The Garden Report - Week 4(ish)

Oh my stars, I have so much to learn. We have no fewer than 30 kabillion grapes growing this year around our deck. Definitely our largest harvest ever and we have never netted them to keep them from the birds. I want to try it this year. Have no idea how to do this.

A pleasant surprise after removing tons of catnip (kids thought it would be a good idea after reading some herbology book last year) was that our cilantro returned beautifully! It's a bit leggy though - is there anything I can do to encourage it to reseed?

Planted bok choy and I suspect that I should have harvested it already since it's gone to flower? It doesn't seem big enough yet though. (And isn't it pretty?)

Our snap pea plants are no taller than 10 inches but are full of beans. Did I trellis them badly or are they meant to be this short?

I have never had luck with carrots. I'm sick of reading other people's blogs who ignore their gardens, who have never gardened, and who don't know what to do with their huge amount of carrots. I all but knit sweaters for things in my garden, but not this year, not with my carrots. I just threw a whole pack of seeds in this smaller bed. That black mark is Luna's footprint - if they can survive the dogs and the fact that I'm not thinning them out, we may have carrots for the first time ever. (I'm trying to act like I don't care about them...when I walk by, I only check them out if I'm wearing my sunglasses....)

Here's the most painful thing so far this year. We have fruit on all three of our fruit trees (two apple, one peach) and I know you're supposed to not let the trees go to fruit so that they can put all their energy into becoming healthy trees. I know. I know. I know. I'm going to check that fact just one more time online and then probably have David pick the fruits this weekend (wimper, wimper).

 

 

David built these monster cages to surround our tomatoes and (hopefully) protect the fruit from the squirrels and the dogs. I planted two tomato plants over spring break - hoping for no more frost. We already have tomatoes growing. I'm planting five more plants tomorrow - it's jail time for them too I'm afraid. I really think these monster cages are working.

In pro-active news, after my last garden post, I did google "when to harvest figs" and found this terrific post. Also, bunnies aren't eating my strawberries...my dogs are. Hmmmm.... xo