Busy as bees

A lot's been going on at Hardrock Ranch. Today, we direct sowed two kinds of chard, three kinds of carrots, mesclun, oakleaf lettuce, wild arugula, turnip, mizuna, purple mizuna, spinach and fava beans. Over in the herb bed, we sowed chamomile and parsley.

Have I mentioned that Mark is the creative and talented one? Here are some examples of his row markers:

And here's a bamboo trellis he's building for nasturtiums:

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The nursery continues to expand - we recently brought a few herb cuttings from Bainbridge Island. Also, we're trying to propagate some native filbert from cuttings (I actually bought some rooting hormone this time).

That's not all, either. Acres of mowing, miscellaneous tree and bamboo planting, construction of a recycle organizing shelving system, snowplow-proof mailbox post design and fabrication, and lots and lots of throwing the ball for the dog. Finally, it's quittin time.

 

Mid-May Planting

Well, we noticed the pages of the calendar are flipping over at a pretty good clip and figured that if we want to eat any veggies from our garden this year, we better get them going. We're not at all sure that "all danger of frost has past" since it did dip below freezing just a couple days ago. So we covered some of the newly-planted seeds with a hoop house, and started some other things in a cold frame.

Cold frame starts include several types of summer squash, cauliflower, summer savory, tarragon, endive, baby leeks, and kale.

Direct sown under the hoop house: arugula, beets, daikon, mizuna, radish, and broccoli-raab.

Near the trellises at the far end (in a former iteration, these were Halloween decorations), we planted snap peas and snow peas.

The pot in the foreground contains an edible flower blend.

Ruby's been working hard, too.

More hedgerow

I singlehandedly planted twenty or thirty plants in a new hedgerow area, this one on the north side of the house. This area was not sheet-composted or amended so I was digging in Hardrock soil. If you can call it soil.

Where was husband? Still tinkering with that electric fence.

 

White Dutch Clover

So remember all that research we did about cover cropping? After much study, we chose White Dutch Clover for the hedgerow areas. It is a low-growing (6 inches) perennial and we were just going to leave it in place as a ground cover in those areas. I also over-seeded the lawn with it. Used over 7 pounds of seed.

Here's what it looks like, and I am having a VERY difficult time believing this is clover. What say you, dear readers?

 

 

Whew - this is a lot like work

In addition to the potatoes, I single-handedly planted 2 rosemary plants, 3 St. John's Wort, 2 salad burnett, 1 rhubarb, 6 chives, 6 blueberry bushes, and a hops vine. These all went into the new bed that curves around the south side of the house. Many of these plants came out of the nursery we set up last fall - looks like many of our starts made it and almost everything over-wintered well.

 

Where was Husband? Tinkering with the electric fence, which so far seems to be keeping the deer at bay.

 

I say potato...

We decided to use Ruth Stout's method: toss the seed potatoes on the ground and cover with a foot or so of hay. Easy, with the added advantage of being able to just lift up the plant, take few small potatoes and put it back down in the hay to keep growing. No digging now and no digging later.

Does it work? We have no idea, we've never tried it this way. We can't hold Ruth accountable, either, I'm sure she's passed away by now.

We put in two varieties: Yukon Gold and Yellow Finn. The hay was from last fall, and it's good and rotten.

 

Spring

Spring comes late to Hardrock Ranch, but it does come. That's not to say you can leave your warm jacket and mud boots behind.

 

A red flowering currant:

 

Lots-o-daffodils:



The pond is full: