It finally stopped Raining... I Think.

At about 5 PM, it finally stopped raining. My yard looks like a swamp. But on the good side my cannas loved every drop of rain. Tomorrow I will go out and inspect the garden and see if I lost any of my plants to a drowning.

If its dry enough I plan to work in the garden. If it isn't, I will start prepping my propagation station for all the cuttings I plan to take this fall.

Today It Is Raining!

Well today I was hopping to finish up cutting the backyard, repotting my new plants, and seting up my cattle panels for all my vining veggies. But its raining! I can not complain. It has not rained all summer. If did it never hit our garden or it rained so little that it did not make a difference. From the weather reports, it looks as if it may rain for the next few weeks. We need over 2 inches and the lakes are at least 2 feet low. So the more rain the better!

Got Some New Plants

Today I went to the new Lowe's in the city of Murphy. I found this Lowe's to be a lot nicer and had better plant prices than the one in Garland near George Bush Tollway. The Lowe's in Murphy had some many plants on sale and they were great prices. The prices ranged for 50 cents to 7 bucks.

I picket several different types of salivas, lantana, and Dwarf Banana Tree. I will have more info on the banana tree.

I then took the Salivas and Flame Acanthus that I potted in large nursery and placed them under my hanging strawberry patch. Before placing these pots around the posts. I installed some old news paper down to keep the grass from coming up around the pot. I then put wood mulch down. Its mostly composted, so I will have to get some fresher mulch next week.




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Not much going on in the garden

I know its been a while since I last posted. Its been so hot and I have been so busy that I have not had nything to talk about on here. The last fews weeks, I have been transplanting my 4 inch pots and weeding my overgrown flower beds. I am weeding one or two beds a week. I am starting to see butterflies in the yard. They seem to love the Zinnias. Then again they are the only things blooming in the yard right now!

I haven't seen in humming birds yet but hopefully some of  my Turks Caps and Flame Acanthus will bloom and I will get to enjoy them for a little while. I finally got the Oleander bed finished. This fall I will rework the bed and figure how to get it stand upright again.

Another New Friend in the Garden

Today I was out in the back of the garden behind my shop/lab weeding the disaster zone that I have been ignoring all summer. I pulled grass, weeds and wild morning glories that were taking over my storage area. Because of this, stuff just gets piled around the yard and taking up valuable works space. I found a huge infestation of aphids and other small bugs feasting on the morning glory vines. While smashing and ripping off th vines I found my first praying mantis trying to hide from me on my wood fence. It didn't work...

Got A New Composting Bin Today

Sunday afternoon we were out looking for some lawn furniture and we stopped by WalMart to check and see what they had left. Since its almost the end of the season, Walmart had dropped the prices on most of the items in the garden section. By the register they had an end cap display for the Super Composter for only $45! Walmart's and Sams both had these composters for 80+ through out most of the season.



After looking the display model over, I decided it was worth a try and it is a lot nicer than my are.

The composter is packaged in shrink rap and the instructions are pictures only on the back of the label. So do not damage the label while opening. The first step was to seperate the parts and make sure I had all the parts. Next I put the for sides together. Next add the corner brackets. Followed by installing the door and hinges. Putting this together will take about 30 minutes or less to put together. It is poorly designed and I would love to able to have screwed/nailed something together. The composter is injected molded thick durable plastic. But the sides do not line up well and the looking tabs will lock completely. The lid is durable and has sturdy spring loaded hinges. Once the composter was in place it looked real good.



Today I added a large bag of fresh grass clipping, shredding paper, coffee grounds/filter, bone meal, blood meal, and alfalfa pellets and mixed in. It is to early to recommend this item. I will see if this composts faster than my homemade units.



I will keep everyone up to date on my findings.

First Pepper Of The Season!

Today I came out and was moving some of my pepper plants around I found that my sweet banana pepper has a nice young pepper on it!




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Created Another New Bed Today

For the last few weeks I have been trying to figure out what was eating my garlic bulbs. Last night I caught the thief. It was my little lazy garden helper! She such a traitor. I found her with a face full of mud and doggie breath that smelt of garlic!

So to fix that I went to the local big box store and bought 6 cinder blocks and set them under my garlic pots. This will put the post just high enough that she can't jump up and get to them. If she does the pots will fall over and she will get caught in the act and I can train her not to go over there.

Before starting my project I tied back the Oleander. Its taking over the whole area. But that project is for another post. Sorry guys!

When I went out work on the yard, I noticed that it was time to move all the plants and cut the high grass down. I really HATE this. Moving a hundred plus plants around in 95+ degree weather sucks! So at 8:45 PM, just after dark, I decided to setup some lights and turn this area in a bed with hardwood mulch from the city green project. First I laid down newspaper and then threw over a hundred gallons of hardwood mulch over the newspaper. Once that was completed I then sprayed down the bed with an insecticide to kill any bugs that got into my mulch from the compost area. When I hit the big box store tomorrow I will get another large bottle and spray again.

I had plenty of light for light duty work. I setup 2 shop trouble lights and a clamp on Desk lamp to light up my work area. Tomorrow if I have the time I may setup some more yard lighting. I have a couple of Christmas lawn decoration spot lights that will work great to light up the dark spots in the yard so I can work past dusk when it is cooler.

After getting my area of mulch down, I placed 6 cinder blocks down and put 3 pots down on top of them. I think once I get the Oleander tied back I will put some stepping stones where the pots are and push the garlic back a few feet and add some plantings around the pots to high those ugly blocks. Maybe some lantana or something that trails.

Once I get the bed finished and I have more mulch I think I will pull my herb garden up and complete the project under there as well. Eventually this bed will rap around the entire Oleander bed and remove most of the grass in that area.

Update on my Veggies and the garden

Its been about a week since I last posted. Its been so hot outside, I haven't done much. Right now I am in the middle of prepping a 10 x 10 shaded bed. So far I have ammended the soil with, top soil, donkey manure, composted mushrooms, landscaping mix, and humus. Before I started that bed was rock hard. I took me hours to get the bed ready for planting. It still needs a little more tilling but right now its in good shape and I will be adding new plants shortly.

Right now the bed currently has some English Ivy that is has some starts in it and ground cover that produces little purple flowers. It starting to take up a large part of the bed. I may pull that up once I get the bed established. I planted Ajuga that I received from a gardening friend in Copper Canyon and some coleus that I never got around to planting earlier this year. I eventually want to fill the bed w/ some ferns.

I did lay a soaker hose down. It took several hours to get it right. I do have several spots that stay dry but, that will be that way until I can raise and level the bed. But thats a different story.

On Sunday I mixed of some compost mix and added to my veggies. This mix has 3 parts donkey manure, 2 parts mushroom compost 1 part peat moss, 1 part landscaping mix, I then added several large hand fulls of bone meal, blood meal, and alfalfa meal and mixed it up. Took that mix and added to my winter squash, sweet potatoes, cuccumbers, zucchinis, tomatoes, and peppers. I added this mix to around the plants and worked it into the top layer and covering all surfacees for each pot. I then watered each pot. Today I checked on the plants and they are greener and look healthier. Tomorrow I will post pictures of my plants.

I Have A New Guest In The Garden!

Today I was out watering when I noticed that both of my new 4 inch pots with small passion vine starts were stripped to the main stem. When just yesterday it was looking promising... After being a little noisy looking for pest I can across our new guest and he is more than welcome to as long as he likes!

Gulf Fritillary