Tag Archives: grapes

Drifts of beautiful pink Mexican poppies are nodding in the breeze in our front yard. They self seed, and are taking over. I’m letting them grow where they want because they are so pretty.

I went to gather eggs this morning and found Henrietta on the nest. She got disturbed and stood up before I could snap her picture. Chicken Little was at the door to the coop, awaiting her turn in the nest. My three hens have four nests to choose from, but they only like to lay eggs in one of the nests. Go figure.

Two of our avocados went on top of nachos this week, made with organic blue corn tortilla chips, grated cheese, and store-bought salsa.

Should have harvested this red cabbage last week. It has split really badly, but it will still taste good fried up with an apple and served with German sausages. That’s about all I know to do with red cabbage. What do you do with yours?

I am not having good luck with my Grandpa Admire lettuce. I had 23 sprouts, but all have died or were eaten by pillbugs except for the last three seedlings. I am hoping to get at least one of these plants to maturity so I can see what this lettuce tastes like.

I have much better luck growing Black-seeded Simpson lettuce, which is my favorite kind. I will thin and transplant this tiny patch soon. My second favorite lettuce is Forellenschuss, otherwise known as Speckled Trout. I’ll have to see if I have any seeds left of that variety. It is so pretty, I can’t resist it. But my husband thinks it looks diseased because of the speckles. Go figure.

The little round things that I have been photographing turned out to be flower buds on my grapevines. These are the real flowers. If you look really, really closely, you can see stamens and pistols on the flowers. They are miniscule. I hope the bees find them or I won’t get any grapes. I worry because I haven’t see any bees lately, and my Granny Smith apple blossoms don’t seem to have been fertilized. I had more flowers on that tree than ever this spring, but so far I haven’t found even one apple set from all those flowers. It is still blooming a bit, so I’m still hopeful for fruit set.

Redhead Radish cotyledon leaves.

Tendergreen burpless cucumber cotyledon leaves. I’m also growing Straight Eight this year, a new cucumber variety for me. I hope to make some pickles this summer.

A mystery pumpkin or winter squash sprouted from the compost. It is doing so nicely, that I’m letting it grow. Probably a big mistake. We’ll see. Mammoth snow peas are growing behind the pumpkin. They will grow up my pea fence by the deck. This is my second planting of peas on this fence this year. With luck, I may be able to get in a crop of beans along this fence after the peas are done. Time will tell.

This row of Cherokee Trail of Tears beans is growing by my water meter and hose bib in a tiny strip of otherwise useless soil. I usually get a crop of peas or beans from this patch of dirt by the side of the house. I’m also growing Blue Lake Pole Beans in the raised bed in back. They are farther along than these beans, which I will use as dried black beans.

This is my rejuvenated Garden of Infinite Neglect, or my GIN garden. I may change its name to Garden of Infinite Niceness, but niceness is such a blah word. Surely I can do better than that.

Everything has recovered from transplant shock, and I’ve even had a harvest of Red Sails lettuce (because I planted them as embarassingly mature transplants last week). The cucumbers, radishes, lettuce, beets and chard have sprouted from seed. I’m waiting for the carrots to sprout next, plus the rest of the beets. If they don’t sprout, I’ll reseed.

I added fertilizer to my three-year-old strawberry jar and rejuvenated it. I may get some strawberries from it this year.

Whoops, guess who should have harvested artichokes last week? These are a bit past prime, but will still be good if I pick them today.

Our Panamint nectarine has set about 30 fruits. The Snow Queen makes even better fruit, best nectarines I’ve ever tasted. My husband wants to know how many of THOSE that we’re getting, but they are just now finishing flowering. I’m happy that they ripen at different times so we aren’t inundated with nectarines.

Speaking of inundated…. Take a look at this Florida Prince peach tree. It is absolutely loaded with fruit this year. And it is all getting ripe at once. This is certainly a case of “use it or lose it.”

The lighting wasn’t optimal for a photo of my raised beds behind the herb garden in the foreground, but I put this in anyway so you can see what a jungle they are turning into with all those tomatoes, Brussels sprouts, kale, etc. My tomatoes are flowering, but only one has set any fruit so far. I go out in the morning and flick the flowers to help them set fruit, but it doesn’t seem to be doing any good. I need some Blossom Set. That really helps the tomatoes and peppers set fruit.