Gardening...

 

 

 

Will you take a turn or two around the gardens with me?  We're still in the early stages of gardening, but things are coming along.  The flowers are taking their turns blooming.  The columbine are finished and setting seeds while the phlox are showing off along with the poppies and larkspur.  The last of the allium are blooming and the shrub roses are just starting with their spring show.   In a few days the lilies will be the sassy ones showing their enormous blooms and bright colors.  The zinnia  and nasturtium seeds have sprouted and show promise of flowers to come in mid to late summer.

The veggie gardens are up and growing!  It has been slow to warm up much here and the wind has been very blustery this spring so my tomato plants are small but healthy.  There are a few blossoms coming, but they need some heat to get excited about growing.  The same for the pepper plants.  Snap peas, carrots, and beans are up and happy.  Onions, garlic, radishes, and lettuce are abundant and we've had  a nice little harvest of asparagus.  Salad eating has been great so far this spring.  I didn't show any pics of the broccoli plants I plugged in, but they are quite happy.  So are the zukes and cukes and squash plants.  

The big patch on the hillside is my potato patch.  The spuds are growing great.  I'm hoping I can avoid potato scab this year.  We shall see how it goes.  It seems that every year is an experiment in the garden.  There are always so many variables year by year. I've been mulching everything I can with old hay to keep weeds down and water moisture in the ground.  That's working well.  The little garter snakes like the warm hay beds with an abundance of bugs underneath.  They surprise me now and then when I bend over to pull weeds.

I forgot to mention that my plum tree has quite a few green plums on it and the apple tree and tiny cherry tree have fruit on them too.  My cherry tree is about 3 feet tall at the most and it's bearing a handful of green cherries.  I'm tickled! 

I have a couple buckets of BFGs (big fat geraniums) that are flanking my front door with their plump, red balls of flowers.  I have always had red geraniums on my front porch in summer.  I like their old-fashioned welcoming ways. Do you?  What's your favorite front door or porch flower?

We've been working in the hay field making as many bales as we can.  The hay will not be abundant this year, but we'll get all we can.  We are thankful we have what we have.  Others in our area will have no hay to put up and hay will be expensive to buy.  Ranching is always a gamble.

Just a few more days until the official day of Summer!  Yay!  I love summer!