blooms

memorial day weekend finds both annual and perennial plants blooming in the pgp...more hairy vetch has bloomed, joining the dixie clover that has been in flower for better than a week...the winter rye in the third photo is flowering as well so we will have seed for green manures and cover crops this coming autumn from a local source..which is at least part of what being sustainable is about...even the asparagus is flowering which means more "berries" in a few months to collect and naturalize wherever it seems there is a likely spot...things are moving along and it is only the end of may....next month will have its share of growth ans surprises too.

greeen manure on a bed of rye

the green manure seed bed in the pgp is doing fine...like the stand in my yard, both the dixie clover and the hairy vetch are in bloom which speaks of seed to come...and the hairy vetch is hitching a ride on the rye here as well..tendrils everywhere...one wonders if they will get to the chinese yams...so far so good this season and i will be collecting all the seed and moving all the plants possible over the next six months...it started out as a year for physically moving gardens and it will finish that way as well...resilience is something we're trying to learn here...my thoughts are that we will need all we can muster soon enough.

last potato planting

off to the pgp this morning to finish up the potato patch that has replaced the forage variety of intermediate wheat grass...turned in yet another forty pounds of composted manure ( i hope the university is aware of the fertile and organic nature of the plot they are reclaiming...bet hey don't...bet it becomes lawn again...bet it gets covered in 2-20-10 fertilizer again in 2015 )...more than two tons since 2009...anyway...i put in three yukon golds, one all red and seven early blue that could not find a home in the community garden...the mashua in the bottom photo seems as happy as the ones in the community garden...hoping for many tubers there...many spuds too.

all clear

strong thunderstorms with heavy rain, wind, and hail that moved through late last night left the pgp unscathed...the mashua in the top photo is just fine as are the nascent asparagus and red pontiac potato in the second...while the dixie clover is in full bloom...i talked to tim form the ground crew yesterday and worked out a tenetive timetable for the shutdown this coming autumn...kindly he basically told me to take all the time i thought i needed but the end can commence as soon as the intermediate wheat grass i want to move gose sufficiently dormant and the seeds from the eastern gamagrass mature enough to shatter an gather to try to naturalize into a second generation stand somewhere on the periphery of the community garden...the pgp in the bototm photo gets greener by the day.

grasses in the pgp

both the annual ( top photo ) and perennial ( second photo ) strains of the maize ancestor teosinte have reached a couple of inches in height and now that the weather is warming they should start to grow like...well...corn...should be able to visibly see it grow if you have the right kind of eyes...the eastern gamagrass in the third photo is a hardy native grass that serve as a forage plant...mostly for deer around here...they seem to love the seeds which is ood since they resemble nothing so much as little chunks of wood when they mature...no accounting for taste i suppose...the winter rye that i panted as a cover crop with the fall green manures ( hairy vetch, dixie clover , and yellow peas ) has seed heads developing...i believe i will let them mature and save more seed...thee will be bits and pieces of this garden spread around after the autumn shutdown...it will remain in spirit and in fact.

yams and a surprise

the chinese yams ( top photo ) are producing robust vines and are making thorough use of the trellis already...it may require expansion before season's end...the asparagus on the west side of the garden ( second photo ) is over three feet tall and will be "ferning" soon...i harvested some spears today ( the season isn't over...i just let the big ones go too long )and there should be more into next month and there will probably be an autumn harvest as well since this is pretty much these plant's last season...i did find a surprise lurking about the garden in several places however and it involves intermediate wheat grass and asparagus..apparently removing the stand of wheat grass and replacing it with a potato patch has allowed enough sunlight to filter to the garden floor for some naturalized asparagus seed to germinate and take root...perhaps this is a chance to dig some year old crowns out of the pgp and move a piece of it along in the autumn...where is the salient question...i am not sanguine about the drainage in the community garden and asparagus hates wet feet...there are raised beds there however and that may save them...the community garden needs some perennials...they are a hallmark of sustainability and can be intercropped closely after the first few seasons of root development...we will see come 2015.

surprise appendix

along the perimeter of the surprises more is going on...the dixie clover is in full bloom...seed saving for other gardens is next...it will be going in along with new zealand white clover wherever there's a need for green manure...the winter rye ( second photo ) intercropped with the clover is erupting in seed heads ( just like the ones in my back yard ) and that will provide seed for cover crops in beds as they winter over and hold nitrogen for plant sin the spring...there is perennial teosinte popping up in the four year old stand and this gardener is pleased by that even if the university isn't ( third photo )...bottom photo is th epgp about 7:30 this morning...coming along.