Turan in the Western Mountains

Spring arrived early this year.  My crocus started blooming about February 21rst, a full month earlier than normal.  Right now the Nanking and other bush cherries are blooming, and they usually bloom on Mother's Day.  How much to venture in early planting is a constant itch in my brain.

I planted snow peas on Good Friday in late March and htey are up now so I planted the sugar snaps. 
There are not wild mustards coming up in yet so I am hesitant to plant out my broccoli starts.  I did seed some pak choi though, it will probably come up wen its wild cousins do.
The cilantro that self seeded from last year is sprouting, or something very similar looking, and I saw a couple orach sprouts.  That suggests planting carrots very soon.  I have 3 types for this year, a late purple and a late orange and an early red. 

The greenhouse has lettuce seeded and sprouted on the side that will house Tomatoes and peppers this year.  Tomorrow I plan to tidy up and prepare the other side for beans.  All my beans are going to be planted in hte greenhouse this year.  That seems a good rotation with the tomatoes.

How are the other gardens in our region faring?

Hi, Turan!

Interesting report, Turan.  I see you plant by  what the wild things do. I try to do that as much as I can but it take times to learn these things, especially when never having thought about it much before.

I figure the plants have better ideas of soil temperature and other conditions for sprouting than I do.

Encouraged by the cilantro and orach self seeded sprouts I went ahead and seeded carrots.  First I had to dig out the tasty, invasive ginger mint that got in that bed.  (I put it there, years ago, and fight it now but it is a very tasty pest).  Usually I mix carrots types ( colors and length of time to mature) and radish seeds.  That mix then sort of thins as I pull radishes and then early carrots.  Any rate, this year I was out of radish seeds and so I am trying that dwarf pakchoi.  The seed is hte same size and it sprouts and matures fast.  We will see.

The apples are starting to bloom and the lilacs will be fast behind them.  Every thing seems 3 weeks ahead of itself this year.  Everything but me. 

The weather keeps on pretending it is June.  I have apples in bloom.
Feeling a bit behind I got the tomatoes and peppers planted in the greenhouse.  The lettuce is growing fast, by next week I will start harvesting.  I could tonight actually,  some thinnings would be tasty with chives. 

My son turned the other bed in the greenhouse for me.  I'll plant the beans in that bed tomorrow. 

In a 4x8 outside bed I planted 10 broccoli starts this morning.  I usually plant 8 plants in a 3x8 bed and that fills it to over flowing.  I am wondering what to plant in the central area.  In the past it would be potatoes.  Maybe I should just let the cilantro come up. 

Next on the schedule is to start rutabagas in soil blocks and squash in some 6" pots.  The bed the rutabagas will go in is full of self seeded cilantro.  I guess my first cilantro harvest will be hte planting of rutabagas.

It is snowing.  Temps are supposed to hover around freezing the next couple days.
I put a second layer of sheets over the tomatoes and peppers in the greenhouse and put a space heater in there. 

You know those foundation vents that open and close dependant on temperature.  4 years seems their limit, they do not close any more when it gets cold. 

The rutabagas in the house have sprouted.

The broccoli is under a cover and usually handles these snow storms well, if covered.

So now to wait until Wednesday to see if I will need to go on a tomato/ pepper plant  buying spree.

A month has gone by and boy things sure grow when they get going! 

Here are some pictures from a week ago.

A garden panorama showing the arch with peas growing on it.



The greenhouse with beans on the right and tomatoes/ peppers on the right.  My sons spent a good bit of time stabilizing it even more.  It did not flap during the wind storm today.



I scattered lettuce seed back in March.  Then in May I transplanted the tomatoes and peppers into that bed.  The lettuce is a bit over whelming but delicious.  The tomatoes have started blooming.



A garden cat.

I was just thinking about your spread and hoping you would post photos! Thanks for reading my mind.

Great pics, Turan. What a challenge to garden where the weather is so unpredictable. WOW! Here we just deal with "hot" and "dry."

My eye caught your tires on black plastic (weed cloth?) Can you imagine what the pioneer farmers could have done with big rubber tires and rolls of black plastic? 

We have a cat that looks just like yours. His name is Spider. His momma was a pregnant feral rescue. Spider was her first-born. When he was only a few minutes old, he spread those long black legs over the entire all-you-can-eat-buffet and dug in (while she was still trying to deliver his siblings) and basically named himself.

Lookin' good Turan.  I like your greenhouse!

looking good...killer area you live in for fly fishermen.

Your cat is gorgeous! Sorry! Plants looking good, but kitty got it goin on!

I had a battle with my camera and could not get the pictures to load to the laptop, then today I tried once more and it was smooth sailing.  Go figure.

Here are some pictures from the end of last month.  Things grow so fast now everything is much bigger.

The greenhouse~ 
I just pulled most of the lettuce and used it as mulch.  We just could not keep up with it and it was too hard to get at as the tomatoes grow big. The beans and tomatoes are flowering.  I never did the toothbrush thing this year, maybe that explains why the tomato set is late.



Winter squash in a hopefully protected from thunderstorms spot.




A robin watching me watching him.  He is perched on the pea arch.  That whole 3x8 bed is peas.




Golden snow peas.  We have had a a couple big pickings of peas now.





Tomatillos growing.  They are in a cold frame in WoWs.  They have out grown the coldframe so I put the lid away.  This is hte earliest I have had the fruits set.




Beds and asparagus trees.  lol





Jasmine being patient.  The cat was stalking her.




Oriental poppy.

Very nice, cute dog, and love the greenhouse!

I love the greenhouse as well.  It broadens what I can grow so much.

Here is our new puppy.  Another thing for Jasmine to be patient about. 

Turan, thanks for sharing the great photos.

"the toothbrush thing?" WHAT is that, Turan??

Everything looks great! New pup is a cutie...

Nice spread you've got there Turan.  And that dog is gorgeous.

AtlantaMarie wrote:"the toothbrush thing?"  WHAT is that, Turan??

Everything looks great!  New pup is a cutie...

Sorry I am months late in seeing your question.
I use the back of an old electric toothbrush to stimulate the tomato and pepper flowers to release their pollen. It is pretty amazing seeing how much pollen they spread when I do this. It helps get the early fruit set. Later the bees and just better tomato conditions take over.

I just realized that this thread is not in the Western Plains and Mountains regional forum. How do I move it??

Turan wrote:I just realized that this thread is not in the Western Plains and Mountains regional forum.  How do I move it??

Should be OK now. 

trolleydriver wrote:

Turan wrote:I just realized that this thread is not in the Western Plains and Mountains regional forum.  How do I move it??

Should be OK now. 

Thanks.

I see that I left this journal in August.  That month is always a big harvest time.  We were eating lots of broccoli, beans from the greenhouse, and a slow but steady amount of tomatoes and peppers.  Because I was in school full time I did not blanch and freeze any of my extras.  I made big pots of broccoli soup when the amount was over whelming. The peas were tasty but gone by August, except the Golden peas, those kept going until frost. I let most of the Royal burgundy and Blue Lake pole beans ripen fully and dry. They are good in soup.

We had a light frost in early September that put ripening into high gear. After that we had a long warm, gorgeous month. I canned a lot of tomatillo salsa using Annies salsa recipe and I dried a fair bit of tomatoes, big and cherry.

First fall harvest for storing~ potatoes.  This is 24 lbs of potatoes from 12 sf.


At the same time I brought in the winter squash.  This picture does not show the couple Thelma Saunders Sweet potato acorn squash.  As you can see the Australian Butter pumpkin enjoyed this summer. We have been eating them in soup and just roasted.


The long warm September meant that we had a bumper crop of apples ripen fully.  We cut and froze many pies worth and I made applesauce and we had the rest squeezed into cider.

Thank you for your kind words, CN.

As I skimmed through this thread I saw all the times people have made nice comments and I did not respond. I seem to be inflicted with miserly comment syndrome, as if I would be charged full amount even if only posting a 'THank you'.

Thank you to every one on this website and have a merry Christmas.