Hi All,
Tod and I went rock hounding for the first time yesterday, well, I guess I need to say, the first time with tools! We always love looking at rocks everywhere we go and some always find a way into our pockets…as long as it is legal! Yesterday though we were out in a specific area looking for Jasper. We do not think we found any but we got some rocks to use in our new rock polishing machine…yes, we invested in a rock polishing machine, lol! We have not set it up yet so the rocks are currently still sitting in the bucket. That was our exciting adventure this past weekend. After that we made our way up to Costco which actually was not that crowded considering it was a HOT weekend. Hope you all had an enjoyable weekend despite the heat-what is up with the humidity too!?! During my morning walk today it sprinkled on me! It helps keep the mornings a bit cooler but man this afternoon is going to be HOT
Busy last week in the garden!
Stanford was out and brought great energy and enthusiasm with them into everything they did! The crew split up and helped to get multiple chores done throughout the garden. In bed AB09 they helped Kelly to get the tomato cages on the growing tomato plants! EL & NL were out to dig ditches for a water monitoring project and at least 1 member of Stanford joined in! Karina had another part of the crew helping her to weed out the infamous bindweed on the West side of the Big Hoop House! They also joined a couple of our regular volunteers out in the pasture to pull out the star thistle before that starts taking over like the milkweed thistle Lance got under control the last few months! Whew, great job Stanford Crew!
Kaleidoscope was out as well and helped Aditi & Kelly clean up a bit around the garden. They continued where a couple of our regular volunteers left off organizing the Potting Shed! They took the pots off the wooden table we have out back and got that stacked into what was taken care of the day before. They also took to cleaning the labels that were found during the organizing! The Kaleidoscope Crew also watered in the trees that are awaiting their turn to be planted in our new beds out back! Go Kaleidoscope!
Did you all notice the pits from our stone fruit strewn all around the garden? The ground squirrels are relentless right now. We had Burrow Busters come out to help us with our problem, so many veggies are getting eaten by them as well, and they inadvertently helped out a toad! Along with SB and the 3 EB’s, they were able to scoop the toad up from a hole they found it in and bring it to safety!
We planted the last of our seedlings that have been hanging on! There may be a few stragglers but the bulk of the work is finished. Companion planting started in L01 with parsley making its way into the ground. For more companion planting Aditi found carrot, beet and radish seeds for us to use. We will also start succession seeding as some of the Summer veggies start to die back. The 3 Sisters also started getting planted in beds AB28 & AB29 so now we need to start the squash in 4” pots to plant once the corn is tall enough and then we can also direct sow the beans to create the 3 Sisters! The corn provides the support the beans need and the squash provides the shade for the corn’s roots and the delicate stems of the bean plants!
Found out this week that the kiwi that is growing by Pump Shed #1 has been taken care of by SB. He was diligently weeding it out last week so we got to talk about what has been going on in that area. He took out the 2 plants that did not make it, weeded around the bench, as well as part of the male kiwi plant and then showed me how he started zip tying tie backs to the arbor for tying the kiwi back in the future! We also placed straw around the male kiwi plant to conserve water.
The P beds had 3 pear trees planted and more holes dug to plant more trees in the future. The new R beds are also getting holes dug for trees to go in.
Lots of bindweed getting taken out of beds K18, A13-A18 & B13-B18. Speaking of binweed, one of our Board Members has been coming out over the past few weeks to spray the plants with 45% vinegar. This will continue over the next few weeks to get them out of certain areas of the garden to test this new way of dealing with them out. So far it is going pretty good, except for the smell…eeewww! We do appreciate all the effort everyone has contributed to getting this bindweed under control!
I am guessing there is so much more that was completed in the garden last week that I may not be aware of and we thank you all for helping us continue this work to ensure fresh produce is being sent to our local community!
FYI, close to 400# of produce went to the local food pantries last week! Great job everyone!
Take care
Lori