Tomatoes in ground- their root knot nematodes are showing. Repotted seems to be holding up...more black swallowtails ready to grow up..too many to count.
I was outside, humidity up to 60's and the heat feels like 100* so I retreated to the house. Okay, I knew it would do that, flimsy stuff, chuckl, I need to find a brace pole...
Wow JU, that is a lot of swallowtails. Call you Big Daddy.
There will be professional tree removal done. Last year my big pepper cost me $650 to remove. My neighbors do not want anything else ruined. I want some of the sawed off trunk, cut into about 2' tall pieces for the garden. Makes a nice stand for some pots and can add levels to the landscape.
We had rain again today but not in our neighborhood. Suppose to have it again tomorrow.
Caregiver company just called and my help put Vern to bed person is not coming. So it is my job tonight. He is currently watching baseball. tied up in the 10th, so we may be late going to bed. San Francisco and San Diego. Late game.
My second Pink Mexican Bird of Paradise is not pink. I now have seeds from another hybridizer, for the pink, so we will see next year.
See you all soon.
Wow JU, that is a lot of swallowtails. Call you Big Daddy.
There will be professional tree removal done. Last year my big pepper cost me $650 to remove. My neighbors do not want anything else ruined. I want some of the sawed off trunk, cut into about 2' tall pieces for the garden. Makes a nice stand for some pots and can add levels to the landscape.
We had rain again today but not in our neighborhood. Suppose to have it again tomorrow.
Caregiver company just called and my help put Vern to bed person is not coming. So it is my job tonight. He is currently watching baseball. tied up in the 10th, so we may be late going to bed. San Francisco and San Diego. Late game.
My second Pink Mexican Bird of Paradise is not pink. I now have seeds from another hybridizer, for the pink, so we will see next year.
See you all soon.
Sharon , that is Kitt with the Swallowtails
1 a kankakee mallow grown from seed
2 a yellow candy cane zinnia
3 a fancy petunia
4 some Celosia
5 the seed grow Cheyenne spirit Echinacea one on the (oops far left is hope (a little small yet ,it is a yellow ,,
This message was edited Jul 31, 2018 1:32 AM
We do have a bit of rain .03" so far. I fertilized and watered anyway. My tomatoes are setting flowers, mostly the Prudens Purple. The Opalka are growing, but since it is 78* out until the rain leaves, and the root knot nematodes are so hard on them, I am watching with pruners handy. My bronze fennel Joe, was slow to grow, not even 2' hi while the regular is at least 5' high. Had to put rings on them to keep them off the ground. Rain gauge now shows us .1" inch. Seems too lo for anything but humidity issues, but I love the lower temp.
A bit of a detour today. You may remember me posting pictures of my winter walking trail along the creek at the back of our property and a small stand of trees that I had hand planted 38 years ago. I promised to try to get better pictures of those trees this summer. Here they are taken from one of my main firewood access trails on the property. I would guess they are close to 40 feet tall now. It has been a good feeling to watch them grow over the years. I would have been a 28 year old youngster at that time. Where did the time go ?
Keith Nature and serenity (sigh) The time it is , ?
Raining here
unusual but the Bronze fennel is enjoying the rain
Fleabane still blooming (neat weed that way )
Hello all
Zinnia 1 2 3
petunia
senna
All the caterpillars disappeared but for one. I moved it to the bronze fennel and he is back to eating. Grasshoppers increasing, really too hot to stay outside, I took down another tomato, and seperated a container pot a bit further from the others. Had to chop its roots back into the pot where they'd crept into the dirt. Dog days have begun and school supplies are fully stocked in the stores again.
Love your photos JU. Beautiful colors.
I did take some photos of the trees next door that are coming down so you could see the impact the removal will have on my landscape. The wall between our property is on the West side of the property. The last photo shows you the area of the landscape that will get much more light, including the Koi pond.
Sorry, first photo is boxes my neighbor asked me to take photos of for them. New Patio furniture was delivered today and they are in Michigan.
Third photo, the silver pine is mine and I do have a mimosa in the back corner. But I hack back the mimosa each fall to control the growth and make it look like a very large fern.
Nice bright zinnias Ju,
Wow Sharon, that tree removal is sure going to impact your yard! Like you need more heat!
Thank you all ,
Sharon , my goodness , when the sunshines in ,
Kitt good the caterpillars all have something to eat , Maybe you will see some butterflies from the missing soon ,
Have seen a lot of butterflies here but not overwhelming numbers of any ,
Cut some grass today , weighed the cats , 9 lbs Tribbles , 12 lbs Mingles ,
170 lbs for me ,,
Lowering my cholesterol and dealing with my glucose level has left me worn out ,
I keep mulling away at things though
Here I am happy I have dropped from 217 this time last year to 190#! Still workin at it tho the muscles are achin. Always had more muscle than other gals I knew, shake head, I look at my soft wrinkles on my arms and wonder what happened.
Anyway Joe, here is my 1 lone bronze fennel with that 1 lonesome caterpillar. I see Gulf frits and dusky skippers constantly, but the black swallowtails only sail thru when eggs are laying. Compared to other monarchs they have such short lives. One gulf frit yest was so worn down you could see thru her wings like they were cheesecloth.
Wow, Kitt, good job. I have lost 15 pounds in the last three months. I stopped eating sweets. Never ate sweets before and was always buying them for Vern and then I was eating them. Vern wanted to know why I was losing weight. I told him I either needed to buy bigger blue jeans or lose weight.
Storming all around us today but not here. I had my hair cut today and my hairdresser told me my hair was getting thinner. I told her I had noticed that. I guess I need to buy some wigs. My neighbor up the street wears wigs and you really cannot tell.
Hard to see good old trees go, but it is interesting to watch them being taken down. After hurricanes everyone freaks out and takes down good pines here. I have a feeling the shade will greatly be missed. :-(
Great captures of butterflies and such. I think the red pepper is probably a jalapeno, if it is watch out, red is hot. Ju, love how creative you get with planters.
I agree coffee outside in the morning is a great pleasure.
Ginger flowering
I have a variegated ginger, I need to find it a good place but dunno if it needs shade or what...may move it to a pot...
All gingers seem to like a good amount of either morning or evening sun to flower good, several hours, and a good watering once or twice a week.
The variegated shell ginger is used a lot here in landscaping, it seems to be the most sun/drought tolerant, but performs the best around the bottom of trees where it is shaded in the hot part of the day. They do have some growing in full sun in the middle of a four lane roadway here, they burn a bit on the leaves from sun and cold temps, but sure do flower good. If you plant it in a pot, use a big pot, they put off many offshoots.
Planter as re-purposing can be fun , when it looks correct and does well for the plants
Today ,
Hibiscus
Bronze fennel seedling
the purple coneflowers doing a third bloom set .
Nicotania
Early Sunflower .
Haven't touched the ginger yet, did grab the 2 loquat sprouts that have been stuck in a 1 gal pot for the last 3 or 4 yrs...dau kept telling me it needs to go in ground, but couldnt tell me where to plant it, sigh. I split the 2 plants up, cut the 1 gal container out of the roots since that 1 gal container was sitting on a 3 gal pot. If it survives it can go inground when she is ready, if it dies I'll get her friend to dig me up a few new ones. We got an hour and a half of thunder and .01" inch sprinkle. My daughter watched a humminbird fly in behind me and go into a hole in the ground under our boardwalk. OK. Nesting? Got the maters dosed with lqd calcium and noted the deer visited the sweet tater vines and the suckering shoots of the maters. I wonder if she is the one drinking out of the water pools I sit around for dogs and kittens...cats. Joe, I repurpose pots til there is nothin left, but acquired new ones recently to gain size. All the trees are shedding leaves like crazy from the heat stress, normal everyday stuff here.
Dbl post, drat it.
This message was edited Aug 5, 2018 9:41 PM
Ju, I snapped these 3 photos this morning with you in mind as I know you like zinnias and Tithonia. This is the first time I have ever put Tithonia in a pot. It's a little big for that. For some reason they didn't do well in the greenhouse this year and only one survived out of a whole package of seed. Didn't know what to do with just one so I stuck it in a large concrete planter
Keith Your Tithonia look really good ! I only had a few survive this year also , Not as easy to grow sometimes as would believe , Zinnia always delightful and cheery ..
Kitt Hummingbirds and cats playing , Hot today , really hot here , After the morning early the answer is well maybe this evening as not much doing when it feels around100 degrees ,
Nice Hibiscus and the Nicotania, a new one to me.
Everything drinks out of my little water fountain and birdbath, the dog, cat, squirrels, birds and how knows what at night.
Keith, so beautiful, I have tried Tithonia in the ground and pots, it never last long here, looks great in spring but by hot summer dies out on me. I usually start it from seeds.
Gonna be a hot week here, not so much rain. Cleaned my workbench area and tried to eradicate my cape honeysuckle vine yesterday (pretty but invasive as all get out), mostly shaded over there, had fans blowing on me the whole time. Looks a lot better now, I still need to get under my bench, but I wore out.
Before and after, honeysuckle was all over that fence, now more light for my orchids.
I like the cape honeysuckles, would be afraid to plant here, tho they do great in southern Cali. Pretty Keith, but I know your area is just coming in to its own time now..
Thanks guys. We have had a very hot dry summer but last Wednesday night it almost froze. 2.3°C. That's too close for the beginning of August
Removing that honey suckle sure opened things up Sherri
Tomatoes are really loving our hot summer this year.
1) Highly recommend this new find. This gem is called Tumbling Tom Yellow. Ended up finding it from one of my seed catalogues due to a request from 2 of my daughters. A few years back I had bought a package of mixed coloured mini tomatoes called Mosaic Mix. I guess both of the girls had gotten yellow ones from me and loved them. Those ones came in in mix of varying shades of red and also orange, yellow and purple. Being retired and all I have been trying to cut back on my spending without impacting the volume of what I grow and one way of doing that is by cutting down the number of suppliers I use to reduce shipping costs and also getting as much as possible from one new supplier that has really good prices AND doesn't charge any shipping as long as your order is over $60 which is very easy for me. So unfortunately I was not ordering from the company that sells the mix and even if I did it was a crap shoot as to whether you got yellow or not. So luckily I discovered these Tumbling Tom's that you can order by colour. The plants themselves are little sprawly but they are very heavy producers and are really sweet. I only have 2 plants and this is just one picking. Lots more to come
2) my main tomato variety, Primo Red
Nice maters, Keith. Sweet 100 cherry do well in FL, the only yellow I tried was 'Sun Gold', they did pretty good in the heat, and produced pretty far into the summer.
I soaked my seeds last night and planted my Pink Mexican Bird of Paradise. Same thing I id about 5 years ago. They just bloomed and they are not pink. So I had ordered new seeds guaranteed to be Pink by seller from Amazon. I do not know if I will live long enough to see if they bloom pink. Just something I want.
I had quite a few tomatoes, but no flavor. Just to hot. Got hot early and stayed hot.
Keith, beautiful tomato crop. I just got on the computer and it is already late. I will post a photo of my pot with seeds. You can bless my photo with a good propagation prayer.
Hugs, Sharon
Keith a ground hog got most of my tumblin toms I guess the critters liked thse also .. good Tomato yours look Great !!! yum ,,,
Sun the tropics and vines ,, lots of to do , nice garden ,!!!
Sharon I am younger than you and I already do that About like well I guess I will see this bloom or grow if I am still around ,, The around buffers the sentiment ...
Think Pink , it helps ,,
Am considering taking my mater vines out of the ground-yet they are beginning to set blooms again: an inch or so of rain today 4th day in a row. I SEE cooler weather heading down from the north, debatable if it will reach this far... took out the fennel and parsley that was spent anyway. Killed two palmfuls of snails that were hidden under there and crushed a bunch of flea beetles. Along with the weeding have been the trimming and fertilizing and waiting for the burn pile to dry out enough to torch. I like those tumbling toms- looking into some snacking peppers for next spring, either the Yum Yums, or another red or orange type. Still debating. My peppers have started back up and those serranos will light your mouth up. The mustang grapes are ripening and hitting the ground heavily. Fall is coming in early.
I cut my tomatoes back and put the trimmed cuttings on a pond tray, stacking the deck for fall tomato, only works on indefinite kinds.
Hate having trees removed, China berry has to go this fall,
Everyone 2nd well, peppers were mild for jalapenos
I sure did love reading up on everyone's adventures in gardening and am happy to see some pretty colors from you all. Keep posting, I'll keep lurking.. :D
Morning glories and a meadow rue ,
Hi all ,,
Thānks for comments guys. Nice photos Debra and Ju. My daughter Tennille had a nice bunch of monarch cats again. She sent one over here which is in chrysalis stage now. I am getting my milkweed established now with hopes for next year.
Corn, cantaloupe and sweet potatoes are loving the heat we have been experiencing. Me , not so much.
Keith really Nice ..
I am seeing several Butterflies here , pictures not so much ,
Ground Hog ate my Echinacea to the ground last night ,
Pair of Goldfinches Top Center and a little hidden
Very good catch eith the goldfinches Ju.
Very good catch eith the goldfinches Ju.
I pulled the grass and weeds from the dog run, we have particle board laid down on parts of the muddy places. I left my weeds a couple of days, and tonite threw them over the fence. These pix arent a tenth of the earthworms that were laying on the ground. It makes me think of Sharon😊. Compressor is pulling down the 90* in house now and I am SO happy it is working. Tomorro will be up to 95* I hear.
This message was edited Aug 14, 2018 10:44 PM
