How does your garden grow 2021 #5 - YouLookFab Forum

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How does your garden grow 2021 #5

Runcarla

Veteran

High summer and the pastels of early spring have ceded way for bold colours. Regular rainfalls are keeping everything green. The last of the first crops - lettuce, peas, snap peas - have been harvested. Tomatoes and zucchini are regularly available now. Potatoes and onions are coming along.

How’s your garden doing?

#1/2 I have a ‘thing’ for Day Lilly’s

#3 a cluster of potted plants

#4/5 some long views

#6 tomatoes from the garden

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31 replies

Latest reply was from Runcarla

nemosmom

Veteran

All the rain has yellowed my herbs
And rotted my petunias. Sadly, I don’t think the basil will bounce back in time for any pesto this year.

ETA: your walkway is so serene and pretty!

rachylou

Veteran

I’m fighting powdery mildew and slowly, slowly harvesting shelling peas and freezing them until I have enough, lol, to make something. Mine is not the location for English peas. Corn is starting to put out tassels!

I’ve also started to make compost. I’ve never done that before. Usually toss it all in the city bin. We’ll see how that goes. I don’t generate a lot of food waste by my lonesome, nor a lot of ‘brown’ paper and leaf material.

JAileen

Veteran

We’re supposed to stay inside. I don’t know what’s going on outside. The smoke is from one of two fires: Dixie or Tamarack. The Tamarack fire burned for a couple weeks before they bothered to do anything about it, because it was small. The thing is, these fires all start small.

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Anonymous

Crabapples and wildlife.

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JAileen

Veteran

Nikki, is that a fox? I’ve only seen them in Alaska.

Our air quality index is now over 200: “Try to stay indoors”. Very helpful advice.

Anonymous

JAileen, I think it’s a gray fox. A little startling to come across it on a walk

Runcarla

Veteran

@ Nikki - could it be a coyote? We have lots of them here in southern Ontario, and some living in the conservation area behind our house. We hear them lots, and see them occasionally.

Actually, yours looks a little small for a coyote.

Anonymous

Runcarla, it could be. I thought fox when I saw it. I e-mailed pics to DEC; we will see if they get back to me. I have some family in Ontario, a set of great-grandparents emigrated from there

Joy

Veteran

I am fighting a losing battle with Japanese beetles. (#4) They are spreading to roses and butterfly bushes and even pink cone flowers from grape vines. I had two heirloom cherry tomato plants in large pots. The dog has decided that she likes tomatoes, even the green ones, and has torn up one plant. ( #5)
Skies have been overcast and smokey. The school nurses have been preparing for breathing problems like asmea. Doing anything outside has been discouraged. If it does rain, there are mud slides caused by no foliage after last summers wild fires. The waterways are being seriously muddied so that anything living in it is dying. That can affect drinking water for millions, as most starts as run off from snow in the mountains. I70 was closed by a big mud slide. It could happen again.

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Ana

(website)

Veteran

Gorgeous gardens!

Janet

(website)

Veteran

We are having a bad lack of rain, and it’s been hot. I spent over an hour outside watering yesterday to try to keep some plants alive that are struggling.

However, the oak leaf and other hydrangeas are doing well, after we transplanted some this spring, the potted geraniums are happy, and the rose of Sharon trees are doing great. And we must have finally cracked the code on keeping the deer out of the yard, because the hostas are the best they have ever looked in our yard!

We do have a wonderful tomato harvest beginning.

And I like this little praying mantis that leaped out of the geraniums as I watered them the other day.

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Anonymous

Esta muy triste I don't have anything blooming now, though I've been watering. Any rain that's been in the state seems to have missed my house.

Anonymous

Runcarla and JAileen, I received an e-mail back from DEC stating that the animal in pics is a gray fox. Also included in e-mail was two articles if you are interested

https://www.fllt.org/red-and-gray-foxes/

https://www.dec.ny.gov/animals/63058.html

Runcarla

Veteran

@ Nikki - very cool that DEC got back to you with a positive ID! I’ve seen red fox, and cross fox around here, but never a grey fox. When I lived in Timmins (about 500 miles straight North of where I live now) we had wolves!

Anonymous

Janet

(website)

Veteran

Suntiger, here too. It'll rain buckets in Baltimore or Montgomery County and completely miss us. We really need it, everything is getting very crispy.

Laurie

Veteran

Looking cloudy in MoCo, Janet and Suntiger. Could today be the day for rain?
I cannot keep the deer out of my yard. They got into my impatiens last week, chewed through half of them through night. They usually don't bother them. Hosta would last 10 minutes here.

Helena

Veteran

Your garden is beautiful Carla!

Mine's a disaster. The front planter did not survive our brief vacation. The bunnies have eaten the daylilies - the sneaky things made their rabbithole under our nearby shrub, so they don't even have to expose themselves to eat, and can munch happily all day. The snails are busy on everything else! Thankfully, the trees are fine, my favourite lavendar is thriving, and I'm content with an imperfect garden

Nikki, I'm so glad it's a fox - we have coyotes in our neighbourhood and they scare the daylights out of me!!

Janet

(website)

Veteran

Laurie, I feel ya on the deer problem. It’s been an ongoing battle for the past 5-7 years. Somehow before that they were not as big of an issue. My husband first installed an opaque black mesh barrier along the fence line so they couldn’t see in to be tempted by our delicious greenery. Worked for a while. Then he extended the height of our fencing with an extra panel, and got about 3/4 of the way around with that project. He improvised on the last bit with som extra fence poles — the lower part of our yard adjacent to the woods looks like we are trying to keep the walkers out on The Walking Dead! LOL Fortunately it’s just the woods so no one in the neighborhood can see it. It’s not pretty but it seems to be working this year (knock on wood!).

Cardiff girl

Veteran

Your daylilies look lovely!The green house has done paticularly well here this year.A neighbour gave me a mini aubergine seedling which l have never grown before and it’s been really interesting to grow,the mini peppers ,tomatoes and chillis are all doing very well too.
we are currently eating French beans,courgettes ,peas,gooseberries,raspberries and blackberries.
l really enjoy seeing everyone’s plot!

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Anonymous

Nope Laurie, we got nothing from all that weather. Though still plenty of mosquitos despite the lack of rain
On the upside though the melons have been especially good this year!
*carries off CGs greenhouse*

Anonymous

@Janet and everyone else with drought, how often are you watering? I'm watering about daily and it's doing no good

Janet

(website)

Veteran

Watering daily here too. I’ve managed to keep everything alive except some grasses we planted near the new “stream.” Tomatoes (in containers) are doing ok. Some azaleas and hydrangea are looking stressed out. We did get a decent rain late last night, finally, and it will be a little cooler this weekend, so hoping that helps.

Good luck with your garden! The watering has been a pain.

rachylou

Veteran

I’m watering every one to two days… but we get fog at night…

Runcarla

Veteran

This summer isn’t droughty for us (southeastern Ontario) but we have had drought years, and I gardened for 26 years on a droughty sand esker. Even now, I plant drought tolerant species - Russian sage, Coneflower, day lily, Iris, sedum, thyme, black eyed Susan.

I had rain barrels at my last house, but not this one. I do collect ‘grey water’ and use it to water pots (I have 18!!) but sometimes use a hose to fill a watering can and hand water. I’m also a big fan of composting, and use mulch to top dress.

We have metered water, and I am sensitive to the expense as well as the environmental concerns.

rachylou

Veteran

We collect rainwater too, Carla - and this year our barrel is running dry!

SarahD8

Veteran

Ooh, I can finally contribute to these threads again!

1-3: beginnings of a patio container garden. 2 salvias, Spanish lavender, and an unusual cranesbill geranium rescued from the 50% off table (I am a sucker for the 50% off table).

4-5: current state of my balcony herb garden. Parsley side is temporarily joined by the non-cat-safe components of my kid's birthday bouquet. Basil side features sweet za'atar marjoram also rescued from the 50% off table. Apparently I'll need to overwinter it indoors, so that will be an interesting challenge to take on.

6: Thai curry made with some of our balcony basil (not Thai basil but we make do with what we have).

More edibles will have to wait until next year. First we have to get rid of the creosote railroad tie raised bed that we inherited from the previous owner. :-/

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Runcarla

Veteran

@ SarahD8 - gotta love the sale table, and the local garden club annual perennial sale with unlabelled mystery plants!

SarahD8

Veteran

Ooh, mystery plants, so intriguing!

I was at another garden center today and saw another weird hardy/cranesbill geranium with a viney habit on the 50% off table. I wanted. But I resisted. For now.

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