Give It Away

I made a really good score on some free plants the other day thanks to some righteous friends down the way. I know some people that live in a 'intentional community', what they used to call a commune. Cool folks and Allen has actually been doing some house framing for some of them. He told me they were looking to give away some trees, so I emailed and sure enough, they said come on down! After I got there Sara kept showing me other plants I could dig if I wanted. I ended up with a large witch hazel tree (which was what I went for), a LARGE blueberry and hopefully, many rootings from said blueberry, if they will take. That is what you see in the bucket there. I also got a good size Rosemary shrub, marsh marigolds, spearmint, irises, a redbud, and 3 or 4 forsythia bushes. And maybe something else I forgot. I was very appreciative and offered them to come dig stuff at my place. Even though we only live about 20 minutes apart there is some difference in our flora, as I have several species they don't. It is really awesome to be able to swap extra plants with folks.

So things here are cranking up with the warm weather. The strawberries are poking out of the pine straw I put around them. I bought a few more the other day to replace a few that died last year. I hope this year's harvest is better than last year's pitiful few. I need to add some manure to their soil.

On the other hand, the cabbage and broccoli are really cranking up! They are in their element I guess with these sunny, mild days and cool nights. Hopefully, I will be harvesting cabbage soon.

The broccoli is coming along too! I think the cold got to a few of the blossoms because I have a few heads with a rotty spot where the head would form. About half are forming a nice size head though. I think they have put on an inch all the way around just this week.

One good thing though, is even with the rotty spot in the center, these heads are putting out little heads to the side, so I should still be able to get something out of them. I am very excited that these are doing so well as this is my first successful growing of broccoli. I tried once before, years ago, but I think I waited until it was too hot.
I have another row of much younger cabbage behind the broccoli, so I should get staggered harvests of that. Even though it was some work, I think starting the cabbage and broccoli last fall and overwintering it was not a bad idea. I will have a very early harvest this spring. Perhaps this fall I will start one planting early enough to harvest in the fall and then stagger the rest. At any rate, it certainly works to over winter the stuff.

I have a lot of other stuff coming up in the garden so I will post a little more of that soon. I know not much of this is real exciting but maybe I'll have something else soon! I do have lots going on at any rate. Due to that I haven't been taking time to comment on a lot of ya'lls blogs but I am dropping by! I guess I just haven't felt like I have much to say lately; either here or there. But I am reading.

Hope ya'll like the new blog design. If any of it is hard to read then let me know. I try to keep legibility in mind and I know some colors affect everybody's eyes differently.