had already divided them before I realized it was technically too early to plant potatoes.  Hopefully they won't get killed by a late freeze!

Fingerling Potatoes, Dragon Carrots and Lettuce leftovers

It was another gorgeous day today - so I felt compelled to do something in the garden :o)

I went to NG and bought two bags of compost - but wound up only using one - to supplement the soil for the Fingerling Potatoes I hope to plant on Sunday.  At first I was going to put them in the back garden bed, but that bed is almost completely in the shade these days, so I decided to find space in the regular garden.  I mixed in the compost and watered the soil, so the space should be all ready for my potatoes in two days.

I also decided to use up some seeds I had in the fridge.  I had three bags of seeds from my lettuce plants two years ago (2014).  I doubt they will produce anything, but it was either put them in the ground or throw them out. Since they are two years old, I went ahead and added a bunch of seeds to each spot. I have three different bags of seeds, so I made three different holes for the seeds.  We'll see.

Along the same vein, Kyle purchased some "Dragon" carrots last year.  He got them too late to get in the ground, so I saved them for this year.  Now, on the packet, it actually says "Germination is slow and uneven, so be patient." Not words of encouragement for me.  So I just poured the whole seed packed down on small row of soil.  We'll wait and see what happens :o)

The sedd packet says:  You can sow carrot seeds as soon as the soil in your garden can be worked in the spring (about 3-4 weeks before the last frost). Seeds need consistent moisture until they emerge. Germination on carrot seed is slow and uneven. The light seed can be blown away by the wind or washed away when you water the beds. Sow the seeds less than an inch apart and thin them to 2-4 inches after they grow to a few inches. Roots will mature in 90 days.

Blooms on the Snow Pea

When watering the snow peas this morning, I found two blooms on the snow peas!  Fingers crossed that peas will be coming soon!

Early February Garden Update

On this pretty day, I just realized how great my garden looks. So I thought I'd give a quick garden update :o)

Winter cleaning a garden bed

Another absolutely gorgeous day.  The sun is shining, the birds are chirping and the bees are buzzing!

Every since last year, I have been perplexed about what to do with my south-most porch bed.  The Esperanza gets so huge, the Obedient plant and St John's Wort takes over, and nothing else seems to grow.  Okay, that is not really true:  The lantana are small and pretty, and the salvia does pretty well.  The fire bush looks pretty during the summer.  But this bed lacks shape.  As you can see from the photo above, during the winter, it is a big brown mess.  And during the summer, it really doesn't look much better.

Asparagus

Two of my five asparagus crowns have come up!  I, of course, was hoping for more of them, but given my experience, half is doing pretty good ;o)

I also have one of my old asparagus crowns coming up.  I haven't been watering these, because I know they need to go fallow over the winter.  But this guy is really near to the new crowns, and probably received some of their water.  

I wonder if I should start watering the old ones now?

Dormant oil for Peach trees

The last few years, our peaches developed a small white worm on the inside. Yuck!

Supposedly spraying them with dormant oil in February (when the tree is dormant before bud bloom) will help with this.  So today, I mixed three ounces of dormant oil with one gallon of water and sprayed down both trees.  I am not highly convinced this will work, but I thought I'd give it a shot...