Planted Detroit Red Beets

This morning we made our weekly trip to Fillmore Market where we bought groceries that should last until next Friday.  Also, I deposited the rent check in State Bank of Southern Utah.  We also stopped at the Zion's bank where I made our monthly $1100 house payment.  We have to make twelve more payments and our house will be paid for.

I walked out to the garden.  The soil at the top of the carrot bed was frozen.  I looked at in the afternoon and the tiny carrot plants showing the cotyledons were okay.

The red beets growing in house five are looking good.  There is at least 90 percent germination.

Can't see the cabbage plants.  But they are doing well.  I am watering everyday.

I planted a tray of Detroit Red beets this afternoon.

Two days ago I put ten Crooked Neck seeds in a zip bag for a germination tests.  Some of the seeds are swelling.

The Green Arrow peas are coming up from the beginning of the row to the end.

The two hens begged me to let the leave the hen house.  They were outside most of the afternoon.


Comments and questions are welcome.

A Welcome to an Unxepcted Vistor

A great sabbath day.   Our dinner was almost ready when we got.  We cleaned up.

We went for a short walk around the front yard and part of the garden.  The Blue Lake pole bean started climbing several weeks ago.  Today the are forming beans.  They are a little hard to see.  I drew a black circle around some of them.

The potato plants are being eaten alive by earwigs.

Breana knocked on our door this afternoon.  What a pleasant surprise.  We haven't seen her since we attended her wedding several ears ago.  She was on her way home from St George and stopped in for a short visit.

 She is a beauty.  We love her so much.

I Pulled two large red beets a little larger than a baseball. I cut on into four pieces and wrapped them in foil. Baked them at 350 degrees for about 75 minutes. I had part of it for dinner. I gave the other one to our six hens. They have been eating on it all afternoon.


Comments and questions are welcome.

Tuesday Afternoon

There were a lot of deer on the road south of Scipio about 4:30 a.m.  As soon as we got home I checked out houses two and six.  The temperature in both were over 110 degrees.  I quickly opened the doors in house two and  opened the east door of house six and removed the fan cover.

Alisha Bills called me on the way home from Manti.  She wanted some help with the weeds in her yard.  There is a lot of tall grass on the north and west edge of her yard.  I hope to develop a plan to help her out.

I planted a row of beets along the south side of house six.  The tray has 105 cells.  Some of the cells had no plants in them.  I planted them along the edge of the drip tape.   we will see how they do.

The above picture show the beets, drip tape, dibble, and holes made with the dibble. the plants fit perfectly in the hole.

Above is the empty tray and part of a row of beets.

I used a tube tray as a template to make holes for the tray of onions.  I put the tray upside down and pushed the dibbler trough every other hole.

I pushed and pulled the onion plants out of each cell and stuck them in the hole.

It really worked well.  I later watered them.

I had eight purple plum tomato plants that I rooted several weeks ago.  I put them in a tray of water to irrigate them.

I pulled some beets our of house two and house six.  I cut off the leaves and stems. Then cut the beets into smaller pieces and boiled them for abut forty minutes.

Comments and questions are welcome.

Cold Foggy Day

We were up early and went to the Manti Utah temple.  It was cold and foggy.  Coming home in the early afternoon, it was still cold and foggy.

At the greenhouse, house two, I dug bup this beet that has been growing for many months.

 Close-up if the big beet.

I cut off the greens and fed some of them to the chickens.  I cleaned the beet.  It is setting on eight inch square block.  I took it to the house and may cut off some of the beet and boil it.

The cats use a space south of our back porch steps.  I strained out all of the poop, sticks. leaves.  It doesn't take long to stink.

It has been a couple of days since I took a picture of the garage/shop that is being built in our close neighborhood.

Comments and questions are welcome.

The Stirrup Hoe is Lost no More

I did the watering and other morning chores.  While watering I found the stirrup hoe.  It was in house two laying flat next two the 2x6 on the west end of the raised bed.  There is a plant which I water at least once a day and watered the middle of the handle at the same time.

I transplanted another tray of red beets.   I transplanted the first half of the beets from the other side of the raised bed.  I have a hard time kneeling.  I made six holes with the dibbler, then I removed some of the beet plugs from their tray, then put the plugs in the hole.  I moved to the other side and made thirty holes.  I removed all the plugs from the tray.  I could then quickly put a plug in each hole.  When finished I watered them.  I finished before it got too hot in house two.

I did a lot of pruning in house one.  Some of the vines numerous branches.  Many of them were over five feet long.  I picked some nice gladiator tomatoes.  We drove to Fillmore for some groceries.  We stopped at Cluff's for a take home lunch.  I gave them the tomatoes with the intent that they might order some.  They said thanks and we came home.

I pulled some of the older red beets.  I washed them and made a group of five beets.

I wrapped them in  plastic wrap and put them in the garage fridge.  I wonder if the will keep fresh for three days.

I harvested two more beets.  One is wrapped and the other is not wrapped.  They are pretty much the same size.  Both of these are in the fridge.  I will see how they look each day.  When we harvest we may not have to wrap them.  Especially if they go to market on the following day.

The wind is blowing in the right direction for cutting down some of the trees.  That is from the south west.  I don't want any falling across the neighbor's fence.   Two stumps are left in the above photo.

The picture above is of a few other trees.  One tree is leaning to the south.  I was afraid to cut it down. The chain come off the bare.  It took me some time to get it fixed and back to cutting.

This small Utah Juniper has been growing here for five or six years.  I caught in the sunlight.  It has about six inches of new growth.  It is under a plum tree and must have been planted by a bird.

A cucumber blossom with a small fly on the right petal.  There is a tiny ant between the two bottom petals.  It is a little bit of a dark spot at the cleavage.  I wondered how that tiny ant made it way up them stem two the flower.

We harvested more dill.

The grapes continue to dry.  Over half of them are dry.

I have been setting on a lawn chair to do weeding and attaching the trellis string to the bottom of the tomato plants.  The chair is a little to low too get up and too large to fit between the rows.  I began making a stool which will be about twenty inches high.   The photo show the four legs and one rail.  The other rails are made.  They are made with eight inch 2x4's.   The legs are made out of two twenty inch 2x4's ripped in half.   I expect it will take about an hour to finish it in the morning


Comments and questions are welcome.

Finally Beets are transplanted

 Red beets begin to germinate on the fifth day after planting.  It takes about four weeks to be ready for transplanting.  This is what I did this morning.  There is about seventy five transplants.  It will probably take another four weeks to harvest.

I worked a couple of hours in house six dropping the tomato plants.  There are three rows of tomato plants in house six.  I dropped one row.  I forgot to take a picture.  It felt a little cooler because of the fans pulling air through the house.  There is a pile of some of last year plants stacked here.   There is another pile west of the west end of house six.  I keep it wet and it is beginning to rot.   In  the above picture there was a nest of wasps.  I will catch the wasps in the morning while it is still cool.

I picked four buckets of cucumbers.  Some were pretty large may be too tough for eating.  I graded them and will take the best ones to the post office in the morning.  Most of the rest will be fed to our chickens.

 Here is a large cucumber.  The chickens have learned that if the peck there way into it they will find the good seeds.  They also eat most of the cucumber.

Here is one of the large hens.

Carol put this puzzle together.  I took her a couple of days.  It is actually nine puzzles in one.

I put out some honey in several locations to trap wasps.  I got one yesterday.  The above pictures is a bunch of ants.  They are about a millimeter in length.  They are hauling the honey away.

It took me most of the day to water the west lawns.  I put fertilizer on the lawn west of our driveway.

We went to Fillmore for groceries.  I stopped at Ropers and got me a pair of gloves and some straps.  The didn't have any.  I lost my gloves and have looked for them a couple of weeks.  On the way home if found them in the car under my feet. If you loose something you can find it as soon as you bug another one.

Comments and questions are welcome.