any gardeners?

“Save BIG money at Menards!

My babysitter takes Evie and the other kids to Menards on rainy days - they play on the display swing sets.”

“My concord grapes are ready to bloom. I guess once they are a couple more years older they will be making anywhere between 20-40lbs of fruit a year....each vine. YIKES! What will I do with em all?”

“Squeeze 'em for juice and make lots of jelly. What you do with the jelly is entirely up to you.”

“actually...grape vines would be great over a pergola...large leaves and then you got a nice batch of fruit at the end of summer. It would make harvesting fairly easy as well.”

“i thought about going the grape route, my kids and i love grapes, but don't they take a long time to spread and mature?...i'm a instant results kinda guy”

“I planted my grape twigs last spring. the first year I had grapes.

I cut the plant back almost all the way this winter. Now it's half way up the supports and going wild. You could always plant an annual vine next to it while you wait for it to grow, like morning glories for instance. That's what I do.
last edited: 5/28/09 6:46:54 AM”

“Hey i just had the septic tank replaced in my back yard...Whats the best grass seed to put down to get some coverage?”

“Yeah..>I kinda expected that...OKAY there note to file, Spirit is not invited to the next Fire Department Car Wash....”

“but xl, their seeds have a 90% germination rate.”

“And my Neighbor in Special Operations on the Drug Task force has a 90% arrest rate (LOL).

Okay we will invite you but you get the old out of shape guys like in the photo on the other thread (LOL).”

“because you want the young in shape guys?”

“NO, Because I don't want you to KILL the young in shape guys (LOL)”

“by "...to get some coverage" do you mean you just want something to hold the soil in place until fall when you can put down something more permanent?...if so, go with an annual rye...it'll die on it's own in the winter, although I'm not sure how well that would work in the south”

“SC...your thumbs be green!...a most excelent batch-a-unjins. Radishes look good too...but they won't do good things to your breath.”

“My backyard looks awesome this year! Wish I had more room in the garden for some zucchini or other squash. Its already crowded with 3 tomato plants, 2 rows of peas, a row of beans, some lettuce and spinach.

My butterfly bush has FINALLY decided to grow, so I guess it is a perennial. I moved quite a few things around to make more space in my perennial garden - looks great. Can't wait for it all to fill in.”

“From what I have seen and heard, butterfly bushes need to be cut back pretty drastic in the fall.”

“Depends on which kind of butterfly bush, HikerDuane. Buddleias need severe cutbacks, Asclepias and other herbaceous types die back every fall or winter. The African Butterfly bush I had in Florida (the flowers really looked like blue butterflies) Died back after a hard freeze, and would come back in a different location.”

“I have an asclepia - and I cut it back late last fall. Should I not cut it back this year, treebait?

I transplanted a lady's mantle too, and its unhappy about it. Hope it springs back to life quickly.”

“I got my peppers in today---5 chilis, 5 habaneros, 2 chocolate bells, and 2 cubanellas


plus, I planted ten hills of summer squash--both zucs and yellow. I hope I planted enough.”

“Where do you live XL?

Do not plant the the annual rye. Has the backfill settled completely? What have you done as far as seedbed prep?”

“I'm watching Puff the yard cat (Smoky's twin) tossing a mole or something into the air again and again, in the onion bed. Now the mystery of the flattened onions is solved. It's really cute to watch, too.”

“

they are soooo sweet this year!”

“Fresh, strawberries? Off with your head! I finally threw out my old ones from my freezer dating back to the mid to late 90's this last winter, they even looked bad to me. I had been making freezer jam just a year ago from my supply.”

“There is a lot more out there getting ready to be ripe :)”

“Our blueberries are starting to ripen. They're nothing like the ones you get at the store.”

“I pulled up about a bushel of yellow granex (think Vidalia) onions Yesterday. I have to get the Texas sweets this afternoon. One of my neighbors and her 2 kids (no nature/outdoor experience whatsoever) stopped by, because they saw me walking into the garage with armloads of onions. The kids have never seen a functioning garden before, never seen tadpoles, didn't know what veggies looked like when they were still growing. These kids hung out and asked an unending stream of questions about all of it for an hour. I was impressed. The younger boy, almost 5 ( and usually uncontrollable) won't eat veggies, but discovered fresh sugar snap peas and radish seed pods (not fully developed, so they're like snap beans with a peppery finish)and now wants to grow a garden. It's not too late to plant bush beans. I figure that would be a great way for them to start.

I'm putting in bush beans and soybeans (edamame) where the onions were, by the way.”

“Tree, I ran into two co-workers that had no idea that big bulb onions were once green onions LOL I'm growing onions for a co-worker (She paid me for it) and when i brought in green onions to this co-worker that's when folks started asking questions.

It's amazing what gardeners take for common knowledge is actually something profoundly new to other folks.”

“Years ago while I was butchering my cornish cross chickens, the neighbors grandkids came over and were oohing and aweing, saying gross, then wanted a couple feet to take home, as the last thing I did was cut the feet off at the knee. I told them to ask grandma as they would stay there for a week or more at a time. Grandma found the feet the next morning by the kids bed. Funny story told by her.”

“CHERRIES ARE RIPE!!!!!!

Ok, So I only have like 5 this year...but still!!!”

“I had to fight with a mocking bird for the cherries this year. Little effer stole most of them, and got all of my honey berries. SO far it hasn't shown interest in the blueberries. I should probably cover them up anyways.

These kids had never seen tadpoles up close before. They didn't even know that they are baby frogs and toads.”

“A freak hail storm hurt my garden yesterday - my biggest sunflower was totally killed, majority of my pea stalks were snapped almost in half, and some damage to my beans and maters. G's parents are camping ~3 miles from here, and they didn't get any hail or the wind we did.”

“aw....sorry :(

I've been picking so many peas, strawberries, blueberries, cabbages and greens that i'm sick of it LOL send some of that hail over here...”

“I'm stuck in Florida for the week. HPM dand well better water my potted things and garden this time. GRRRR.”

“I'll be pickin peas in another couple weeks, it has just been so cool, then bam! in the upper 80's. The gophers have been raising a little ruckus, but I have been getting their numbers down on the weekends when I am at home. Caught five now, they ate two of my potato plants last week and a couple of my pumpkin plants and some of the peas. They somehow missed the beans, one of their favorites.”

“Seed catalogs have started arriving. Got Seed Savers Exchange and Pinetree Garden Seeds so far along with the first snow of the year on Friday.”

“Stupid effing post problems

I got my Pinetree gardens catalog in this weekend too.”

“We ate a couple of this years sweet potatoes last night. I diced and roasted them with olive oil, cumin, cinnamon, cardamon, salt and pepper. They came out very moist, almost wet. They were much more like pumpkin than last year`s sweet potatoes. These were supposed to be the same variety too, but I really doubt it.”

“Now that it is below zero, I want to go bping one more time this month. What am I thinking?”

“Sounds like fun, if you`ve got the right gear.”

“Thoughts on the garden...

Now that I've decided to get rid of all the girasoles (Jerusalem artichokes) I finally found information on how to cultivate the dang things. Keep them cut to only 4 feet or so, so they put all their energy to tuber production. I've tried prepping and cooking the things, but they turn out terrible. They're best eaten raw. They're somewhere between raw carrot and potato in hardness, and rather sweet, with a faint hint of celery. I just washed and lightly scraped them, and ate them out of hand. I think they'd be fantastic in salads. They don't store worth beans though; they dry out very quickly. It's easiest just to leave them in the dirt, and pull them out as needed. I just ate 2 handsful of them, with some baby carrots and radishes that were growing in the lawn around the garden area. Cool.

I've got some of my onion and shallot seeds started; the shallot seeds smell good. I've never grown them from seed before.

I keep pulling carrots from the lawn (heavy clay) and they're always straight as can be. I haven't grown too many, because I've always heard that they get deformed from growing in heavy soil. Not the case, apparently, with my sparkly red mud.

Laurel wants her own garden area this year, so we're going to till under another patch of failed lawn and put in some veggies and flowers for her. She wants to start some flowers NOW. Annual sweet peas to the rescue. They prefer cooler weather.

Anyone here do any canning/ freezing? I plan to get into this later this year. I'm a newbie as far as I'm concerned. I haven't done any canning, pickling, or anything like that since I was 16 or 17 years old. Many, many moons ago...”

“I always thought they tasted like waterchestnuts and would go good in stir fry.”

“the ground is still froze here and has some fresh snow. I need to consult my seed catalogs and order some seeds soon to get a good selection. never know, may warm up.”

“Pansies love cold too Treebait.

I can and freeze.

We're underway w/ garden plans too. WAY too early to do anything but dream up here. Birch has plans for building a greenhouse this year. I'm hoping it works out; would be lovely having greens and a hot house tomato or two. he's also wanting to move to raised beds and increase our growing area greatly by taking down a useless cottonwood tree (hooray) and I will move my perennial garden I put in fall of 08. It's always fun to rearrange that stuff anyways.
Thinking about chickens. Birch has decided, I'm still not sure. I don't believe the city would be pleased.”

“I wouldn't mind a chicken or two. The town doesn't care, but the HOA does. ;P

We're back to cold, crappy wet weather here. Ugh. I loved being out in the warm sun for the first time since November, when I went to Fl. for Thanksgiving. At least I got a lot of yard maintenance done.

I soaked a bunch of navy beans, for making baked beans the other day. I put one of the soaked beans in a little dirt, and it's already sprouting. Cool. Not long now, it'll be a kitty snack. They love sprouts. >:(”

“My seeds and strawberries are ordered. Ordered from Park's, Gurney's and Pinetree. I'm sure I will have to shovel snow off the garden area to plant the strawberries.”

“I've got several kinds of seeds started right now. I picked up some celery seed yesterday. I haven't seen that available around here before. It's a Utah variety though, so it'll be stringy. There hasn't been much celery development over the years for some reason. There aren't that many varieties available, unlike 10 million kinds of tomatoes.

We have more rain in the forecast for tonight and tomorrow. I want to get out and get the gardens beds ready, but it's way too wet. I'll just make the mud clods worse if I try to do anything out there.”

“In a couple weeks I'll start my spinach outside. :) they can go in even if there is snow and ice yet. Next weekend i'm starting my peppers and tomatoes and herbs.”

“I need to see if I can set aside part of my garden for early stuff and try to get it in, in March, some of the greens, root crops and then plant more later. Kinda hard to get motivated when the ground is still muddy. I want to "develop" some more of my ground that I have been just growing Winter Rye on. Love to see the waving heads in the summer.”