Garden Time!

57°f this morning (13°C), cloudy after a night of heavy rain. Birds singing, owls and turkey gobblers calling in the woods.

After all that drudge work of cleaning out my ebay room, it was wonderful to get outside! Wednesday I spent a few hours tilling,  then used a spading fork to dig down and loosen the soil, then tilled again yesterday to get a small patch ready for planting. 

Those tall plants in the foreground are my leeks from last year, still doing well, and a short row of chard that also wintered over. Some kale is coming back too.

Now there are 3 kinds of onion sets in a short row, and two kinds of lettuce, radishes, beets, chard and carrot seeds in the ground. I mulched the strawberries that have escaped from their containers and made a pretty nice patch all by themselves.

So we have a little jump on the season, even though it is supposed to be down in the mid-20s area night next week. But these are hardy seeds and sets that will not be bothered by cold temperatures,  and the ground is unlikely to freeze. 

Spring is coming on gangbusters now. Sadly the pear tree is blooming so it is likely to get bitten by the freeze next week. We had a marvelous pear harvest last year, though, with plenty in the cellar still. If you remember, we had so many we used them to make pear cider too.

A little garden walkabout from yesterday:

Under my poor ash tree, which is slowly being killed by the emerald ash borer. I refuse to cut it until it is completely dead. It still had a little life in last year. It used to be my blue bottle tree.

The view from the porch.

It is a battle with the dogs in this area. I am trying to plant it completely in spring bulbs but they seem to think it is their nap room. Notice all my booby traps to try to keep them out.

A little parsley plant that survived winter.

And a row of chives and parsley in the herb garden. I never got this garden cleaned up last fall. 

Little johnny-jump-ups coming back to life in a planter.

Apparently I planted these last fall. Now I need to look them up to see what they are! Some sort of dwarf iris, I think. There is quite a patch of them.

 

Little dwarf daffodils, which must have been planted by chipmunks, come back stronger every year in their odd location. The mess of downed trees are from when Sarah's road was dozed. Eventually we will get it cleaned up.

Coming and going along the front walk. I need to tidy up where we spread mulch.

We leave for Florida tomorrow,  a quick trip to see our youngest son. By the time we get back, it will be cold again...and the grass will need to be mowed. I so relish these early days of Spring, before mowing and weeding commence!

It was a perfect evening for the firepit. What a really nice day.

Leaving you today with a couple dance videos from what is evidently a TikTok craze right now, dancing to a Beyoncé song. This first one sure reminds me of AC...maybe its the beard and flash of red?

And here are the Gardiner brothers, Irish dance champions.

I have to admit, I like the old guy best, but the boys are pretty cool too.

Copyright Susanna Holstein. All rights reserved. No Republication or Redistribution Allowed without attribution to Susanna Holstein.