Hi Hiveans, folks in the Agricultural Mindset and everyone who loves gardening.
Well, I was hoping this week would be nice and calm. Inducing to great garden growth. Instead we got tornadoes, more rain and cold nights.
On Saturday my parents and I spent a good part of our evening sheltering in the basement and listening to the wind howl as hail battered the house. In between the rumbling and howling of the weather we listened to emergency weather reports as they kept everyone updated about a supercell that had formed over the city and the four small tornados that yad formed and were making their way across the countryside. One briefly appeared less than a mile from our house. The power flickered on and off. And then suddenly it was gone.
Our house was spared from anything other than heavy wind and hail. I walked outside and save for a few emergency vehicle sirens in the distance everything was eerily calm and quiet. Save for a few small oak branches that had snapped off and littered the street the garden was unscathed.
So all in the garden had maybe 3 good days of sun. The rest were very windy, rainy or like Saturday.
However, there is some promising growth this week. Many of the plants are flowering!
Here are the tomatoes. Last week I added the circular growing lattices for them to climb on. Unfortunately, the resident cardinal bird has discovered them too. He sits on top of the wire frame and surveys the open field. He also poops on the tomatoes. Not sure what to do about that other than hope he moves on.
The Sweet 100 Cherries are still by far the tallest and fastest growing. They also have a decent amount of flowers budding up. I figure they will be the first to have harvestable fruit.
The Better Boy tomatoes are still compact and relatively short. Both are doing well though. Unfortunately, they are the ones the Cardinal seems to prefer pooping on. Also, they seem the most sensitive to bad weather. They showed some sign in the beginning of the week that they didnt appreciate the cold. They're doing better now.
My favorite the San Marzano has really sprung up this week and done well. Its almost as tall as the Cherry tomatoes and has a good amount of flowers.
The Italian basil hasn't gained much height and showed some stress in the form of leaf curl. But hes enjoying the current sunny weather and is preparing to send out side branches. So all good. Smells awesome too from several feet away.
The Jalapeno has a few buds forming at its crown and is beginning to create side branches. He's tall and lanky at the moment but an aggressive grower.
The bell peppers (capsicum) seem to be attracting some sort of pest thats nibbling on them. I need to do more investigation. So far I've found a catepillar, and earlier in the week i found a grasshopper jumping around. I'm not convinced I've solved whos eating my bell peppers.
Nonetheless, despite their short stature they are producing little bell peppers and flower buds. Here's a pic of the tinsy bellpeppers starting.
The Boston pickle cucumber is doing well, although theres not much to write home about. But still steady growth.
The zuccinni had a good week. They are spreading out and they have dense clusters of flower buds at the center of their shoots.
Here's my attempt at a close up shot of the zuccinni buds. My tablet wont focus if i get too close and zooming in just makes a pixelated mess.
One of last weeks newcomers the Okra definitely did not like those cold nights and got stressed. They are growing steadily, but the new leaves are a pale green that im not sure I like the colour of. Its also in one of the beds that got some of the worst in flooding from all the heavy rain. I'll keep an eye on it. But I'm not too invested in the okra anyways.
The cantaloupe next to the okra is getting thick and doing lots of stuff but its not growing in height. Just thicker. And its leaves have remained folded all week. Another one I need to keep my eye on.
On to the lettuce bed thats doing exceptional!
The Swiss Chard is getting pretty good rosettes of fresh new leaves and looks very healthy. In a few weeks I'll start snipping a few leaves here and there and making salads. The photo doesnt do them justice. They are very lush and robust.
The bronze Romain is doing the best of all. They've doubled their leaf count and size! I happy.
The coriander/cilantro is perky and delicious. I keep sampling the leaves. They are sharp and full of flavour. You can see some reddening and purple in some of the leaves. I think that was the response to the cold weather.
The red onions are doing better than i thought. Onions like cold weather, so they were thrilled with this weeks weather. The real test is to see how they do with the warmer months coming up. I did lose a few of the tiny onion sprouts on the far left. But the rest all have greened up and gotten much more stout.
The broccoli had a good week and got a lot more leaves on them. They're finally beggining to do something. Maybe next week they'll show signs of flowering. They haven't really gained much in height but they have gotten twice as wide.
The cabbage have tight rosettes of leaves forming at their center. To me I still think they are the cutest looking veggies in the garden.
There are the beets but I forgot to get pics of them. They're doing ok. Nothing exciting though. As a consalation here's a shot of the broccoli/cabbage bed. The beets should be somewhere half hidden in the background.
The seedlings are doing great. The radishes will probably go into the ground later this week as they are making their first sets of real leaves. The fancy lettuce in the background of this pic are doing well too. They're small but a few gave actually sent out real leaves too instead of just cotyledons.
The carrot seedlings are finally looking solid. They're still weeks away from being planted.
Tomato seedlings hanging in there despite the lousy weather.
Well, thats it for this week. I have received a packet of Black Magic Zuccini seeds. They look like normal zuccini but apparently a little smaller fruit size and excellent flavour. I'll be germinating those seeds this week. I am also expecting sunflower seeds to arrive this week.
I'm not going to comment on my expectations for the garden this week as I have no idea what the weather is going to do. I'm just hoping no more crazy wind or tornado warnings.
I also have that backyard relandscape project to continue on this upcoming week.
I'll have a post in a few days about that.
If anyone would like to see what the prior weeks have looked like for my garden journal you can find the posts here;
@hidave/victory-garden-post-one
@hidave/victory-garden-post-two
@hidave/victory-garden-post-three
Wishing everyone health and safety and I hope all of your gardens are doing fantastic.
Best,
-hidave
All photos by hidave