I've put a lot of things in or on the ground this month. The leaves, weeds, and dead animals will become dirt (or "soil" to be PC for all those dirtologists). And the seeds I planted will hopefully grow me some flowers and veggies!
Some have already come up...and some seeds got dug up and eaten by a squirrel before they had a chance to sprout. I was going to let the seedlings go a little longer in their little yogurt cups, but after one feast, the squirrel had it in its pea brain that there were seeds in the cups. Each day there would be new little holes dug around the base of the sprouted seedlings. I tried moving the trays of seedlings all around, but this squirrel is stealthy. He even found them on the tractor seat! So I gave up playing hide and go seek with the squirrel and my trays of seedlings and planted them in the ground. The squirrel is on Nash's hit list. Unfortunately (for me) Nash has never killed a thing in his life.
For future reference...plant these things in May:
Morning Glory & Chinese Lanterns: They climb, so give them a trellis or something. Ruth uses string weighted at the bottom by a T-post. Soak and scratch the Morning Glory seeds to give them a head start.
Dahlias: These were dug up in the fall and stored in the cellar. They were put in the ground at the beginning of May and the first leaves showed up last week.
Gladiolas: I probably should have put these in the ground (6" deep) in April, but I didn't get to it. I got them at the dollar store and I buried them shallow...a rough start to life, but we'll see how they do.
Nasturtium: I put some seeds I collected in previous years in the ground, but was so excited to see these flowers, I bought a plant and put in by my front walkway. I'm not necessarily a fan of blaze orange, but my grandmother always had nasturtiums so they show up in many of my happy memories. See it?
Strawflower & Statice: I've never grown these before, but there was a barren area next to the barn so I sprinkled a bunch of seeds there. If they come up I'll have nice cut flowers I can dry for winter bouquets. Right now there is a bunch of stuff coming up...I'm not sure what's good and what's bad. So I'm letting everything grow up a bit. We'll see what I've got in that area next month.
Veggies and tomatoes!
I planted in about 1/3 of the fenced in garden area. Peas, beans, lettuce, cucumbers, sqush, zucchini, green onions, green peppers, eggplant, tomatoes, and basil. Watermelon and pumpkin went to the squirrel.
I started all but the peas, beans, lettuce, and onions in yogurt cups in the past few months and transplanted them outside this month. Note: when transplanting tomatoes, bury the stems a few inches—almost to the first set of leaves.
The remaining 2/3 of the area will get filled up with staggered plantings of peas and beans (to ensure I am sick of them by the end of the summer) and whatever Ruth wants to plant. Probably some swiss chard (which I OD'd on last year), more tomatoes, and whatever else catches our eyes at stores in the next few months. I also planted the tomatoes kind of close to each other because the ones I started from seed look so pathetic that I don't think they'll make it. If they do, I may transplant them again and space them out more.
I also planted potatoes for the first time. Another case of seat-of-my-pants gardening. I've heard people talk about planting potatoes over the years, but never really looked into it. Even when I went to plant them. Ruth went out of town for a few weeks and as she was leaving she said, "I bought some potatoes to plant, they are in the fridge." I always envisioned putting pre-sprouted potatoes in the ground. But I suppose they are probably even more inclined to sprout if they are already in the ground.
So I chopped the potatoes up so that each piece had at least 2 eyes and buried them about 4" deep. When Ruth got home she asked if I had left the chopped pieces out to dry first, which I hadn't. I had never heard of this part. We'll see what comes up. Just in case I may leave some potatoes out to sprout...
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