Spent a little time outside today and saw lots of deer foot prints. They've been prowling around my garlic though it doesn't appear that they have sampled any. They usually don't, but they must be getting hungry as it's been rather dry and nothing is growing.

Snow advisory overnight here.

Maybe an inch down here tomorrow Cindy, a Gorgeous day here as it hit 70F and we had a hint of spring. Almost wrapped up the fruit tree pruning, glad I planted a new peach tree 3 years ago as my original 17 YO tree is on it's last root. Other than squirrels the other critters are sparse around here, so far.

Cindy - Aldi did have one box of frozen chicken wings out so selfish me bought two 4 lb. bags. I'm going to do one bag on the grill buffalo style and the other bag will be baked with 2 different savory seasoning recipes.

Looks like you are getting snow right now (~7:00 cst) but it hasn't gotten to vgkg yet. We have sunny and windy 35F here today.

Hey Jack and vgkg- Yes, we did get snow but not very much and it's already melted on the driveway and sidewalk. Temp is right at freezing.

Going to be making this recipe for super bowl fare this evening: https://www.goodhousekeeping.com/food-recipes/a36323456/shrimp-zucchini-and-corn-enchiladas-recipe/

Looking forward to this dish.

It started snowing here again.

Cindy those enchiladas sound really good but I wasn't able to look at the pics and recipe because the GHK site threw up a blocking page and wanted me to sign in to view it.

I decided to make baked Cajun BBQ wings with all of the second bag. Can't fit 8 pounds on the Weber and these I can make in the oven at the same time.

Cajun BBQ wings

That's odd Jack. It opens right up for me. Here you go:

Ingredients

1 15-oz jar mild green salsa

2 c. fresh cilantro (including stems)

1/4 c. sour cream

1 tbsp. olive oil

2 small zucchini (about 8 oz), cut into 1/4-inch pieces

1 lb. peeled and deveined shrimp, cut into 1/2-inch pieces

1 tsp. ground coriander

1/2 tsp. chili powder

Kosher salt

2 cloves garlic, finely chopped

1 c. fresh corn kernels (or frozen corn kernels, thawed)

1/4 c. grated cotija cheese

8 small yellow corn tortillas

2 oz. Monterey Jack cheese, coarsely grated

Chopped red onion and cilantro, sliced radishes and jalapeño, for serving

Directions

1. Heat oven to 450°F. In a food processor, puree salsa and cilantro until smooth. Add sour cream and pulse to combine. Spread 1 cup mixture in 7- by 11-inch baking dish. Transfer remaining mixture to medium bowl.
2. Heat oil in large skillet on medium-high. Add zucchini and cook 2 minutes. Add shrimp, then season with coriander, chili powder and 1/2 teaspoon salt and cook, tossing, 1 minute. Add garlic and cook, tossing, 1 minute. Remove from heat and toss with corn and cotija (shrimp shouldn’t be fully cooked).
3. Wrap tortillas in double layer of damp paper towels; microwave on High until soft, about 1 minute (be careful of steam when removing). Working with 1 tortilla at a time, dip in reserved salsa mixture, shaking off any excess. Place on cutting board, top with heaping 1/4 cup filling, roll up and place, seam side down, in baking dish. Repeat with remaining tortillas and filling.
4. Spoon any remaining salsa mixture on top. Sprinkle with Monterey Jack and bake until cheese begins to brown, 8 to 10 minutes. Serve topped with onion, cilantro, radishes and jalapeño.

Maybe you are a GHK member, IDK.

I'm one of those that doesn't care for Cilantro which seems to be a large part of the sauce recipe. Maybe I would just quadruple the garlic :-)

We do not care for cilantro either. I was just going to leave it out. Maybe use pesto?

Not a member of GHK either. Not sure that the deal is.

Nyuk, the snow here was just for looks, 0 accumulation, just enough wetness to freeze up the windshield wipers overnight. We're having my homemade chili for the big game. I think the Bengals will be dining on Gyro's during the game ;-)

Here's our snow for today. About half of it has already melted.

The high temp here today was 33.

Cindy that recipe sounds delicious...maybe we can do that once we finish all of the left overs in the refrigerator! I'm starting to harden off beets, onions, lettuce and spinach to go out under cover next weekend. About 25% of my tomato seeds sprouted already in 5 days.

I'll be eating a little crow today, but it was a good game. Temps in the 30's today so not much to do outside, but at least it's a very sunny day. Happy Valentine's Day!

Len - It was delicious! Really good. I ended up omitting the cilantro and didn't have any pesto on hand so did without that too. Also added more Monterey Jack cheese.

Getting dahlia cuttings underway...have 5 so far and lots of sprouts.  Hope they root for me now.

Nice day today hazy sun and 59°. I mulched one asparagus bed with leaf mulch. The ground was frozen and there was a 1 1/2" frozen cap over the compost piles. But at the bottom edges I got enough to get the job done. And got a good workout.

Good grief, John. It's only 49 here! Not fair.

Cindy - The warm spell is probably coning towards you now. If that;s the case it'll go thru in the middle of the night. I'm guessing on that, but that's what the experts do. However as I said the ground is still frozen and the vacant lot next door still has a huge patch of snow cover.

It was 65 here yesterday afternoon but very windy. Now it is 29, very windy and raining. Soon it will be windy and sleeting followed by windy and snowing. 5-8" expected so we will get either 2" or 2'. Then it will be 6F overnight. Sunday it will be near 60.

I need to get a couple beds prepped for onions and broccoli and clear out my gus beds but it doesn't appear that will happen any time soon.

It's already changed over to snow here. It only sleeted for 15 minutes but it came down hard so there will be a nice slippery glaze under the snow. Glad I don't need to go anywhere until Saturday!

It's 56 here now and was down to 36 overnight. Your cold air doesn't look like it will make it here, Jack. It will be below freezing at night but the daytime temps will be in the 40s and 50s after today. Today might be 66 degrees but very windy.

I have 42 seedlings visible!

The noon news on 2 today, they spent a good bit of time explaining why we'd see flooding today into tomorrow. Well I remembered the frozen ground yesterday which he never brought up. I waited till later in the afternoon and went out with a digging fork. The ground was frozen about 1/2" to an inch down. So how would the ground absorb the melting snow and rain water. No wonder they get the guesses wrong. No input from the field.

Happy Friday for those of you who still care what day it is!

The scenery out my window is quite beautiful this morning with the sun shinning off the 8" blanket of pristine snow. With the near full moon and clear skies I could see at least 200 yards out into the corn field before sunrise.

The deer seem to be enjoying the snow. There were 8 or 10 of them including at least 3 antlered bucks that roamed by around 7 am. The bucks were still acting like the rut was on and chasing the does around. They should be dropping their antlers any day now but I've seen antlered bucks a few times well into March.

Happy Friday to you Jack and all of our mates. Hopefully we are waking from our winter sleep!

Tomato starts are up under lights, except the few that refused to germinate (Including Tonopah, which just defies me) I have some of those on paper towels in a plastic bag to see if they will sprout there and then go into promix.

Speaking of promix there does not seem to be any to be had except at horrible prices I won't pay. When my bag runs out I guess I will go back to using coir and vermiculite. There are some Sunshine mixes that would probably work but not available here in northwest at retail level and can't use a pallet. :)

Thanks Len!

I still have at least 3/4 bale of Promix left from last year which will be plenty for what I intend to start this year. I took half of my grow light fixtures down to the lake to hang in the garage for lighting so I will only be able to grow starts for myself and one friend this year. I have yet to tell my neighbors that they are on their own this year but I need to do that. I will offer them seeds of some varieties that they like if I have plenty.

I didn't check at my favorite local gardening store a couple weeks ago if they had their usual stock of Promix this year. I'll be going there in a couple weeks to pick up DD onion bunches and maybe some seed potatoes and I'll check then.

Planted out multi-sown onions and beets when the sun came out today. Will keep them under cover for the next few weeks but nights have stayed around 40 so they should be fine unless things change.

My local Southern States (feed & seed store) finally got in the Ambrosia corn seed. It only came in 1-lb packages at $20/lb so it ain't cheap. That should last me 3 years or so. The fall planted spinach is looking good and trying to wake up from dormancy but these nite time low 20's/teens are keeping them in check. I'll plant some more fresh spinach seed when I plant my peas in early March.

I'll be cleaning up the fall planted spinach soon (weeding, thinning, ferting, & mulching w/compost) and should be picking it in about 3 weeks or so if the temps moderate a bit. Finally finished pruning all the fruit trees, there were many tent caterpillar egg sacks scattered all over the apple tree stems, easy to rub off by hand, look like penny sized black styrofoam wrapped around the twigs....

eta, not my pic

Next step will be applying the Dormant Oil spray.

Anyone here ever use a cordless electric cultivator, such as the Black and Decker 20V MAX Lithium Garden Cultivator?

mallory - I have a corded electric tiller and I love it. Turns out that I've had it for nine years already. Surprised me that it's been that long. https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B004H4X6Z6/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&psc=1

Cindy that is a much more powerful tool than the battery device. I don't till so not an authority! My tiller is a stirrup hoe:)

How about today's date: 2-22-22

Cool.

Mallory's link is for a cultivator not a tiller. Designed more for just breaking up the top inch or 2 of soil rather than tilling deeper. Today's lithium battery powered tools are pretty powerful. That being said, I've never been a fan of Black and Decker power tools.

I have a 4 stroke Mantis that is perfect for my all raised bed garden. I can till a 4'x10' raised bed in just a few minutes.

My DH heard spring peepers last night for the first time this spring. Last spring it was March 3rd that we heard them for the first time so they are ten days earlier this year.

I had to turn water off to greenhouse last night and drain...drat. It was freezing and snowed a bit last night and they say 20 degrees tonight. I forgot it was February!

Cindy - the peepers may have been out here yesterday but I didn't notice. It was near 70 here. If they did come out for some fresh air they quickly went back in their holes as we are back to cold with a low of 8F tonight.

Your cold will be here later tonight, Jack. It's 69 right now and will be 33 overnight and then 36 for a high tomorrow. Burrrrr.

Did any of you see Kevin's video from this past 4th of July?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lSZFgwVyn_A

Thanks for posting that video Cindy, glad they seen happy with their farm life.

Cindy - Watched that video and another that came up: Kevin's farm. Can't tell what the date is.

Wow Cindy now that's a "Garden"! Does Kevin deal with a local Farmers Market?

A nice day here after 1/2" of rain overnite. I decided to clean up the rows of fall planted spinach now since the weeds are easy to pull and long range temps appear to be avoiding the teens. My brother brought me a few buckets of "mushroom compost" that one of my nieces swears by so I'm experimenting with some of it on the spinach below. 2 wide rows with 2 narrow rows within each.

The wide row on the left was composted with my stuff about 6 weeks ago while the wide row on the right was not. The left wide row got chewed on by something (slugs?) so I just reseeded the empty spots. The wide row on the right was mulched with the mushroom compost (only the lower/dark half). We'll see how each half progresses...

I believe this was my low this morning…cold all day but made it up to 20 or so.

I got my pepper seeds started in a salvaged rotisserie chicken tray with matching lid. For the first time I'm starting them on a heat mat which came from eBay; $32.

I just finished starting my broccoli. 12 Emerald Crown from Johnny's. Today is the first day of a warming trend. Only 53 today but the rest of the week will be mid 60s to low 70s with lows above freezing. Then it goes back to hades with highs in the 40s and lows in the 20s for the following week with a couple chances of ice and/or snow.

Here is a little while I am going to fertilize my garlic with dissolved urea water.

My first round of tomato seedlings are tucked into their new homes. The strongest of these will go into hoop house in 4-6 weeks and I will rehome the rest. I'll start another batch in a couple weeks to plant outside.

Our recent hard freeze appears to have done in my beets, so sowing another tray today. I'm afraid if the ones in the garden do survive they will think it is their second year and just go to seed. Patience, Grasshopper....

All this talk of seed starting is making me second guess my upcoming trip. It's always so hard to plan a vacation at any time during the gardening year, which I failed to remember begins in February.

It's looking like I will be buying way more plants this year than I have ever before. Or...do you think I could start some seeds (broccoli, peppers, tomatoes are the biggies) the day before we leave, make sure they're saturated, add a dome/cover, and cross my fingers? We'll be gone 8 days.

Margi, 8 days is not that long. Tomatoes will come up but not until about day 4, peppers will be lucky to sprout in 8 days. They will be happy you are not hovering over them:) I just put my pepper seeds in plastic bags wrapped in paper towels and don't expect any of them to be ready to sow for about a week. Do you use a heat mat?

Margi - I start my peppers in mid March but I don't top them like some do. If I did top them I would start a month earlier. This year I won't start my tomatoes until the last weekend in March. I don't want them to get over 6" tall and they seem to really take off after about 5 weeks.

Broccoli should be started now and will want to be potted up in a couple weeks. Can you take them with you?

Len and Jack - Thanks for the tips. Maybe I won't give up on starting some after all. Trip is now 3 weeks away.

Jack - Hmmm...I'm pretty sure my hubby would disown me is I attempted to take seedlings on a plane and then on a cruise.

Tomorrow is March 1st, which is my target day to put pea seeds in the ground. This weeks weather is looking wonderful, albeit dry. I think I'll get them planted by the end of the week. Tomorrow will be a super busy day at work and Wednesday I won't have time either, so maybe Thursday. Fingers crossed. We're still enjoying garden peas from the garden out of the freezer. There's nothing like them.

Don't forget the lights and a stand of some sort. And you need to consider some support to protect against tipping as the ship rolls! in the navy it was traditional to use a wet slice of bread to keep your drink somewhat stable.

John - Ha!

We went over to the local garden supply store to order mushroom compost. I'm torn between getting my moneys worth out of the cost of delivery and on the other hand not ordering enough or too much for what I have the energy for. They still haven't opened for the season. I was hoping to get 4 yards today as it hasn't rained lately and it's going to tomorrow, I want it off road so I'm trying to make his decision to dump it off the driveway easier to make.