Great Online Find!

In my pursuit to find blogs of gardeners in my area, I found a great live video feed of a hummingbird's nest through An Alameda Garden.

You just have to check this out! What a beautiful hummingbird. I just watched the mommy fly in and feed her little chick!

http://cam.dellwo.com/

Enjoy!

Spring Is On It's Way

An unwelcome guest is trying to hide.

  

  

Between left and right raised beds. There are chionodoxa in addition to more crocus that should be coming in soon.

 

Baby Earwig. The nice thing about the cool weather is the bugs are slow. 

The LO holding a cabbage worm that fell from the peas.

 

First pod!

  

  

Have a good weekend!

Lucky Number Seven

I was looking at this picture I took a few days ago, and didn't even notice his legs until just now! This guy was hanging around my habitat for fungus gnats (ie cilantro).

Please click to see this odd beauty.

First Harvest of 2010

Last night I snipped enough lettuce from the salad table, and a bit from my right raised bed for 2.5 side salads (the .5 being Boy Wonder's mini salad). I also pulled a few of the radishes growing there. I finally grew radishes! Only took me three tries. HA!

My harvest:

They're still teeny little things, but at least I can say I've grown them now!

 

 The carrots and peppers are store bought (for now!)

 

The LO tried a slice of radish when I showed him the pink (pink is the one color he can identify 100%), and promptly spit it out, running off screaming "Eeeew! Bugh, Mommy!" Boy Wonder said he didn't like them, but had no problem finishing them.

I'm very happy with the taste and growth habit of the Summer Crisp Lettuce. I've already sown more seeds in my left raised bed. The French Breakfast radishes are rather bland compared to the few store bought kinds I've tried. I wonder if it's the variety... I'm leaving the rest of the radishes in the table for a while to see if they get bigger, and if the taste changes.

Starting 2010 With Rain, Growth, and Blogging

First, thank you to those of you who contacted me to make sure everything is ok, and to those of you who have encouraged me to get back into writing. After being gone for two weeks back in October, I fell out of the writing and gardening groove. Having the holidays thrown in there didn't help much either! One of my New Year's "Do Better's" ("resolutions" seems so extreme, and tend to drop by the wayside faster than "do-better's") is to get back in that groove!

So, here's what have been growing around the garden. I have two sets of most pictures. The first of each are from 1/11, and the second from today, after we've had a week of rain (gasp).

Below: Salad table, and current hot spot for producing life! Left (sown 11/5): Summer Crisp Lettuce. Right, back to front (sown 11/23): French Breakfast Radishes, Short & Sweet Carrots, loose-leaf lettuce mix.

Cilantro. After all the rain, I have fungus gnats--bad. I drilled more holes at the bottom, and will treat with BTi once the rain tapers.

SFG, right side: Peas and broccoli, and hidden behind the broccoli, under the peas are carrots. The carrots were more of an experiment after my carrot seed mats sown in my west-east running raised bed failed due to lack of sun, and slugs. The peas are taking up so much more space than I anticipated. I added a wire "fence" to try containing them, then I added more trellis string I had and tried tieing them back, to no avail...

At least the peas are beginning to bloom.

My broccoli is beginning to flower! YES!

SFG, left side: Looks like a bunch of weeds, yeah? Garlic and onions are in the back, with soggy onion scapes taking over the empty spot on front right. Shallots in the front left. I dug down in the dirt to see what's happening, and nothing is happening. Nothing to match the growth on top at all. I'll give them until April when tomatoes need to go in (yes, tomatoes, but more on that another time) to show me they're worthy, or they're gone.

 

The orange bush/tree is doing really well. This year there are a lot more but smaller fruits growing than last year... Interesting...

My hyacinths and crocus' (croci? hehe) are coming up. Early I think? They aren't very picture worthy at this point since the flowers that haven't been decapitated by slugs are spread far apart...

Hope you've enjoyed!

PS Many thanks to Mom and Dad for my new camera! Now I just need to learn to use it to it's full potential!