What Did You Do In The Garden?

[ducks4you]

Last week, while preparing to feed ponies their grain in buckets on the other side of the south fence of the training area, I threw the rake (that I use to drag the buckets closer--makes it look like my horses are vicious and I trying to remain safe!!--nothing further from the truth!) I ducked through the pipe fencing to retrieve it and found myself, 30 minutes later, that I had pulled ALL of the weeds growing there, under the fencing and around and through the strategically placed RR ties, without even THINKING about it!
I guess I like to weed.
I sure have been enjoying the clear view for the past week.
I am good at throwing things. I threw the fishing rod in at the pay-to-catch trout pond a few years ago and retrieved the fishing pole with a trout attached.
It is a gift.

 

[Dahlia]

still weeding the North Garden. if things go ok i'll finish today before the rains happen. two edges to go with one partially done already.

while working on the upper flat part where the turnips are at i was picking the broad leaf plantains and pulling off the seed stalks and throwing them in the grass because the birds can come along and eat those. later on Mom was going around picking those up. i tried to tell her about giving the birdies something to eat but she just said that they can eat the berries off the honeysuckle bushes/trees. arg! so much for the birdies having some food for later in the season. i know they do eat a lot of those seeds...

as for the honeysuckles they've been eating a lot of those berries and spreading those seeds around. i pull thousands of those plants out each year. it is getting into the stage of things where we get drunk birds from eating all the fermenting berries.

We have drunk birds from time to time flying into our sliding glass door. There is a bush in the backyard that has strange berry like fruit that is causing the drunkenness!

 

[flowerbug]

We have drunk birds from time to time flying into our sliding glass door. There is a bush in the backyard that has strange berry like fruit that is causing the drunkenness!

it's sad when it happens and scares the bejeebus out of us, but we don't like curtains or netting so... the other times of bird collisions happen when the birds are chasing each other for mating or hunting. i have a picture in my archives which is from when they were building this house and i was sleeping on the bare base plywood floor in the living room when a pheasant ran full tilt into the patio door. talk about scaring the poopoo out of someone. it's a full outstretched dust image on the patio door.

 

[flowerbug]

and speaking of spider webs... i took the crawlspace cover off to check out how things looked in there and found the start of a mouse nest and plenty of spider webs so since i was already cleaning out the birdbath and bleaching the algae i put the cover aside to clean it, removed all the spiders and webs out of there, swept up and removed any debris and then i refilled my chemical warfare device (a widemouth pint jar that i put some bleach in, the lid has a few holes in it to let the fumes out). it seems to work for about a month before it needs refreshing. washed down the cover after evicting all the spiders from that too and then wiped just a bit of bleach solution on the underside to perhaps deter more creatures. normally in the past there's not been that many spiders down there so all of a sudden to have a lot more showing up isn't what i expected, but ok... i think a part of it is that we have the big pine tree dropping a lot more stuff over near that cover. and, well, i don't hate spiders, i just don't want them living there...

 

[Cosmo spring garden]

Harvested all sweet corn,shucked it, washed it and bagged it up. It's in the fridge for fresh eating. I only grew enough for fresh eating. Also harvested some okra and one yellow squash.
Tried to clear the paths in the greenhouse. I hope the plants I butchered in the process will survive.
Canned 14 quarts of salsa, 12 quarts of pasta sauce and 2 quarts of tomato sauce. It's been a busy day and I'm tired .

 

[Dahlia]

Harvested all sweet corn,shucked it, washed it and bagged it up. It's in the fridge for fresh eating. I only grew enough for fresh eating. Also harvested some okra and one yellow squash.
Tried to clear the paths in the greenhouse. I hope the plants I butchered in the process will survive.
Canned 14 quarts of salsa, 12 quarts of pasta sauce and 2 quarts of tomato sauce. It's been a busy day and I'm tired .

How much corn did you grow for yourselves? It is hard to find organic corn on the cob around here! I did finally see some last weekend and snatched it up! So tasty!

 

[Cosmo spring garden]

How much corn did you grow for yourselves? It is hard to find organic corn on the cob around here! I did finally see some last weekend and snatched it up! So tasty!

I think about 100 plants for our family of 5. One littlest member eats about half of that

 

[Phaedra]

Keep training beans for climbing high

 

[flowerbug]

spent some time today getting the sill to the shed doorway somewhat removed and replaced by rocks and caulk. it was rotted and the black carpenter ants were using it as a home so i needed to remove as much of it i could take out without having to remove the whole door and wall around it.

i may have even gotten the queen of the anthive or at least i hope so, but either way i also was smushing a fair number of ants and then removed the rotted wood and sand that was all through there, swept it up and let it dry out a bit before trying to get it filled back in with a more waterproof seal and no gaps tor the ants to exploit again. i needed to let the stuff dry that i already put down before adding some more but at least it should keep the water out if it rains tonight.

having spent many hours trying to get rid of these ants and having them come back so many times over the years i hope this will be the end of it when i can manage to get it sealed up better.

 

[Branching Out]

Several of our neighbours have companies in to spray their foundations each year, to control ants. I have often wondered if it is worth the expense, and the chemicals. We always use a homemade Borax solution at our place. The ants never completely go away, but using the Borax has been enough to keep the ants out of the house, and to manage large colonies.