Gardening, Puttering and Adventure Thread, July 8

Hello to all you gardeners, putterers, adventurers and readers! This morning, we are starting out with a beautiful photo which I usually think of as a mountain wildflower:

Hi. Been reading Ace of Spades for many years. Thought you might like to see a picture of one of the bitterroots growing in our yard in Montana.

If you use it you can just refer to me as Jackson Creek.

Thanks.

Beautiful! Makes me wish I were there. Or maybe somewhere else in the mountains or higher elevations where they might grow. I happen to have some photos from a friend's trip to Island Park, Idaho:

They have big mosquitos there, reportedly. There are often challenges on these quests for beauty:

Edible Gardening/Putting Things By

From By-Tor:

My LA County Fair ribbons came today. The white is third place for my sauerkraut; my apple butter won 1st place, Best of Class, and Best of Division.

Congratulations, By-Tor! An inspiration for The Horde! Takes some advanced planning, though.

Seemed like a bacon and eggs and prize-winning apple butter morning.

Mmmmm . . .

Hey KT,

I had such an amazing surprise out in the garden this morning. I had planted a Green Indian Thornless Jujube about 5 years ago. The tree grew very well, got to be a nice size and was healthy. Trouble was that I have never gotten any fruit off of it. The first few years I kept thinking that it needed to get bigger, it took time, blah, blah, blah. But by this point I was getting a little mad about it and started to do some research.

That research lead me to pruning it pretty hard this spring, fertilizing it more, and watering it a bit more and I have also heavily mulched it. As I was watering something near the Jujube this morning I looked down to see this. Very small baby jujubes. It was one of those moments that make all the time and effort spent in the garden seem like nothing because I GREW THIS! I have yet to have a jujube but when they grow big and ripen, I will take pictures and let you know how they are. They can be eaten fresh or dried and of course, I will have to try both. Happy gardening horde.

WeeKreekFarmGirl

Great news about the jujube fruits! "Thornless" is a big deal with jujubes because the spines can be wicked. Thornless varieties are often grafted onto thorny rootstocks, and they sucker. So you have to be careful.

Dear K. T.,

My wife (the lovely and accomplished Annalucia) and I are now enjoying
the fruits of the garden. As the attached photo shows, the broccoli is
almost ready to harvest. It's our favorite vegetable, served raw with a
blue-cheese dressing or hummus, or lightly steamed with butter and
lemon, or in a stir-fry. If you haven't had broccoli cut fresh from the
garden, then you haven't had broccoli!

I've also included a shot of two of the many peaches on our peach tree.
They're about 1.5" in diameter, so they have a way to go; but so far, so
good. There is *nothing* as good as sun-ripened peach picked right off
the tree!

The weather in SE Wisconsin continues very dry and unusually cool, with
highs in the 70s. Also, the wildfire smoke is quite noticeable. At
times, it smells smoky outside, and the sky is much hazier than it would
be normally. We could really use some rain.

Nemo

Great report, Nemo! The peaches and broccoli look wonderful. And you're right about the quality of fresh-from-the-garden broccoli. On some varieties, picking the central head early will give you more side heads later. On others, it won't.

Anybody else harvesting anything?

Wish you had one of these? They could make a home model, couldn't they?

This is incredible Ag technology, and it’s here. Laser weeding. https://t.co/TFLIk8Mx3x

— Westside Farmer 🦅 (@JoeDelBosque) July 7, 2023

Ah, Nature

We were just discussing Hammerhead Worms on June 24, and now we have a real example!

This was on the side of my shop yesterday morning. A hammerhead worm. I had heard they are an invasive species, but this is the first one I have seen. Supposedly they eat earthworms. It’s about a foot long stretched out.

- fd.

Don't chop it up. Just makes more of them.

Puttering

Doing any puttering?

Gardens of The Horde

Anything going on in your garden?

Hope everyone has a nice weekend.

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Week in Review

What has changed since last week's thread? Gardening, Puttering and Adventure Thread, July 1

Any thoughts or questions?

I closed the comments on this post so you wouldn't get banned for commenting on a week-old post, but don't try it anyway.

posted by K.T. at 01:09 PM

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