Day 19 - Corn Damage Diary

I'm posting this the day after I took the photo. I did not get the fertilizer on the corn over the weekend, like I had hoped.  I did, however, get it sprinkled around the corn on Day 20 (June 18) so I'm not falling too far behind. Today is probably a better day for fertilizing, anyway, because it was a much cooler morning, and won't be too hot today. 

While sprinkling the blood meal around the stalks, I noted that several branches were broken (not from wind) and one tall stalk was laying on the ground.  Although I did not see any prints (man or animal) in the dirt, I am assuming that an animal took a shortcut through and damaged several plants. I set the one back up and am hoping that the roots were not damaged since the soil was still pretty moist and they did not look broken off. In the mean time, I put the PVC cross back up over the area damaged, and placed a side barrier of PVC on the south side of the garden as a (hopeful) deterrent. I guess we will see if that works, or if I need to get my bird netting out for the next month. Big Sigh.  The photo below is "yesterday" when there was no damage yet. 

The large stalks are growing quickly. The smaller ones are working on it.  The two replants from last week are about one inch tall. 

Day 19 6-17-19

Day 16 - Corn Journal

So I did replant some of germinated corn (2) that had not yet popped up, then suddenly, one did pop up in a location that I had already replanted a week ago. CRAZY! The earliest corn is about four inches in height while the younger ones are about two inches. So they are not too far behind.  The germinated replants have already sprouted and barely peeking out of the ground. All Good, regardless.  I plan to add blood meal around the larger ones this weekend. 

6-14 corn likes hot temps

The Does Visit

This morning, three of the four cucumber seeds popped up.  No photos of them but they look like healthy starts.  

This evening, at twilight, two large does (female deer - white tails) visited for a nice graze.  I wish I had a telephoto lens, but even with that, the low light would still make it hard to get a decent photo. 

A few of the corn are still struggling. We did hit 81F today, so I will check on them again tomorrow. 

Does Grazing at Twilight

Gardening Update June 9 2019

I took a lot of photos, so let's start with the newest sprouts. The radishes are sprouting and so is the lettuce.  The radishes have full sun in my square garden bed. The lettuce is planted in small two gallon pots in the shade of my trees to minimize burning from the sun.
Tiny radish sprouts even cool weather	The lettuce sprouted too this week
This past week (Wed. - Saturday) we had very cool weather and rain, which normally would have little impact on bell pepper plants, except we had a heavy hail during one thunder storm on Friday... And, yes, the poor bell peppers got hit hard.
Holes in the Pepper plant leaves	Pepper plant leaves sliced and diced
A different type of damage to my berries.  I pulled the berries into the greenhouse (along with the tomatoes) before the cold temps set in. So they were protected.  On Saturday, I even ate my first sweet taste of strawberries of the season. But, I'm not the only one who loves sweet strawberries.  The ants came in for the meal last night.  I have since sprayed WD40 around the buckets to keep new ones away. This does a nice job of keeping them out of the berries (since they can't fly) and I am not inclined to spray anything ON the plants. But, yah, those little buggers make quick work on some very nice ripe strawberries!
Looks GREAT from the back side. Ha!	Half the berry eaten by tiny ants!
Newer Berry Plant from Last Year	Biggest Producer this Year
Okay, so now let's look at the Garlic and Onions.  Hey the fall planted Garlic is still looking great.  Fingers crossed that we actually get nice, solid garlic from this crop. This is the last month and they should start sending up some spiraly scapes soon. Cut those off for cooking since leaving them will hinder the size of the garlic. I never seem to have very good luck with onions. But I keep trying.  So, this year's got pummeled in one of our thunder/wind storms back in May, and I just don't think they are going to revive. In two 5 gal buckets are the ones I salvaged from the garden bed before I prepped it for this year's garden. Some are surviving, two have gone to seed, and three are struggling.  So it is anyone's guess.  I have photos of the "buds" on the two "seed" onions, below.
Garlic near the end	Beat Up Onions
Salvaged Onions	Onion Blooming for Seeds
At least I was smart enough to pull in the tomatoes before this week's storm hit. They are doing well; growing fairly fast.
German Blooming	Purple Cherokee Blooms
SunGold Tomatoes -n- Blossoms	SunGold Different Angle
The hail storm did NOT phase the potatoes.  The potatoes are developing a lot of blossoms which is a sign that the potatoes are on the vines under ground and are growing.  We will need to pull these barrels under the trees for the cooling shade (like we have for the lettuce), or the hot sun will stunt the growth of the potatoes. Once the blooms die back, the leaves will also start to dry, and then we can dig up the potatoes for storage in a cool dark box in the garage for the rest of this summer. Red Potato Blossoms
And that sums up the first week of June's crazy weather!

Day 11 2019 - Corn Journal

The corn has been doing fairly well, with the exception of a few of the starts have started dying. I have used all of the remaining starts from the greenhouse, but still.... I am guessing that the cold spell that we had, set them back? Not sure.  I am going to germinate ten more seeds.  I have waffled back and forth about doing this. but, even though they will be two weeks behind the rest, perhaps it won't be too late a start. So, for now, we have a fairly good start, but not as good as last year. 

I do think that the row cover did a great job on the ones that had already sprouted early.  There are about six that are struggling.  The next few days will be really hot. So, that will either kill off the weak ones, or pull them out of their lull.

Of the six seeds I had starting in the greenhouse, only four of them sprouted. Two mildewed in the ground.  I will just germinate the ten new seeds in my garden window in the house where there is less humidity and temp fluctuation. 

I will put a dose of blood meal around the well established ones later this week. 

Sweet Corn Starts 11 days since planting

Day 6 2019 - Corn Sprouts

Corn Status Update - More and more of the corn sprouts have been peeking up since the weekend. I now have 38 of the 40 seeds spouted which, even if the other two do not pop up, I have spare starts in the green house. 

We should be good with a thick crop of 5 x 8 corn stalks in my 4 x 8 corn bed. North to South, the seeds were planted 8 inches apart while East to West, the seeds were planted 10.5 inches apart. 

I found one tiny stalk/seed pulled out and laying on top of the soil.  I was able to replant it with one of the six starts I have in the green house which just started to pop up this morning. 

Weather prediction is that temps are going to drop from the highs of 70s-80sF to the low 60s for the next few days.  I have everything in place to cover the crop for those days with a floating row cover in my attempt to keep the soil warmer.  I will cover it tonight before the cold night temps set in. 

Day 6 of Corn Bed

First Weekend of June Planting

I know, I'm about two weeks late on many of the summer plants, but I did get the seeds in the ground today. 

Planted today:

• Lettuce 3 types, 5 per pot
• Cucumbers 4 plants, 3 pots (I trellis them between pots)
• Radishes 1 row
• Carrots 2 rows (intended to plant 4 short rows but changed layout of garden, see below)
• Thyme 1 row
• Basil 1 row
• Dill 1 row
• Bush Beans 1 row

There will be a lot of thinning over the next few weeks.  I way over planted everything.

This particular garden bed was a mess of roots and blackberry vines that came up through the bottom of the garden. The snakes were not in this garden under the "weed killing tarp" tilling it up for me. Plus I had to take a spade to get deep into the soil to dig out the stupid wild blackberry vines, and get the weed roots dug/broke up. I "hand tilled" with a shove, pulled out weeds/roots, threw on a thin layer of manure before raking/leveling and planting. I am hopeful that I got the majority of the roots and that they won't "re-root."  

This past month, I had a hard time keeping the tarp in place on this bed because this bed is more exposed to the winds, and the storms kept blowing the tarp back, exposing the edges of the soil to the rain and stuff. It took me the better part of Saturday to get the soil ready to plant. I have a "cage" around this garden bed because, with the bed being out away from the house, the crazy dogs, cats, coyotes and deer like to romp in it. I included a photo (more for my memory of what's where) of the rows of herbs and vegetables that are in this bed.

Remember that before I threw the tarp on that garden bed, I had pulled out a bunch of wintered over onions? Some are struggling to grow. Two, however, have started to flower.  They grew some really thick stalks with one big flower bud at the top of that stalk. I have read that if I allow it to continue until it is dead/dried, that I can shake the seeds from the flower into an envelope and plant them early next spring in the greenhouse. It will drain all the nutrients from the onion in the process. Worth the try, I guess. 

Day Three - Corn

In the other raised "corn" bed, half of the corn have come up. That's a pretty fast start - I planted mostly germinated seeds just three days ago! I counted 20 little sprouts today.  I have my PVC in place in case I need to cover to protect the plants.  The weather temps are supposed to turn cold (low 60s as the highs) later this week. I have the floating row cover all ready to toss over the corn bed for those days to protect the tender growth and keep the ground warmer.

With that, my Micro Garden is on its way.  Finger Crossed!!!! 

I took some more photos today.

Bigger Garden Bed
Corn Sprouts on 6/2/19	Some Sprouts Circled - PVC in place.
Cut Oregano Drying	Potato Barrels
Berries Starting to Ripen