May 17, 2010: Harvest Monday

The Week of May 10-May 16

Harvested:

Nine oz. lettuce (Buttercrunch & Little Gem)

Four oz. green onions, 9 oz. lettuce (thinnings), 18 oz. spinach

Four oz. radishes

Visit Daphne's Dandelions to see what others have harvested this week.

Planted:

12 Quadrato peppers
4 Calwonder peppers
12 Australian Yellow lettuce
10 Drunken Woman lettuce
1 Cherry Roma tomato
2 Market Miracle tomatoes
2 Persey tomatoes
2 Marglobe tomatoes
2 Homestead tomatoes
1 Husky Red Cherry tomato (container)
2 Sibirskij Stambovyj tomatoes (containers)
1 Gartenperle tomato (container)
1 Minigold tomato (container)
1 Dwarf Champion tomato (container)
1 Green Grape tomato
2 Grey Zucchini (one died, one left)
2 Black Beauty Zucchini
6 white alyssum
18 Sweet Williams
1 pkt. blue bachelor buttons (seeds)
1 Dwarf Meyer lemon tree (container)

Observations:

Gartenperle tomatoes are in full bloom, Minigold and Sibirskij Stambovyj tomatoes have buds.

Taste tested Tyee Hybrid and Melody spinach, Tyee won hands down. Melody left a lingering bitter taste. My neighbor, Pat, has been in the hospital for knee surgery. She'd only been home one day when she got pneumonia and ended up back in the hospital. She's home now, so I took her half the fresh spinach and some onions for her and her daughter to enjoy for their dinner last night. The daughter made wilted spinach salad, with bacon and balsamic vinegar, and Pat said it was by far the best spinach she had ever eaten!

General Gardening:

Hoed the east garden, which was sprouting lots of tomato and marigold volunteers. These seedlings were from the huge marigolds from last year, that overtook the garden, I definitely don't want them again this year!

Applied fertilizer & alfalfa pellets to the two lettuce beds.



Cleaned out the zucchini bed and dog proofed the hills with these cool "Grow Through Plant Supports" that I got at the dollar store for 90-cents each (they're having a going out of business sale). I ran a bit of wire fencing around the outsides for good measure. That bed has been Annie's favorite digging spot.


Stocked up on composted manure, perlite and vermiculite to mix with the peat I had on hand. Finished filling all planters and got them planted....six more tomatoes (the white pot on the right didn't quite make it into the picture) . Mr. Granny mowed, and I used the clippings to mulch all of the tomatoes. All of the tomatoes are now planted, forty-two plants in all:

Amish Paste 1
Angora Super Sweet 1
Black Cherry 2
Brandywine, Sudduth's Strain 2
Cherokee Purple 3
Cherry Roma 2
Clear Pink Early 1
Dwarf Champion 3
Eva Purple Ball 1
Gartenperle 2
Golden Dwarf Champion 2
Green Grape 1
Homestead 2
Husky Red Cherry 3
Kellogg's Breakfast 1
Kimberly 1
Marglobe 2
Miracle of the Market - AKA Chudo Rynka 2
Mini Gold 2
Nyagous 1
Persey 2
Sibirskij Stambovyj 3
Sungold 1
Unknown (Angora seed, did not have the fuzzy gray-green foliage) 1

Strung twine up the dog kennel side for the pole beans to climb.


Heavily pruned the euonymus and flowering quince. I should have taken "before" photos of these grossly overgrown shrubs. The euonymus was over 8 feet high and had grown half way across the path from the front to the back yard. I took it down to just under six feet. The quince wasn't quite that high, but had grown wide enough to poke its thorns into anyone who dared walk the path.


Cleaned out the fern garden. I love this spot in the yard when it's really hot outside. Many of the ferns are nearly four feet high, and it's always cool and shady to sit by them. They were moved here from my Mother's garden more than twenty years ago.

Gave (next door neighbor to the east) Pat's daughter 9 tomato and three pepper plants, put all the rest of them out front with a "free" sign. The entire box of 21 plants disappeared in less than 30 minutes. Six of the tomatoes went to the neighbor to the west of us, so those won't be far from their birthplace ;-)