Weeds & Cole Cropa

As soon as it was light I walked out the garden to see if I had caught any earwigs.  I set out a water trap and a vegetable trap.  Most of the water was gone.  I think that some cat had drank the water.  There was no oil.  And there were no earwigs either.  When it gets light the earwigs hide.

A lot of Morning Glory or sometimes called bind weed growing under the hoop tunnel.  I decided to cover them with weed barrier fabric.  I pressed one edge into the damp soil to hold it in place.  The brick were there to keep the wind from blowing it.

 This photo shows it completed.  The piece was not wide enough to reach all the way across.  That didn't matter.  Morning Glory was not growing on the south side.  The right side in this picture.  I pressed the edge on the right side into the wet soil.  I used spikes and washers to hold the left down.

I dug a small trench under the edge on the east end.   I drove the spikes through the barrier to hold the edge below grade.

Then I covered up the edge with soil.    There is no photo of the west end.  The west end of the barrier was a little short.  I put a patch on it.  I drove spikes around all the edges to hold it down.

I took a picture of the earwig damage suffered by the plant.  I put it on Face Book hoping to get some solutions.

Warm weather brings humming birds.  We put up the humming bird feeder.

The Topaz Melons are beginning germinate.  I circled one of them.  The seeds are nearly ten years old.

I planted twenty-two cole crops in a raised bed.

I dug up a lot of weeds.  I getting this spot ready direct seeded sweet corn.
Several people stopped by during the day to get pots and trays.

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Asphalt

The Swan man came by yesterday afternoon and left bag full of food that I had ordered last week.  I took the bag and filled it with one of the large nursery pots and filled it with the aluminum cat food containers.  I took them out to the shed.

I dug up six strawberry plants and planted them west of the bale of straw.   I dug the holes and put compost in the bottom of the hole.  I the placed the plants into the hole.  I did it six times.  I watered them.

Here are a few more.

I was working in the garden when a pick-up stopped on the street in front of our house.   He wanted to put new sealant  on our driveway.  I talked to Carol.  He said that it would cost me $350.  We haven't sealed the driveway for a long time.   I told him okay.  I would pay for it.

His son was helping him.  He started next to the concrete and worked his way back to the street.

There was two to three inch strip between the asphalt and drive concrete.  He had a bag of asphalt the he filled the crack.  It didn't take much.

The finished job looks pretty good.

The rest off the afternoon I dug, hoed, and pulled the

Eight Tomato Plants

I saw some strawberry plants yesterday.

It doesn't look to healthy.   I got this photo this morning.  am going to move it.  I don't know where.  There are a few more around.

I wanted to water my grape plants.  I removed the broken pipe and looked all over and finally found the right fitting.   I cut the one in half and inserted a tee.  Now there are two faucets where I can run two hose at the same time, or water two rows with out dragging the hose from one row to the other row.

I moved this bale of straw next to the raised bed of strawberry plants.

I got some Blue Lake bush beans to plant in the bale of straw.  I drilled four holes in the straw to  plant the beans. four seeds in each hole.  I drilled some more holes and soaked the bale with water.

One of the buried pipes has been leaking for years.  I dug down to find the leak.  I thought I would have to replace the compression coupler.  I cleaned away the mud and removed the leaking water.  I tightened the compression nut.  I did it several times.  It stopped the leak.  I filled the hole with soil.

I planted eight of these large tomato plants.

The basket is put over the tomato plant.  It looks pretty weird because the shadow of wire on the ground gives the appearance of more wire than there really is.

 

The tomato plants have been the greenhouse all of their lives and needed to be hardened.  Buy using two tree baskets and a piece of weed barrier, I can shield them from the harsh sun.  The second basket holds the weed barrier in place.

I have a lot of burlap.  It makes more sense to use the burlap.  A little light makes it way trough the burlap.

This shows all eight covers.  The one at the far left is hiding.

This doesn't show all of them.

There has been a slight leak in the irrigation pipe for years.  It is just one of those jobs I will take care of later on.  Today is the day.  I dug down to where the water was leaking from the pipe.  There was a compression coupler connect the pipe together.  I think that it was leaking years ago and I cut out the broken piece and put in the coupler.  I was able to turn it with a pipe wrench.  It still leaked some but not as much.  I tightened it some more.  About the third time that I tightened it, it stopped leaking water.

I dug up all of these weeds.   I hope to plant all summer squash plants in this row.

By the back porch is growing this shrup.  It looks like a snowball bush  But it isn't.

The Red Bud is really pretty.

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Cucumbers

Carol told Ann Stephenson to help herself to some rhubarb that is growing in our garden.  I wanted to pick it myself.  After breakfast I picked a nice batch.

Some are quite thin and the others of much larger.  Some of them have a nice red color.  I took them and a nice batch of asparagus.

I loaded the bail of straw that I got the other day on to the cart and wheeled it out to the compost pile.

I may move it and plant some Blue Lake Bush beans.  I can make a row on the outside of the bailing wire and put four plants on each side.

I planted four kinds of cucumbers.  Four six packs of Burpless cucumbers.  Four six packs of Orient Express.  Two six packs of Sweet Success cucumbers and two six packs of pickling  cucumbers.

 I put three seed in each cell.  The exceptions were two seeds when there were not enough seeds.

 I covered with potting soil and watered them down.

The sweet corn we planted had never been fertilize.  I put a heaping teaspoonful of Ammonia Nitrate between each plant.  I did both rows and then turned the water down to them.  Fertilizer dissolved and went into the root system.

I set up a trellis for the Green Arrow peas.  I pounded conduit in the ground at a slight angle.  I then put up the two foot welded wire and use tie wire to hold them to the conduit.   The peas should grow through the wire and the tendrils will connect to the wire.

Carol asked me to clean the pine needles and dig out the weeds under our Austrian pine tree.  She said that it was several days ago.  She told me something this morning which I thought was clean un the pine tree.

 Well I did it this morning.

This creeping barberry has many yellow blossoms, I couldn't resist taking a photo.

I planted gladiator seeds ten days ago.  They have been setting on a waterproof heating pad and are now beginning to germinate.  Three of the twenty-five seeds have poked up their tinny heads.

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More Potatoes, New Seed Planting

I watched the Saturday morning wood working TV shows.  As soon as they were over I went to work preparing a row for more potatoes.

There are two rows of corn which we planted and watered yesterday.  To the left of them is the potato row.  I cut out all of the weeds.   I had cut the potatoes into planting size pieces a couple of days ago.

Tilled up and back two times.  And with a rake I pulled the soil out of it from both sides.  Carol helped me plant potatoes.   I made a small hole with the shovel and put the soil to the side.  Carol put a potato.  I made a new hole and covered the potato with the soil.  This continued until we finished the row.  We had a few potatoes left over.  I put them on the end of the onion row.  I went back and put a little more soil each potato.  Lastly, I stepped on each potato which compressed the soil on top of the potato.

I planted some potato in a round barrel type thing.  One of the potatoes is coming up.

The tractor has been stuck on the upper pad.  We couldn't drive it out.  The front wheels would spin and dug them deeper into the ground.  I got the truck and was driving it close to the tractor so we could pull it out.  Jim suggested that Jessen could use his four wheel drive truck.  I took our truck back.  Adam got Jessen's truck and pulled it out.

The front right tire was leaning tight to the edge of the tractor.  It was so tight that the wheel couldn't turn.

The guys have been harvesting the hemp all day.

After lunch, I sprayed the weeds in the orchard, on snail hill, and more west of the drive way.  I prepared to loads.  I used one pint of Round-up per load.

I did three loads.   I filled each back-pack tank with a solution and put the tank on the bench.  It made it easier to put in on my back.

 I planted one tray with Hale's Best cantaloupe, Topaz melon, crookneck squash, and Crimson Sweet watermelon.

The was some bailed straw posted on Face Book for free.  It was delivered and left on our driveway.  It was soaking wet and very heavy.  Some of the grain seeds were growing.

Just before supper I picked asparagus.  There was more than I thought.  I took it to the Masner's

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