Things continue to look mostly good here in our gardens.

Because of my feet problems, I hadn't walked the gardens as thoroughly as normal. Basically ignoring the potatoes. On Saturday night around 8, I looked at them and they were covered with the potato beetles! In all stages of life. I killed a lot that night and then again yesterday. I feel like I got most of them. Rick came over and treated the plants too. They are pretty damaged by those little bugs. It's a first for me.

It happened fast too. I know that I did exam them maybe 6 days prior.

The tomatoes in the SG look good, but several of the plants continue to have yellowing on the lower branches. I continue to clip those off. I didn't get them trellised in time, so they laid in the mud for a few days. But, they really do look good despite that. And they're loaded with small fruit and blooms.

Asparagus continues...

Some of the cabbages are nearly ready. I had to give them a treatment of Bt. Normally I'll use it maybe once a season. Carefully.

Something got most of the kajari melons. Pretty sure it was a "cute and furry" and not an insect. They are planted at the far end of the kitchen garden. There are 3 remaining plants and I put cans around them until they grow up just a bit more. Also put more seed in.

Cucumbers are growing....maybe a little slowly, but they are growing. These are the Persian ones and do prefer warmer weather.

The tomatillos look great this year! I'm so excited for this. I bought a larger fruited variety last year, but last year was just so brutal and they did not do well at all. I didn't get a single fruit. This year, I have fruit forming already. We really like tomatillo salsa.

Let's just revisit last year for a moment. What an odd year. It wasn't just the drought. The spring was very windy for a long time. Many days. Oklahoma is always windy, but last year was extreme. I had so many plants snap from it....and damaged. Many of them (like the tomatillos) never really bounced back.

I was recalling how Dale and Carrie wanted to make a video of my garden last year....and we kept waiting for it to look somewhat nice. It never happened.

So, I'm basking in the prettiness of the gardens this year. Are they perfect? No. But, after a year like last year, we can really appreciate our situation this year. Hopefully it will continue, but even if it doesn't--this month has been so nice. And I am thankful for that.

Today's task will be continuing to work behind the shop. I have the perennial side of the native garden all weeded and want to put down woodchips today.

Then will start on the smaller side, that I'm calling the "reseeding" side. Jen came out to get some (what we hope) is comfrey and volunteer West Indian gherkins, and we looked at some of the weeds coming up on that side. I am fine with some of the weeds especially the ones that are almost ground covers, but want to dig out the crabgrass and Bermuda.

We went to a party last night, but came home early so I sat in that garden weeding. It was twilight and so pretty. From where I was sitting, the hoop house was on my right and I could see the pretty SG to my east. The chicken were behind me. Just lovely. A lovely moment.

Okay. Less rambling and more action. Time to get to work.

Rick thanks for starting us off. Hou zz doesn’t like me lol. Jennifer sounds like a lovely evening. I enjoy wedding which is a good thing because all my pots are full of grass and weeds. Since pulling isn’t an option right now I’ll just clip them out. Many plants are still recovering from removing all the weeds from around them. They were well protected from sun and wind. On a sweet note I have teeny tiny grapes on my vines and blueberries tried to make but something got them.

Beans look great Rick!

My daughter planted the tomatoes for me yesterday. They will probably only have cheap cages this year. Husband and I compromised with 12 plants. I hope to put more somewhere else, but at least there are these 12. Black cherry, vorlon,Cherokee carbon, Gary 'O Sena, Indian stripe, Ramapo, Paul Robeson, Louisiana Gulf State, large red cherry, atomic fusion, Jersey Devil, Grandma Suzy's beefsteak. I have some Heidi, a bison and a celebrity I would like to plant, but that might not happen. Some of these were looking bad and interestingly, it was the hybrids that looked diseased. The potato leafed plants looked the best. Atomic fusion was a freebie, purple stems and dark leaves.

Hope you all have a good holiday!

Rick, thanks for starting the thread, Houzz is not very kind to me either.

Jennifer, I have more trellises to build, and tomatoes on the ground. I will not prune these tomatoes like the others. I normally don't prune much, and always have blight, but have not noticed any this year.

My onions and garlic was a flop, I just had too many irons in the fire, I have to cut back and only plant what I can care for. I seem to be getting farther behind every day.

I have got to get set up for watering, because it looks like the wet weather for us is ending. This has been one of our better spring as for as getting rains spaced out to where little watering was needed.

Kim, I have a lot of weeding to do also, but I plan on cheating. I will spray some of the fence lines, and maybe spray a strip around the garden, if I can keep the lawn from growing into the garden, the in-garden weeding is easier.

Jennifer, do you just mulch your paths with the wood chips, or do you mulch around your plants also? I went down buy our mulch pile last evening, and I am still having problems breathing, it seems as the mold growing in the wood chips really does not like my lungs.

I feel ya Larry. I have to be especially careful now that they removed part of my lung. Yesterday the air quality was poor and humid was high. I just couldn’t do it. Here’s my tiny baby grapes.

Kim, weeding is so relaxing to me. Except pulling Bermuda grass. lol.

Yes, please be so careful with your lungs.

And....baby grapes! How cool is that?

Hey, speaking of Bermuda grass. Have y'all noticed that a lot of people are having issues with their Bermuda grass lawns? I've seen several people mention issues online. And, my Mom said hers is dying and a neighbor is having issues too.

Could it have been the drought last year? Is there some new Bermuda grass disease? IF it only affected Bermuda, would that be a bad thing....? Hmmm....

The Bermuda on my property is having zero issues. lol

Amy, let me know how the Paul Robeson does for you. You have a good selection of varieties!

So far, the heirlooms that are struggling the most for me this year is the German Johnson. It has such a tasty fruit.

I had this crazy idea. So, the garden behind the shop is for the pollinators and critters. Two tomato plants volunteered there and I left them. Tomatoes did exceptionally well there last year. In fact, I've never had such large and full plants. So, my crazy idea is this: what if I leave those plants for any hornworms that show up? Relocate them to those plants? More than likely, two plants wouldn't be enough. But....it is a garden for the critters, right? So, why not hornworms too.

Larry, that's great that you don't have blight this year! I do put wood chip mulch around some plants. They are around the perennial native plants right now. Rick used them to put around the SG tomatoes too. In the past, I've used them around more plants, but haven't had the time to get everything mulched properly this year.

Sorry the wood chip mold is bothering you. It's possible it's bothering me too in a different way. My eyes are swollen. But it could be all the ragweed that I'm pulling up or anything, really. Honestly, my house is so dirty right now, it could be my house.

Today, I'm doing laundry. And am about to head out to trim the vine/plant that is growing rampantly on the chicken pen. It took forever to take off and now it's out of control. I think it's a winterberry. Dawn gave it to me as a coral honeysuckle. LOL. It's not. But, it does it's job of shading the chicken pen. It's planted on the west side of the pen and works well. It just has to be trimmed back a couple of times a year.

Speaking of Dawn, she gave me a Laura Bush petunia several years ago and it's reseeded each year around the chicken pen, except this year. Disappointing. But, I saw a bright violet flower in our burn pile and was excited to see that it is a Laura Bush. There's two of them. I dug one up and put it back in the chicken pen bed.

That burn pile "garden" is amazing.

There's hardware cloth on the fence of the chicken pen and that keeps little beaks from eating my plants.

Most of the pollinator/native bed is finished now! There's just a few (million) crabgrass that needs to be pulled on the "reseeding" side. I won't do that today because I'm trying to keep my fingernails from being too gross. I have a hair appointment this afternoon and Pilates tonight...and want to look presentable.

So, I'll keep my gardening chores o trimming the thing on the chicken pen and possibly the chaste vitex. It's really growing, and I want it to look more like a tree than a bush.

I live in a high mineral area. This area, up till 80 years ago produced a lot of coal, we seem to have a lot of other minerals also. My soil test show high P and K , iron and copper are pretty high also, and the well water will stain everything a rusty color. My soil will not perk test either. To make a long story short, gardening comes hard in this valley.

Here is a picture of some egg plant and peppers in my north garden. I have all ready lost some roselle plants, I think from the soil being too wet, then turning off hot and dry. Please note the rusty tint of the soil. I assume that the tent is from high iron and copper in the soil.

If anyone of you have any words of wisdom for me please state. I would like to improve the soil and not work so hard at getting a crop.

If you say "Move", you may be right, but that is not an option.

Thanks

Larry

Sorry, Larry, I have no words of wisdom regarding your situation.

I wonder if you could plant some type of cover crop or sunflowers or something that could improve the soil for future people. Some of the YouTube videos have talked about how sunflowers and other things pull toxins from the soil. I don't know if that is true or not, tho. Or if the things that are in your soil are toxic. It looks like the plants are healthy.

Personally, that is what I would do.....and then would build raised beds near my home for eating/enjoying. That way you're improving the area for future use, and still enjoying gardening close to your house in a down-sized way.

I have one remaining roselle, Larry. I'm glad it looks healthy. Finally. It was iffy for awhile. I lost the other one. Only wanted 2. Roselle jelly is not my family's favorite. They like it okay. And I have a lot left. I want to make tea with it this year, so don't need a lot of plants. It is a pretty plant, though.

My chore of trimming that vine thing off the chicken pen yesterday turned out to be a bigger job that I thought. It had roots in several places and while it did provide great shade for the chickens, I can't have it overtaking the coop and pen. And I do like that wild look, but....

Anyway, it is tidier now and still provides shade.

Got the chaste tree trimmed up too. Excited to see that it's as tall as Tom now. It was really knocked back in the winter of 2021.

I have a refrigerator drawer of asparagus. This might be the day to make cream of asparagus soup. We might have two more weeks of harvest. It's starting to fern.

Seems like everyone must be very busy this week.

I'm enjoying not working so much.

Jennifer, I tried growing corn to pull out some of the excess P and K, I think that it helped, but it was a lot of work. I have not had a soil test in a few years, but I feel sure that P, K iron and zinc are above optimum, they use to be 200% to 400% percent of optimum. To get the mineral count down I would harvest the corn for us to eat, then harvest the stalks for the cattle. It seems as though the stalks trapped some of the excess mineral, and by feeding them to the cattle I could kill two birds with one stone. I don't think I am man enough to harvest corn stalks any more.

The plants are not really healthy, they have been in too wet of soil. At one time this garden was made something like a raised bed. I would till a strip around the garden ( on the lower sides ), digging and tossing the tilled soil into the garden, then I would make a berm of organic matter in the moat. By doing this I created a path for the excess water to drain, and, then every year or two I would harvest the organic matter from the moat and toss it into the garden. Over the years my garden soil became deeper, and the moat became a good place to stop invading grasses.

I have gotten to old and beat up to garden like I use to, so I am allowing my gardens to become more like they use to be, and hopefully by the time I am no longer able to garden, the area can easily be turned back into a smooth lawn.

We still have 4 or 5 roselle in the north garden, but in all we must have 200+ in all of our gardens. I don't keep up with the total count of our plants, I just know that we have too many to care for.

I just came from checking the wildlife garden, and it looks like we have well over 100 tomatoes, near that many egg plants, and at least 1000' of cowpea rows. We are eating squash, cucumbers, hot and sweet peppers, and sungold tomatoes, but no ripe large tomatoes.

Larry, R & R is doing an interesting thing that I don't really understand. But, it looks like something you would do. Skip the video up to about 8 minutes and 30 seconds to that part of the video. They have an earlier video describing the method of what they're trying to do there, but I'm at work and can't look for it right now.

The earlier part of the video is just her talking about a blue bird that keeps flying into her kitchen window and she shows her raised beds. Those things might not be as interesting to you....but if you go to about 8:30 or so, you can see what they're doing with their "in ground" garden.

Jennifer, thanks. I am not sure what you are talking about, but if you are referring to the small reservoirs for holding water near the plant, I still do that, but I keep my rows straight. The egg in the hole, I have never done.

I have never had a raised bed as nice as the ones shown, but I do try to make my garden function as a raised bed by having a drainage path for the water to leave the garden, but that area needs repairing, but I have equipment broken down and will have to repair later. We are trying to get hay baled and potatoes dug right now.

We got the first cutting of hay done, and about 600 pounds of potatoes dug. We have near 150 hills of squash to plant, and another 50 sweet potatoes. We have close to 500 tomatoes that need to be tied up and mulched ( that may not get done ). We have 12 to 15 loads of wood chips that need to be moved. We just cant get caught up.

If you have not tried using the little reservoir neat the plant, I would suggest that you try it. A lot of the time I will just use a foot print near the plant, I just mulch over the foot print, but I know it is there and and make sure that I spray water in that area. ( I spray by hand or use drip tubes)

I use to watch Roots and Refuge when they started out in central Arkansas, I enjoyed it, but I started using tractors more, and my style drifted away from theirs. I am no longer able to get around like the younger folks.

Yeah. I can't remember why they curved their rows. There was a reason. I doubt I'll ever garden like that, but still find it interesting even tho I don't understand everything about it. Sorry if you didn't find it interesting.

That area is a first year garden for them.

The egg thing. She gets a lot of criticism for that. She always does it even in Arkansas. She does not believe it's helpful because of the eggshell, but something in the egg that helps the health of her tomatoes. Because she is an influencer, so many people do the egg thing only to find that critters have dug up their gardens to get to the eggs.

Some people get really upset that she shows it in her videos. But, it's her garden. She can do what she wants.

I guess this week's thread will just be a conversation between you and me, Larry. :)

Jennifer, I expect the curved "dam", Is just that. I expect that the lay-out is really a small pond, with the plants planted on the pond bank, or dam. I do much the same thing, except dig a hole with post hole diggers between the plants, and keep the plant in a straight row, it I can.

Here is a picture of my north garden. This is my oldest garden and has had more amendment added to it than my other gardens. Note how shallow my top soil is, most of the land around here is much like mine, all gardens need amendments added. My top soil is darker than the native soil because of me adding so much compost for the past 20 years.

I started gardening like this 20 years ago when we moved to this wet, low area. I started digging the ditch on the two lower sides of my garden to permit water to drain away from my plants. The first few years I dug with a shovel, then with a tiller, the past few years the digging has been done with a tractor. If it were not for my tractors I would have to quit gardening. I am just not man enough to do the things I use to do with ease.

A fellow from the water company just came by for some onions. He had seen the Egyptian walking onions in my south garden and said he would like to have some because his grandpa has some years ago. It is so nice to live in the town where you grew up, and to be able to know the folks and their kin, and everyone sharing.

Jennifer, I do hope others will jump in and tell their tales, if not you and I will just have to pick up the pace and talk for everyone.

We just got dumped on with heavy rain around the OKC area. 0.6 in inside of half an hour.

Looks like I'll have to rent a boat to make it over east this weekend.

Rick

I am here too. Jess does the egg because someone she knew did and it worked. I personally would not waste the egg lol. We know it doesn’t release calcium but I believe it attracts microbes in the soil who feed on it and then leave fertilizer for the plants. Same thing with fish or banana peels etc. i buried a case of banana peels in a trench around an old apricot tree. Next year I had a great harvest and that tree had not made apricots in many years. She just needed a little boost. The swale’s at Jess’ are just an experiment to slow down the water run off. It reminds me of closed eyes. Like blinking. Now that they have all that acreage and helpers they can do lots of experiments. Someday I will have my piece to plant to my hearts content. For now I am laying on soft pillows dreaming of the day. My old home place is getting tons of rain. They’ve had over 10” and more coming. Amarillo has had flooding. We have had a little here but not too much

I dumped a couple of buckets of wood chips in the wildlife garden this afternoon. It looks like we may have a large amount of wood chips this year, and plenty of places to dump them, we have erosion problems every year.

Gardening is getting much harder for me this year, we have over extended ourselves, and have plans to boost our fall garden. Neighbor is telling me that the demand seems to be high for produce. We even have a few people wanting turnips, I don't recall ever wasting the space on turnips in the spring garden. Neighbor is buying stock out of Florida now because the only thing we have is potatoes, squash, cucumbers, and banana peppers, and not near enough of those. We have a few Sungold tomato plants producing, but I only planted about 30 seeds for our grand kids to have tomatoes to pick.

We have already had to start watering. Looks like we may get rain this weekend.

We watered Wednesday night and got a bit of rain last night. The news reported over a half an inch of rain in our area yesterday afternoon, but the rain gauge says no. There were barely any drops in it. It rained hard for about 10 minutes. (of course, right when Tom was trying to mow)

But, there's still chances for some rain later tonight.

Larry, there's an "urban" homestead that I often drive by on my way home from work. He has built a really neat farmstand at the road. It has a small refrigerator even....and a cash box. There's always people stopped at it buying stuff. People do like the fresh food. He charges a lot for his eggs, but people still buy them up.

Kim, I'm with you. I'm not willing to sacrifice an egg. Even when they are in abundance around here.

I'll probably be posting often. Trying to distract myself from what's about to happen in less than 2 weeks.

Jennifer, neighbor has a little "Store", he has heat and air in it, as well as a freezer and refrigerator it is about the size of a large single car garage.

I went to the greenhouse this morning and potted up another 50 Covington sweet potato plants, I can get another 50-75 of plants, then I am calling it quits, we have enough sweet potatoes planted, we should have at least 750 plants.

I hauled a couple of scoops of mulch yesterday and quit, the traffic on the highway is bad through the week because of the rock quarries along this highway, I can get up early Sat. or Sun. and get more mulch when there is no traffic.

I still have some open space in the house gardens, this may be a good time to grow out some Arabat squash seeds. I also should plant green beans, even though if may be a little late for them. I could use a little more okra at the house, but I think we have a few hundred feet of row in the fenced garden.

Our patty pan squash are starting to produce, I may have to harvest one today. I did not care much for the patty pan when I was a kid, there for I don't eat them often today. It seems strange how I eat things now that I did not like when I was a kid, and I was taught to eat what ever you could get, and be thankful that you had it.

We took out all of the cabbage & brocolli the other day. We even got the cauliflower to produce nice heads. I'm calling it a success because we got a nice harvest and the broccoli side shoots were more than I was expecting.

My thoughts after looking back is to wait 2-3 weeks longer before planting to avoid some of the awful weather & protect from wind the first month or so. And of course, to shoot for early varieties. We had Waltham & Lieutenant broc, Snowball cauliflower & ruby red & stonehead cabbage out there. All in all, good veggies going in our bellies.

I turned most of the brassica and cabbage plants under and planted a row of sweet potatoes in their spot. We could use some rain (here we go again). Have been bone dry for a couple of weeks now.

On the tomatoes...I've pruned very minimally with the determinates on a weave & indeterminates in high cages. Just hope to get my haul and yank when the disease sets in, then go another round of determinates for fall. I'll try and get some pics of a few today.

Sounds like rain coming tomorrow afternoon.

Rick

Two neighbors came over to check on my beets and turnips. One neighbor had ask me if we had any beets or turnips, I told him that I doubted that we had any develop because we had a flash flood shortly after planting and much of garden had washed away, and the bed had never been worked or weeded, but he was welcome to check and get anything that he found. To make matters worse the hay crew came by and baled the pasture, The hay crew and my grand and great grand kids have been driving the RTV through the garden. ( The is just a part of the pasture I drug the cultivator through, then disc ). Anyway neighbor carried in a turnip that had been run over with a tractor, and said that he would be back tomorrow and check in the weeds to find any produce, he says that he has customers asking for beets and turnips both. I am not sure if he can find anything worthwhile, but I ate a part of the turnip he brought in and it taste good.

The tractor sorta mashed this turnip, but neighbor said there looked to be plenty more beets and turnips both out in the weeds.

The area where these were planted is where I use to have my compost piles, but I ran out of compost last winter

We are getting rain, but we are getting some dime sized hail also, hopefully the hail will stop and the rain will continue.

I potted up 60 more Covington sweet potatoes, this makes 110 that we have ready to plant after we finish digging the Irish potatoes.

Congrats on the brassica harvests, HWY.

We were getting dry again, but got a full inch of rain last night. So glad. It will save me a lot of time.

Did you find more beets and turnips, Larry?

We did the usual grocery shop today.

I pruned and tied up tomatoes in the SG, but only got one row done. I ran out of twine, but just found another roll that I forgot about. They have aphids but lots of ladybugs too.

It's hard to work in that garden because the rows are so tight. The second row is especially tight. I will try to work on it sometime this next week. But, this next week has a long to-do list including the summer coop clean and cleaning the turtle tank.

Tom has a timer on the turtle light. And put together some pretty nifty waterers that have a float in them for the chickens. Those things will make it easier on the "house sitter" while we are traveling. I bought things that attach to water bottles. Supposedly slowly waters the plants. Thought I would put them in the pots.

I did a bit of weeding in the kitchen garden. We have our first pimentos, bells, and jalapenos. They are still small, but they look good. We'll be harvesting them soon.

Hope everyone is doing well and got just the right amount of rain.

I am for sure moving home tomorrow. I am looking forward to watching my garden grow and being able to water it and maybe even plant a little okra. My fil used to plant his on June 1 so I am not too far off. I’ve got one 10’x30” bed full of all the potting soil that the kids dumped in there from dead plants. A little raking out should be good to go.

Jennifer, I did not check the turnips and beets today. The guy that baled the hay and ran over the beets and turnips was here today working on the baler and hauling hay. I did not want him to feel bad about a crop being in that mess he ran over, plus my grand daughter came to visit, the rain also kept me in the house a long time today.

I don't know how much rain we got, but, it was at least .3 inch. The rain, hail, and wind was a little rough on the tomatoes. I was so proud that I was doing a much better job keeping them tied up, but I fell off the wagon and they got out hand in just a few days. I tied some damaged plants up today, and hope to do more tomorrow.

I harvested our first pimento pepper today, and I have a sweet banana pepper ready for harvest. All the peppers are green, I wont expect any ripe ones for a long time.

We are getting a lot of squash and cucumbers, but I don't thing we are getting many customers at the produce stand yet, but this is only the second day the stand has been open, and they are trying to sell the garage sale stuff out first.

I hope to get up in the morning and pot up the last of our sweet potato slips. We have a few late slips, which I may try growing in hay.

I have got to quit gardening, and start working on equipment, it seems like everything I own is broken down.

Unfortunately, the rain went all around us. Our potatoes are dyng back now and i've got more beets than I know what to do with. Need to pull em. It's gonna be a beety summer for sure.

Had to liquid fence our sweet potatoes, the first planting was topped overnight by Peter or something else. It seems to work if you lay it down really good.

Thinking about cowpeas this summer. Any good bush-like cowpea varieties you guys like?

Knuckle purple hull cowpeas has been my favorite , followed by Pink Eye Purple Hull.

I usually succession plant Knuckle Purple Hull after I dig potatoes and onions.

Rick

I pretty much go along with Rick as my choice of cow peas, and I plant Zipper Cream for my better half. The zippers do not taste as good, but they shell much easier.

Our potatoes are not really ready to dig, but we have come up with about 750# so far.

Rick, I tried to start a thread, but, I am sorry to say that I am not smart enough, but thanks so much for starting them.

I went over to the greenhouse and potted up the last of our Red Wine Velvet sweet potatoes. I told neighbor that we should have a total of 750, he told me that the number would be closer to a 1000, + plus we have given over 100 plants away.

I have tomato plants that I need to tie up, the wind was not nice to my plants, but a lot of the blame is mine, I should have had them in better shape. I had a little hail damage, but only a few broken limbs.