Mushroom box. 5.11.15

 Last week I bought a mushroom growing box at Home Depot.  Impulse.  Followed the directions.  Simple.


Today I noted the mushrooms are starting to grow.  The label states ready to harvest in 10 days.

Vegetable Gardening in Raised Beds. 5.11.15

Raised bed planted with bean seeds and protected with fencing.  5.11.15

 The former strawberry bed was weedy and the soil level sunken lower than I wanted.  I pulled what weeds I could, turned the rest over, and moved a few wheelbarrows of soil from a pile we keep for that purpose.  The pile consists especially of sod removed for other planting around the 2 acres.   Decomposition of the sod makes the soil a little better than it was.

In this bed, I planted Roma and Yellow Wax beans.  Also a small row of cilantro and some onion sets that were laying around already sprouted.

The cover is meant to deter deer and rabbits.

Tomato plants ready to set outside.  5.11.15

The fencing is not perfectly sealed and  birds may also get in.  Better than nothing.

Tomato plants in the sunroom were ready for planting.  That meant removing weeds from a second raised bed.  I had prepped it during winter but failed to cover to prevent weed growth.  The grasses were over 3 feet tall.  I pulled, then used weed eater, turned the soil over and raked somewhat smooth.  Planted tomatoes.  Mulched with thin cardboard food packaging.  Not pretty.  that gets covered with straw or grass clippings later and will no longer show.

Tomatoes started in raised bed, cardboard mulch.  5.11.15

Set up Warré beehive. 5.9.15

Warré beehive set up 5.9.15

Earlier I set up this Warré beehive see if it would attract a swarm.  It did not.  Today I picked up a shipment of honeybees and installed them into the Warré hive.

The Warre hive was developed by Gustave Emile Warre (1857-1951) which he referred to  as "Ruche Populaire " or  "The People's Hive".  

These hives look very easy to build from scratch.  The only part I can't easily do at the moment is the rabbet.  Maybe I can give myself a router as a retirement present next year, with a rabbet bit.

I lost the info, but I think these new bees are Russian:Carniolan hybrids.  That was on the Beethinking website last year.

Strawberry Bed. 5.8.15

Start of Strawberry bed.  5.8.15

I renovated 1/2 of a vegetable raised bed, and planted strawberries.  Three of the plants were "Pine-berries", a small white strawberry advertised as having a pineapple flavor.  The rest, I forget the varieties.

The prior strawberry bed developed too many weeds.  Most of the strawberry plants died.  I had not been able to maintain it.

This is in an area not visible from the street or neighbor.  For the moment, I mulched with newspaper.  The boards are there to prevent wind from blowing the newspaper away.  The cage is there for deer.

I added a couple of wheelbarrows of yard soil to the previous strawberry bed.  The soil is from a pile we make from planting and removing sod.   I mixed it into the compost amended soil and planted Roma and Yellow Wax bush beans, and a row of cilantro.  I did not plant strawberries, not knowing if the strawberry plants died due to viral disease.  Viral disease has been described as an issue with older strawberries, best to start a new bed.

Pollinating Pawpaw flowers. 5.4.15

3-year-old NC-1 Pawpaw.  5.4.15

3-year-old Sunflower Pawpaw.  5.4.15

NC-1 Pawpaw flower shedding pollen.  5.4.15

Collecting pawpaw pollen.  5.4.15

 Today I pollenated pawpaw flowers.  I've been watching closely for flowers at the pollen shedding stage. 

The NC-1 is the largest of the 3 pawpaw plants that I planted summer 2012.  My goal has been to transfer pollen from Sunflower, which is smaller, to NC-1 stigmas.  However, each has only a few flowers, and what I do depends on the stage of each flower.

As it happened, 2, of the NC-1 pawpaw flowers were shedding pollen today.  When the entire flower is a dark burgundy, that's when it starts to shed pollen.  When the flower is almost all dark burgundy, it is not shedding pollen yet.  That is when I'm hoping the stigmas are receptive

The pawpaw flower makes a lot of pollen.  Much more than most of my other fruits

I pollinated 2 flowers of Sunflower with pollen from NC-1.  I also pollinated a flower of NC-1 with pollen from a different NC-1 flower.   That is not considered an option, but maybe this tree has not read that book.  If the flowers on Sunflower start producing pollen when flowers on NC-1 appear receptive, I will transfer pollen in that direction. 

Pawpaw flower prior to shedding pollen.  5.4.15