Phenology Events

Today my willow looks like this picture I took on April 14, 2007.



This picture of my forsythia in full bloom is dated April 14, 2009.

Two people have told me they saw red-wing blackbird. I saw one as well. It wasn't until the second one told me this a bird that comes back in summer, when the weather is predictably warm that I did a double-take.

My son saw two bats.

My forsythia is about to bloom. Pretty sure it will bloom tomorrow. Crocus were blooming yesterday.

My Artic blue willow is budded up.

The frogs are singing tonight.

So what's a gardener to do?

I'm working with the idea that we are have a zone 6b spring and the calendar says April 17, not March 17.

I rototilled the family garden. Thanks to handsome son for taking a small engines course getting an A+ AND overhauling my tiller! I planted peas. I planted carrots, radishes, and lettuce. In Wisconsin. I am thinking of planting some fava beans. Generally, I don't think favas are planted here.

I haven't planted my tomatoes for transplant.

I'm going to make the best use the weather. I'm not going to plant heat lovers, but if it can take some cold, it's getting planted.

Pea planting tips: Soak in warm water for 20 minutes before planting.

Beet and Swiss chard planting tip: Put seed on a wooden cutting board and crush them with a rolling pins. Each "seed" is actually a pod with 3-4 seeds inside. The small seeds are dark, radish brown, to black.

My Beets, So Far, and the Potager

Burpee's Golden Beets

In addition to the family garden, I have every spare inch in my own yard planted with fruits and berries and salad fixings. My one big space splurge is the short row of potatoes, they need some space.



















Honeysuckle


Lettuce 'Butterhead'


Strawberries 'Honeoye' with a garlic scape in foreground


Edamame, finally coming up. Edible soybeans are a lot slower to germinate than I would think.


Makeshift fencing around four blueberry bushes in the potager, 'Yukon Gold' potatoes, carrots 'Little Fingers' and leaf lettuce
Soil to right has been replanted with some rutabagas and a second planting of radishes.






'William Baffin' rose showing sawfly damage

Germinating Chard and Beets: Update

Steps I took to sprout my chard and beets:

1.)Crush the seed coat on both the chard varieties and the orangey-yellow beet from Jung's (I'll look up the cultivar name and post it here).

2.)Soak in warm water for a half hour.

3.)Strain the seed into a piece of paper toweling.

4.)Hold over night in the folded up toweling in a Ziploc bag in a warm place.

5.)Plant them out at about 1/2" depth, a couple inches apart.

6.)Keep well-watered.

Mine germinated in just a couple days. The temps were high 70s to mid-90s, with 50s at night.

Seed Germinating Tip for Beets, Chard, and Spinach

I read this about this seed germinating tip in "From Seed to Skillet".

I know that stratification is needed by some seeds, but never thought to apply this particular technique to this group of plants. Last summer, I direct seeded some beets and had particularly poor germination. Spring has been particularly cold here and any jump I can get on germination so my seeds are not rotting in the dirt seems like a good thing to me. What Williams does with these lumpy, bumpy seeds is roll them with a rolling pin to crush the outer seed coat. I felt I would surely damage the gymnosperm within, but no.

Upon seeing them crack, I dusted them into a cup of warm water for an hour. Then I strained them through paper towel, folded up the seeds in the paper toweling, and placed them in a Ziploc bag.

Two days later, I could easily see the root panicle emerge and quickly sowed them in the ground in my potager. I also did spinach and placed them in individual cells for planting in the family garden. The spinach on my light rack have emerged from the soil in one day.

With the difficult spring we have had here in central Wisconsin anything a gardener can do to save growing time will be rewarded in your harvest.