well shucks...

I was going to get some gardening done today, but we seem to have some weather blowing in... the wind chimes are banging around at a level that's starting to get annoying. I may have to run outside and set them on the ground soon, just to get some peace and quiet... the jingly jangly is starting to work my nerves....

no pics this week. Just didn't see anything worth taking a pic of. Thursday was a very trying day, a total of three orders that were completely and unnecesarilly more difficult than was absolutely neccesary, including having to wait at the airport for a package that was sitting in plain sight the whole time. Grrrrr....

I now have a total of 4 bales of straw curing for the garden. I set them in a square in the back yard, the empty space in the middle I may use for further composting, just throwing leaves and plant trimmings in there as they happen... I couldn't resist checking and I have confirmed that the seed potatoes are starting to root in the tires. There will be two hills of them. I have another giant flower pot here, and I'm considering sitting it against the fence to grow some sweet potato vines. I had one sprout in the cabinet, and the vines look really great climbing up the fence, and they have quite nice purple flowers too. Growing them in that giant flower pot will make them easier to harvest, as the part of the fence I have room for them is sitting in a part of the yard where the origional contractors who built the house 20 years ago evidently dumped excess concrete and mortar, so about six inches under the soil level, there are chunks of rocks... I've been pulling them out for years now, but there doesn't seem to be any end to them. Doesn't make digging for sweet potatoes easy.

The cucumbers will be vined up a dead eucalyptis tree... Cukes bear heavier when they're climbing, so if you're only going to grow a couple of plants, you give them support. I'm putting an old tire over the trunk and setting it on the ground. You then attach old wire hangers which you've un-bent into circles along the trunk, to give the vine tendrils something small to grab onto. The tire will keep my compost in one area, where I need it so it doesn't get wasted. Plant about 4 seeds in there, and let the plants climb away... I've done this before, and got enough cukes to eat all summer, and enough to make pickles.

I'd find a place on the fence for the cukes to grow, but I can't as I'll be vining pole beans up that...

I thought about growing some cabbages. They are really beautiful when they're growing, looking a lot like giant green roses. But they're also relatively inexpensive at the store, so I probably won't bother. I can always change my mind later though. While we can plant cabbage now, we can also plant them in August here, for a fall crop to store for winter use.

Carrots are another veggie I may consider come August. The potato tires should be harvesting about that time, so I may use the tires for carrots after that... I've never been able to grow them in the ground here, as our soil tends to compact and prevent them from growing good, and the straw bales don't really work for root crops, as that straw is pretty tightly packed...even if they did grow good, it would be impossible to get them out.

Peas, either sweet peas or eating peas, have to be planted in the first week of Sept. here, and they'll bloom and produce right up into January. Sweet peas often survive all winter. Some of them may go along the fence where the green beans were, as they'll be gone by then, and so should the cukes, although I have harvested cukes right up to October. Of course, it's entirely possible that I'll be sick of cukes by then...

Sorry about all the rambling... And now I have to go, as the cats have started their usual "I am cute, I am lovable, I am adorable, now FEED ME BEFORE I HAVE TO GET UGLY" routine...