gardening | what we did this morning

We inspected everything we've planted so far. The Asiatic lily shoots are taller. The creeping jenny and the three creeping thymes have perked right up after being planted four days ago. No signs of growth on the strawberries yet, but what we planted was bare roots, so that's hardly surprising. The various vegetable seedlings are also growing.

We planted:

--more beans, including "Christmas beans"--I'd never heard of them--can't wait to find out what they look (and taste) like; also planted soybeans

--some more peas

--cabbage

--Brussels sprouts

--celeriac (I've never see that growing, either, nor ever eaten it)

We will water the garden later--tried to just now, but the hose was being squashed by J's and my car tire in the driveway. We can move the car later and free up the hose, and I'll give everything a good soaking later in the afternoon.

Oh, and also, the tree that's near the garden bed is starting to leaf out, so we should be able to do a Google image search and determine what kind it is.

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Celeriac is delicious, IMHO! I'm too lazy to make proper celeriac remoulade so I just grate it and add a mustard-y vinaigrette.

I'm curious to see how it tastes!

Yeah, I'm trying to think how to describe it but coming up short. Slightly sweet (in the way that carrots are, if that makes sense), a bit celery-ish, but smooth/cool in a root-type way?

Good luck on the brussels sprouts. I tried growing some from seed, they never sprouted. Apparently they're extremely hard to grow.

Like cabbages and broccoli, brussels sprouts are often sold as seedlings at garden stores. You might try watching for them there.

Yeah that's the plan, since seed starting failed miserably. Peppers and tomatoes did great, other stuff not so much.

Even cool weather crops like spinach, lettuce, carrots and radishes are having issues right now. My sugar snap peas either didn't germinate or got decimated by voles as soon as they were 2-3 inches high.

The weather is roller coastering something fierce here right now, this week, high 70s to near 80s, but by Monday, back into the high 40s to low 50s, even high 30s on Weds, then back up again.

So I told the husband there is absolutely no point buying veggie plants until the weather straightens out. Which might mean no garden again this year, unfortunately.

>> Yeah that's the plan, since seed starting failed miserably. Peppers and tomatoes did great, other stuff not so much. <<

Peppers and tomatoes are easier to start from seed.

>> Even cool weather crops like spinach, lettuce, carrots and radishes are having issues right now. My sugar snap peas either didn't germinate or got decimated by voles as soon as they were 2-3 inches high. <<

Alas!

>> The weather is roller coastering something fierce here right now, this week, high 70s to near 80s, but by Monday, back into the high 40s to low 50s, even high 30s on Weds, then back up again. <<

If your garden isn't too big, you could try covering the plants. Some folks like row covers. Some buy fancy glass cloches. I cut the bottoms off of milk jugs and use those as mini-greenhouses. Any kind of cover will typically grant one zone warmer, and you can layer them, like putting down jugs and then a floating row cover over them.

>> So I told the husband there is absolutely no point buying veggie plants until the weather straightens out. <<

Likely so.

>> Which might mean no garden again this year, unfortunately. <<

Well, you could probably grow shorter-season things, just not the long ones. Cherry tomatoes are among the fastest fruiting tomatoes, for instance, and summer squash grow in faster than winter squash.

>> We inspected everything we've planted so far. The Asiatic lily shoots are taller. The creeping jenny and the three creeping thymes have perked right up after being planted four days ago. <<

Yay!

>> No signs of growth on the strawberries yet, but what we planted was bare roots, so that's hardly surprising. The various vegetable seedlings are also growing.<<

Strawberries can take a while to wake up.

We planted:

>> --more beans, including "Christmas beans"--I'd never heard of them--can't wait to find out what they look (and taste) like; also planted soybeans

--some more peas

--cabbage

--Brussels sprouts

--celeriac (I've never see that growing, either, nor ever eaten it) <<

Go you!

>> Oh, and also, the tree that's near the garden bed is starting to leaf out, so we should be able to do a Google image search and determine what kind it is. <<

Most trees are easier to identify with leaves or flowers out. Some have distinctive bark that's easier to spot in winter, like shagbark hickory or sycamore. Walnuts have big leaf scars that look like a monkey fact! I get a kick out of trying to identify things.

https://www.treehugger.com/beginning-guide-to-winter-tree-identification-1343460

https://www.gardenatoz.com/what's-up!/aiming-for-answers-hit-or-miss/budbreak/to-identify-it-bare/

Thanks for those links. :-)

what we did this morning

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