Trellis

The first trellis for the peas is officially in the garden!  If the peas seem to like it, we'll put in another 2-3 for the 2nd pea planting and the pole beans.  For about $40, I don't think it's too bad for a 4-sided pyramid trellis.  We get 8 feet of plantings in a 2'x2' square!

We didn't get the potatoes in the ground tonight - decided to go out and play BINGO instead ("we" won $99!).  Won't get done tomorrow either, but Saturday is looking promising.

We did get the live trap though - hopefully it'll go in the ground tomorrow.  Rascally rodent.

We have our second planting of spinach, beets and a couple of the lettuces coming up (I didn't have time to check which ones - but I'll check this weekend).

ASPARAGUS!

6 asparagus plants from my original planting (2 summers ago) came up again this year!  There was nothing to be seen yesterday, but a little bit of sunshine can go a long way. 

They were originally purchased from Gertens as plants (not crowns) and planted in 2010 as 2-year-old plants.  6 of the original 8 remain.  I had planted 6 more aparagus crowns last year, but they never really did much.  I was nervous about any of them coming back this year since the rabbits mowed them to the ground last year - and I thought they didn't eat Asparagus!  Although, they took out my hot pepper plants too so maybe they just had very advanced palettes.

Also, here is my first lettuce bed - isn't it coming along nicely?  The bright row in the back are the radishes and the spindly ones in the front are the spinach.  The red versions are a bit harder to see, but hopefully in a week or so they'll be nice and big for all to see.

Temperatures are projected to be ranging from 40-low 60s for the next 10 days, which should be perfect for these cool season crops.

2nd Planting!

We had the first bloom of the season today!  Not something I have planted - a crocus maybe?  It makes me want to plant more...

A visit to Chicago this week has left me a bit jealous of their Zone 5-ness.  Everything seemed to be in bloom!  From the tulips and hyacinths to the lilacs along the highway.  It was a much welcomed site and one I hope will be here soon.  Many of my tulips now have large buds on them and I'm hoping a day or two of sunny weather will bring bounties of color to our yard.

We made some more progress today in the vegetable garden.  I took up a few rows of the remaining sod (still a bit to go) and made my second plantings of Spinach, Arugula, Beets, Green & Red Lettuce, and Radishes.  Still nothing coming up from my Carrots/Scallions/Kohlrabi/Pea planting, but those guys all take awhile to germinate.  My initial lettuce plantings are still continuing to grow (the radishes are quickly outpacing the others, as they should).  The rhubarb is coming along exceptionally well considering my tomatoes shaded them all of last year - but still nothing from the Asparagus.  Hopefully the bunnies didn't kill them permanently when they ate all of the foliage off last year (rascally rabbits!).

The Easter Holiday comes next weekend, so I don't anticipate much work in the garden (maybe late Sunday afternoon if the weather cooperates?), but I'd like to get another round of peas in the ground as well as the potatoes and onion sets.  Perhaps Thursday will do...

The Lettuce Are Coming! The Lettuce Are Coming!

Radishes - Day 5

Well, it's official - we have germination!  Where there was nothing to be seen yesterday we have little shoots, nicely in a row.  Some are speedier than others.  The D'Avignon radishes for example - there was absolutely nothing in that planting row yesterday and today they are taking the lead by far.  Some of them, like the beets, we are still waiting for signs of life, but we are expecting sun the next few days and I hope everything will take off!

Hopefully we can spend tomorrow afternoon in the garden.  My top priorities are:  Putting up the fence now that we have yummy lettuces growing, pulling up the rest of the sod, plotting out the beds and getting the other cold season crops into the ground.  We'll do a temperature reading tomorrow to see where the soil is at - but it hasn't gotten above 70 this week and we've had plenty of rain so I think they should still be just about right.

To update on the other seeds:

• Spinach - not much to be seen yet
• Arugula - Day 5 - A nice little row of seedlings, barely off the ground
• Green Romaine - Another nice little row, but kind of sparse
• Red Romaine - Nothing to speak of
• Green Butterhead - Nothing here either
• Red Grand Rapids - Nada
• Green Grand Rapids - Little seedlings coming through
• Radishes - doing great as we mentioned above
• Beets - nothing yet

In other parts of the yard, the bulbs keep doing well but still no blooms.  We do have solid leaves on the lilacs though!  Soon the whole south side of our yard will be green :-)  Happy gardening everyone!

Lilacs