Thursday 25 July 2019

July 25 '19

After the excitement of a birthday and an anniversary comes the normalcy of every day life. Because I am on summer break right now, my days consist of all the normal tasks that everybody is responsible for: tidying, gathering up garbage and blue box (recycling), making meals, laundry, getting groceries...

A big part of my time has been spent digging. As described before, I hand dug my vegetable garden where the strawberries and ridiculous amount of weeds and grasses had taken hold. Here is my garden now, with the plants that I had already put in (in the little space that was to be had in the late spring). Now I have thrown a few more seeds in the ground and covered them with husband-designed rabbit munching prevention devices. If some of them germinate and produce by the time fall frosts come, well then, that will be a success.  You can see the old carpet (upside down) on some of the bare earth. I want to see what else we have lying around that can be used on the other bare parts to kill off anything that I didn't manage to hand dig / pull.


I need to be more diligent in watering the plants that are already up. This heat has been pretty tough on growth (when there hasn't been much rain at all). I'm looking at the picture and it really doesn't fully show the size of the garden area that I dug up and weeded. It really makes the whole thing look quite small, but trust me- there was a lot of digging - in 28 degree heat with a humidex of 36, 38, even 40 (this is Celsius, by the way).

Anyway, late July is not as spectacular in the flower gardens as beautiful late June, but here are some of the highlights:

Salieri Daylily.

Cement planter with sweet potato vine, geranium, and coleus.

Our little arbor with potted red geraniums, covered in trumpet vine. There are some buds, so hopefully it will put on a decent show. The bugs tend to eat the buds before they can open.

Lucifer crocosmia.

Daylily, possibly 'red magic'.

So, the heat has been a little hard to take (I'm actually fine with it, but son, the cats, the chickens seemed to have more difficulty). Here is symmetrical Samson in one of his favourite spots, where he can look over his kingdom.


The chickens prefer it when things are little cooler. I think egg production was down a bit during the extreme heat. I made sure to give them fresh water every day. They have shade in their run as well. When I come out the back door, they race to the fence, as I am usually the provider of food. Their favourite is leaves of dandelions, although leftover mashed potatoes can send them into a frenzy as well.


Sorry, girls. No treats right now.

Now that most of the hens are old enough to lay, I get a lovely collection of eggs.


There is a whole variety of shapes, shades, and sizes depending on who laid what and how old they are.

And there you have it.


23 comments:

  1. That is a BIG patch of garden to have hand-dug!! Hope you ate extra calories while doing that task as you must have burned off a lot of them. How exciting to have that new space in which to plant. And when you've killed off all the weeds, and removed the carpet . . . all the more space.

    We rid an area of what we thought might well have been a breeding ground for the eggs and larva of the white cabbage moth (they lay their eggs in the soil) by covering it for one summer and the following winter and spring with black plastic. Don't normally like to use the stuff but we got it as wrapping around some woven wire fencing so decided to use it. Sure didn't allow anything to grow under it. Hope your piece of carpet works as well.

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  2. I think black plastic would be perfect! In my mind, that piece of carpet was a lot bigger, or maybe the garden was a lot smaller. I really do need to find something else to cover the rest of it, or all my work will be in vain. We are replacing our pool liner. I'm thinking that would be fantastic...

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  3. Your world is really very beautiful, despite the weather. I know day lilies will make more flowers when they get lots of water. Love your arbor!

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    1. The daylilies are only just starting to bloom. With some rain, they'll probably keep going for a couple of weeks. (IF we get some rain).

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  4. You have a beautiful garden Jenn. Ours is wilting in the heat today.

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    1. Mine could really stand a good soaking. Nothing like a steady rain.

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  5. I love your Salieri Daylily, beautiful color!

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  6. What a beautiful arch. I love the greenery as much as the geraniums.
    Hope you do get something to harvest. Good luck with the carpet.

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    Replies
    1. It took quite a few years before the trumpet vine even started to bloom, so I get excited when I see buds.

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  7. That's a lot of eggs! Hope you can find uses (or customers) for them.

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  8. I love your arbor, and those beautiful eggs. Our girls just started laying this week, thank goodness. Store eggs are just not nearly as good.

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    1. They're not, are they? People always comment on how dark the yolks are.

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  9. Love every one of your photos! Your garden looks great and all your hard work shows. I love that combo of plants in the cement planter. The geranium is a beautiful color with that foliage. We get about 18 eggs a day, which is far too many for just the two of us. I was giving all the extras away, but some people have started to pay me, and I'm accepting the money! It goes into an envelope for chicken feed.

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  10. such beautiful eggs.....in spite of the heat your garden has some lovely colour.

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  11. Jenn you certainly have a lovely flock of hen girls & what a wonderful egg collection - you'll be gifting all those soon (col). Samson, SO handsome. I've not been out to the garden much because of the mosquitoes - nothing seems to repel them! I find it funny odd that we aren't that far apart & yet we have had lots of rain (not bragging) this year. Weather, Mother Nature, Climate Change - hard to figure out. ... Mary-Lou =^..^=

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  12. That's a lot of eggs! Congrats! Samson looks very sweet overlooking the common folks as he does lol ;) Your flowers are very pretty, I really love the way the arbor looks!

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  13. All your plants are beautiful, thanks for sharing with us. Looking at your eggs reminds me of a teaching lesson that although they are all different colors outside without the shell they are still a egg.

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  14. Geraniums are my favorite garden flowers. If I had a large area, there would be colors of all types.

    Your hens do a mighty fine job of producing.

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  15. It looks GORGEOUS! And so tidy and neat -- now THAT is a ton of work. My strawberries are spreading too, but I want them too and so I'm hopeful for next year. I might have to have a heavy hand with the dill, though! You are an inspiration!

    The arbor is especially beautiful along with all the lilies. And I love seeing your "girls" and their eggs. I suspect that the heat thing makes a lot of sense. I wouldn't want to be "egging" when it's so hot! What a haul you have -- and they are so beautiful!

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  16. Your garden is SO beautiful! I love the arbor and Samson's perch. Your girls have given you quite the haul of eggs, too. I bet they are better than any store egg anywhere! I need to get out and water and do it early before it gets so hot. Everything is growing and sometimes dries out too fast!

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