I am the Weed Warrior....!

I almost feel victorious.

I finally got everything weeded and i do mean everything.  With varying degrees of thoroughness, the Jerusalem Artichokes i sort of slacked on, but after almost 3 hours of weeding i didn't care.
The rest of the garden was done as thoroughly as i possibly could get it. It was a great day for weeding, cool and overcast... i think i still got a sunburn.

It kinda stinks that the carrot and parsnip beds look so bare when everything else looks so good.  I left the weeds in the aisles sonce i don't feel like doing the extra work of removing them.  I might later but not now.

I don't usually take the row pictures from this end of the garden, but i felt like doing that this time.

Now that they are weeded, i can actually see my peppers and eggplants.

Burdock and then Globe Artichokes... the artichokes don't seem to be going anywhere yet.  The Summer Squash are small too...

Salsify, surviving brusseld sprouts and cauliflower plants, then beans...Provider bush beans.  I forgot the name the other day.

Birdhouse gourd, i love the leaves on that plant. They are velvety and soft, not like summer squash, melon or cucumber leaves which are spiky and irritating.

I have native ladybugs all over the place here, i like them better than the asiatic ones- the type that swarm and sometimes bite.  These are rounder and have a larger black 'head'.

Here is a ladybug larva

And i found this yellow ladybug eating yellow aphids.

My experiment with the celery base is working, cause its really coming out of the soil now

Marechal Foch with flower buds.

i hate the dust in my camera lens.



While i was out weeding, i found a few spots where i think the fence is too high.   I think the groundhogs are just walking right under it. I found that they have eaten the leaves of my horseradish almost to the nubs...  so i might go use roundup and totally re do the fence and include the far part of the garden that i didn't think i had to worry about-- the JA patch and the Asparagus bed.
I thought we had gotten it low enough to stop them last week, but the rain compacted the soil and they got under it again.  So i'll try this one more time and see if that is what was happening...

Who knows.

Just weeding and stuff

They must have heard me, cause my secret cabbage seedling is gone.  I did pick and eat my kholrabi, so i claim victory over that.

So they are still getting in.

The fence simply cannot be working. Yeah it keeps cats and dogs out, but that's not what eats my stuff.

I think we might try using chicken wire sooner rather than later,  why wait?  As soon as i get another installment of funds, it will happen.  If i'm going to try again for a fall crop i will need it.

Or i will simply plant a whole row of kale (and maybe some pretty flowering types, beautiful and edible).  That is the only thing that still remains untouched.  I can't believe it.

The collards aren't getting hit too hard either.

I think i might try growing the chard in a big pot i have.  Or maybe get back into container gardening again. I like this idea and instructional i found in another little blog i follow called A Potter's Garden.  Her blog led me to this: SWC.
Now, i'll always keep a terrestrial garden, but if i can't keep the woodchucks out of my broccoli any other way, i'll have to grow my veggies in a box that is off the ground and can be surrounded by a small wire cage of some sort.

No way i'm going to let this continue and i'm not going to give up on growing cabbage and broccoli..

Anyway, i weeded a lot today. Got both sides of a whole row done and most of another. That makes me mostly caught up

I can actually see my onions now,  some of them are paired with herbs, so that is what those big green clumps are in that section.  The walkways are full of the pulled-up weeds.  I don't know if i should put them in the compost pile or leave them there, i'll be stepping on them regularly and if their roots dry out enough the remains will become mulch.

I still need to pull the weeds that are living on the edges of the walkways,  but i had to call it a day after these rows were done.  I hope to finish it up tomorrow.
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This is a mess!I used those strips of plywood to hold down the row cover, but i just haven't made putting them someplace else a priority.
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I have a baby cucumber!

Its blurry cause i stuck my finger in the photo, but this is so i can see how small it is now.

Hopefully these plants produce a lot and nothing gets into them.

I dug up and sent off a rosemary and a basil plant and sent a few of the Welsh onions i ended up not having room for (to my SIL). They are like chives, only fatter, flowering in white instead of pink and they have a flavor more like garlic.

I'm also brining up some country style pork ribs to smoke and grill tomorrow.  I have them in the basic salt and sugar brine with a tablespoon of 'sweet' pickling spice in it. I'm hoping that the spices will make things seem to taste sweeter since i won't use barbeque sauce on them.

I need to find out what i can use chervil with. I have a few plants that are doing great but i forgot what the stuff is good with.  I think it is in Herbes de Provence ....  maybe good with chicken?  I eat a lot of chicken.

I'm almost scared to say it, but my basil plants all look nice.  There is word of a basil blight that is not just causing headaches for commercial growers but home gardeners as well.  I don't know anyone else on my street or anyone within a few more streets who garden, so i think my risk is minimal.
 My sage also looks good.  I hope to have plenty to dry to use until next summer.

Currently reading "The Backyard Berry Book" i'm still reading the grape grower book, but the berry book i have os a library loan and its one of 5 or so that i borrowed, so it has a higher finish priority.

Oh, speaking of grapes, my Reliance and Marechal Foch have flower buds. I noticed this when i was giving my Toddler a supervised  run of the yard.  I didn't have enough hands for the camera so i didn't photo the grapes.  I think i will let them open just to see them once, then i will remove them in favor of stronger growth.