the little wild kingdom

flowerbug

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I wonder if Baker Creek would be interested?

i've been able to rehome some garlic to a grower downstate but they are the only people so far that have expressed any interest in things i've grown (on the commercial scale).

note, i had to send them at my own expense and they've let me exchange that for seeds here or there so it's not been a bad experience, but they're so busy they don't send updates on how it has gone. i may see them at the upcoming seed swap (this winter) i hope it will still happen. it is on the calendar and i plan on being there.
 

flowerbug

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Ummmm.... I'm further south! I'm living in a time suck right now, but surely by spring I could devote an area to tuck a few seeds in the dirt. No pressure of course, lol!

I like a good experiment...

you'll have to fence them very well to keep the animals out, but i'll send you some to try. :) PM address and i'll put you down for sending. :) probably will be after the first of the year before i get to it. i have one more large package going out this week and i'm done for my budget this year so i have to wait for the calendar to roll around again and my funds magically reappear. :)
 

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sorting beans, getting a bit more organized (haha), reading books, waiting for the ground to dry out more, hope i can get outside tomorrow. some days are more flexible than others. :)
 

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was able to get some more gardens put up for the winter today. a bit chilly out there and windy but at least there was progress. a high of 50F and winds up to 35mph. tomorrow is supposed to be calmer even if a bit colder but that is ok. i've already dug out a trench that i need to use to bury the last scraping i need to take off the top of the garden that is left. and then once i get that done i can spread out the last few buckets of wood ashes and get that raked or dug in.

the garden i need to take some dirt off the top with the weeds, it can be skimmed now and i'm glad i did what i already got done in there today (found all the grass and got that done first just in case i can't get back there right away). that was already buried in another trench. the other part of scraping the surface is to gradually lower the garden area and to use that sandy soil in a neighboring garden which needs to be raised up a bit more. the tulips and other spring flowers underneath the garden prevent me from doing this all at once without a large amount of work that would have best been done the end of July or early August. to say the least, that didn't and likely won't happen...

so we are making progress, garden are getting put up for the winter. almost all of them will be done tomorrow if the weather cooperates and i can actually get outside.

my back was not too mad at me today and it isn't getting worse so we'll see how it feels tonight and tomorrow. so far so good.

plenty more to do. there always is, but it does feel good to have more accomplished now because it sure makes spring a lot easier too and i can get work done on other projects like cleaning up a mess i made last year or ...
 

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Congrats! Sounds like you made really good progress.

yes, feels good and did it again today as planned so we are done with the bulk of the gardens. :)

i only have to spot check all of them now and do some light weeding. all the wood ashes are spread out and dug in so i can get those buckets back to the person who fills them back up for me each winter. before he was putting those ashes in the trash. they do help with our heavy clay soils so it's really nice that it has worked out this way. a few minutes ago Mom was saying we shouldn't get them any more but i already told him that we wanted them this year too and he has a bunch of extra buckets from us already. i can keep using them as long as he wants to do it. i have a lot of area yet that i've not ever put any on, plus plenty of gardens that can use them.
 

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half the squash are roasted and in the freezer. two of them are completely new to us. Sweet Dumpling Squash lived up to the name for sure. too sweet for me (yes, hard to believe) but i've not usually been a huge fan of acorn type squash anyways so while this was an improvement it still didn't do enough. luckily all those SDS could be mashed up and mixed with all the other squash.

the other squash new to us this year is a cross breed of some kind and i was afraid it was going to be more like a Hubbard, but it turned out to be a very good squash so now i have yet another project of seeing if these seeds will come true for a few years. if they do then i'll have to figure out a name. i have two other large squash just like it yet to roast so there should be plenty of seeds. very healthy squash and pretty large seeds. hybrid vigor or not we'll see what happens.
 
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