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Monday, May 8, 2017

Monday May 8

The rains have finally ended, and this will be third consecutive day with abundant sunshine.  According to my rain guage, about 7 inches of rain fell over a period of eight days.  That's a lot of rain, but people to the west, in Illinois and Missouri, got it much worse.  It never rained hard, thankfully, and my pond was in no danger of overtopping the levee, but the accumulation did cause some flooding around here, and the bridge I normally take to get to Bloomington is still closed.

I picked the first 'solid' food yesterday, as opposed to leafy greens, a Kolibri kohlrabi, weighing in at 12 ounces.  The rabbits were most appreciative of the leaves.  I haven't decided whether to slice it for snacking or dice it up and fry it like hash browns.   If it's mild, I like kohlrabi best raw. 

So far I've harvested about 3 pounds of spinach and 2 pounds of lettuce, both overwintered.  The lettuce in the Earthbox has been a real disappointment.  I pulled out the original planting and put in some new starts, but they are doing no better.  I have to conclude that it's the Miracle-Gro potting mix, although most of the seedlings that have been started in it have done fine.

Although most of the seedlings have done well, the true leaves on the okra seedlings are not very green.  The pepper plants behind them look perfectly healthy.

Next year I should buy a bag of ProMix.  I like the Miracle Gro because the fertilizer is mixed in, but this is very frustrating.  Seems like they are constantly changing their formulation.

I had to put a makeshift fence around the raspberry patch.  The rabbits are just not going to let the raspberries grow up unless they are kept out.

The Earliglow strawberries are growing well in the pallet planter.  The conventional wisdom says you should snip off any blooms the first year, but that's not going to happen. I want to try some of these berries soon.  Anyway, strawberries grow like weeds.

And the apple trees are looking very healthy this year.  I cut off the leader on the Golden Delicious (the tree on the left) this winter and it's developing a nice shape.  Too bad most of the buds were frozen and not many apples were set.

With a promising 10-day forecast, I plan to move all of the seedlings into the coldframe shortly and turn off the lights for another year.  It won't be long before the warm weather plants go in the beds and there is a lot of work to be done first.  To see what other people are getting from their gardens, head on over to Our Happy Acres.

7 comments:

Lea said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Lea said...

It is a job trying to keep the animals from eating our gardens before we can harvest it. All this rain has put me behind in my planting, but finally today I got my okra planted.
Happy Gardening!

Kathy said...

Have you grown okra before? We have had no success with them and I wondered if you have any tips please?

Eight Gate Farm NH said...

Things are looking good, Mike. Nice job pruning the apple tree, but I'm sorry you lost the buds.

gardenvariety-hoosier said...

Kathy - Okra is one of my favorites and I've grown it for years. It should do well in any soil with enough organic matter in it. It also develops a pretty deep root system so make sure to dig down a ways and amend the soil. Unless you are in the South, stay away from the long season varieties. The modern F1 hybrids will start producing earlier.

Dave @ HappyAcres said...

We were fortunate and 'only' got a bit more than 3 inches of rain in the last week. Closer to I-64 some folks got 8 or 9. It's still a lot of rain. FWIW, I switched to Promix for the reasons you mentioned. The Miraclo Gro folks put too much junk in the soil for my tastes. Before that I used Bacctho, but I think I get better results with the Promix. I guess I need to start my okra soon, you are ahead of me on that!

Margaret said...

We had several days of rain as well and then yesterday, temps were only a few degrees above freezing. Things are suppose to normalize as of tomorrow - let's hope the forecast is right about that!

Very envious of the kohlrabi! I have Kolibri in the ground as well and it is actually looking much better and putting on more growth than most other things that seem to have stood still during our recent cold snap. The cool weather should ensure some nice, tender kohlrabi - can't wait!

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