Zach's Walk

[kazedwards]

The gardens looking good today. Yesterday we got a good rain and it reply benefited from it.

The cucumbers are really taking off. They will start to climb up the trellis soon.

Mark Twain is really catching up

Mamie Brown's Pink is one of the most vigorous and sturdy right now.

Estler's Mortgage Lifter is catching up at the same rate as Mark Twain. Both were small plants when put out. It has the biggest tomato flower I have ever seen too.

Speckled Roman is one of the plants that had the really curly leaves. I was really worried about it at first and almost pulled it. Right now now it is the second plant that has set. I guess it is just wispy foliage.


The corn is really taking off too.

This is the garden from the deck.


I also have a Myers's lemon tree, Orange tree, and a pixie grape up on the deck. They are really enjoying being outside. The small pot are clementine seeds that I started over the winter.

[kazedwards]

I'm starting to get lots of fruit set. Siletz has had the most so far with around a dozen. One of them might be starting to blush too.


Speckled Roman also got its stripes.

Reisetomate has also set one.

So has Sungold F2, Goose Creek, Betimes Macbeth and Tom's Landrace Paste but I didn't get pictures of those. I'm sure there are a few more too. It was in the 70s today and will be tomorrow too. 80s on Monday then back to the 90s after that. We have had some rain too so I'm sure that it has all helped.

[kazedwards]

A strong storm came through last night. We had a few tomato stakes break but not to much damage to the plants. The real lost was our pear tree. It was an ornamental pear that was here when we bought the house. Around 25-30' tall. We loved that tree. It set our house apart from the others. We used it as a landmark for others to find our home. Everyday when I get home it made me smile.

It had three main leaders, not sure if that's the right term. It was one of those that broke. One of our neighbors that does trees stopped by and told us it was just a matter of time before one of the other two comes down. He said the whole tree needs to be removed. We think that is best but it gives us grief to do it. Our house already looks naked with part of it down and it will look like the rest after the tree is down. A friend is coming over to help me take it down on Saturday. I plan on taking cuttings before then. I will take as many as I can. I will put some in water and others straight into pots. We are hoping to start building a house in the spring and will plant them there, if we find a place we like. The tree will be missed.






Here's a pic from a few years ago.

[khoomeizhi]

that's the nature of those bradford/calleryana pears, unfortunately, at about that size. they're always relatively short-lived trees, with so much vertical growth and weak, acute-angled crotches. i'm afraid you can expect the same thing from any future ones as well.

[philagardener]

Sorry about your Bradford Pear; as khoomeizhi said, they are not very strong trees and subject to wind/winter damage, so unfortunately it was just a matter of time.

On the bright side, now you can replace it with one that fruits :>)

[reed]

Yep, Bradford pears lot of people planted them and they pretty much always do that. They were not supposed to be able to reproduce but turns out that isn't the case.  www.kentucky.com/news/local/counties/fayette-county/article69033692.html 

I'm not sure I agree that they are such a terrible thing, I mean as far as invasive species go. They are beautiful in bloom, critters like the little fruits and from what I'm seeing they either are dehybridizing or crossing into phenotypes with more open growth and larger fruit.  They are certainly better than those nasty tree of heaven and with fifty million dead ash trees there is room for something more pleasant than Johnson grass and wild roses.  

[steev]

Berkeley planted lots of them as street trees, very pretty in bloom and winter leaf; they ripped them all out when the pears started dropping big branches on parked cars.

[richardw]

Shame to have had the pear damaged, its certainly weakened the remaining two stems.

[kazedwards]

Yes it has and there are stress marks too.

[kazedwards]

Today I weeded most of the garden and mowed. Used the grass clippings as mulch on a 1/3 of the garden. With all the rain the last week the weeds started getting out of control.


The corn is doing well.

I'm starting to get a lot of fruit set on the tomatoes.




Peppers are also starting to put out.



Ground cherries are coming along nice as well.

The garlic is doing great too. I really need to get out there and start plucking bulbils.
This is @reeds Indiana Homestead. The flowers seem viable and bulbils are a really pretty red. I might have waited a little to long on plucking the bulbils out.

This is the Chesnok Red. Really great umbels this year. It is definitely time to start removing the bulbils.


The umbel from the TGS plant.

Here is the other TGS plant that harvested today. I'm really happy with it. I really need to start thinking of names for them.

[kazedwards]

I noticed this on the corn this morning.

[kazedwards]

I pruned the tomatoes today. They needed it with the storms and high wind we have had the last few weeks. They keep breaking the stakes in using.

I also dug reed's Indiana Homestead garlic. All of he flowers had dried up so I figured I should. I have 8 rounds and 8 bulbs. I will plant most of them this fall. Might try a few to get a taste.

[kazedwards]

Today I harvested all of the garlic. The scapes I cut and put in water. I will start drying them in a few weeks. All of the garlic I have drying in the garage under a vent. I am very impressed with the size. The volunteer garlic was largest. The rest was good size as well. I didn't even know garlic could get this big.



My two largest bulbs


Here is the average size.

[kazedwards]

Chesnok Red is the only garlic I have grown before this year so that is what it is. I think it is a missed round or bulb from last season but they could be a bulbils that fell when I was removing they last year.

[kazedwards]

Jul 25, 2016 10:22:38 GMT -5 toomanyirons said:

Sorry, I recall that information now from one of your previous discussions, just couldn't find it. Anyway, those are the largest and whitest Chesnok Red bulbs I have ever seen. I find it interesting how soil composition affects wrapper color and clove peeling color as the garlic adapts to local growing conditions.  Back when I grew this variety mine were heavily streaked dark red on pink.  If you had handed that bulb to me I would not have guessed it to be a purple stripe type of garlic, I would still incorrectly guess it to be a porcelain type. 

You said you removed the scapes from them and put them in water, so that means those plants were being used for true seed production?  Good on you if you can get seed from such nice plants.

Normally I would leave them in the ground until the umbels dry down but this week we are going out of town and I have had a few fall over. So decided to cut them and put them in water in the garage so the swelling seed heads can finish maturing. Then the umbels will go into a paper bag. If I was growing for better production I should have pulled the bulbs beginning of July maybe late June. Leaving them in the ground so long tends to deteriorate the outer wrapper and turn it brown. As the outer layers come off more purple shows.

Last year I didn't have any color to the bulbs that I harvested in mid August only brown. I was surprised to see color on most this year.