Peppers, Eggplants, Thyme. 4.3.22

 Here are some of the peppers and eggplants that are sunning outside today.  They are behind the tomatoes in growth, even though I started them earlier.

Behind them are the Rosemary cuttings.  I think two will grow.  The other doesn't look so good.

There are still lots of pepper and eggplant seedlings in six-packs to up-pot.  I do a few each day.

This is the thyme six-pack that I started later.  I think these are bigger than the earlier starts now.  The reason is it was still too cold when I planted the earlier thyme outside.

I think the others will be OK, just set back a bit from their time in the cold.

Flower Seedling Plants. 4.3.22

 The flower seedling and cutting starts are doing pretty good. 

These are carnations, statice, bloodflower, milkweed, late started coreopsis, ratibida (Mexican hat flower), later started oregano, and later started thyme.

These are mostly geraniums.  The more lush ones are mostly starts from cuttings last fall.  The puny looking ones were starts from this winter.

The big planter / container box is done, and the containers are 1/3 full of soil.  When they are full, two of the ten will get flowers (carnations and statice), two will get Serrano peppers, and four will get bush beans.  Im not sure about the remaining two, maybe shallots in one and a bush tomato in the other.

Tomato Seedlings Growing Fast. 4.3.22

The tomato plants are in Black Gold potting soil.  For most, I'm using taller pots, 4" across, so they don't get root bound too fast.  There are still about 6 weeks before they can go into the ground. These are all slicing tomato and a few cherry tomato plants.

It's a lot of plants, but about half are for gifts.  

At this early stage, the dwarf types are easily distinguished from regular height plants.

The three on the left are dwarf, the two on the right are not dwarf.  The far left plant is "CC McGee", a "potato - leaf" dwarf.  

The one exception is Reisentraube, which so far is as small as the dwarf types, even though they are a regular height - type plant.

All were in the sun for a few hours yesterday.  They looked fine afterwards.  In fact, I think the leaf color looks better.    They will be in the sun for most of the day today, too.  I'm actually hoping that the dwarf plants can be in pots longer than the regular height plants, to give me more time.

Potato Plants Emerging. 3.31.22

There are several potato plants emerging from the early planting of sprouted potatoes.  This variety has red skin.  They will need a little cultivation soon so the weeds don't compete.  I don't know its name.  The yellow ones have not emerged yet.

I just checked on the Fedco  website.  They should be shipping potato orders in April.

Fig Buds. 3.31.22

 Fig growth buds are swelling (green tips) and so are the buds that, if conditions are favorable, will become figs.  Yummy!  Plus, maybe this year if there are enough of them, I'll try canning a batch.

Forsythia Blossoms. 3.31.22

Here is the forsythia bush that I grew from a cutting about fifteen years ago, then transplanted about nine years ago.  It's been pruned back pretty heavily a few times.

Last year, I took about ten cuttings from this bush to start a privacy hedge.  It's nice, they bloom even when only one year old.

These one is from that batch of cuttings.

I have two jars of new cuttings in water for another batch, about ten more potential plants.  No roots yet but it's quite early for that.

The challenge is, should I water and fertilize the young shrubs this year?  Then they will grow faster, but it's (a) more work and (b) growth on the watered, fertilized plants is more lush and tender, so deer eat them.  So then they need protective fencing, too.  Still, I might do that anyway.  Without fertilizing, they grew about one foot to eighteen inches the first year.  I'd like to get them at least five feet tall un two or three years.  Growth also seems to be faster on well-established shrubs.

Asian Pear Blossoms. 3.31.22

 Asian pears are blooming.  I did a major pruning last fall so I can reach the fruits to thin them and apply protective bags for coddling moth etc this year, but deer cant reach them.  I see lots of jars of canned fruit ahead this summer :-) but not too many to manage.

 

 

Peach and Plum Blossoms. 3.31.22

 Nanaimo Peach.

Garden Gold Peach.

Hollywood Plum

Methley Plum

Might be a productive season :-)

Rufus In The Grass. 3.31.22

 Rufus loves the grass.

Grafting Some Heritage Apple Varieties. 3.28.22

The Fedco apple scions came in the mail.  I kept them in the fridge until I could graft them.

I grafted "Liberty", a red, disease resistant variety, to make the top tiers for the espalier Redlove(TM) Odysso(TM)  Red flesh apples are a novelty, but I have three varieties and don't need to have the full espalier as a red flesh type. 

The Odysso(TM) has red wood.  That is also true for the others, and for the Bud-9 rootstock too.

I tried making my favorite type of graft, Whip and Tongue, but my knife was too dull and/or the wood too hard, this time.  So I made cleft graft, which is easier but not as "perfect".  Even then, it's a very marginal graft, not a smooth cut and edges don't match nearly as well as I usually do.  Fortunately, apple wood can be quite forgiving.   Wrapping tightly might bring more of the uneven edges together, too.  So maybe it will take.

Then I added "Blue Pearmain", an old New England variety, to the Redlove(TM) Era(TM) espalier.   Here is the Fedco description:  One of New England’s most famous varieties. Mentioned by Henry David Thoreau as a favorite in his wonderful essay “Wild Apples.” Grown throughout much of Maine for well over 200 years. Massive trees still found here and there.

Here is one of the USDA Pomological Watercolor Collection images, by Mary Arnold, dated 1912.  Image attribution:  "U.S. Department of Agriculture Pomological Watercolor Collection. Rare and Special Collections, National Agricultural Library, Beltsville, MD 20705"

I did manage to make a whip and tongue graft for that one.  Still not perfect but it has to do.  What works best for me as a cutting tool is a single edge razor blade - being very very careful - and I didn't realize I had one from last year in my grafting kit.   In both cases, I tried to wrap tightly, although I did the best I could with what I have.

The third went onto a Geneva-222 rootstock.  That poor thing had a story.  I had grafted onto it two years ago, which took but it was a spare scion that I really didn't want, then regrafted last year with something else.  It seemed to die during the heat spell so I left it sitting by a shed all summer and fall.  Outside the pot.  Then last winter I noticed the wood was still green, so I repotted.  I used that for the variety "Mutsu".

Overall, these are the least promising looking grafts I've done in many years.  It will be a few months before I know if they took.