Planting Squash Plants with Black Plastic Mulch. 5.9.2021

 I want to save squash seeds this year.  I plan to cover the flowers with mesh sacks but also want to isolate the plants, while giving the vines room to roam.  I have never used black plastic mulch before.  Black plastic mulch supposedly kills weeds, reduces water requirement, warms soil, and increases yield.

This area was not accessible to mowing, so a few months ago I put down black plastic to kill the grass and weeds.  I decided to leave it there, and plant some of the squash seedlings there.

In this area, I planted Illinois Squash, a Cucurbita mixta variety, and Fordham Zucchini, a Cucurbita pepo variety.  The Zucchini is a bushy type.  It should not be difficult to select a few blossoms to isolate for saving seeds. 

The grass and weeds were almost entirely eradicated already.  The soil was moist under the plastic sheets, which have been in place for several months.

There are more squash seedlings to plant elsewhere.  Most of those locations are also already under plastic.  I hope this method is successful.  It does indeed feel like less work, better weed management, and better water management, already.  Not very attractive, but that's OK.

Some Irises. 5.9.2021

 The iris bed was too much to keep weeded, and I didn't get to mulch it last winter.  So it's pretty weedy.  The interesting thing is, this is the first year they didn't have leaf spot and bacterial rot diseases.  My theory is that they need ground cover, either mulch or weeds, to prevent soil spores from splashing onto the leaves and starting an epidemic.  The down side of the weediness, other than appearance, is there seem to be fewer flowers this year.

I love bearded irises so will continue to work on my growing method.  I feel certain that will mean a bark chip mulch.  Last fall I moved some to the vegetable and fruit garden.  Those are mulched and also have no leaf spot or bacterial rot diseases, and also few flowers.

Tomato, Cucumber and Squash Seedlings. 5.9.2021

 About 3/4 of the seedlings are in the ground now.  This is it for planting seeds in containers for the year.

I wanted Pink Banana Squash but none have germinated.  I bit the bullet and ordered a packet on line.  Postage was significant for one packet, but this is the last chance to try to germinate some of this variety for the year.  I found them on the Victory Seeds website, which is a company that I'm coming to like.  They sent the seeds out the next day and I got them two days later.  We'll see if they germinate.

Some of the squash and cucumber seedlings.  Also some Chinese Chives.  These pickle seeds are form ones that I saved last winter, great germination but who knows what the cucumbers will be like, because I didn't isolate the plants or flowers and I don't know if they were hybrids.  Squash seedlings quickly outgrow these little containers.  I planted the Gete Okosomin and one of the Yellow Zucchinis in the garden yesterday.  Others to follow, and giving away a couple of zucchini plants.

I've planted most of the basil but there are still a few to go.  Same with peppers.

A few of the remaining "Extreme Bush" tomatoes.  I'll give away a plant and find a location for the rest.

The Soyu Chinese Cucumber packet was from 2016.  I planted about 6 seeds.  So far, one has germinated.  That's good enough but a few more would be better, so I planted another container.   I'm glad I saved the old seed packets.  This summer I can let one go overripe for seed saving.  [Edit - that photo was yesterday.  This morning I saw that two more seedlings have emerged.]

The rest of the cucumber seedlings.  I planted more than I want, because I didn't know which ones would grow.  Varieties are Alibi hybrid, a Bush type that doesn't designate if hybrid, another Bush type that is F1.  I think I'll plant all of the hybrids together, and try to isolate at least one of the Bush type for saving seeds.  Maybe the ones that I grew form saved seeds this year, and the other Bush type that does not state Hybrid.  These should be ready to plant in the garden in two weeks.

Planting Early Sweet Corn Seeds. 5.9.2021

 It's still early.  I usually start planting sweet corn about May 15th.  Even then the first crop doesn't always do that well.  Two weeks later usually works better.  Since I plant every two weeks until mid July, however, this time has some potential for an early crop.  This year seems warmer, earlier, than most years have been.  Plus, the soil temp is 20C which translates to 68F.  The minimum soil temp for sweetcorn is 65F so in theory, we're good.

This soil thermometer has a Fahrenheit reading but it's inaccessible on the back of the thermometer.  So I have to convert from Celsius.

These are the early types I'm trying this year.  I tried Early Sunglow a number of years ago and didn't like it.  It wasn't productive. However, this is a different location and maybe I'm better at it now.  Trinity is a type I liked a lot in the past, but couldn't find seeds for a while.  Seeds'n'Such seems to have some older varieties that I couldn't find elsewhere, so I bought them while looking at seed websites last winter.

Quince Aromatnaya in Bloom. 5.9.2019

 These look a lot like dogwoods, except five petals instead of four.  Of the grafted types, only Aromatnaya is thriving.  I should take a good look at the others and decide if they should be removed.