We had air quality alerts yesterday morn - seems the Canadian fires have taken off again this year and we will benefit from smokey haze all summer long. Has Canada not done any preventative cutting of their timber? I've noticed a huge push to do so in my region including my ILS. State land is being cut back, private land being cut back and cleared. It makes me wonder if they fear what's been going on North of us and trying to be preventative. All I know is the haze is lousy but gives fantastic color sunrise/sunsets. So trying to find some positives there. My dahlias hated it last year I think it stressed them.
Speaking of dahlias, I think the first ones into the bed may be the seedlings. My goodness are they all over the place. They tend to be laissez faire about their growth habit. I wonder if that's because they are thinking about growing a tuber and in the early stages they sprawl. At least that's been my experience the last 3 years (or maybe it's 2 years?!). I take notes as I look. I have some that have some fine growth habits right now. Interested to see where they all go and if these fine ones become thick stalks. Will see. I'm also wondering on colors. That always intrigues me. I watch the buds and hope to see peeks of colors before they open. I'm hoping for all sorts of colors. Last year I had a nice variety. I'm hoping this year is the same.
As my plant out schedule shifts depending on what my body dictates. I hate how it's feeling. Slows me down. My brain goes a mile a minute as my body moves like a sloth. Today I hope to finish my planters, and get the iris weeded by where the dahlias will go. The rest of the dahlia bed has been looking good.
Need to deal w the buckets of rabbit poo to add to the garden. And the compost heap move since that's the finished stuff - I need to deliver it and get it in place and feeding/protecting my south bed that's terrible soil. I hope for the energy and behaving body to get my projects done.
So looking for some good in my day and some happy with the future plants.
Mornin friends! I had the northern lights last night. More visible w my camera and it was beautiful through that lens! I'm sharing a few with you from my ILS drive as they live in the country and don't have the light noise as we do from the few of areas in town.
Today the sun is nosing its nose out. I will head out after bit and get my table set up and my planters out to work on. I still need to fix the rust issues on my trough clamps and give them a spray to freshen them up before use.
And then into next week will be the dahlias! I hope! Maybe if the bod behaves I'll start to place my end posts for spacing. And then loosely string twine so I have a plant out line to go by. Ready to get the show going!
Enjoy the lights!
Awaiting this dopey possible last frost at 7am. What a kooky time to do a temp drop at 7!
Then once the kids head to school I'll get myself together and head out. Today I think I'll work the garden and plant, then if I can still move I'll work on getting the planters out and cleaned and ready for tomorrow. And next week I think will focus on the in ground stuff!
The dahlia layout is done. I have all the seedlings marked on it and will plant in sibling order. Look forward to what might emerge even though some of the seed parents weren't what I had hoped you never know what will come forward!
Looking forward to my flowers and garden. Speaking of I should quickly figure out what will go where in the garden. I lost one tomato plant it looks like. Grrr.
Will also have to drop buckets off with the nephew for more rabbit poo. I did notice the rabbits aren't hanging in my garden boxes and I was speaking to someone and they said sometimes rabbit poo from others deters wild rabbit visitors. Fine by me! And maybe it will protect things from getting eaten down to the quick. Who needs it?! Darn rabbits.
I'm looking into next week for the dahlias. If the body behaves and doesn't decide to yell at me, my plan would be to do a few rows each day. In the past I've done them all and then couldn't move the next day. Not the wisest!
Hopefully everyone else's gardens are looking good and all is well. Suppose to be 82° or so on Mother's Day, maybe if I get all the dahlias to the front porch they'll all take off in height!
Making eggs in purgatory. Never had them before, but hoping that extra protein powers me through until lunch. I'm back and forth on whether nightshades are my issue with inflammation. DONT TOUCH MY TOMATOES! They are always summer to me year round packed in the flavor. I'll toast up some up bread and have that with it.
Happy day all! Stay safe if you are in the path of spring storms.
Do I need a frost warning? Do I really need early morning temps to dip to 32°? Ok atmosphere, get this hinky temp thing out of your air, BTDT a while back, it's time to move on from ice crystals.
I covered the tuber plants with sheets and they are on the porch. Hopefully they and the annuals will be just fine. I brought the tomatoes and dahlia seedlings into the house. So no worries about those overnight. I hope.
I need to trash two of my plants and bleach out their containers. I had been thinking they had mosaic virus and I had it confirmed w the dahlia peeps that they did look sketchy. So no huge loss, I'll give them a toss and try to keep the rest of my stock healthy as I can. Who knows if that will be, but I'll try.
I got the dahlia bed roughed up again, in fact I sank in part of it. I amended the soil over the winter with rabbit poo, bedding, leaves and grass clippings. I'm hoping it makes fantastic soil. And even more fantastic blooms.
Now I struggle with what I plan to fertilize with at planting. Since I added all the compost I don't know if that will tilt me anyway in particular. Nitrogen and potassium are my soil recs from two years ago. I've added potash at close out and let it work in over the winter. A friendly agronomist told me that can be best for working into my soil. So I keep trying and will probably do a soil sample this fall again and see how I am sitting. Hopefully for some sort of improvement is my goal. But still stuck on how to fertilize properly. I mean what do you think rabbit poo does? I don't think it'd be super high in any one thing, but I have no clue.
Totally ready to get it all going! I'm ready for blooms and totally not welcoming to hopefully what will be our last frost!
It would totally be nice if the weather actually got rid of these near freeze temps. Thursday night the low is to be 34°. Do I want to bring in all the flats and plants? No. I can keep them on the porch and covered and toasty I guess but who knows. I'm back and forth. The good news is the hut shelf is now empty so I can put the flats on that and roll it the laundry room and I should be able to get 12 flats on it if I went the narrow way if it indeed is 36" wide but I don't think it is. So maybe 8 flats. Will see what I do but that might be wiser I don't know. It's such a pain in the rump.
Speaking of, this whole aging thing stinks! I not only realize it with my mom and what she's going through but with my own self and to say in 40 years I can be doing the same thing. Ugh. I'd rather go to sleep one night before it all goes to hell and not wake up.
Anywho, that's where my mind is stuck right now. Aging! And caregiving from a distance. That type of crazy.
Making dinner and then once that's done have to help kid1 make a treat for school tomorrow. Then need to find the gumption to do the low hanging household fruit - dishes, laundry, cleaning etc. yuck.
Tomorrow it's to rain most of the day. Therefore, I think I'll plan to sew. I'll get that other dress done for Mother's Day (brunch) and then get my mom's quilt top done and maybe dropped off. That would be great!
Friday I'd love to start planting! I plan to do baskets first. But I also need to get the brackets in shape to hang so maybe Friday will be doing the planter cleaning: rust removal and repaint. Aaack. Always something from here that I forget I need to get done.
Seedlings still look good. Didn't notice that one of last years that didn't bloom is a dark leaf variety. However I'm wondering if it's my missing David Howard because the one I have labeled D Howard is not a dark leaf. Hahahaha. Wouldn't be the first time I mislabeled. But I didn't think I had the David Howard's by the seedlings at all at harvest - two opposite ends of the garden. Who knows anymore. With bloom I'll hope to have my answer.
But back to the original thought: I think I'll plan to just cover the darn plants w flannel sheets and hope for the best. Dang weather! The freeze can get the hell out!
