What's Growing in the Garden

Garden is still pretty barren, but I did get another panel added to my tunnel. Will have peas, green beans and Lima beans on it this year. Got the rest of the metal and plastic pulled, so garden is ready to go as soon as it dries a little more.

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Above average temps hitting us for several days. 79° today and will hit 85° on Monday. Peas are in the ground, potatoes tomorrow, and even thinking about putting in some sweet corn.
Edit, scratch the sweet corn, just looked at extended forecast and going to have lows in the mid 30's next weekend. Sweet corn doesn't like cold weather.

Will pick the first asparagus tomorrow. Peaches are done, pears and apricot in full bloom. Apples and cherries are just beginning. Don't really like the hot weather this early, but will have good temps to get good pollination of all the fruit trees.
 
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trc65 said:
Garden is still pretty barren, but I did get another panel added to my tunnel. Will have peas, green beans and Lima beans on it this year. Got the rest of the metal and plastic pulled, so garden is ready to go as soon as it dries a little more.

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Always look forward to your photos and that includes the ones of the farm. Thanks.
 
trc65 said:
Garden is still pretty barren, but I did get another panel added to my tunnel. Will have peas, green beans and Lima beans on it this year. Got the rest of the metal and plastic pulled, so garden is ready to go as soon as it dries a little more.

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Noticed the grass & weed killer in the foreground picture. What is the brand, and is it better than Roundup? Chuck
 
That is Farmworks brand from Tractor Supply. It's definitely better than brand name Roundup because it's about 1/10th the cost. Glyphosate is glyphosate wether it's in Roundup or one of the dozens of generics available. Just make sure that the generic you buy has a surfactant already included. Different companies may change the formulation slightly in regards to percentage of glyphosate. Anywhere around 40% seems to be the sweet spot for cheapest formulation. It's not necessary to buy the concentrates that are over 50% a.i.

I buy the 2.5 gal jugs, but they also have it in gallon containers at tractor supply, although the gallons are sometimes labeled differently and in the garden section rather than farm chemical section. When I bought this jug a few years ago, think it was $40 for the 2.5 gallons.

As long as you are comfortable mixing your own, lots of money can be saved with generic chemicals.
 
Spuds are in the ground. Kennebec and dark red Norland.

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Sour cherry is blooming (on the right side of the pic) and the first apple is getting started.

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Best part of all, asparagus for supper!

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I stole some space in my wife’s small garden enclosure for 10 white oak acorns from a downed tree last fall. Kinda gave up hope, but they are on nature’s schedule and have started poking their heads up.
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Tim has it about right, Chuck, maybe not quite 20 but a long time. Early on they are breakfast. Later the bucks horn them as saplings. We’ve got a lot of volunteer dogwoods I keep trying to spread around. A few have made it many have not. We lost a smaller Japanese maple last fall. They pulled it completely out of the ground.

Hard to see them in this picture, but here are 2 of the culprits.

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Nasty vermin.... A gated community down the road a bit took 296 of them things away via the aid of sharp shooters and no one outside the community had a clue. Most residents inside did not notice either and had no issue until the number was published. Some of the residents commented that they might need to shear shrubby, as the deer had been doing so long it might now be a chore at least for a few that had shrubs that survived.
 
Vermin, absolutely. Only thing worse is the squirrels. The deer damage or destroy anything that grows. The squirrels damage the vehicles. That gets very expensive.
 
Tom Smart said:
Vermin, absolutely. Only thing worse is the squirrels. The deer damage or destroy anything that grows. The squirrels damage the vehicles. That gets very expensive.
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Vehicles...a few years back, Isuzu and a few other non-native auto makers used soy and corn based products in their wiring insulative coating. Gee, wonder why rodents started eating the wires more often....daa.
 
I now keep woven wire fence around all my trees that are under ~10" diameter. About 5 years ago had a 5" thick tulip poplar that the bucks almost killed by rubbing. It's just now getting almost fully healed over. This winter they completely destroyed two Canaan fir that I was testing for growth rate and suitability for windbreaks. They were 4 ft tall. They also rubbed and severely damaged a 4 ft arborvitae.

Doesn't matter if a plant is deer proof, or not preferred, they like to walk around and browse, ripping branches off pretty much everything. Same thing with flowers, they will browse on pretty much anything yanking them out of the ground even if they don't eat it. The only flowers that are safe are the ones in pots on our raised deck.
 
trc65 said:
I now keep woven wire fence around all my trees that are under ~10" diameter. About 5 years ago had a 5" thick tulip poplar that the bucks almost killed by rubbing. It's just now getting almost fully healed over. This winter they completely destroyed two Canaan fir that I was testing for growth rate and suitability for windbreaks. They were 4 ft tall. They also rubbed and severely damaged a 4 ft arborvitae.

Doesn't matter if a plant is deer proof, or not preferred, they like to walk around and browse, ripping branches off pretty much everything. Same thing with flowers, they will browse on pretty much anything yanking them out of the ground even if they don't eat it. The only flowers that are safe are the ones in pots on our raised deck.
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Not healed over...callused over.

You have steep steps to the deck? Around here, anyone with the new ADA compliant sloped steps get deer climbing the steps to wipe out deck herb gardens and greens. Always odd seeing deer on a second story deck eating Marigolds, something they used to avoid.

They don't seem to bother our daffodils or onions but will trample our garlic.
 
Not steep steps, but haven't seen them on the deck yet. If they start coming up on the deck, I'm declaring all out war.
 
Just a note on repellents. I've used and tried just about everything. I use quite a bit of electric fence, which works once they get a shock. They can jump the waist high fence, but once shocked, they tend to stay away from the area. Bait the fence using a dab of peanut butter on aluminum foil folded over the wire.

Some chemical repellents work well, but beware those that have blood meal which will attract coons who then dig everywhere trying to find a meal. I use one repellent for hostas early in the season, but have to switch to cayenne pepper flakes when I plant annual flowers.

One that works well is "Plant Saver". I used to use it with the little cotton bags and hang it on trees. I even made a bunch of plant stakes ~ 1 ft tall to hang the bags around flower beds. The coons love tearing those bags up. Now I just sprinkle it on the ground around perennial plants. Most of my fruit trees are big enough that a little grazing doesn't bother them, or me. Smaller trees are fenced.

In the garden, they love the little brassica plants. For those I use a arc of woven wire fence covered with bird netting until the plants are about a foot tall.

As Mark mentioned, they love browsing on garlic tops in spite of the fact that garlic is a main component mentioned in most home made repellents.

For anyone who legally can, gunshots work well too. Not shooting them, but a couple shots from a .22 into the ground when you see them. That is usually enough to keep them away for a little while
 
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