I'm trying to wrap up the cool season plantings. and started collecting tomato and pepper plants for later on . hope it'll quit frosting soon.

Rick

I put out about 50 lettuce plants, but I am late and they are small. I have turnips coming up. This is the first time I can remember planting spring turnips, I wish I had planted collards instead. It is time to uncover my carrots, I hope covering them with black plastic helps. I have never had any luck with carrots. I tilled the bed deep and added perlite, I hope this helps the germination this year. The first of my tomato seeds were planted late Feb., they are too small to plant even if the weather warmed up. I have 12 cucumbers that need to be planted, I will have to up pot them again because we still have too many cold night ahead of us. The weather gets crazy in this valley, and I don't feel safe till around the first of May. The zone lines have changed in favor of a longer growing season, but that still does not change my Microclimate much.

It's a little chilly today. I haven't been out much but did get some stuff done indoors. Most everything is put in it's place now. And I have a pile to donate to a garage sale. A large pile.

I did start a few varieties of basil and the Saint John's Wort....not in the usual way I start seed, so hopefully it will be okay.

It is chilly out, but the hoop house is 60 and warm, so it feels nice in there. The onions that are in the garden next to the hoop house are beginning to get their 3rd leaves, so that is good.

The comfrey is looking pretty. I'll try to dig some up for anyone who wants some. I'll come back with a picture of the comfrey. Last year, the comfrey and dock seedlings looked the same to me, but I've figured out how to tell them apart. Obviously, when the comfrey is in bloom it's easy to tell, but the newer ones are more difficult.

I am about a week behind on my planting chart that I had made in the beginning of the year. We too have been having a lot of cold nights and I just don’t feel like cucumber seeds would be happy in the ground right now. My squash seeds I got two out of five varieties to germinate. So far.

Worked on my wall. Paint and redo my jars should finish it. I want it done so when I harvest and dry things I can put them straight away. I am growing two types of agastache for tea, two types of mint, and about 10 herbs for culinary use. If half of them make it into jars I will be thrilled.

The picture

Kim, I am impressed, that is a nice shelf.

I never know if I am running ahead, or behind. I some things I know I am running ahead. I am so afraid of being late, it often causes me to be too early. Here is a picture of some cucumbers that I planted for Madge. I tried planting them early because I though that they may not germinate, well they germinated sooner than I expected.

There are 12 cucumber plants there that need to go in the ground, and it is much too early. The sweet potato slips are coming off early also.

I have some bell peppers coming up at about the right time, I think. I have a lot of plants that need up potted, but I am running out of room.

These peppers seeds were planted on 3-10-24, and I have about 27 of the 37 that I planted already breaking through the soil. The flat of seedlings were seeded on 3-8-24, and they are ready to be up potted.

It looks like I spilled some turnip seeds into my potting soil. I will toss the turnip plants when I start up potting these plants.

Larry your plants look so great. I need to get some potting soil so I can pot up my plants. Some of my tomatoes are ready and some of my herbs will be ready soon. That shelf is actually a wall I built

Kim, I need to do some potting up also, but I have not been feeling well, plus it is a little cool out side. I could up pot in the bedroom, I have a mineral tub of potting soil in there but it is a little messy potting plants in the house.

I need to go down to the neighbor's green house to pot my plants and leave them there. I think he wants that also, but I am just not able to take care of his plants also. Neighbor came over yesterday and said that he had not been able to get any of his seeds up.

Does anybody remember that there was a listing of all the tomato varieties with brief descriptions from A to Z on houzz, or maybe it was garden web then.

Is that listing still around?

Here's a Dawn bump on tomato varieties .

https://www.houzz.com/discussions/2054100/tomatoes-in-oklahoma-part-i-varieties-types

I just bought some Super Sioux , haven't done that one in years , any thoughts?

Rick

I dont recall anything about Super Sioux tomatoes. I think that I have grown the Sioux, but don't remember anything on it either. I am trying Early Treat for Early Girl replacement. I ran out of Early Girl and 4th of July seeds both this year. I still don't have all the seeds that I ordered this year.

I have been up potting this morning, this is the first up potting to the 36 count cells for this year. If I had room under the lights I would just go straight to the Solo cups, because it may still be a while before I can go to ground planting. I went out at 9: 30 and we still had frost in the shade, and the min/max shows a low of 24 degrees this morning.

I am trying a Bush Beefsteak again this year. I started some last year, but I think neighbor got several of the "special to me tomatoes" and planted them in his market garden last year. The plant that I manged to steal and plant in a container for Madge did very well.

I grow a Sioux or super Sioux most years. They're dependable and pretty good in heat. They are an old fashioned red tomato, I think probably 8 oz size.

https://tatianastomatobase.com/wiki/Category:B.C_KO_T

Slow, those bush steaks produced LOADS of sizeable tomatoes for us last year. They were planted in the garden and ended up being a surprise for us. Going in again with them.

So sad. I lost about half of my tomato plants in heavy frost last night. I did not know it was getting that cold. I hope I can salvage enough so I can still share with people I promised porters.

Oh Kim! I'm so sorry!

I should have been prepared. I was dealing with an escaping dog until dark and just came in without thinking about plants. I brought them in tonight just to give them a chance to warm up and maybe rebound. Don’t know if you can see the dying babies.

Kim, was the top opened? It got down to 24 here, of course I expect I am 100 miles north of you. It I had any Porters I would bring them, but I am not sure if I have ever grown a Porter. I set a flat of tomatoes out for a little while, but I was afraid to let them get too much sun.

Yes it was open. These are seeds I have grown since 2012. As long as I have 10 good plants I’ll be okay.

Kim, again, so sorry about your tomato seedlings. I'm glad some survived.

I should get mine out for some sun today.

Not much gardening was done yesterday. BUT, I did get my house (mostly) back in order. The floors were scrubbed on hands and knees. The main living spaces are cleared of clutter and donation boxes, etc. Enough so, that Alice the Roomba is back in action today. Funny thing, she had an ornament hanger stuck on her roller. Probably the last time she worked was right after putting the Christmas decor away.

Having said that, I still had charms that were made for December/Solstice hanging on my dining room window rod. They still smelled good--oranges and cinnamon, but they're in the compost now.

I went to The Greenhouse in Norman yesterday, too. And did purchase two things and really wasn't planning on it. One is something I've wanted for awhile for a specific space. It's a Sunburst St. Johnswort. It is a shrub that doesn't grow too big. From what I understand, it's not native to Oklahoma, but is to Texas and the rest of the south. There were only two left, so I bought one.

Also, purchased a Little Redhead Indian Pink, that is native to Oklahoma. If anyone has experience with it, please share.

The Greenhouse had an entire greenhouse full of native plants. I thought that was cool. That may be a new thing for them.

Anyway, on Monday I did spend time in the garden. About half of the pathways in the kitchen garden now have fresh woodchips. I'll probably go out in about an hour and finish it up. That's quite a job. Mostly because I don't have straight rows in that garden, which makes pulling the cart through the garden a bit difficult.

There's only 1000's of volunteer sunflowers everywhere. I'm pulling them up. Love them, but they overtake everything. They're allowed in the burn pile garden. These are just the wild ones that get so big.

Also on today's list is cleaning up the asparagus beds. Usually this is done in November. Oops. Didn't get to it then. And, normally my asparagus shows up a bit later in April. It's here now, tho. I chopped up a few spears and put them in the frittata last night.

The columnar apples are about to bloom.

I should probably finish up my indoor chores and get outside instead of rambling on about every item in the garden, which is always tempting to do.

Oh, did I mention the potatoes are showing up?

For real now. Gotta go.

I am sorting through my plants and up potting. I have 100 + plants outside starting a hardening off cycle. I have cucumbers ready to plant now, except that its too early, this also may be the first time I have started cucumbers inside.

I had better go move my plants to the shade, they have been out about 1.5 hrs.

I did not do a full inventory yet. My son and his wife came and helped me in the dog pen. Sophie is a digger and we had to get something done so she could quit digging out. We got that fixed and then he drilled holes in a lot of my tubs on the side for better drainage. It’s hard for me to drill those holes. It sounds like everybody has a lot of great things going on in the garden and life in general. I am so looking forward to the spring fling. I did lose most of my Roselle I think there’s one that might make it we’ll see. Keeping the tray and the tomatoes in the house last night and all day today seems to have helped because some of the ones that I thought were complete goners actually perked up. I’ll do a full assessment this weekend when I start potting up. we’re supposed to get rain Thursday and Friday.

I'm glad this is the day I'm working because it's been rainy.

Rain is good. It was getting quite dry at my house.

The kitchen garden paths now are fully covered in fresh wood chips. Both asparagus beds are weeded and the old ferns pulled out. Unfortunately I already saw an asparagus beetle.

Gardening is a different kind of workout for sure....and I'm sore.

I was hoping to have the entire kitchen garden weeded by last night, but didn't get it done and I worked until dark. One of the beds has a small weed that is hard to explain. I noticed it in the fall. It seems like stunted henbit. And it's thick. But small and hard to pull out because it's so small and thick. Not like most henbit. It took nearly an hour to weed a 1'x2' area.

The carrots are growing, tho. These are the ones that were sowed thickly in the fall and kept disappearing (grasshoppers?) But there's quite a few that are growing well now--in the midst of that stunted henbit stuff.

I'll probably clear out the remainder of the other beds tomorrow and come back to this one last.

Stuff coming up: Rhubarb, horseradish, asparagus (early for me), carrots (from the fall). The valerian is looking good and the lemon thyme and comfrey too. Newly planted this year: cabbage, broccoli, kale, spinach, and lettuce all thriving. Strawberries--some newly planted and some from last year. Potatoes popping up. Onions and garlic looking good. Oh, and chamomile is everywhere. Someone warned me about this...and it's what I wanted. So, I got my wish. Elderberries, blackberries, goji berries, and columnar apples are all awake.

The dandelions are cheerful. If I had time, I would collect them and make jelly. Many things in the native garden are waking up too.

I want to try artichoke again at some point.

I've been reading about sacred geometry, the golden ratio and the Fibonacci sequence during my lunch break. If my intelligence matched my curiosity I would be dangerous. But, we're all safe, because it doesn't. lol

But, the divine proportion is pretty amazing.

And it's back to work now.

I have been trying to get a few things up potted, and was afraid I would run out of supplies right in the middle of something, so I went to Poteau, Ok., then to Greenwood Ar. to get my supplies. I can pot up plants even if the weather turns bad, but at this time of the year it is easy to run out of supplier. Each Co-op was out of something that I needed, and some of their stock may not be reordered for a while.

Why do I not listen to my wife when she says " you are planting too much"?

Well, I had better get to work also, there are a few things I can do outside before the rain starts.

Well the frost thinned out my Porter tomatoes for me so I won’t have as much work to do. I planted my chocolate cherry tomato seeds and they are not coming up and I vaguely remember last time I planted them two years ago they didn’t come up. I’ll give them another week but I’m not gonna count on them. I do have some snow white coming up. Soon as I can get out there where it’s not raining hopefully Saturday I will do a full inventory. I got my soil I broke down and bought a $20 bag of pro mix. I have a giant bag of espoma plant fertilizer so I will mix a little of that in there when I pot up. I fertilize pretty heavy on my large pots last time before it rained and it’s really starting to show. The plants are starting to green up and grow.

Oh and Larry I think gardeners have this innate ability to silence the naysayers. Not on purpose it just happens

Kim, I think the mate of a gardener will have a special spot in heaven as a reward for putting up with the gardener. Madge and I try to support the other ones hobbies, but she has a harder job than I do, she puts up with muddy feet, dirty clothes, and a husband that smells like diesel fuel.

It has started raining here, and I felt like I needed to get the potting soil that I bought today under cover, if it gets too wet it is heavier and harder for an old man to lift.

I had to unload Madge's car to the back porch to make room for the potting soil I was going to pick up at Greenwood. Greenwood does not carry the Top Notch, and Poteau was out of Happy Frog. I have never used the Top Notch before this year, but I am trying if as a filler, hoping to stretch the good stuff a little farther. I have 15 bags of potting soil on hand now, some will be used in mineral tubs, and maybe a little in the garden, because I am out of compost. I can buy compost for less money, but it is harder for me to handle.

I agree Madge deserves a medal. If I had a husband he would too.

Y’all make me tired just reading about what you do. My husband and me too have had too many doctors appointments lately and I’m behind on my garden and yard work. My plants are looking good although the cucumbers are getting big faster than expected. Ive uppotted everything except cockscomb. I’ve planted hollyhocks snd brown eyed girl sunflowers twice from seed saved and not had a single one come up. Snapdragons and oregano just germinating - I did get good stand of lavender.

Jennifer the plant I have issues with is the common storks bill. It would mske a good groundcover in a heavily trafficed area but I don’t want it in garden - it’s difficult to get rid of - flat and spreading

We got about 7/10” of rain last night. I put out s few more broccoli and baby choi before rain and potatoes are coming up. The sugar snaps are about 6” tall and looking to climb

We have gotten considerable rain. More than I thought we would. I have no idea how much because the rain gauge broke. I can't seem to keep one of those things for any decent length of time.

Larry, I've never used Happy Frog and have been fortunate to not have had many issues with potting mixes. Except in 2022. Normally (if I don't use peat pellets) I use a sterile seed starter and up - pot to a potting mix with fertilizer. This typically goes without issue. 2022 I got a bag of bad stuff, like so many other people did around the country. Luckily, those tomatoes took off once they were put into the garden. I know some people weren't so lucky. With me, it was just one bad bag and one or two trays.

I've made my own too....and it's a bit cheaper, but I have to have my brain in the right place to do that. I'm always in such a hurry.

I can't remember what I put into the Greenstalk (and that was just a couple of weeks ago LOL) but it seems to be doing well. It's time to makes some salads now. Those plants are doing better than the ones in the hoop house.

Although the hoop house ones are doing well too.

Doctor appts are such a time consumer. I love sugar snap peas. Do they normally do well for you? Aphids are such a killer for me and peas. It's not that I don't have plenty of lady bugs and lacewings. I have videos of my aphid covered peas with lady bugs in all stages, and lacewings and their eggs (on those string things) all working hard, but the aphids still kill the peas. So frustrating and I've pretty much given up on sugar and snow peas.

I don't think the weed is storks bill. It really does look like stunted henbit. The only thing I can think of, is it came up in the fall and then froze a bit, but the newer henbit came up and didn't have that freeze. I just don't know. It's weird.

Linda Vater is on Living Oklahoma right now. She does have a lovely Oklahoma garden. I've never really followed her, though.

There's a few things that need to be done inside this morning and then I'm going to head out to the soggy mess and try to weed the raised beds. We'll see how it goes.

I can't believe this is the last day of SB. I need another week! :)

Jennifer, I don't do "hurry" very well, except when I am getting tired, I can do that in a big hurry.

We may need to move in with our doctor to save on gas. Madge said that she had 4 appointments coming up in Apr., I have no idea how many appointments I have.

I just got back from neighbors, he was wanting some sweet potato slips. I move 2 flats of Covington potatoes to his greenhouse, and I went down this afternoon and pulled between 45 and 50 slips and stuck them in pots. Its too early to plant sweet potatoes, but some of the slips are getting as long as your arm.

I seem to not have seed starting mix around when I need it. Here is some pictures of peppers that I have started this year. I have two bags of seed starting mix, somewhere, but, I cant swear where it is. These seeds were started in Pro Mix L C 15. The areas you see where the plants are missing is where I was trying to use up old seed.

The top peppers are Ashe County Pimentos, they were started about 2- 27-24. The bottom peppers are California Wonder. I really got lucky on these, I got 103% germination rate, or had an extra seed stick to my finger when I was planting them, because I counted out 37 seeds, and got 38 plants.

The peppers to the right end of the flat are new seeds, the ones moving over to the left were from old seed packages. Most of my seeds I start after Madge goes to bed, I try to give her more rest time. If you notice, will see that the potting mix was not mixed well. It was late, dark and muddy out, and I did not want to go to the shop for another bag of Pro Mix, so I use some of the Happy Frog that I had on the back porch to stretch the mix I had in the house, and I did not do a good job mixing the two together.

These peppers were started on 3-7-24, and they look better in person, the camera is trying to give these peppers a yellow tint, but they are really nice deep green.

Larry your plants always look great healthy and so nice. I don’t have a lot of doctor appointments because I don’t have insurance maybe next year I’ll get it. Jennifer my sugar snap peas are doing great they’re about a foot tall and should be blooming soon. I planted I believe in January. It was a trial to see if they would sprout and they did so I will do that again. Reading over some of dawns old notes I found where she would try early plantings. Sometimes it worked out sometimes it didn’t. My squash just now is emerging from the soil. But I think that was a soil problem not necessarily weather. The soil that I used in several areas crusts over into a hard mat across the top. I was going to get some vermiculite and put across the top of those pots but I forgot. One being came up out of 30 so I replanted some of those. Oh and I had cleome sprouted and I really didn’t expect that because the seed was so old. There was a lot of smoke outside so I had to come in but I am going to get up very early and Do a full inventory before the smoke hits.

Kim, my peas do well until the aphids kill them. I feel like I've done everything "right". I don't use pesticides (other than Bt very carefully and specifically on brassicas) and I've invited in tons of ladybugs of all types and lacewings. And those beneficials are in my garden. They just can't keep up with the aphids.

It's a weird deal. Even the noodle beans I so badly wanted mostly because they're cool looking on a trellis.

I'm so happy that yours are already so big!

I'm happy to see the basils sprouting, but the saint john's wort is not yet.

edited with some crazy pics of my noodle beans showing all the above mentioned critters.

.

Kim, thanks, but my plants only sometimes look great, you don't always see the duds.

My soil always crust over. I even added a lot of perlite to an area and tilled it in the soil is looser, but still crust over. I am not sure a light crust is always bad, it seem to help sometimes in water retention. I would rather have soil with enough organic mater in it so it wouldn't crust, but for me that is almost impossible.

I have been wanting to try putting something over my seed to see if it would help germination, but have not tried it, of I have tried using potting soil, but it can dry out very fast.

I am a little afraid to plant squash, I am still in frost range, my min/max shows that it got down to 36 last night.

I have lied to myself again, I am still up potting plants, I don't even know how many plants I have, but I have over many more plants than I have room for, and I am still up potting, someone like that need special help.

Kim, is someone burning brush piles? Around here it is too wet to be fire season, although we were under a burn ban about 2 months ago.

Jennifer, with critters like that I don't see how you can grow anything. I had more aphids,and lacewings than normal last year, but the aphids finally won, they are such a drain on plants.

I had a 5 gallon bucket of turnips in the house a few months ago and they got past their prime and I notices, what looked like aphids climbing the inside of the bucket, so I took it out side and poured some dish soap in the bucket and filled it with water, hoping to kill all the insects.

I have never taken as much interest in container growing till I saw some of Kim's and Amy's pictures. I want to work harden on container growing this year, and I want to try to keep some king of onion going all year.

This is some of the containers I will be working on.

Of course you have seen my onion project. These are all some type of winter onion, as soon as I figure out which types I want to keep, I will reduce the number to where I wont have such an excess.

I never work this hard on garlic before, matter of fact, I would seldom grow it because Madge would not use it. The garlic looks pale to me, is this normal, or does it need some nitrogen?

I have been trying to learn a little about cooking. I have been trying to use stuff from the garden, and it seems as though Madge is taking a greater interest in the things I grow.

Now I need to go start lunch for my Sweetheart. Please don't look at all the grass and weeds I need to pull.

Well I’m almost used my whole bale of promix. I was determined to use it all today. I need to pot up my amaranth and then I will be finished. I planted a lot of seeds and fixed a pot of zinnia and calendula near the rabbit hutch that should look pretty. The soil that I started with this year was so poor quality everything was just stunted and I noticed the last few weeks with these nice rains we’ve been having that those things just weren’t growing. I got them out of that and into pro mix. I mixed in about 2 cups of Espoma fertilizer with that whole bale of pro mix. I’ve done a little weed eating a lot of tidying up and fixed my water hose. I filled up two mineral tubs and about five buckets for watering later in the week. Larry the smoke actually comes from my neighbors that moved back home. They smoke a lot on their porch and depending on the way the wind is blowing it goes right in my garden. it’s very unpleasant smelling stuff. I have a hard time with any kind of smoke now. I managed to salvage close to 30 porters and I probably have about 20 more so that will be enough for all friends family and fling. I planted some more tomatoes today and Herbs and peppers. Six weeks until the fling

I am trying to up pot some peppers, I just took a 72 count tray out to get a little sun. I am taking a little break and then up pot ting some banana peppers to 36 count tray, I am out of 72 count. I will then up pot some tomatoes to 36 count tray. I will then go to neighbor's greenhouse, I have 69 sweet potato slips potted up there. I have 2 flats of sweet potatoes making slips in the greenhouse, I am plaming on giving away to friends and neighbors the slips from those 2 flats. I have pulled 69 slips and still not through the first slip harvest from those flats.

Kim, your plants look nice, the tomatoes are the only ones that I can recognize, I just don't know a lot about plants.

I have never understood the smoking thing, I tried it, like most kids, but I was not man enough to like it.

I worked 7 hours between garden and cooking. I am done. I am going to start buying soil for next year so I don’t have these problems again.

Thanks Larry. I potted up some I normally wouldn’t. they were so small but I needed to get them out of the cruddy soil. I was sitting here thinking the other day my son came and helped me and he said are you going to cover the whole garden with the insect netting. I said no I’m going to cover each pot. Well if I had enough insect netting it seems like it would be easier to cover the whole garden. It’s already fenced in and I have a gate installed. We did that last year to keep the chickens out of there. I have it measured. I will calculate it all in a minute. But it seems like it would be easier to hand pollinate

I have been potting up more plants. I have grown basil the past few years because my grand daughter like it. Madge does not use it, but now that I have the urge to learn to cook, I think I will read a little about basil, if that stuff taste as good as it smells, I could get fat on it. I have been starting sweet basil, and rubin basil, that sweet basil swells heavenly, but I can see where the rubin basil could find its place also. I expect that I have at least 10 of each of the two.

I don't see how you are going to cover your garden with insect netting, and make it work, I don't even do a good job at keeping the flies out of the house, and I think it would be a much harder job keeping insects out of the garden.

Kim, what growing zone are you in? I have you pictured somewhere along the TX OK border. I can tell by the way you post that your weather is a little warmed than mine. My zone has changed a little, I think most have, I think now I am located on the border of 8a and 7b, but my microclimite puts me closer to 7b

I am just southeast of Gainesville about 12 miles. I’m not sure what zone I’m in. But I think I am on the line between 8a/8b. Last year I well my son fenced in my little garden area to keep the chickens out. He did a good job so even after they were killed I just left it. I will take pictures to show you.

I planted seven different kinds of basil but except for the purple one they all look exactly alike. I planted a cluster in each pot and we will see what happens. Excuse the mess. It’s better than it was but not yet finished. You can see how close the neighbors are in the one picture.

Daughter and Boyfriend are coming over today and bring lunch, Madge likes for me to sorta clean up my trash. I am taking my plants outside. I told Madge that these look as good as a house plant, and believe me, they look better in person. My camera and I just don't do well with inside pictures.

This is mostly cucumber plants and sweet potato slips, and you are right, it is much too early to be fooling around with either of these plants.

I just took pictures and counted pots. I have 25 mineral tubs and two 10 foot inground beds. I I am seriously going to attempt to cover the entire garden in insect netting. I have an old awning frame I can sit in the middle to give me a little bit of height. My actual garden is 12‘ x 22‘ with a few things on the outside. I did all the calculations according to my sons directions and came up with more than enough insect netting to do this project.

Kim, that is a lot of growing area. It is surprising the amount of food a person can grow in a mineral tub.

My grand daughter and her husband was here today and she told me that she needed 2 more mineral tubs. Daughter and her boyfriend was also here today, and I took orders of all the different kinds of plants that everyone wanted.

I set most of my plants outside today, and the cold wind was really rough on the sweet potato slips, they had been growing on top of the grow shelf and had not been exposed to much light, and no wind. If the damage sets them back any, I think that I will still be okay.

Jennifer I can not imagine aphids like that. I had flea beetles really bad in Quitaque. And of course grasshoppers are horrible here. But those aphids are relentless