oldmobie's Doings

[Joseph Lofthouse]

May 21, 2014 18:52:50 GMT -5 oldmobie said:

Red circles indicate possible additions to the landrace. They certainly have gotten started quickly. I'll compare growth and production. Should I rogue the stragglers, or see what they produce?

The longer I am involved in landrace gardening the more willing I am to chop stragglers. The first year I might forgive slow growing plants if they have other traits of value such as super-bug resistance. I've found that stragglers tend to be pikers for the whole growing season and to be generally less productive, so after the first year I'm not all that willing to let them grow.

[oldmobie]

Same peas I posted about yesterday, hopefully a better pic:

[oldmobie]

Lately I've been reading some other members' posts about using willow for a living fence. It got me thinking about the living fence I'd like to grow. This happened the same day we bought landscape timbers for Mrs oldmobie's butterfly garden, which put a new thought in my head. Black locust. (My wife says "You know, I've been thinking..." is the scariest phrase she can ever hear from me. You ladies may now begin feeling uneasy on her behalf, if you're so inclined.)

The living fence I've wanted to build would consist of fruit trees which are graft compatible, so where I cross the limbs, they'll "take". Around here, that should be apple, pear, peach, cherry and I think plum, apricot, almond. I still plan a section of that.

But what about black locust for home-grown timber edging? A quick google indicated that it contains toxins that could kill an animal, though it often doesn't. Where my fence is going, there are currently sheep and goats, and only 5 strands of barbwire between it and cows. No go.

That same search led to a mention of what we call hedge around here. Other folks call it Osage Orange. Posts I helped dad make of it 20-30 years ago are still good as new. There's a tree about 100 yards north of the barn. Aparently nontoxic. The cattle deaths from eating the fruit are now blamed on choking. Also mentioned: it's a member of the mulberry family. How long does mulberry wood last in contact with soil? I guess we'll find out: birds have "planted" me several mulberries. If it's no good for timber, we'll still eat the berries. It seems folks have grown both from cuttings.

I took 12 of each.



If anyone with sheep and goats doesn't know it, mulberry leaves are apparently made of candy! I've had goats that are afraid of me come within arm's reach to eat from a limb that I held down. If the limb is big enough, the sheep get in on it, but they won't stand up to the goats for it, usually.

Watering in the new garden today, I fould an unreal number of tiny bright green seedlings. Does anyone know if this is what newly germinated clover looks like?



My wife and oldest son predrilled all of the whole landscape timbers to edge the butterfly garden. She and the younger son have started pinning them down with rebar stakes. When that's done, we'll measure for the ones that have to be cut. She also planted one of her new climbing roses at the end of the swingset.

All of the mature lettuce is bitter and starting to bolt. The red salad bowl is fine. Slower to bolt, or just less mature? One pak choi bolting. I think I need to taste test, and maybe harvest the rest, so I can taste it before it gets bitter.

[steev]

The only problem with mixed hedge-fencing of various species is that they may be differently susceptible to whatever (a lot of my pears are showing fireblight this year, never did before), so you have to deal with occasional gaps. We try to arrange things to suit ourselves, but Nature rules.

[Joseph Lofthouse]

I built this living fence a couple decades ago. Even when it was young, some of the trunks grew faster/bigger than others. It is apple trees that were woven together and grafted at each crossing point. There are multiple varieties of apples in the fence, and the right most diagonal limb at the bottom is the first successful graft I ever made of scion wood onto a rootstock. The trees were obtained at an end of season distress-sale at a big-box store.

Image courtesy of Google StreetView.

[oldmobie]

May 22, 2014 23:33:08 GMT -5 Joseph Lofthouse said:

Image courtesy of Google StreetView.

Looks great! I'd be thrilled with those results!

[oldmobie]

Slightly thinned the carrots today.



Transplanted some of them into the old washtub. Gave some away, and finally put about half in the compost.



Green beans are starting to come up.



Corn is starting to come up in the new garden. Nothing to take pics of yet, just tiny green points. Maybe in a few days.

Harvested the pak choi that hasn't bolted yet. Afraid it'll probably go to the worms. It's full of holes, has what seems to be eggs on the back, and in at least three places, something folded the leaf back and made a cocoon in the fold. I did clean a small piece and taste it raw. It was mild, between lettuce and cabbage, but fleshy and crisp. Not sure about a whole salad of it, but it'd be great in a salad.



Mrs oldmobie put out more sunflowers today. She has two full rows now of the Mammoth Russian, Giant Grey Stripe, my saved seed from both grown together, and Joseph's Landrace (XL seed). In front of that she's started two more rows of shorter sunflowers: Lemon Queen, Velvet Queen, Teddy Bear, along with a mix (Evening Color, I think) and mexican sunflower (The seeds look different, I doubt it's a true sunflower.). In front of that is black eyed susan. She's about half done.

She has some wire framed window box type planters that mount on a porch rail, which she intends to mount to the horizontal spreaders of the A frames of the swingset. Trouble is, the liners are shot, and she can't find new ones the right size. Today she settled on a design and started making her own.

[Joseph Lofthouse]

That seems so weird to me: To have peas and beans at the same stage of development. My peas have been in the ground for something like 10 weeks and are just starting to flower. Perhaps the weather will trick me into planting beans next week, but to be prudent I may wait another couple weeks to plant the beans.

I keep saying that I really aught to develop a hot weather landrace of peas, but I never quite get the seed, and the timing, and the ambition all together at the same time.

[oldmobie]

May 24, 2014 0:20:45 GMT -5 Joseph Lofthouse said:

That seems so weird to me: To have peas and beans at the same stage of development. My peas have been in the ground for something like 10 weeks and are just starting to flower. Perhaps the weather will trick me into planting beans next week, but to be prudent I may wait another couple weeks to plant the beans.

I keep saying that I really aught to develop a hot weather landrace of peas, but I never quite get the seed, and the timing, and the ambition all together at the same time.

I actually WinterSowed peas this year. I guess they don't like that. They didn't come up. It was late for peas when I put these out.

[flowerweaver]

Got my peas in late this year and the leaf cutter ants decided they would be more useful to them than me and carted them all away. They are very smart little fungus farmers who, according to a pact l have with them, have left my garden alone for over a decade.

[oldmobie]

Potatoes just haven't been doing well at all this year. I planted almost the same way as last year, which I considered a success. I put down a single layer of newspaper to suppress grass and weeds, put my eyes on top, and put a very thin layer of straw on top with intention to add more after they were up. Last year 5 pounds of seed potatoes yielded 5 gallons of harvested potatoes. This year, 5 plants or less have managed to get leaves above the straw. Almost is a big word in this case. I think the difference is that this year I cut eyes apart to make more plants. Last year I put the spuds in whole. It's hard to keep the newspaper moist, it's always wet or dry. The whole potatoes had food enough to endure until the roots hit dirt. Most of these eyes have just been hanging on, no roots. Today, we moved the straw, gathered all the eyes that were still alive, but hadn't grown yet, and replanted into holes inthe dirt, with just a bit of compost over the top. They might still make, but it'll be a late crop.



Now I'm thinking about the space we emptied. Probably bush beans or a cover crop. Really leaning toward bush dry beans; I can pack 'em in tight, to smother weeds. I won't have to leave walkways. And they're a legume.

Speaking of cover crops, I think my buckwheat's coming in! (Yes, I'm that easily excited.)

[oldmobie]

No edible gardening today, but I did get a few "before" pics of my wife's "butterfly garden" which she says is becoming more of just a flowerbed.



The green rectangle is where she planted birdhouse gourds. In the red circle is a yellow climbing rose. In the pink oval is a red mandavilla.



Here you can see one of the window boxes. There's one on the far side of the other A frame. When she gets the other liners in, the last 2 boxes go in. There will be 2 side by side on each A frame. The geraniums under the platform are to be planted in them, as well as flowers from seed. Maybe petunias?



See the white circle? Meet the villain of the story. He's of the opinion that birdhouse gourd seeds belong in his gut, not in the ground. She planted them 3 times. Yesterday. If he doesn't straighten up, there could be a box of Stove Top in his future. Early retirement, farm style.

The holes you can see near him are the sunflowers and black eyed susans. Shhhh! Don't tell the duck! As far as we can tell, he hasn't disturbed them.

Down the right side, just out of this shot, is a row of assorted pumpkins and ornamental gourds. Again, if the duck left them.

[oldmobie]

As of last night, we're about half done fencing the goat and sheep pasture. We've gotta hurry. Droppings in the new garden today. At least one corn seedling looked bitten off. I picked up all 12 mulberry and all 12 hedge cuttings today and put them back in the bucket. Most of them still have leaves.

Speaking of the new garden, about half the watermelons are up, as well as probably a third of the corn. Probably gonna have to expand using a push mower. The trimmer had a meltdown. Wouldn't stay running, so I checked what I know how to check. Plug was dirty, so I cleaned it. It started and ran well, so I started trimming. About 10 minutes later, it died and wouldn't start. The only fuel filter I can find is a piece of screen wire in the bottom of the tank. Looked clean. Took the bowl, float and needle valve off the carb. Covered in yellow gummy stuff. Probably old gas. Cleaned with new gas and a toothbrush. Air filter needs replacing, but I cleaned it as well as I could. Went to start it back up, on the third pull, the rope failed to recoil. Gave it a little flick to unstick the spring, and the rope came out.

The north two (oldest) rows of sunflowers are starting to come up.

Decided on beans and my 4 new Gypsy peppers in the spot where we took out the potatoes that weren't growing. Incidently, they're starting to shape up in their new home. I think most will make it.

Decided to space the beans 1' on center. I had a 6' X 8' area to plant, so 48 beans. 24 each of Joseph's bush dry bean landrace, and Carole Depp's Resiliant hybrid (Joseph's strain). As per instructions, soaked overnight, then tried to seperate the Carole's that imbibed water from those that didn't. (I soaked 24 Joseph's and 30 Carole's in 2 bowls.) After the soak, they looked the same. Until I noticed the pack of dry seeds. The Carole's are a smallish bean anyway, and I had counted out 30 of the smallest. After the soak, they were all bigger than the ones in the package. I planted the 24 biggest and tossed the 6 smallest.



That's my portable grid. I started out squarefoot gardening, and in some cases like to use the spacing for other plantings. I just read that if beans are crowded each plant produces less, and they like .5 to 1 square foot each, so I put one per square instead of the four I used after reading Mel Bartholomew.



I planted by flattening the left over straw from the potatoes, and "wallering out" (That's a word, in the Ozarks.) a hole down to the soil for each bean. Then I dropped the bean in through my PVC pipe. Last, my wife put about a cup of compost over each.



Gypsy peppers.

[oldmobie]

Finished the sheep and goat fencing today, and moved 'em to the new pasture. Now I can get serious about the new garden.

I now have one pea and one green bean that reach to the trellis. The peas probably won't make this late, but I'll let 'em try. I marked the bean as the fastest early grower for seed saving time. All of the beans I got as trades gave 100% germination, my store bought from this year gave around half. It's been 14 days now, so time to replant. Also, something bit the top off of one vine, so I just have a stump with no leaves. Does anyone know if that'll grow back, or should I replant it?

My pak choi's been putting up a flower stalk for some time now, and today the first blooms were just starting to open. So, on the advice of oxbowfarm , my wife and I stripped the top few inches of seed pods from my Michihili cabbage to make a division; pods below will be pure Michihili, the ones above, and the ones on the pak choi, will be potential crosses.

Thursday my wife replanted sunflowers that weren't coming up. They're popping up very well, though they're still small.

It's probably time to replant any corn that isn't up. The Ashworth was planted differently, so was the last to germinate, but is starting to catch up. (It was planted into compost on newspaper, with just enough straw over the top to hold the newspaper. All other corn was planted into compost in holes in the ground. Watermelons are mostly up. Will probably have to replant one hill.

[philagardener]

May 31, 2014 18:04:15 GMT -5 oldmobie said:

Also, something bit the top off of one vine, so I just have a stump with no leaves. Does anyone know if that'll grow back, or should I replant it?

If it was chewed off above the cotyledons, lateral buds might grow. Below the cotyledons, replant.  Good luck!