Busy Spring in the Garden!

 I've been having so much fun in the garden that my blogging can't keep up!

About 4 weeks ago, I gave up on the seeds I'd planted in the back raised bed due to the ongoing squirrel attacks. While we're planning an enclosure, I got busy on a new plan for spring. I pulled out a couple plants that I could salvage after the squirrel damage (the two asparagus, some chard and alyssum that may not make it). The soil level had settled a bit since the bed is so new, so I added several bags of raised bed mix, a few bags of composted chicken manure, and some coffee grounds from Starbucks. This helped bring the level up. After letting that settle for about a week, I then planted some tomato starts and one eggplant there. I did plant the tomato starts extra deep, but next time I think I'd plant them deeper. They're a cherry tomato and a plum tomato. I'm hoping since we don't actually eat those plants but rather their fruit that the squirrels will leave them alone. I did put a plastic cylinder around them to protect them for a bit just in case they're tempting. So far, so good. I also planted 2 of the cherry tomatoes in pots nearby.

We've deployed a couple rat traps that we hope will be annoying enough to at least discourage the critters. I also heard that sometimes the squirrels want the water in the seedlings as opposed to the seedlings themselves, so to try to help this I put out a saucer of water on the ground on the other side of the garden. The first few days of the traps being out and baited with sunflower seed butter, the traps were sprung. Since then, it's calmed down. Maybe it is helping, but I wouldn't bet on it. I don't notice a big recovery of the poor chard sprouts. 

We also planted a white guava tree in the back. On 3/30 it was 53 inches tall. So far, it's looking like it is fairly happy. 

I received cuttings of several types of sage and a red fig tree cutting that I'm attempting to root. 

At the garden exchange, I also picked some aloes suffering in a pot. Perhaps they hadn't been watered in a while. I'll see if I can revive them.

I sowed some old herb seeds indoors. Most haven't germinated, but the cilantro has. In fact, so much has come up in one little pot that I'm considering if I should attempt to separate them. 

This last weekend, we bought the cedar 2x2's to make the cage to exclude the rodents. We still need to get fasteners and hardware cloth.

Planted bulbs, Garden Update

 Recall the passion fruit vine I recently planted? It is not happy. The other day, I took a closer look at it and discovered 7 snails on or around it, which I removed. Then 2 days later, there were 2 more. I'll keep checking it and picking them off. I hope it recovers. My friend saw how sad it looks and told me not to worry as she'd already asked her other friend for more cuttings.

Remember the lettuce wasn't looking so good and I gave it fertilizer. That was an organic vegetable fertilizer brand. I think that was too much for it, as it quickly withered and died.

In other sad news, the asparagus starts that I'd enclosed in protective plastic sleeves (old juice jugs with top and bottom cut off) is browning. I'd guess the overheated in the sun. I've removed the sleeves, but kept the wire spikes I put in with them to dissuade rodents. I hope they're happier now.

And the great, yet inevitable, garden tragedy of the week is that right after fertilizing, the squirrels discovered the chard and beet seedlings. They had a feast! Hubby and I have been researching wire enclosures to decide what to make to exclude the squirrels from the garden.

Some of the flower seedling I planted over a month ago are starting to sprout, so we'll keep our fingers crossed for them.

The succulents we moved around a week or so ago are looking pretty good. A friend gave me another succulent that we put in the back border. Speaking of the border, we also planted snapdragon and alyssum starts there (and alyssum in the veggie bed). We also planted about a dozen of each ranunculus and freesia bulbs in the back border. I hope they get established and return for years! Time will tell.

Passion Fruit Vine, Eucalyptus, Fertilizing

Last week we finally had the eucalyptus removed from the back yard on the East side. It was a nice visual screen between us and the neighbor's but it was an enormous tree that was very out of place for the location and required lots of trimming to keep it safe that near the house. Plus, I disliked the leaves it dropped, knowing it was pushing out other plants. I'm looking forward to planting a fruit tree near there instead.

On Saturday (2/17/24), a friend gave me a passion fruit vine, which we planted in the back yard near the back fence. I hope it will grow on the fence eventually.

Today,  I fertilized the back vegetable bed, all the fruit trees, and a bit to the star jasmines. The many seeds I'd planted a few weeks ago in the vegetable bed germinated quickly and have been slow to do much since. I'm hoping the fertilizer will help. I really should thin them, too, but I haven't yet. I'm not the best at thinning

Garden Update

 The seeds that I planted directly into the raised bed are going crazy. Those were all ones I'd saved from last fall (beets x 2 types, chard, lettuce) plus a newer envelope of carrots. I didn't realize they'd do so well. If I'd known, I would have planted them more sparingly.

On the other hand, the seeds that were mostly old that I planted in little pots or 6 packs aren't doing nearly as much. Fingers crossed that more come up.

Last week, I brought seeds (beets x 2, chard, lettuce, celery) first to the library for the seed library and later to the garden swap at the library. I came home with a few tomatoes and some passion fruit. Yum!

This weekend, we transplanted some nasturtium from the community garden bed (where it was overwhelming the space) to a side of our yard. We'll see if the plants survived the journey, which was actually pretty funny. Dear husband carried the long nasturtium vines slung over his shoulder for the mile hike home! We sometimes get odd looks coming back from the garden. This time we truly deserved them.

We also moved a hydrangea that a friend gave me years ago from the pot it had been in to a border area. The loquat seeds that the kids and I started from neighborhood fruit May 2023 went into the front yard. I won't hold my breath on getting any fruit from those soon. They're about 5 inches tall. We also cleared out some succulents from a bed where I didn't want so many of those. I'll give them away. When next we have time and interest, I hope we'll plant some succulents that are currently in pots in that bed. 

Southern California is getting an historic amount of rain, which is probably good for the vegetables bed and eases the transplanting but bad from some homes, etc. Son's dorm has some leaks, the hot water died, and today classes were virtual. Our home has been fine, thankfully. I hope everyone is staying safe and relatively dry.

Planting more seeds

After posting about planting asparagus on Saturday, a friend warned me to be ready to treat the asparagus for the asparagus weevil and asparagus aphids. Perhaps I’ll soon regret planting them. On the bright side, they’ve survived 2 nights without being decimated by squirrels.

Sunday was another busy planting day, as a friend came through with milkweed seeds. Thank you, friend! I planted an entire flat of those (6x6=36 starts). In 6 packs, I also started alyssum and carnations (Chabaud, Dianthus Caryophyllus), plus the poppy yesterday. In little pots, I started sunflowers, three flower mix packets that I’d been given, and some Sweet William from a friend (Dianthus barbatus). Hopefully some of these will flourish for us. I'm hoping to plant flowers in the border around our redone retaining wall.

Fertilized, planting seeds, new asparagus

 Happy 2024!

The star jasmine climbing up trellises on either side of the garage was looking a little sorry on the west side. It has done this before in winter and fertilizing seems to help, so I gave some Osmocote to them plus other flowering shrubs and potted plants in the front yard.

I've been waiting for bare root asparagus to come to the nursery to get some for our new raised bed in the backyard. The nursery flyer said they were in, so I went there with my mom this week. Sadly, they sold out fast. I was able to get 2 small potted asparagus, which I planted as the first plants in the raised bed. The tag says "Asparagus Millenium" and "Aspargus Officinalis". I put an old container, missing it's top and bottom, as a plastic tube around the plants with wire spikes coming up through them in hopes of protecting the plants from critters. Fingers crossed.

I also bought a Scented Geranium called "Sugar Plum" hoping that it might discourage squirrels in the backyard. I'm thinking it will avoid direct squirrel damage but fear it won't deter them. I'd really like some vegetables to survive in our back bed but not sure how to achieve that exactly. One way I know will work is to enclose the whole bed in hardware cloth on a wood frame, as they did at the community garden. It may come to that, but I'd prefer to avoid that. Anyway, we planted the geranium plus I took some cuttings to root some more plants from it. We've also planted some vincas from the fall to edge the back yard.

In the new bed, I buried some old pumpkins, as I do each year with that line of miniature pumpkins. The first ones I buried were from fall 2022 and had been explored by animals, so I'm not sure how they'll fare. We're still enjoying the fall 2023 harvest inside, but those will go out in the coming months.

I was going to plant some milkweed seeds to get starts to plant around the yard this year. The ones I had last year, I never planted. I had caterpillars and butterflies, and sometimes lent them to a friend for her use in a school library. They were in flats and shuffled around for a long time such that few survived. So, I need a new batch. I got the flats all ready but discovered I'm out of milkweed seeds, so that will have to wait for another day. Instead, I started a few California Poppies.