What Did You Do In The Garden?

[valley ranch]

Does you lettuce get bitter in the summer~

 

[Gardening with Rabbits]

Our cabbage is purple from exposure to the elements.

Steve

Some of mine are purple too.

 

[ducks4you]

Does you lettuce get bitter in the summer~

Yes. There are supposed to be strains of lettuce that stays sweet during hot weather. ALSO, I read an article that suggested planting lettuce in mostly/partial shade. It will grow more slowly, but it is supposed to not bolt. Worth trying.
http://www.groworganic.com/organic-gardening/articles/growing-lettuce-in-the-summer-heat

 

[Collector]

Everything we planted was started indoors and in our greenhouse. It is nice to have plants already started to put in the garden. It has been wet and cold this spring and the plants are not as big or robust as usual. I agree starting indoors is easier than most think and also adds a couple months to the gardening season.

I watch a LOT of gardening programs and so many of these expert gardeners start from seed indoors and then plant outdoors, which is something we all can do!

 

[valley ranch]

I moved some very young tomato seedlings to the garden from the greenhouse, they didn't take the blaring sun too well, I think I'll have to replace them. They were just too small to take it~Next batch I'll shade them a bit somehow.

 

[Gardening with Rabbits]

I planted some collard greens today and a few Swiss chard I had started inside. DS and I had 3 barrels of rabbit manure that had some bedding inside and had been rained on and snow melt. We got the barrels to the alley and dug a hole down in the compost and got the water all poured down inside and covered quickly. The smell was horrible. We have another pile of half finished compost and did the same with that. It is going to be smoking now. Starting to rain again.

 

[Collector]

This evening we planted tomatoes, peppers, beans, carrots, and radishes. Thankfully the weather held off. Tommorow the high temp is going to be in the 50s probably rain grr.

 

[Nyboy]

@Gardening with Rabbits what kind of bedding do you use. I tried composting pine shaving I use for bedding, turned into a cement like mound.

 

[ducks4you]

I guess I never thought much about how other people clean their stalls. I conserve all good bedding so I do not remove good bedding material that Will turn hard, AND I use FINE Pine shavings. I used to use medium for my horses, but the fine breaks down MUCH better, into tiny little pieces one year later, plus the soiled bedding which contain both manure and urine. So, MY compost mixes really easily with the soil and is fluffy. IF you have a LOT of big used shavings, I would suggest that you mulch with it after you turn it several times.
I still use medium shavings in my chicken's coop, but I don't remove that with spot cleaning every day, as I do daily for my horses in the winter and very wet warm weather.
There is a new product (I Think it's local) called "Ewe Poo" and they spend the time mounding and moving piles so that their composted manure looks like black gold, so to speak. When I stripped my horse's shelter last summer and I tilled the bottom 4 inches, IT looked like black gold. It takes time for this stuff to break down, but piled up shavings exposed to the weather is like making cardboard.

 

[Beekissed]

Today I hope to get on some weed removal operations, then planting lettuce, broccoli, carrots, pak choy and flower seedlings into the garden...doing a few low tunnels for lettuce and such this year so that I can give them shade when it gets hot and also keep bugs off them.

The tomato seedlings are starting to show up through the soil of the seedling trays. Putting them out later than usual this year due to the cold and wet spring we had last year....seems like this one is working up to being the same. Peppers will go out even later than that, as last year not a pepper produced around here until September anyway.

Hope to get squash, cukes, beans, and pumpkins planted this week, then go over to my grandgirl's garden and do the same, but first I have to finish building their garden gate arbor and wooden trellising for their porch.