Frost April 11, 2012

Well ole mother nature had one last blast of chill left in her. Last evening the temperature in the middle garden dropped to 37 degrees. As we planted a bit earlier than my father has always recommended we chose to buy a little insurance. The low tunnels we installed earlier in the season seem to have done the trick. Not sure of the impact on our strawberries or grapes but we will get a better idea over the next few days.

I can only hope that that this bit of cool weather has set the flea beetles back. They seem to have enjoyed our warm winter and early spring a bit more than anything else. Honeybee activity has been very light this season. Our blackberry bushes are loaded with blooms but we are seeing few honeybees this year. Looks like it may be time to install a couple of hives. 

We are expanding our little patch of garden to encompass another two acres. The soil is some of our fine Mississippi clay. We will work the beds this weekend and plant our first cover crop (soybeans). It will be a year before we build up enough organic material for the beds to be usable. 

Time to head for the office. Back to the gardening later this afternoon. 

Planting has begun in earnest!

This year we ordered our plugs from Harris Seeds, http://www.harrisseeds.com. The plugs arrived in perfect condition! Due to our very early spring we immediately began getting them in the ground. 300 tomato, 300 peppers and 550 herbs went in the ground over the course of last weekend (3/30).

As we violated the old southern rule of not planting before Easter we called on our friends at Johnny’s Seeds (http://www.johnnysseeds.com) for their 4′ low tunnel hoop bender and Agribon AG+19 just to be safe. Thus far we have not needed the protection but we are ready.

Speaking of the low tunnel hoop bender, what a great device! We created 50 hoops is just over an hour from 1/2″ EMT. We started our coin jar to save our change to purchase the 6′ low tunnel hoop bender this summer.

While we have just started our 2012 Spring planting season we are already working on adding an acre of speciality cut flowers to our garden in 2013. The beds must be created, organic matter added and the drip irrigation installed. One thing about dreaming big is that there is always good old fashioned hardwork to be done.

Time to grab a hoe, until next time.

Spring is Early!

We grow over 70 varities of Irises and all of them are in full bloom.