From commentor Ema Ema:
Inspired by WaterGirl’s One Good Thing thread, here is one good great thing from my [Central Park] garden – blooms!
White…
Pink…
Red…
Yellow…
Cyclamen…
Blue violet…
Magnolia…
We also have a certain someone (who just learned about ISO settings) splashing in a puddle like a duck.
And here is a real garden duck.
***********
We only got an inch or two of slushy snow blowing across from the Midwest’s late-season snowstorm during Friday night / Saturday morning, but I’m just as glad we didn’t take the leafing-out potted roses out of the garage yet…
What’s going on in your garden (planning), this week?
raven
The azaleas have passed and it’s still very cool so, while I rebuild the bed in my truck, the boss lady has been killin it in the garden! I’ve taken on the yard next door since our neighbor died and his widow is not a physical person. It’s prefect for me because I don’t have to worry about stepping on some valuable plant. I have my mowing path all set so I just keep going into her yard. It was so overgrown with kudzu that I cleared what I could and now I’m trying to keep it down by mowing very high and hitting the fresh shoots with the weed eater.
Baud
Cheerful color on a dreary day. Thanks, Ema Ema.
Lapassionara
These photos are lovely. Thanks.
We are supposed to be having some warmer weather here, so I am getting ready to battle the weeds.
Baud
I’m social distancing from my yard. I’ve embraced the vision of turning the earth back to nature.
p.a.
RI will announce rules for reopening garden shops tomorrow! Target 4/27
OT: Hahvahd study says a minimum of 152 tests per 100k population required for CAUTIOUS reopening; in US only RI is at that level. We are at 185 per. Now if only we were really an island…
JPL
Lovely.
satby
Beautiful photos Ema Ema! Thank you.
After three nights of hard freeze weather in the 20s and about three inches of slushy wet snow the temps yesterday got to the mid 50s with lots of sun, so it all melted. I lost a lot of the daffodils already in bloom, but they were open a week already so they were fading anyway. Waiting to see what bounces back.
After Tuesday this week no more freezing nights are expected. We’ll still get a few light frosts maybe, but the trend will be increasingly warmer. And my grass is overdue for a mowing, but it’s been too wet before now. Still is, but another sunny day and I will be able to do it.
OzarkHillbilly
Beautiful pics Ema Ema, thanx.
rikyrah
Good Morning, Everyone ???
rikyrah
The pictures are beautiful ?❤️
satby
@rikyrah: Good morning ?
charluckles
Low of 7 degrees. The spring flowers are toast, but I am hopeful the foot of snow insulated everyone else
Baud
@rikyrah: Good morning.
WereBear
Gorgeous! We are not there yet, but I will get out and enjoy when it does. Just a bit of knife edge in the wind yesterday, but the sun felt good. The cats and I jostled for sunsquare space.
raven
@OzarkHillbilly: Ah, you are here! Since we use the truck for gardening I can hit you up in this thread. I’m replacing the wood bed in my truck and I running into issues. I’m using two sheets of 3/4 treated plywood and the original wood was also 3/4 so the wood is supposed to slide in the slot on the edge of the bed and wheel wells. I cut the 4×8’s down to 3×8 and made the cutout for the wheel wells. The bed width is 6×8 so the two sheets should fit I just can’t get the wood to slide all the the way into the edge, I’ve tried laying a 4×4 against the edge and whaling on it with a sledge but they just won’t seat properly. One of the problems is that the bed moves when I whack it because it is not fixed to the frame, all the carriage bolts through the edges secure it. So, I’ve thought of either taking a belt sander and working the edges of the plywood down a bit or cutting a bevel with my rip fence on my circular saw. Guidance?
OzarkHillbilly
@raven: I’ve run into this problem a few times over the years. Beveling the top side with a belt sander is the first thing I thought of, 5 degrees or less over 3/4-1″ should suffice.
raven
@OzarkHillbilly: GREAT!!! Thanks.
zhena gogolia
If I can get a minute from my work today, I’m going to Wikipedia to look up the plot of Phantom of the Opera (we watched the 25th anniversary Royal Albert Hall performance last night). I don’t get it. Did she know him before he took her in the boat? Was he teaching her to sing? Or was she just dreaming him? Did she think he was her dead father? How did he get into the Opera? Did he have supernatural powers, or was just really good at the Punjab lasso? Was she in love with him at the end, even though he was a cold-blooded murderer? Why was Raoul in a wheelchair at the beginning, and where was Christine?
Phylllis
@raven: I can tell you from personal experience that your neighbor is beyond thankful that you are doing that. When my first husband passed away, our across the street neighbor, who had a riding mower, would zip across the street and do my yard after his. It was about the best thing anyone did to help me. You’re a good ole fella, as we say in these parts.
OzarkHillbilly
@raven: I would also rip it down to 35 7/8. A little bit of extra room can make a big difference.
raven
@OzarkHillbilly: aha!
raven
@Phylllis: These are/were odd folks. He was declining rapidly and engaged in some really troubling behavior. She works at the university library and is almost non-communicative. She has a friend who I’ve done most of the commo through him. I know she appreciates it but I just don’t think she is equipped to engage. She had talked to us maybe 5 times in 20 years and always when she was drunk. It’s pretty sad but I can’t help but think she was really trapped with him.
debbie
Central Park is truly beautiful in the spring. Somewhere around here, I’ve got piles of Kodachrome slides of the flowers and trees.The azaleas were just starting to bloom when a couple nights’ frost hit them. It will be a sad spring if they’ve been killed off.
Spanky
@OzarkHillbilly: I would also consider greasing the mating surfaces with something. If it were finer wood I’d just use paraffin wax, but for treated ply maybe something like vaseline.
Or what the heck, rub an old candle stub along the edges for starters, that might be enough.
raven
@OzarkHillbilly: I bought one of these bed strips but I’m hesitant to try to do the milling required for it to seat properly. I don’t have a table saw or router.
raven
@Spanky: I have a chunk of beeswax somewhere!
jnfr
We had snow all week. I have a very impatient box of strawberry plants on my desk, where they are starting to grow even though I can’t plant them yet.
Can’t believe how soggy the ground is here in Colorado!
Kay (not the front-pager)
These are lovely! I really enjoy the Sunday morning garden chat pictures. I wish I had any talent at all for picture taking. My daffodils are glorious this year since we divided and spread them out last year, and the hellibores… I had no idea when I planted 5 scrawny plants 10 years ago that they would muscle their way into the shade garden under the crepe myrtle to such an extent. I didn’t realize they would self seed. We now have dozens, and have given many away to friends, family, and neighbors. They start blooming in February and last through the peonies in late May. The frilly white doubles at the foot of the clematis are my favorite.
We have such a deer problem that we can only plant deer “proof” (haha) plants such as the daffs and lenten roses in the yard. They even climb steps to eat out of pots on the porches! But I am able to do a little container vegetable gardening on the fenced back deck. I guess those protesters in MI are not familiar with that furrin company Burpee, among many others, where you can order seeds and plants. I got seeds almost a month ago, and already have lettuce and sissy arugula getting ready to harvest in its infanticide state, and peas, bok choy, garlic and shallots perking along. Yesterday some herb plants arrived in beautiful shape. They were expensive, but their condition was such that I will order from them again. I have several varieties of peppers, beans, and tomatoes started indoors, and more seeds coming from another vendor. Oh! also potato sets are supposed to be on their way!
I’m still worried about the food chain. Our back door neighbors have chickens, and I’ve been bugging my husband since February that we need to get some too. this is funny since for our almost 48 years of marriage he has claimed to anyone who would listen that he wanted chickens “but Kay won’t let me have them,” which was always a convenient lie. Now we have the room & zoning for them he has fallen silent. Yesterday I told him we need to get chickens and a couple of goats for the milk because I’m scared we won’t be able to get food for the 4 of us (son & DIL live with us). He got mad but I don’t know if I got through to him. I think he’s scared too and just doesn’t want to face what it means about what it means about our future this late in the game. Kind of hard to go from being a stock broker to being a farmer at 75.
Wow, this took a dark turn. Sorry. Those pictures are really pretty though, and my garden is doing really well. And on the upside, it’s cooler for April than it’s been in years, and the air is clearer. Maybe this pandemic has bought us a couple extra years to deal with climate change at least.
OzarkHillbilly
@raven: At an angle! at the center seam edge (again 5 degrees should be sufficient. I don’t think I got enough sleep last night. Either that or I’m getting old enough to forget all the little things I didn’t used to have to even think about.
Dorothy A. Winsor
We don’t have our own yard here and we’re not gardeners anyway, but there are raised garden beds that residents can sign up for. Despite the snow this week, groundskeepers removed the winter straw and mesh coverings. The garden cravers will be out there today, I’ll bet. I can see the beds from my office window.
raven
@OzarkHillbilly: So cut them so they will mesh at the angle? God I don’t know how to say that. . .overlap?
OzarkHillbilly
@Spanky: Not a bad idea. Might be better to rub it into the channels.
@raven: A router with a jig is the way to go with that. Easy to make a jig with high grade plywood if you have a table saw. But you don’t.
raven
@OzarkHillbilly: What about spray silicon lube?
Spanky
I think we’re very lucky here near the Chesapeake Bay to have missed both the cold and snow from the west and the severe storms in the South. Still, last night’s clear skies brought a low that just hit freezing, so I doubt any damage was done. Looking at the 10-day outlook, it looks like that may be winter’s last gasp.
So far this year the “garden” chores have consisted of trying to reclaim the acre from the out of control wisteria and trash trees like mulberry. So far it’s pretty much a draw: wisteria’s almost gone and trash trees are reduced, while they’ve given me tendonitis in the elbow, rotator cuff pain, and seriously raised my lower back problems. I might be starting to get the idea that I’m not 25 anymore.
raven
@Spanky: Dragging these 4×8 sheets of treated 3/4 up and down from my “shop” to the truck and back at 70 is fun!
Spanky
@raven: That’s a scarph/scarf joint. Used all the time in boat building.
OzarkHillbilly
@raven: That would be even *better* but it probably isn’t necessary for this.
** where better equals calming one’s more anal retentive side, if one has one. I used to be a lot more anal retentive about this kind of stuff but nowadays I’m more like, “If I can’t see it, I don’t care. If somebody else sees it, fuck ’em.”
raven
@Spanky: I could find it on the Western Flyer rebuild site! (I did find it, thanks)
Immanentize
@OzarkHillbilly: I wrote this for you:
The man from Mizzou was a wreck;
achy jounts and a pain in the neck.
Nights he was tossing and turning,
His mind ceaselessly churning,
So by morn all he uttered was “Blech.”
tomtofa
Beautiful portraits, Ema Ema. Nicely seen and lovingly captured – a soothing start to Sunday.
Spanky
@OzarkHillbilly: The other way to do it with a hand plane is to lay the mating pieces on top of one another, mating faces up with the top one slid over so that about 4-6 thicknesses of width showing of the lower one. Is that clear? The point is to use the two pieces as a guide to plane a slope into both pieces. It’s pretty easy with plywood because the plies act as indicators as to how you’re progressing. Little isobars, as it were.
Now you’re going to tell us you don’t have a plane.
raven
@OzarkHillbilly: I’m just thinking about getting something in that slot. The front right section was badly rusted so I got some 1′ angle iron and screwed it above the ledge and the edge is pretty. . .edgy!
Spanky
@Immanentize: I like the “jounts”. Gives it that Chaucer feel.
raven
@Spanky: Actually I do. Now being able to use it properly. . .
Immanentize
Ema Ema — great colors to get me inspired! Yesterday’s inch or so of snow is gone and we will be up to a sunny 60 today. My service berry tree is in bloom and some stuff is poking up, but no real action yet. Next task is tilling the garden bed and aerating the yard (tiller has a hole-poking attachment). I’ve been raking up the beds and bagging old leaves and bush trimmings. Thursday is our first curbside leaf pick up of the year. Yay!
OzarkHillbilly
@raven: Beeswax is best, paraffin is 2nd best.I always have several chunks of beeswax laying around. I keep the paraffin for the inevitable times I can’t find any beeswax.
Spray silicone… I’m not sure I ever used it when working with wood. I have no idea how well it would work.
raven
@OzarkHillbilly: I’m shooting for functionality. Replacing the bed with the old school boards and dividers would cost $750 plus. This is a project for a truck that is used to haul shit and drive around and rap the pipes.
Immanentize
@Spanky: It’s too Sunday to spell correctly yet.
OzarkHillbilly
@Immanentize: BwaHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA…. gasp…. wheeze….
You know, it’s pretty sad that you find inspiration in a broken down old hillbilly. Still, that’s one for the bulletin board. Thanx!
raven
@OzarkHillbilly: I guess I was thinking about
ELMERS Slide-All Dry Spray.
Immanentize
@OzarkHillbilly: Composed between the hours of 2am and 3:30am. I was commiserating.
Aleta
The Maine Farmer Saving the World’s Rarest Heirloom Seeds
Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z095Sk7Uz_M&feature=emb_title
OzarkHillbilly
@Spanky: I have… I don’t know how many planes I have (bought a compass plane at an auction a couple years ago, just so I could have one)
Years ago I pulled into a Home Depot to grab a couple things real quick while heading over to a kitchen job I was doing on the side. Somebody broke into my truck and grabbed my finish box. In addition to a smooth plane and a block plane, I had a jack plane, a shoulder plane, a bullnose/chisel plane, a mortise plane, and… I feel like I’m leaving one out.
Most of them were old ones that I bought at flea markets and yard sales and reconditioned. At the time (mid to late 80s) i estimated about a $2,000 loss. I never did replace that shoulder plane.
Spanky
@OzarkHillbilly: That sucks! Shoulder planes aren’t that easy to come by these days, although I don’t know how many tenon shoulders a hillbilly carpenter needs to tweak :^)
OzarkHillbilly
@raven: I’ve never used it but the Amazon reviews have these 2 among the many:
Looks like it works well with wood.
OzarkHillbilly
@Immanentize: I feel your pain.
Sab
@Kay (not the front-pager): How will you feed the goats? They eat a lot.
Spanky
@raven: Just be careful using silicone sprays on surfaces that might get a finish (not treated ply, obvs). That stuff causes real adhesion problems.
OzarkHillbilly
@Spanky: When I was doing finish work on a regular basis I actually used it more than a little. I found lots of ways a shoulder plane could be useful. A couple years after they got stolen I found myself almost entirely framing and hanging so the desire to replace it flagged. Now that I’m mostly retired and doing what I want I am jonesing for another. Maybe I’ll find one at a flea market when things open up again, but I doubt it. That’s one of those items more likely to be found at an auction and I generally avoid those.
ema
Thank you, everybody!
JPL
@Kay (not the front-pager): Like you, I’m concerned about the food chain. It’s already happening with chicken and pork plants closing down.
JPL
@ema: Thank you because a little beauty is always appreciated.
Spanky
Since this is a garden thread I guess an accounting of how things are coming along here in Southern Maryland is in order.
Daffs are long done in the microclimate along our south wall and just finishing up elsewhere. The cherries of course were done a couple of weeks ago. Redbud has just finished. Oaks have tiny yellow leaves and big racemes of pollen that goes directly up my snout. Maple helicopters are flying already. Black locusts are getting ready to bloom while the walnuts are doing their usual late bud swell. The irises are up and budding already.
O. Felix Culpa
Beautiful, uplifting pictures. Thank you, Ema. It’s always nice to close with a duck. :)
Immanentize
@OzarkHillbilly: of course you sent me on a long “shoulder plane” education trip. It seems that many are saying other tools are just as useful….
Renaissance Carpenter linky
Spanky
@OzarkHillbilly: Well, most auctions are now online only, so while the opportunities have expanded so has the customer base, and of course it only takes two bidders to drive the price up.
Friday and Saturday was to be Martin Donnelly’s annual Spring auction in Nashua, NH. It was totally online. I recall a couple of user shoulder planes. Check the link & search “shoulder” to see what (I think) the hammer prices were.
Other auctions coming up this summer are at his mjdtools.com website, in case you really get the urge. I happen to be fighting the urge somewhat unsuccessfully, even though I tell myself I’m in deacquisition mode at this point.
OzarkHillbilly
On the gardening front, I got the satby inspired hugelkulture beds built. Once I get things growing in them I’ll send pics to Anne. Although it’s tilled, I have a bunch of stuff to get into the veggie garden in the next few weeks.
The Zen garden annex (for lack of better terms) is all built and I am working on getting it planted. I still haven’t settled on what bushes to plant between the new walkway and the Zen garden. The pond is not yet up and running because I still have to clean it out. The flutterby garden is seeded but I still don’t see much coming up beyond wild violets, blazing star, and flutterby weed. I got some yellow cone flower seeds from baker creek started and they will go there soon. I also started a bunch of purple cone flower seeds that were freebies and they need to find a home. So too wild thyme, agastache, wild bee balm, and… one or 2 other things. Ah! Daisies, can’t forget the daisies.
Spanky
@ema: I just discovered on your pictures that my cursor becomes a complementary color to whatever it’s being dragged over. The cursor creates quite a striking contrast to those vivid hues in your flowers. Thank you!
Spanky
Anybody have a recommendation for an evergreen bush under 6 feet that is butterfly friendly? I don’t think Buddleias are evergreen, are they?
ETA: Will do a job of screening some mechanicals as well as helping the wildlife. Would also help if it were native.
OzarkHillbilly
@Spanky: Estate auctions are what I’m speaking of. I see the flyers at restaurants, grocery stores and gas stations. Guns are the big driver of turnout at them but tools are a close 2nd and if the individual was any kind of a collector they can be the #1 draw. At the auction where I got the compass plane there were 2 or 3 jointer planes that went WAY too high ($200+ ?). I got the compass plane for $40 in working condition. Only 1 other bidder for it and I don’t think he had any idea what it was.
raven
So this is treated plywood and I have a gallon of Thompson’s and it says this but I think I should seal it anyway?
OzarkHillbilly
@Spanky: One of the evergreen Viburnums maybe? I am probably gonna use one of them.
OzarkHillbilly
@raven: I would.
raven
@OzarkHillbilly: I’m on it like a duck on a june bug!
debbie
@OzarkHillbilly:
“Flutterby” is a new word to me, but it’s perfect!
OzarkHillbilly
@debbie: I picked it up from a long gone female friend I knew 40 years ago. So much more appropriate than butterfly.
debbie
@OzarkHillbilly:
It’s the best spoonerism I’ve ever heard. Now, how to fit this into conversations?!?
satby
@OzarkHillbilly: Flutterby may have come from this, a wonderful series of children’s books that I read to my own children. I still have many of them that I saved in anticipation of grandchildren some day. I bet your little granddaughters would love them.
EDIt: appears there’s a problem with the reissue series, so the old ones from 1980 are the way to go.
a friend sent me butterfly weed plants for my birthday and I have to decide where to put them. My yard is starting to get crowded ?
jeffreyw
I thought
I saw
A bread and butterfly
Flutterby
Gvg
In Florida, I am mostly past what I consider Spring, which was nice about a month ago, but we haven’t got to our rainy season yet. I have started more vegetable seeds than I planned because relatives are starting to worry about the food chain, including my sister the doctor who has never hardened and now is trying.
a few days ago my neighbor called through the fence “have you seen two kittens?” and it appears the feral momma she was trying to tame has moved under my garden shed, so it looks like the next month will be kitten taming and then finding homes for them…just In case anyone is interested. Mom is a nice looking black and white, 2 are tuxes 2 are calicos. Neighbor wants a specific tux kitten. Few pics yet as my phone can’t focus properly for under the shed.
Kay (not the front-pager)
@Sab: We have 1 1/2 acres, with much of it an environmental easement that is woods overgrown with invasive vines around a part-time stream. We have thought about renting goats to help beat back the vines in the past. This would just make that permanent. And maybe relieve my husband of mowing the lawn? We back onto a state park that is also plagued by invasive vines, maybe we could sneak them into the park to graze the invasives and do a little good at the same time.
Spanky
@OzarkHillbilly: Yeah, in fact I was just perusing viburnums. Then I got distracted by rhododendrons, which would be for another part of the yard. And it turns out that there are evergreen Buddleia.
In any event, the search is more fun than actually digging holes, so I’ll do that for a little longer.
MomSense
@OzarkHillbilly:
If anyplace has one, it’s Liberty Tools. This is a tiny little town in Maine with the tool shop, an ice cream stand, and the shop of the couple who make the Common Ground Fair t shirts. You can buy all the old shirts there. The tool shop is a big deal in Maine. In the Before Times they had a live cam of people shopping there.
They are closed now, like everything else, but maybe they would send one to you.
http://www.libertytoolco.com
MomSense
@MomSense:
There’s a whole page of planes and shaves.
Kay (not the front-pager)
@JPL: My daughter-in-law went to the store yesterday and only got about half of what was on our list. She said whole sections were completely bare, not a single thing on the shelves. There were no grain flours at. all. I will be drying and sharing my sourdough starter soon, even though it’s just getting started, because I won’t have flour to keep it going. I haven’t been able to get pork since the first week in March, although that seems to be a fluke of when I ordered or something for early March. But my DIL said there wasn’t much chicken, and she was only able to get 1 package (store limited how much a customer could buy) of very expensive ground meat – I think it was buffalo or something? I don’t think Saturday was a smart day to shop, but beggars (and old ladies who don’t want to die) can’t be choosers. I placed an order last Wednesday that will be ready for pickup this coming Wednesday. I’m hopeful that a little more of our order will be there. My niece in NJ is a personal shopper in NJ though, and she said that last week for the first time there were really very severe shortages.
debbie
@Kay (not the front-pager):
Shopping is totally hit or miss. Yesterday, Kroger only had a couple bags of store-brand flour (yuck), but then Giant Eagle had 5-lb bags of Pillsbury AP flour.
EmbraceYourInnerCrone
My daffodils are facing but all my other plants are starting to perk up. Need to put supports in for the peonies before they bloom. It really feels like spring now!
JMG
My Friday shopping trip found plenty of pork and chicken, but hardly any beef at all, just a few packages of ground beef and some very weary looking steaks. Next Friday it’ll probably be the reverse. That seems to be how it’s going. Always some things missing, but never the same things.
Kay (not the front-pager)
@debbie: At this point I would take anything wheat-based. I mean, ANYthing. I have not been able to get flour for 4 weeks. I bake at least 3 loaves of bread a week, usually mostly whole wheat & rye so I need those flours, but I have a big bag of gluten so I can use crappy flour & mix in brans of various types in a pinch (which I do anyway). But coconut or chickpea flour really doesn’t work for yeast bread or sourdough in my experience.
I may ask my niece to send me a couple bags if she sees them at her store in NJ though. I’m desperate enough I’m willing to pay shipping. As I say, I’ve been trying for 4 weeks.
Miss Bianca
I am just dazzled by how many jackals can take such beautiful photos!
grandmaBear
@Kay (not the front-pager): I found a 50 lb bag of King Arthur flour on Amazon recently after spending weeks trying to get smaller quantities. It’s a lot of flour but if you do that much bread making it might be worth it.
OzarkHillbilly
Off topic but I have to pass this on. Well worth the read: On the trail of a Nazi war criminal: ‘It’s my duty as a son to find the good in my father’
………………….
In between the 2 above excerpts is more than a little of his mother’s scrapbook containing pictures, letters and diary entries which perfectly encapsulates the phrase, “the banality of evil.”
grandmaBear
I spent part of yesterday putting in planks to make a raised bed in part of the garden. The area’s not flat and has lots of heavy clay soil (hence the raised bed) so lots of work trying to get it level. Need to do a little more work to finish it today and happy the weather is cooperating. I was late ordering seeds but have a few germinating now.
WhatsMyNym
@Kay (not the front-pager): Check the restaurant suppliers if you are buying that much flour. Like this one I came across online. Even local suppliers that sell in bulk.
debbie
@grandmaBear:
I follow a FB group of America’s Test Kitchen fans. To read their posts, you’d think King Arthur flour was like gold.
trollhattan
Spring is at the middle of its run here. The dogwood has dropped the last of its…whatever look like petals but aren’t, the mock orange has stopped mocking other oranges while the lemon and lime are blooming. The bottlebrush blooms are popping and the bees and hummingbirds are quite happy about that. Anything that had dropped leaves has leaves now, and pollen is rampant. A-choo! Awkward.
debbie
@OzarkHillbilly:
And this sentence alone is what is wrong with our species: “She sought to persuade the judges that the Myanmar military’s actions against the Rohingya community might be excessive but they were not plausibly genocidal.”
MoCA Ace
Thanks for the beautiful pictures. Here at the 45th parallel the willows buds are breaking and the lawn is greening up. Took a walk in the woods yesterday and no spring ephemeral wildflowers yet… I expect them any day now.
I started tomatoes and peppers this year and being anal about having a plant in every cell of the six pack I put two seeds in each… of course 99% of them sprouted and I don’t want to waste any so today I will be potting up my tomato and pepper plants. Since I planted twice as much as I need I now have 4x more plants than I need. I’ll be supplying s lot of friends and family with peppers and tomatoes this year.
Under the cold frame I have lettuce, spinach, peas, and radishes that I planted two weeks ago. Despite several below freezing nights and 3 inches of snow I should have fresh radishes in about two weeks.
WaterGirl
@ema: I love this, with all the colors! Simplicity and beauty personified. Just what is needed on a day like today.
Sab
@Kay (not the front-pager): Around here there are a lot of goat enthusiasts who have web pages for rehoming extra goats. The goats I rented were fainting goats.
Quiltingfool
I get my meat from a locally owned slaughterhouse; there are several of them in this area, as it is rural (although this is a big tourist area, because of Lake of the Ozarks). I talked to the owner the other day, and they buy beef from local farmers and raise their own hogs behind the shop, so they are fairly self sufficient regarding meat supplies. His biggest worry was getting rid of the waste from butchering. He told me his waste hauler just doubled their price, and if the route his shop is on is not profitable, they will quit doing business with him. He can’t afford an incinerator, they can cost a hundred grand or so. Supply problems are like dominoes; when one piece falls, the others follow suit.
scav
Seems to be shifting to the next wave here. Still have some daffs, the cherry and apple trees are just starting, as are some camassia and even a Centaurea montana and a few coral bells! So the mostly yellow is moving towards more blue and other popping colors.
Immanentize
@Quiltingfool: I feel so bad for your butcher. That’s just offal.
hotshoe
Spring should be almost done here (rural central CA) but we had the fortune of late spring rains and cool cloudy weather — fortune at least for the spring crops and wildflowers — so everything is green and gold.
Mary G
Those pictures are glorious!
jeffreyw
@Immanentize:
Groan
WaterGirl
@Immanentize: GROAN!
WaterGirl
@Mary G: Wondering if you have seen my email messages?
SFAW
@Immanentize:
Somewhere, NotMax is reading that, and saying “Damn! Another opportunity missed.”
Immanentize
@jeffreyw: I know…. Anyway, I’m glad to see you! I got my son a fermenting crock for his birthday (tomorrow) and I remember that beautiful Ruben picture. Any tips on making saurkraut?
Immanentize
@SFAW: High praise indeed!
Lots of butchers in my family (my grandfather, my Godfather, an uncle….). So I was primed.
Cheryl from Maryland
@OzarkHillbilly: Yikes. This explains why during a yard sale to sell my parents’s stuff, a stupid cow opened my great-grandfather’s tool chest, despite it being in another room with blankets and rocks on top. My great-grandfather owned over 20 late 19th/early 20th C. Planes as well as carpenter squares, etc. We made her empty her bags, take off her coat, and searched them and her car, then threw her off the property. She must have blabbed to her friends as later at the sale we had some guys asking to see the tools. No more yard sales for us!
Cheryl from Maryland
@Kay (not the front-pager): Try nuts.com. They are flooded with orders (they are my source for coffee), so use the internet at around 9 am Eastern Daylight Time M – F. Once they have as many orders as they can handle, they stop for the day.
Litlebritdifrnt
It has been quite exciting this Spring in my new garden waiting to discover what I have before I do much more additional planting. The front and back gardens are heavily graveled (to prevent weeds I suppose) so there are few things planted in the ground but lots in containers. In the back there is a clematis growing up a laundry pole (don’t know what colour yet), and three clumps of what I now know to be Bluebells (which I love). Also on my back fence a pink clematis is spilling over from the neighbour’s garden that is smothered in buds right now and is going to be spectacular. In the front there is a small shrub in a pot that turned out to be a Camellia which has been very pretty. Other than that there is a TON of hosta coming up in containers all over the place. I have plated nasturtiam seeds at the edges of them which I hope will germinate before the hosta get too large. Just waiting for a mail order delivery of some bare root plants which I will put in containers out front. Very exciting.
jeffreyw
@Immanentize:
Start it last month do it will be ready today!
Immanentize
@jeffreyw: thank you for that sage advice. Do you add carroway seeds or dill or other things in fermentation? Or is that after?
satby
O.T to the garden thread, but I just wanted to share this Go-Fund-Me to people who might have a little to spare. I drove as part of this rescue transport relay for years and all of my current dogs (including Hershey and Rosie who died last year) came up to the Chicago metro area through it. The driver was in a terrible accident and is still hospitalized and the shelter transport van totalled. Fortunately, it was on his return trip, so no animals were injured or lost. The driver, Dane, drove over 600 miles per week transporting animals from southern and central IL, MO, and even further. Edit: I should make clear that these are relays pulling from over 20 rural high kill county shelters in several states and going north as far as WS and MN as well as around Chicago.
Immanentize
Litlebritdifrnt
Oh and BTW found my forever mechanic yesterday. The car broke down yesterday in a store parking lot. Googled local recovery services and through sheer serendipity called a guy called Tony Nobles. He was there in 20 minutes and cause he couldn’t fix the car on the spot took me home in his van and then towed the car to his shop. He called me several times to let me know what was going on (there was a loose connection between the alternator and the battery which meant my battery was “jiggered” as he put it, I believe it’s a technical term :)) He charged the battery overnight but it was deader than dead, got me a new one and delivered my car to my house this lunchtime, less than 24 hours after he picked it up and on a Sunday to boot. I honestly have never seen customer service on this level ever in my life. I was not surprised to learn that he has been in business for 40 years and has an absolutely stellar reputation. He was a delightful bloke and you can guarantee that I will be going to him for all my car needs in the future. What an incredible stroke of luck it was to find him.
Aleta
@satby: Is there also a fund raiser for Dan’s medical, etc or has that already been covered ? This one asks for prayers for Dan and “Donations will go directly to the purchase of a new van and expenses related to transports.” Thanks for the information.
jeffreyw
@Immanentize: You want that stuff in there from the start.
satby
@Aleta: I emailed for an update and will let you know when I hear back. He’s in serious condition.
MazeDancer .
@satby:
How horrible.
Tossed in a little.
Tweeted out. Maybe @darth will retweet.
Kent
I think this thread is tailing off. But I’m wondering if anyone here does greenhouse gardening for vegetables.
I live in the Portland metro area (on the WA side of the river) so should be in prime gardening territory. But we also live on a slope on the edge of a greenbelt that is full of deer, coyotes, and rabbits. And everything I have planted in the past couple of years (squash, peas, grapes, lettuce, etc.) gets mowed down by the wildlife before even getting a foothold. I’m thinking of putting in some raised beds with high fending around but by the time you get all that built the investment is getting close to a proper greenhouse. I’m wondering if may for food production, just putting in a greenhouse and using that year-round or as close to year-round as possible is going to be the better option.
Anyone here do greenhouse vegetable gardening?
Kay (not the front-pager)
@Sab: I shouldn’t have taken that nap. Where’s “around here”? I could use a re-homed goat or 3…
Kay (not the front-pager)
@Cheryl from Maryland: Thank you! I’ll set my alarm, and check every day.
Kay (not the front-pager)
@Cheryl from Maryland: I just placed my order. It was a little bit more expensive than supermarket prices, but I expect the quality is better (it is all organic, to start with), and more importantly, it’s available! Coffee was not, however. ;-) What a pleasant experience after all this hand wringing! Thank you thank you thank you! Gotta love a fellow Marylander!
Lyrebird
What beautiful photographs!
Thank you!
Spring has sprung! Good to have a smile before I go, let’s see, sign up to be on the waiting list to order more hand sanitizer. But so good to see spring!
satby
@Aleta: ok, the update on the driver Dane right now (a few minutes ago) is that he’s still in a coma. He’s an older gentleman so head trauma at that age can be catastrophic, not to mention all his other injuries. There may be a fundraiser set up for him at a later date, they’re waiting to see what the family may need help with. It’s an awful situation.
SWMBO
@Kay (not the front-pager): For sourdough you need to get a more northern wheat. It has more gluten which feeds the sourdough.
https://www.tastecooking.com/southern-flour-make-better-biscuits/