and my flower garden and
fish pond are both receiving major alterations.
Memorial Day weekend traditionally kicks off summer around here.
It is when the main part of my vegetable garden is put in.
There's not much in the vegetable garden this time of year except for garlic.
And garlic won't be harvested for at least another month or so.
The weather here in western Pennsylvania doesn't settle until the end of May.
Planting tender vegetables or bedding plants much before May 23 or 24 can be a risky business.
In fact we had a hard frost here just last Monday.
The frost blackened the baby grapes and I don't think we are going to get any grapes at all this year.
Looks like a complete crop failure.
Some years that's the way it goes.
Cabbage, broccoli, Brussels sprouts, celery, onions and lettuce were planted last month during the cooler weather.
My asparagus bed was dug up and remade this year.
I only saved half of a row from the original bed and salted the part of the bed that remained to keep the weeds down.
Asparagus like salt and salt will kill unwanted weeds and grass in the bed.
I'll need to plant more asparagus crowns next year to keep me in a good supply.
Asparagus is a very long lived perennial vegetable plant.
It's my experience that a well made asparagus bed will last about 15 years - maybe more.
A new bed of asparagus takes about 3 years before it really starts to produce heavy and dependably.
This year I didn't get around to planting any spinach or peas.
I'm considering planting some spinach for salad greens in
plastic tubs.
My kitchen firewood is stored next to the cook stove in plastic tubs during the wood burning season.
But in the summer the tubs sit empty and might work well for spinach.
Green beans, yellow beans, corn, tomatoes, cucumbers, sweet peppers, watermelon, cantaloupe, zucchini, yellow summer squash, acorn squash and winter squash were all planted yesterday in the big garden.
Beets, carrots, turnips and potatoes will follow maybe sometime this week.
Indian corn and pumpkins will go in during the first week of June.
It never pays to plant pumpkins too early.
Early planted pumpkins do not do as well as pumpkins planted after the ground has really warmed up.
My flower garden and fish pond are getting a face lift.
On one side of my pond I removed the rocks that were hiding the rubber liner.
I want my fish pond to have a more "natural" look, so I'm bringing the lawn right to the edge of it.
I plan to ease the transition from grass to water with pea size river gravel.
For now I have to trim the liner, cover it with soil and sow grass seed.
Hopefully I'll get to it this week.
The unintended consequences of of my pond redo has been that the level of the pond has dropped by about 14", a case of major algae bloom (cloudy green water) now exists and I have a big pile of rocks to move.
The pile of fish pond rocks is next to the herb garden that is also being made much smaller and redone this spring.
The herb garden is about 1/4 of the size it used to be.
My flower garden is being altered too. I want it to be much, much smaller.
I've got piles of dirt where a part of my flower bed used to be.
Click here to see the flower garden before I tore it up.
The piles of dirt will have to be leveled out and sown with grass.
The remade perennial bed has a "first year" look to it.
No matter.
In a couple of years it will look great.
For now I planted some annual flowers in an old tub.
The tub sits next to the back porch where my rocking chair is.
I figure the flowers will keep me cheered up this summer while the grass, herbs and flowers catch on and take hold.
The garden and fish pond should be back to normal and beautiful by the middle of next summer.
