reaching for the light

In for a break, after what seems the first "normal" gardening session of 2023. For two solid/liquid months I've been attempting bits of garden work between rains and chores. And trying - as Jane commented in an earlier post - "not to get too attached to an idea of what the outcome of the garden will be." A perfect description.

Practicing non-attachment by admiring daylilies.
Also ferns and grapevines.

As part of my sensible goal to do more gardening at waist-height and closer to the house, I invested in two Birdie beds during a 20% off sale last Autumn. I did not expect to have to wait til June 21st to actually get the first one filled and planted, but that's how long it took, working bit by bit over many days to gather up the muddy materials to fill the base. Leaves that I chopped and saved last year. All sorts and sizes of soggy sticks from every paddock, gathered in cartloads on rare days when the mud in the paddocks was not too deep for the cart wheels. A load of shavings from cleaning out the hen suite and barn. Also layers of actual mucky mud, which is so heavy it had to wait for days when my Occasional Helper could be here to fill a bin and heave it into a raised bed.

On the afternoon when I could finally start plinking tiny seeds into the soil, thunder began to roll in and I had to finish up quickly and hustle through evening barn chores. Not quite fast enough, though - the deluge arrived in full force, escorted by thunder and lightning. Since I was already soaked, I thought about finishing up the chores before heading back to the house, but the chores would have required standing in water and wrestling with metal gates, so instead I sheltered in the barn with Azalea and Hazel as lightning cracked overhead. We had a cozy visit after agreeing by mutual consent to talk about anything but the weather.

And look at the first raised bed, just one week and more rains later!

Actual rows of seedlings! My thrill level was off the charts.

Three kinds of greens, two kinds of broccoli,
and an assortment of radishes.

The second bed was filled and planted on the 28th, also just before a thunderstorm. This morning I checked, and radishes - planted between rows of carrots - are already reaching for the light. I've never been able to grow carrots here, so that bed will get a lot of checking. And I usually don't plant radishes at all, but this could be the Year of the Radish.

Many tall plants, including bee balm, have been flattened by the rains,
but some milkweed has managed to stand.

Back in the first week of June, I planted pole beans, along with dill, okra, and kale, in the terrace garden. In the wet weeks that followed, it seemed likely many seeds would rot in the ground, and I just had to wait for things to dry out at least a little before replanting or working in what is usually my main vegetable garden.

Roughly 80% of the 2023 blueberry harvest.

Well, yesterday and today have been beautiful days! Today the terrace garden area was more accessible, and not just a saturated and dripping jungle of undergrowth. I puttered happily, smacking mosquitoes, pulling up goat snacks for the boys who followed me down, and releasing the few tiny dill seedlings and young okra plants from an overstory of galinsoga and catnip. I patched two rows of bean netting while apologizing to the scant bean plants for borrowing their stock-panel trellising back in May for short-term goat use. The netting was intended as a "starter" trellis to be supported by reinstalled stock panels long before the beans needed the height. But I was never able to get into the terrace garden to replace the panels, and as much as I miss my lovely stock panels in the terrace garden, I imagine the pole beans miss them more. The good news is, I've used the panels to divide the Upper West Side in a new way, so that most of the herd can now access that area simultaneously but in two groups. Which is especially nice when the sun is finally shining after they've spent days cooped up in a shelter or walking along bits of scrap lumber to keep their feet out of the muck.

Doesn't it look like this bee is hugging the flower?

That's how I feel today.

~~~~~