Rain!

It rained, it rained, it rained!

 Do I sound excited? It will be so nice not to have to spend Saturday moving sprinklers around in the morning and evening. The yard is happy, the dogs not so much. While they will run into the rain to answer a barking dog next door, a heavy dew can be enough to make them reluctant to wet their dainty little feet. It rained on Aggie and I on our walk this morning and he was glad to get home. I didn't really care. Wet is good at this point. Cassie stayed home as she is recovering from yesterday's surgery - she was spayed. Seems to be doing well, but needs to stay quiet for a few days.

The weather is projected to be very nice this weekend, low humidity and low nineties, with morning maybe down to the upper sixties! Since I don't have to water Saturday I can get some of the materials that have accumulated in my driveway to their proper places in the yard. I am recycling some concrete edging a neighbor was disposing of to define the pathways on my front beds, and still have about a quarter yard of compost under a tarp that can be moved to places it can do some good. Also some wood pallets to make another compost bin. I have been waiting for a break in the weather (and some improvement in my foot - plantar fasciitis) and it is here. The weather anyway; the foot I will manage.

OK, still too hot.

I am concentrating on keeping things alive, watering mainly. I have cleaned some old stuff out of the veggie garden, and although I have some okra coming up, and yardlong beans and a few sweet potato slips I planted form the ones in my pantry, I am not really willing to plant more seeds in this heat - I don't know if I can keep them alive. May be best to wait a bit and concentrate on winter greens and such.  I am pruning back the tomato plants to see if I can coax them to start up again for the fall.

The little waterlily nurseries are shallow enough to need topping off almost daily. (Those are dishes with clay mud in the bottom and a few inches of water above. Great way to start baby waterlilies.)

The bog plants are huge, of course - fish water 24/7 and lots of heat. Lovely white butterfly ginger, so fragrant!  I am giving away some more pond plants Sunday. That should finally empty the little kiddie pool. I will then clean it out, put a few inches of play sand and water to cover it an inch or so. New puppy play toy for hot weather! Some of my trusty mosquito bits will keep it wiggler-free.

I have projects piling up, but can't take the heat. Even the mornings are humid enough to feel oppressive. OK, I am a wimp. After I get back from the morning dog walk I really don't want to go back out there. The dogs get precedence, coolest part of the day (and pavement!) for their walk. Aggie has bounced back very quickly from his surgery (hard to believe he has gotten old enough to be neutered!) and is full of energy and high spirits. Cassie has her appointment in a couple of weeks. Meanwhile we have our walk then hunker down and try to stay cool.


I am very pleased that one of the thunderstorms that popped up last night hit me with almost 1/2 of rain - that makes such a difference. Wishing rain to everyone that needs it - and a little more for me! Ciao now.

Hot so hot so hot

I have two thermometers on the back porch, both in the shade. The one on the wall of the house reads a couple of degrees hotter than the one hanging from the lattice behind the potting bench. That one gets more air movement, but both are always in the shade. The 'cooler' one is solidly on 100 degrees. And it is humid.

Then there is the metal dragonfly thermometer hanging from the back fence where it is in the full afternoon sun. Almost at 120 degrees.

It is still June.

*sigh*

Painted Ladies. Isn't it a pretty name?

I planted these and Scarlet Runner, and Scarlet Emperor to climb the bean poles in my vegetable garden. I had heard that they produce beans as well as the pretty flowers, but so far just the flowers. They are so pretty that I don't mind. I have some bush Roma beans that I am enjoying, usually eaten fresh off the vine as I stand there and the puppies nose around. Cassie likes bites of green bean; Aggie has no interest.

I let a couple of my Ichiban eggplant get past me in the heat and they started shriveling. Bummer. But more are on the way, and the green goddess eggplant has 3 or 4 I need to pick. And more cucumbers, always more cucumbers - good thing I like them! Tomatoes are continuing to ripen. I don't expect more to set until fall, but lots of green ones are still coming along.

It is my watering day - back to moving sprinklers!

Water so that it will rain...

I watered well yesterday, so today I had a pretty good rain. No complaints - I was going to mow, but I can do that tomorrow.
The squash are about dead and gone, vine borers. I got some good crops off of them, but should be able to get more without those dreadful pests. I tried burying the vines to promote root growth, but I don't think it is working.
Aggie surprised me this morning. I had been at the back side of the pond filling some plant tubs, and was back by the front. Suddenly he came barreling across the stepping stones in front of the bog! He is the adventurous one. I am glad we are having lessons with the escape ramp. They will be splashing in the bog before I know it!

The puppies are helping in the garden...

I am so tired of the humidity. OK, I am looking forward to a few days of good rain, as forecast ;) and I do not forget last summer's extreme drought, but it should be comfortable to go out at 7am to the garden, not drippy. *sigh*

However, last week's rain has produced a lovely thick flush of rain lilies, and the vegetable garden is happy. I have lots of flowers, lilies, cannas, skullcap, daylilies, and more. Not to forget all of the scarlet runner and painted lady beans. In theory those produce green beans, but mine are just flowering. I have some asparagus beans planted in with them, though, and am getting beans on those and on the bush romanos in he cinder block bed. The tromboncino has a large squash hanging from the trellis, and I am trying to extend the life of my squash by burying the stems in mounds of dirt, to form new roots. A few of the vine borers finally got through.

With the impending rain I got out there and dug the potato bed. With one exception all the vines were essentially killed a couple of weeks ago by an overnight defoliation of hornworms. Hey! I think I just came up with a new term of venery: a defoliation of hornworms!

Anyway, it was fun digging them out - I kept going over the beds and finding more. I am sure I missed some. There were 4 with pitchfork wounds which I will cook today. None are large. A few had rotted - the reason I wanted to dig them before the projected rains. I had planted the aged sprouted remnants of a bag of russets, too soft to eat, so anything is a bonus, and the new potatoes taste so good, a different texture, yummy.

What really made it fun was deciding to let the puppies help. Probably a bad idea in the long run, as I have been trying to keep them out of the garden, but I removed the little (pitifully inadequate) wire fences first, and did keep removing them from the remaining fenced areas. They can walk through those little fences, so they are meant more as a deterrent/learning tool than a real block. I had to be very slow and careful with the fork, sometimes lifting them with the pile of dirt! They had a blast. Dig dig dig - they are doxies, after all - getting gloriously dirty.

Now that the bed is well dug, I will add in a little fertilizer and plant okra. I have been eating mostly out of the garden for a while, squash, green beans (usually eaten right there as I pick them) some tomatoes - lots of green ones coming along - as well as cucumbers and eggplant. And a few late snow peas. Between the yard work since I was laid off in February, and especially since I got the puppies, I have lost 15 pounds by eating better (lots of veggies and fruits), more outdoor time/exercise, and being too busy with puppies to remember to eat. It is 11:30am and I am just now finishing my morning oatmeal. It is a drop in the bucket to what I need to lose, but every drop counts.

Crinum is blooming, Asiatic lilies, guara, cannas are glorious in bog, daylilies and rain lilies, black and blue sage, some others…

Yesterday I ate from the garden: tomatoes (cherry), squash, green beans, potatoes, green garlic, squash blossoms (omelet) and picked a young cucumber but haven’t eaten it yet. Tromboncino that I shifted to a bigger trellis has a huge blossom open. Hope the work picking vine borer eggs and killing the moth I found pay off. No apparent frass deposits yet on the various squash.

Grass needs mowing. Even without actual rain the incredible humidity has kept things growing green. I have ordered these cool watering bags, 8’ x 9” with drip emitters you can place on them and stakes to secure the ends. I can set these up and fill them with my rainwater, and a little seaweed for a continuous drip. Looking forward to trying them out.

Sadly, the cardinal nest which I found in my crepe myrtle and took a quick (and too dark) picture of was robbed last night. Name your culprit – raccoons, possums and feral cats all roam (and defecate in, grrr) my yard and garden. I discovered it when my puppy started eating something on the ground nearby and I pulled it out of his mouth to discover a baby bird leg. The nest was only 6 feet off the ground, so vulnerable, I suppose. But I loved seeing the cardinals flying in and out of it.

Wow, over a year since that last post promising pictures and things. I have most of the front yard in beds, almost all of which made it through the summer drought and the winter deep freeze (with a little help). I do need to work on sizing pictures. Including some of the new puppies who are now 'helping' in the yard! They love the pathways around the veggie garden, and my cinder block bin of decomposed granite, slowly going to paths, is now the dig den. The liriope bed is puppy jungle.

I will try to get some pictures up soon. Really.