Tansy Ragwort and Cinnebar Moth Larvae. 7.3.19

Tansy Ragwort and Cinnebar Moth Larvae.  7.3.19

Very cool to look at.  I try to keep ahead of weeds, especially the toxic and invasive Tansy Ragwort.  However, sometimes I miss them at the edge of the property, until I see them bloom.

This time, I see the cinnebar moth caterpillars having a feast on tansy ragwort flower heads.

I will leave the plants in place until the caterpillars are done, then pull the plants out.

Squash, Potato, and Sweet CornZucchini Plants. 6.21.19

Potato Plants.  6.21.19

Most of the kitchen garden is looking pretty good.   I dug a couple of potato plants today, ones that had dried up looking leaves.  The vast majority are not ready yet. The summer squashes and zucchinis have early flower buds.  The sweet corn is irregular, with some large and some small plants, but the large ones are looking robust.

Zucchini Plants.  6.21.19

Sweet Corn Plants.  6.21.19

Tomato Plants. 6.21.19

Tomato Plants for Slicing Tomatoes.  6.21.19

All of the tomato plants are blooming, and have stout, green, robust vines and leaves.  Most of the slicing tomatoes are tied up as single cordons.

Tomato Plants for Sauce Tomatoes.  6.21.19

Chestnut Tree in Bloom. 6.21.19

This one is Maraval.  Last year, this tree was the first to bear, having two chestnut clusters last year.  This year, there are about 10 female flowers.  Hard to say because they are so small and so high on the tree.

Precose Migoule also has a couple of female flowers, and lots of male flowers.

The very small Marigoule is vinally growing nicely, and has a few catkins of male flowers.

The Marissard seedling has no flowers.  Nice looking tree, but no flowers.  It's probably a mistake to buy a seedling, even if it's named.

The plan was to have them close enough together to pollinate each other.  But with the small size of the trees, and the small numbers of male flowers on the trees that just started making them, I have tried to hand pollinate using catkins of the other tree.  Unfortunately, doing so I broke off one of the two potentially bearing branches of the Precose Migoule.  That was going to need pruning anyway, but a few curse words were said.

Cowlitz Peaches. Progress Report. 6.21.19

Cowlitz Peaches.  6.21.19

The big test will be in the ripening, but so far the Cowlitz Peach Tree is looking great.   There are about 20 peaches, maybe 25.  A few have been mauled by critters or birds.  It's not in an ideal spot, probably too much shade.

However, this might be one of my best peach yields in a long time. 

I'm guessing they'll ripen some time in July, maybe August.

Cowlitz Peach Tree.  6.21.19