Lessons of Green and Red

I put a lot of extra work into my strawberry patch this spring. Mainly because after picking the berries last year I let the patch go and it became very overgrown. That's pretty much an understatement of the year, I had thistle weeds in there that you'd need a stick of dynamite to get 'em out. I was determined to get my strawberries back into shape. I spent long, mosquito ridden hours digging up stubborn weeds, grass, treelings, etc. An hour and a half's work resulted in one bed being done, I had four, not to mention at least that much more space that had stray strawberry plants in them that I needed to tend to.

About halfway through the second bed, little nagging concerns started scurrying around in my brain, tripping over my nerve endings causing random thoughts to pop into my head, "Not seeing a lot of little white flowers here." and "Geez, where are all the runners?" were two of the most frequent. Well, I figured it was weedy so may-be the plants were overwhelmed, they'd do better now they had their space back.


After I finally got all the weeding done, I topped-dressed the whole bunch with compost and worm casings. Now all I had to do was get to the others that had sprung up outside the beds. Strawberry season came and considering the bounty I got last year, I was looking forward to making jam and freezing lots of strawberries. My yield was seven. Seven berries. Yup, seven, not counting the four or five half eaten ones I didn't pick. Seven.

If all else fails, read the instructions. So I went to my books and found out something very interesting about strawberries. They generally last three years, then they give up the ghost. Not only that but the planlets on the runners need special care if you want them to be fruitful. Wish I had known that before I put in a good 10 hours plus, not to mention a lot of good compost and worm castings. I should have known that strawberries came with an expiry date. I research everything. But strawberries were one of those impulsive buys, where I just stuck 'em in the ground to see what would happen. It was working perfectly so why mess everything up by looking for facts? Obviously, I should have.


Not all is lost. I will wait till the end of strawberry season before doing anything. I'll probably get a couple more I can toss in my cereal. Then I think I'll just till the whole area, being careful not to bother the daisies. Yes, I have two big daisy plants in there that I'd like to keep going. May-be I'll look into how to keep daisies coming back ... before it's too late.

All I Have to Do Now Is The Weeding

And may-be a little comfrey tea in a few weeks...probably top dress the plants at some point, too. But the point is the garden is in. It took longer than usual because the store-bought seeds were dismal. After two weeks, I realized not much was going to come up so I re-planted carrots, snow peas and beans.

I bought a flat of cucumbers because mine from seed didn't seem to be doing much. I think the biggest problem with mine was the flat they were in was on the top shelf on my silly greenhouse when it was toppled by the wind. Many cucumbers perished that day and the remaining ones were grievously wounded, out of the whole flat only six remained. When I went out to plant the new ones, I notice that mine are going like gangbusters. Guess I'll be making lots of pickles and celery relish this year. If I have too much, I can always add a jar or two into my Christmas baskets. Homemade anything seems to be well-appreciated (except if given to a teenager, but the look of mortification and horror on their faces is a Christmas gift in itself.)

The corn is doing really well, it's about 8 - 10 inches high now. The zucchini and pumpkins have flowers and the zucchini already have little tiny baby zucs. The tomatoes I bought are budding, the ones I grew are doing well too. The ones I left in that embarrassing cold frame seem to be much bigger than the ones I transplanted.

So it is done and I'm happy about it. The war on weeds is going full blast and I'm hoping to get out today to pick the ripe strawberries. Gardening is the coolest thing :).