That's right, I live in the boonies and my options are dialup, which doesn't work, and satellite internet. Every time I think about getting satellite internet I go online (at the library or coffee shop) and read all the negative reviews from users and decide it's not worth it. Of course in our enlightened corporate brave new world forming a public internet system will probably invite a lawsuit from a big corporate internet provider. Seems that corporations are now entitled to their profits and any public action that might deny our wonderful job creating corporations their due dollars and possibly force the CEO to buy a bit smaller yacht is reason enough to litigate. So I go to the library, which no corporation has sued. Yet.
But back to gardening. Typically I get the first overwintered spinach about the middle of March. This year the spinach is just now producing. The lettuce in the Earthbox in the mobile coldframe is doing well. I harvested a nice batch a week ago, and today got another nice picking. It looks like oak leaf and bibb.
Most of the pepper seedlings have been moved out to the coldframe now. It can easily keep the temperatures inside above freezing during a light frost. That leaves room under the lights indoors for the new seedlings and I don't have to put in an additional light unit. I've moved the young brassica and lettuce seedlings out to the coldframe also. The strawberries are extras and I'll try to give them away.
These are the seedlings inside. I repotted one 6-pack of tomatoes into 5" pots (drinking cups) and will repot the other 6-pack soon. They will be moved out to the coldframe later this week. Usually I just buy tomato seedlings but the greenhouses start them way too early and they are rootbound by the time it's ready to set them out. So this year I bought seeds - a sauce variety called Pompeii, http://www.smartgardener.com/plants/169-tomato-pompeii/overview and a French hybrid for eating called Crimson Carnello, http://www.groworganic.com/renee-s-garden-tomato-crimson-carmello.html. Both are F1 hybrids with VF resistance (important to me), indeterminate and from Renee's seeds. An impulse buy.
In the beds things are coming along. The onions and garlic are doing well. The cole crops are growing slow but growing. Strawberries are looking good. Still waiting for the asparagus to pop up.
And the spinach is finally starting to produce. I've picked 5 ounces so far this year. Break out the champagne!
And my two apple trees both have fruiting spurs this year. I'll have to thin them but should get a few apples this fall. The Fuji has a beatiful shape. If only the Golden Delicious looked this good.
2 comments:
Considering the difficulties with internet access, I think you do pretty well!
I notice you are ensuring that the branches of your apple tree grow in the right direction. It's a bit like espaliering, but without a wall.
I grew up on a mountain in Colorado, ie the boonies. My dad tried to get the commercial people to run lines up there, but no one would. So his solved his (and the neighbors') internet problems by starting a co-op. He ran a T1 line to his house and used radio to bounce the signal up the canyon to all the neighbors. Of course he probably put about 10K of his own money into it. And one heck of a lot of work. What people will do for high speed internet. No corporation has sued him for this, though they did want to buy him out once. They wanted rights to the tower on the mountain though. And my dad wasn't willing to put that in the deed.
I so wish I had spinach. My overwintered spinach looks really sick this year. I'm thinking it is going to be a very poor spinach year.
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