Garden Time, JINMAN ??????

[jinman]

...You know getting older and bending over thinning those rows out gets to the back . I told my wife I was going to get one of those grabber things that you can reach down and pick stuff up with, modify it and use it to pull weeds .

David

David, I know exactly what you mean. Last year it took me forever to plant, but this year it's a breeze. I also have a little tiller like the Mantis that does a great job weeding. If I'm lucky, I won't have to bend over until it comes time to pick veggies.

We'll see in a few weeks if I have to do any serious thinning.

I do feel sorry for all you folks who still have winter weather. It's great to get out in March here and plant a garden.

 

[jinman]

Hey BB_TX (Bill)! You started this thread and now I haven't heard much from you. How is your garden going? How about some pictures. I'm not going to let you off that easy.

 

[Egon]

I do feel sorry for all you folks who still have winter weather. It's great to get out in March here and plant a garden.

Okay !!!

 

[Thomas]

"I do feel sorry for all you folks who still have winter weather. It's great to get out in March here and plant a garden."

OUCH that hurt,but I'll let it slide if you send some of your warm weather our way to help drop 2+ feet of snow Jim.

 

[jinman]

OUCH that hurt,but I'll let it slide if you send some of your warm weather our way to help drop 2+ feet of snow Jim.

Thomas and Egon...
This summer when the temperatures here are in the 100s, I'll be wishing I was where you are. Right now it has been dry with no significant rain for almost three weeks. The trouble with planting my garden is that I have to immediately start watering. However, look at this forcast for tonight and tomorrow. It looks like things may change for us.

Forecast for the week

 

[Egon]

That type of weather looks like prime summertime here.

What is +100F anyway???

 

[txdon]

That type of weather looks like prime summertime here.

What is +100F anyway???

Egon I was outside last August framing the Garage/Storage building this was a typical day.

Before the sun rises it is 80F. You want a cold drink not coffee. Your AC has been running all night and as soon as you step outside the warm humid morning warns of a punishing day. Your skins starts to turn moist in the attempt to prepare for the onslaught of heat. At mid morning the temperature is now 90F you are thirsty and drinking and drinking the sun is glaring in your eyes and if you hair is thin your scalp starts to burn. Everything is done in the shade. At lunch (if your lucky) you can take off your wet clothes, shower and put on some dry clothes and feel a bit refreshed. You are not really too hungry but a light cool salad or sandwich sounds good. After lunch every minute seems to get hotter at 100F at mid afternoon every tool that is exposed to the sun burns your hand, it is hard to breath, every 10 minutes you must get more water with some type of electrolyte added. Your mind cannot analyze as well anymore. At 5:00 PM it is now the hottest time of the day it is 107F. You feel like someone opened the oven door and you have to breath the hot air, you cannot escape it. You find yourself sitting more and more drinking more and more and asking yourself what was I doing now, then, what am I doing out here now any way, you escape by going indoors for a while. You cool off and look outside the sun is less bright and it is 7:00 PM you cautiously step outside it has cooled 5F to a tolerable 102F. You slowly work for about an hour and call a day. At 10:00 PM you check the temperature, it is 98F. You sigh and think of the cool weather Eegon is having, he may even be in a sweater right now!

 

[Egon]

Good gosh, we get a few days at +35 C [ 95F ] and that is shade time for me now.

When we first moved here There were days I'd work in that temperature but no longer. Maybe I realized retirement had arrived.

 

[Bird]

Good gosh, we get a few days at +35 C [ 95F ] and that is shade time for me now.

When we first moved here There were days I'd work in that temperature but no longer. Maybe I realized retirement had arrived.

I think it's called "old age", Egon. I never lived or worked in an air-conditioned house or building until I was grown and left home. And I can remember seeing more than 110F on the thermometer in the shade at my dad's service station more than once. I'm not at all sure I could do that now, though.

My youngest daughter had never been in the little bass boat I bought last August and she'd never seen the state park at Ray Roberts Lake, so she wanted me to take her boat riding yesterday. The water temperature in the lake ranged from 57 to 60F and the air temperature got to 80 yesterday.

Today I've mowed, edged, trimmed, fertilized, and spread a granular insecticide on the yard. If it ain't raining, as forecast, when I get up in the morning, I'll get the sprinklers going.

 

[jinman]

Today I've mowed, edged, trimmed, fertilized, and spread a granular insecticide on the yard. If it ain't raining, as forecast, when I get up in the morning, I'll get the sprinklers going.

I powerwashed 3/4 of my deck today, hoping all the time that it would start raining and I'd have an excuse to stop and let my back rest. The stain that looked so good just two years ago was chipped and showing bare wood everywhere the summer sun hits in the afternoon. I've stained and put polyurethane varnish on my front door every year since my house was built. One year of sun and the paint looks as old as I do.

 

[Bird]

Jim, I sure understand that situation; sun and water will do it. The house we had before I retired in Dallas had the front door recessed in far enough that it only got sun on the bottom half, but it also got wet when I watered the yard, so eventually I took it down and refinished it, and added a glass storm door. And now the one step and 3 or 4 feet of the south end of our 12' x 22' deck gets the sun every afternoon and gets wet when I water the yard. I put an extra coat of Sikkens Cetol Dek on the whole deck about a year and a half ago and Margaret told me this past week that I need to work on that end of the deck again. I had noticed that, but just haven't done it.

 

[Egon]

Good morning Thomas. Are you getting the same impression as I that several "Chiels" are applying some salt to our cold sores!!

 

[BB_TX]

Hey BB_TX (Bill)! You started this thread and now I haven't heard much from you. How is your garden going? How about some pictures. I'm not going to let you off that easy.

All I have done so far is till it all and put my onions in.
I was so impressed with your garden last year I wanted to make sure you documented it again.

 

[Thomas]

Good morning Thomas. Are you getting the same impression as I that several "Chiels" are applying some salt to our cold sores!!

Morning Egon.
Naaaa,can't believe those's southern gentlemen would do such a thing...wellll maybe tiny tad,

Enjoy these warm temps,gotta feeling old man winter not done w/us yet.

 

[Bird]

Well, that 100% chance of rain forecast for last night did happen, I guess. I got about .15", a power outage for a couple of hours during the night (with no wind, thunder, or lightning ) and the 100% chance forecast for today has now been reduced to a 30% chance and I think that's overly optimistic, so I just now turned the sprinklers on. At least there's still no wind at all and it's 62F out side.

 

[jinman]

Well, I've chronicled the rain we got in the Photos forum, but here is a shot of my tator patch experiment. I decided to leave the hay in place to see just how it would work out. Getting potatoes to come up through a foot of hay is slow in comparison to getting them to sprout from dirt, but I'm pretty excited about our success so far. I have potatoes over a foot tall. I hope they are making lots of tubers below ground/hay too.

 

[Egon]

I'm gonna try the potato method if I can scare up some mown dead grass from last year.

 

[BTDT]

In this pic, the 20" tire to the left of the tomato cage (the tire with the other tire leaning on it), is where I am going to try the potato in the tire growing suggestion. As the plant comes up, you add more hay, soil, etc. Then you add more tires, more hay, until harvest, then just kick the whole thing over and pick potatoes up off of ground. We'll see.

 

[jinman]

I'm gonna try the potato method if I can scare up some mown dead grass from last year.

Egon, remember this is "super hay." It's been walked on by a donkey, layed on by two old dogs, and all of them did unmentionable things into and around the hay. That makes it magical.

 

[Egon]

Well, maybe I should try some seaweed?