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.