Thursday, June 18, 2009

Dayton "Dirt' June 19, 2009

June 19, 2009

Right now you should be thinking about planting another patch of vegetables especially beans, corn, cucumbers and squash to get the garden “going” later into the summer and early fall.

I was surprised when an organization in Wadsworth to which we donated tomato plants for planting and harvesting by economically disadvantaged families had said that the man that would plow and prepare the ground was concerned about the “late” planting (June 15th) as it was already June!

I laughed when I heard this statement as I have planted many vegetable gardens between June 1 and June 21 with great success. Again, it is some ancient mentality that some of us have that everything should be done by Memorial Day in the garden.

A the nursery, we’ve been transplanting trees and shrubs for a while now but next to be transplanted are our “starts” of Azalea and Rhododendron from our greenhouse that we rooted from cuttings last summer. These transplants will be ready to sell in a small size next spring after they have over wintered at the nursery.

Again, please perform the root wash on Rhododendron, Azalea, Pieris japonica and Blueberries (just as we do when we transplant them) as it is a sure way to foster good root growth of the plants. For more detailed information as to what a root wash is, take a look under gardening tips and look up the instructions for Rhododendron-Azalea planting.

I’m excited too as our new crop of blueberries that we transplanted in March is growing like weeds!

These plants still need time to root out into the new soil and to branch out again after a final trimming we will give them in late June.

I recall my early years of gardening of hoeing, weeding, hilling up the rows of potatoes and waiting for the first harvest of warm season vegetables.

One of my fondest memories is when my grandmother and her friend from Barberton, Mrs. Postek were digging in one of my rows of Pontiac Red potatoes and started screaming. When I ran to them to see what was the problem, they had dug out a huge potato that weighed in at 2 3/4 pounds! My grandmother was no novice at gardening in that her city lot was like a food factory providing many meals of fresh and canned vegetables for the family table.

Its no wonder with the money she was able to save that she had $5,000 in the 1930’s to lend a close neighbor in order to keep the neighbor’s house out of bank foreclosure.

See you soon,
Tom

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