Weekends are for fruits and flowers: Part 1 (Warning: PIC HEAVY)

vAs people have time to look at pretty pictures on the weekends (or will just ignore these posts because they have better things to do during the weekend...can't blame them!) I decided to post some recent pics of the garden as I don't think I share the prettier side often enough.

This is during a time when I had time and get my artsy pics on.  (Click to enlarge pics btw, I kept most of them at medium for easier loading, but they're obviously better when expanded)

Surprise! I left a daikon radish in the ground too long and it flowered!

 Unexpectedly pretty purple geranium-like looking flowers to me

 

 The everbearing strawberries have all been in full bloom and looking healthier than before.  Many are starting to bear fruit, but it will take a while before they go from this:

 ... to luscious and red.  This one looks like it's got a bonnet on and has fingers to its lips in thought.

 Even the mache has cute little flowers, tiny ones that I am sure hoverflies will like.

Some waxy broccoli holding onto a drop of water

Sweet, sweet sugar pea!  It's relatively hot, but I suppose for their cool steeple shaped flowers and nitrogen fixing properties even not get a good crop is fine (I started them a bit late too anyways)

Sunny mustard flowers. Look like little butterflies.

The salad burnet, which is doing AMAZINGLY well from the winter into this weather is flowering for me for the first time. Meaning: I need to cut it back hard and as I don't think I will be using this like a mad woman the flowers will probably have to go because it makes the leaves tough (like they sort of are now... probably a good idea to split this baby too.  It's big and beautiful!)

My happy columbine!  Love these unusual flowers!

 Closeup:  (each flower bud just prior to blooming looks like an alien space ship or a squid or octopus!  

A whole bunch of them together looks like a school of them swimming in an ocean!)


Finally, for this last part I leave you with a hyacinth bean just emerging:

It's not my fault! The garden just doesn't understand "no!"

So, I'm on a squash growing moratorium due to squash vine borers being full of hate and eating of my past squash crops.

APPARENTLY, the garden didn't get the memo.

Opening my compost pile, what do I see?

(Yeah, pardon the giant crumpled up newspaper, sometimes I gets lazy...)

Yep, those looks like some kombucha squash (seedlings now)  husband and I ate some time ago.  I had saved the seeds for another time when squash growing was more favorable, but apparently I missed a few/need to turn the compost pile.  Man, these guys are straining to get some light.  AND boy, do I want to let them grow out the compost pile....mmmmm Japanese squashiness.

But gah.  Can you imagine how terrible it would be to have squash vine borers lay in your compost pile?! TURN PILE! TURN!

The garden can't stop dropping hints though!

(UPDATE: apparently this photo didn't load earlier though I swear I saw it had)

Yep, them be some self seeded cucumber seedlings.  For reals Garden?  You know that the husband doesn't even like cucumber!

So... shall I "let things be?" or become Persephone, SQUASH DESTROYER?

Let us eat lettuce! Salud to the salad!

A while back my mother gave me a bunch of seeds that she thought were chard, then I realized when looking at them later they weren't and confronted her about this and she then said it was a Chinese vegetable of sorts, which after a while of talking with her I concluded that my mom is just a nut as usual. 

The seeds (sown under a raspberry plant) appeared to be lettuce like and after promising that inform readers of their fate this is what has sprung up in their place:

Looks like lettuce doesn't it? (Bleeds like lettuce too, you know that white sap that oozes when they're cut)

The only thing is, is that I have no clue what lettuce they are.  They were apparently 2 different lettuce varieties.  Obviously lettuce seeds are pretty standard tiny skinny football shaped things of varying shades of brown so if anyone is able to discern what is what here I'd appreciate it.  Both appear to be loose leaf lettuces, one I would not be surprised to be a generic black simpson and the other has light purpling about the leaves.

Here's the first type:

And now the second:

(closeup of purpling)

If you're a lettuce eater/grower/identifier, I'd appreciate any info!

On a similar note, husband and I made chirashi salad again with the plethora of greens that abounded in the garden!  In the basket is sorrel, salad burnet, siberian kale, garlic green, mache, mystery lettuces #1 and #2, mustard greens and Swiss chard.

Though not a "true" salad by some historical definitions where there are dozens of greens if not more, it was still quite delish with the pops of spicy of the mustard, the textures of the soft mache leaves/flowers (it was bolting now) to the ruffly kale, garlickiness of the... garlic and unexpected flavor of the chard.

It was my first year growing the Swiss chard and I was WEIRDED OUT by the saltiness of it.  Not unpleasant, just not expected.  I wonder if it really was as salty as I thought it was or if I simply note saltiness more than other people.  Other than dehydration, what might make chard more salty than usual I wonder? Large amounts of fertilizer (which I swear I didn't do)?

Vinegar mint!

Oh vinegar, how you are so near and dear to my heart.

You are delicious, clean the inside of my house naturally, are great for my hair, kill weeds with ease and make my plant pots bacteria and fungus free!

As I was making my yard smell like a pickle factory/fish n'chip shop earlier today I had an epiphany that I might be able to control my mint in my herb bed a little better than my current tin can border method: VINEGAR!

I'm not worried that I will decimate mint (really, really hard to do).  So in addition to the tin can border (which I like to believe will control the mint not only physically but maybe by heat that is  theoretically absorbed by the can making it inhospitable to the creeping mint underneath), on one of my tin can border, in the inside area where the mint grows I doused a line of vinegar there and between the cans.

A little later in the day and I already see a little line of mint die-off, while the inside of the border stays healthy, fresh and minty!

The mint was relegated to the lower portion of my 2 tiered raised herb bed and slopes downward so I am not too worried about causing any other herbs to die off, assuming that the vinegar doesn't travel far from the original douse point.

Cross fingers!

Potentially confused plants waking up

The hibiscuses are coming back again! Grrrr-reat! Except that if I recall... it feels a little early?  With all this mid 80 degree weather I think some of my plants have become disoriented!

First it was the really cold winter and now unseasonably warm spring, I suppose I can't blame them for being in a hurry to get up and out and enjoy the heat.

Both hibiscuses are looking spry, though the Red River one's buds are growing relatively slower than the other hibiscus's.  I suspect because the Red River's in a shadier region of the garden.

The small numerous buds makes me think of sad thoughts of an acne ridden teenager (oh will those days never end?!).  On a happier thought, though some might contend this as something to celebrate, the morning glories are coming back up around it too, self seeded all over, including under the Red River hibiscus where it will wind its way up the branches and flower among more exotic looking flowers.  Almost like congregating with angels, hmm guys?  If they start getting a little too strangle-y of the hibiscus I'll just yank some up.  It's fun though to see the 2 different flowers on one plant though.

(you can see about 4 little morning glory seedlings popping up around the hibiscus base.  I think I saw yet more popping up later today)

More confused plants include the stevia/sweetleaf.  It that came back!  Dude, it's a zone 11 I found out (not a zone 9 I thought for a while) and so my super mulching methods worked, I am still startled to see it coming back and with so many numerous and strong shoots.  I thought for certain that there was no way it could survive that winter especially as I was convinced I mulched too late.  I have suspicions that the first year I mulched (a couple of years ago) I also piled LOTS of dirt around the base of the plant and so maybe that it some good increased protection to make this zone 11 plant essentially perennial for me here?!  Just to be sure too I did a taste test and yep, it was the painfully sweet stevia I remembered it to be.

Always nice to see things persevere in the garden.  Makes me think I actually am too, though I haven't been doing much work to help them along!

B-limey!

My kaffir lime tree and I like to play a game every year.  Each year I bring it inside when it gets chilly.  It hangs out in the warm kitchen and I merrily take leaves from it for delicious ethnic dishes during the cold winter months (you're supposed to use the leaves, I've never seen it produce flowers, or obviously w/o flowers... fruit).

When it gets warm again in Memphis I attempt to acclimate it outside, in a shaded, sheltered location where invariably, a little bit of wind does this to it:

THEN, (each year) I freak out and fuss if the stupid tree will make it with no leaves, though it did retain two stubborn leaves for once this year.

AND AS USUAL, it shows sign of new leaf life again after weeks of worry:

(Yeah, I need to stop freaking out about this stuff... just my nature)

I'd like to add that I got my lemon and this lime tree at the same time on Craigslist, both for $20, with their original terracotta pots, base and pretty rocks for water to drain into.  A steal I say.  Just a plug (I'm not affiliated with them!) for the awesomeness of Craigslist for having connected me with all sorts of very interesting people and deals like these trees and my super reproductive cannas. 

(NOTE: as much as I love Craigslist... if you do use this great system, please be careful still.  Strangers are strangers, so make sure reliable friends know where you are and when you are meeting with people to purchase or exchange items!)

Secret Agent Bee: Gentlemen! (click title to "get it")

(UPDATE: Pardon the idiotic un-finished post, was going to go back before it was scheduled, but yeah...)

Popping around the garden I was charmed by a very odd looking inverted teardrop shaped be.  The head of this bee was at the pointy end of the teardrop and it was very wary, yet seemed playful at the same time alighting to pause here and there, waiting for me to get to it to get a better look before flying away again.

After LOTS of time on the internet trying to figure out what it was I've determined that it's a parasitic, potentially beneficial pollinator fly from the Bombyliidae family.  The cool feature about this fly (besides its appearance) is that it lays its eggs by its prey's den or home and the fly's larvae crawl into the den and then eat the prey!

The unfortunate part is that it seems that Bombyliidae's don't distinguish between annoying crickets/grasshoppers and wasps (which can be helpful too as pollinators) and helpful beneficial pollinators such as solitary bees and etc.

Still, nifty to see and have around!


MORE INFO:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bombyliidae
http://www.cirrusimage.com/flies_bee_Bombylius_major.htm
http://thenaturalstone.blogspot.com/2006/04/studies-of-bee-fly.html

Utterly re-purposed potting bench (it ain't pretty)

Though I lust after a sculptural, beautifully handcrafted cedar or whatnot potting bench, with pegs(!) to hold tools, shelves that separate pots from other shtuff, a soil drawer and slatted table top that allows soil to fall through and be collected/recycled for later use... I ain't got the monies.

Which is fine. Such luxuries, as nice as they are, are not necessities.  (Hurray! My head's screwed on relatively straight in that category!)

So, after many years of collecting random stuff has evolved into my recycled/thrifted potting bench:

Just about everything in this picture has been either re-purposed/recycled/thrifted or curb-side found.  The major aspects of my potting bench are the 2 plastic barrels, gotten from the local Coca-Cola plant I frequented to make rain barrels with (these were extras I magically was able to fit into my now defunct mini-van... how I miss that vehicle..sort of)!

The table top of the bench is an old, but sturdy, plywood/laminate countertop someone down my street chucked.  It was originally pink-ish but thankfully faded to more beige (I hate pink).  It has a hole for a sink in the middle that is now covered by my greatest recent find that has I think completed my bench: PLANTATION SHUTTERS!

These shutters are of terrible cheap material;  material that is too flimsy for good household use I think (which is probably why they were chucked) but excellent for my use.  They must have been used outdoors partially as they were filthy.  I didn't even bother with washing them off because dude, they're going to get dirty on the potting bench anyways.

What I feel sort of awesome about is that they allow me to have that nifty slatted soil table top part I've always been craving:

They're slightly tilted to have enough room to let soil fall through the slats into some plastic containers (also curbside found) below for collection, OR can be fully opened to allow bunches of soil to fall through.

HUZZAH!  So yeah, who needs a fancy schmancy cedar bench?

Experiment in bypassing damp off

Most of my original tomatoes that I started by seed fell victim to damp off.

Aggravating, but many horticulturists suggest not starting tomatoes too early anyways as frost or disease from cold/damp that can occur early from early planting of tomato crop.  Luckily I had some seed leftover and so I've begun again, this time with the luxury of reasonably warm and sunshine-y outdoor weather.  A later home-started harvest, but with luck there will still be a crop!

A very kind friend of mine purchased a good size Bonnie's indeterminate heirloom tomato for me in addition to a smaller hybrid indeterminate (that had 2 plants in it!) so that I wouldn't be without the deliciousness early this year.  Oh us vegetable gardeners and our tomatoes!

But back to damp-off crud:

After I started pulling out the totally damped off seedlings from their small egg carton "pots," I wondered to myself  about the famously well known stem-rooting properties that tomatoes possess and thought that  I might still yet be able to save some.  So I kept one Tropic tomato seedling with a pinched damped off stem and popped it in a small bath of water I was growing a grocery store fennel bulb in, making sure that the damped off stem base was under the water line.   .

Here is the result after a week or so:

(at this point I had discarded the damped off portion that existed below the newly rooted part you can see now)

Now that I have potentially found a way to save damped off seedlings I am slightly smacking myself at not having done with more of the sad looking plants I chucked. 

So, just wanted to share if any of you run into damp off issues.  (There is hope!)

Oh, hai there!

Spring only truly arrives when I see this in the garden:

ASPARAGUS!

I really should have taken a pic of this earlier.  One day ago it was but an inch tall!  Asparagus, like rhubarb, is known for its ridiculously fast growth (which I still need to procure...)

Not only is asparagus fantastic for being a perennial vegetable, but the speed of its growth just makes you feel like your garden is really working hard.  Plus, have you seen the price of asparagus these days?!  In addition, I can't describe how awesome fresh asparagus is (sprinkled with some parmesan cheese, olive oil, wrapped in proscuitto...mmm).

It's a spring veggie, but on odd occasions, my asparagus has been known to grow a few stalks late in the year, like in August... I'm not complaining!

Once I saw this stalk popping out of the soil I started hunting for others because 1) what sort of meal would be good with just ONE asparagus stalk (that's almost a mournful looking image isn't it?) and 2) if there's one, there's GOTTA be more ready to show their stalk-y self.

AND THERE ARE:

Other good signs are the fern-y leaves:

I purchased my asparagus 3 years ago when they were 2 year old crowns.  Asparagus takes a while to get started and settled into a bed (and really don't like to be moved, though I did do it once for good reason).  When they're 3 years old you can start gently harvesting them, but year 5 (now for mine) is when things really get going I understand so I'm totally REVVED to eat 'sparagus all spring!