Seedy Saturday

Rust colored sunflower

Welcome to Seedy Saturday! This weeks FREE seed giveaway is for some small seeded decorative sunflowers.

In 2009 I planted several packets of mixed colors of decorative sunflowers and they were in all shades of red, rust, orange and yellow. The plants were quite variable also, some just 3 feet tall, up to about 6 feet. Some plants had just one or two larger flowerheads while others branched out a lot and had a dozen smaller ones.

The bed they were growing in was not in the best shape, so they would probably have been bigger and had more flowers in better soil. The flowers attracted a lot of bees and butterflies and the seeds attracted a lot of finches and other small seed eating birds. My idea for growing them was as chicken feed, but the dogs got the chickens before I tried them out to see if the chickens liked them.

Since sunflowers are very much outbreeders there is no telling what you will get when you plant these, they will be a big surprise. I hope that the winner will send me pictures of them when they bloom!

To be in the drawing for these free seeds, simply comment on this post! For the fine print rules, read this post.

In other news the weather has been warm, sunny and dry and I'm having to water the outdoor gardens a bit. And the rats that have taken up residence under the house, in the walls and attic are stirring. One nibbled some pea shoots in the greenhouse. However, I set a trap and got that one. Getting ready to reset the trap as I know there are a lot more of them. Thinking maybe I need to buy some more traps. One might not be enough.

I got a windfall of two boxes of aging produce out of which I canned 21 pints of applesauce and some half pints of salsa. Just lucky enough to be in the right place at the right time. I'll be doing a how-to article for making the applesauce.

Good Reading

June 16, 2011 at 2:35 am

Well there were hoof prints in the potato patch this afternoon. But I don’t think it was javalina because nothing was rooted up and they were pretty big. So I have a feeling it was the deer that have been hanging around. It’s been really dry so I’m thinking that they are coming for water.
I might put a tub of water over across the creek for them or something, just to help keep them out of the yard.
In the meantime I’ve been having a wonderful read over at Gene Logsdon’s blog; awesome fella, I’ve been reading him almost as long as he’s been writing. Bought a few seeds the other day and cleaned out one of my seed boxes this afternoon. I really am trying not to go whole hog on the garden but my fingers are itching to be in the dirt.
So I planted about 3 luffa seeds, a few red sunflower seeds and some snapdragons. That shouldn’t get me into too much trouble. I planted them in some soil blocks and set them in the kitchen to keep the birds and chipmunks out of them while they sprout up.

Season Review October 31, 2009

Season Review

October 31, 2009 at 2:49 pm

Well since summer seems to be gone, I thought it would be a good idea to think about this past year and make some notes for next year.
It seems that last spring I could have planted more lettuce, radishes, beets & carrots later in the season. This would have helped with the gap in late May. While the kids enjoyed the baby corn, it seems they really wanted regular fresh corn.
I definately need to plant more melons. Plant less small tomatoes and a lot more large ones.  Give the large tomatoes more space, they probably need a good 24 inches each. I only had about 2 doz large tomatoes, could probably use upwards of 75-100. It takes a lot to make sauce, ketchup and other tomato based things.
Twenty to thirty row feet of snap and snow peas are probably enough, since I don’t like the way they are when you freeze them. But we could use 50 or more row feet of shelling peas for freezing little green peas and probably 25 feet or so of the Blueshokker soup peas.
Since the Lima beans didn’t set pods until late September, they could probably go in a lot later than they did.
I need more bird protection, especially in the summer and fall. Not only did I lose a lot of seedlings to the birds, but also a lot of sunflower and popping sorghum seeds.
I need more rat/squirrel/rabbit  control, they got some melons, tomatoes, squash and other things.
I want more peppers of all types. The amount of squash was fine, as we don’t eat much, especially of the summer types.
We would probably eat more spinach type greens, but mustard and turnip greens were a bust at the table.
We could probably eat more dry beans. The amount of green beans might have been too much, they weren’t a big thrill for the kids so I anticipate the 21 pints I canned to be more than enough. Though I will plant less yard long beans and more Kentucky Wonders.
We could use a lot more strawberry plants. Nobody likes Huckleberries, so I will just invest in more blueberry bushes.
We needed a lot more cucumbers. So this year watch out for the aphids and try to get rid of them ASAP.
I really need to work on the succession plantings. Not keeping up lead to a lot of gaps this year.

It’s a Jungle Out There September 6, 2009

It’s a Jungle Out There

September 6, 2009 at 3:48 pm

Well, here’s a few pics from around the yard to catch up since I missed so much of August.
Heavenly Blue morning glories cover an arch by the front gate.
The small sunflowers are still blooming. They attract a lot of butterflies and bees of all kinds.
One of the surviving Heritage raspberries has put on a few fruits.
The Moon & Stars watermelon is going strong, tho no fruit yet.
Elephant Ears & Canna lily
The Jicama are going strong, just hope they are making nice big roots!
Can’t hardly walk beside the house for all the plants out there.
Delicata squash almost ready to pick.
The eggplants in pots on the patio are doing very well.
A couple of Rio Grande pepper plants loaded with fruit.
The back garden. The two empy beds in the middle are for carrots and parsnips.
Kentucky Wonder green beans cover a 5′ wire cage. So far it’s been so hot they haven’t set any beans, but I found one yesterday so we should have lots of them soon.
Apache Purple pod beans cover part of the greenhouse. They are just beginning to bloom.
Cucumbers & beans. I don’t think we’ll get many more cukes tho, they are severly infested with aphids. I think I should probably just pull them out.
Four o’clocks bloom by the front gate.
16 baby artichoke plants in their pots. Just not sure where I’m going to plant them!
The 11′ Lima beans, which still have yeilded no beans.

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Tally HO!

September 5, 2009 at 4:05 pm (corn, cucumber, food, freedom, gardening, grow your own food, self sufficiency) · Edit

All right, I’ve gotten a bit behind posting here, just soooo much going on in Aug! The grand kids went back to school and so did their mom, so we have children 7 days a week now. But the numbers are in for August; 100 eggs and 79.5 pounds of produce.
Heavenly Blue morning glories cover part of the greenhouse. You can just see one of the Kabocha squash in the leaves at the lower left.
Here  you can see that corner of the greenhouse on the right, then the baby corn, the row of paste tomatoes and on the left some cucumbers and an apple tree still in it’s pot.
Yesterday and again today it is raining. Actually when I took this pic through the front door it was also hailing. We got .4″ of rain yesterday and it is very dark and rainy again today. We were going to go to the lizard walk at the arboretum today, but don’t think that is going to happen. This rain looks like it might hang out all day. It is 9 AM and it is as dark outside as if the sun were nearly down! And I’m loving it and so it the garden.

Too Darn Hot! July 29, 2009

Too Darn Hot!

July 29, 2009 at 3:16 am

whew! It has been about 105 for several days, last night at 9:00 it was still 93.  I don’t do well in the heat and would much rather lay around in the shade drinking icy mint tea, but no rest for the wicked as they say. So in the garden I am busy trying to keep everything watered so it won’t die and it repays me with abundance. [I looked at the tally sheet for July and I think we are pushing 100 pounds of produce for the month ]
Here’s the big corn patch, most of what you can see here is the Bloody Butcher beginning to tassel. Also the patch of small seeded sunflowers. Close up is a part of an old greeting card rack, which has become a trellis for a couple of luffa plants.
I love the color of this small seeded sunflower!
Compare this shot of the yellow Moon & Stars watermelon plants with the one from July 4th and realize that is only 24 days of growth!
The Elephant Ears are getting huge and the canna isn’t doing too shabby either!
A tomato forest. After I took this pic I actually pruned these back a bit. With it being over 100 degrees every day I know that none of the current blossoms are going to set, so I took out some of the excess suckers and branches. That way the plants will stay shorter and are less likely to break later when they do start setting fruit again.
Here you see Miracle’s triple header sunflower is falling down on the baby corn. Her giant 8 & 1/2 foot one is in the background.
If you look closely where the leaves clasp the stalks you can see the little ear shoots coming out on our baby corn. The girls haven’t seen it yet, but they will be excited when they do-they have been waiting for the baby corn all summer.
The yard long beans are growing like crazy in the heat. The yellow blossoms are the Double Yield cukes from www.freedomseeds.com
Pickles on the vine.
The Kabocha squash by the greenhouse is turning orange already.