Friday, August 1, 2014

Dayton "Dirt" - August 1, 2014

With the first of August, the bounty of the vegetable garden is beginning to flow although a little slower than usual due to the cool days and even cooler nights. Sweet corn at the Seiberling Farms was delayed about a week because of late planting due to prolonged wet weather in spring and now with the cool weather, a few more days of delay were added so that the Owl Barn was not able to offer Seiberling sweet corn until late last week.

The nursery stock seems to enjoy the cool weather as it is making growth almost as much as weeds - but not really! Just a few more cuttings of shrubs have to be stuck and then it’s done for the year although the new greenhouse facility under construction now will make the sticking of various herbaceous perennials possible that will be transplanted next spring.

The Thailand Giant elephant ears that are planted in pots along the driveway and in front of the owl barn are causing quite a stir. Some leaves are approaching five feet in length and 30 inches across and it seems some will grow larger than that! The plants were shipped from Zeeland, Michigan in small 3 inch pots at the end of March and then transplanted into a 1 gallon nursery pots. In mid-May, Thailand Giant was transferred to a 10 inch pot when in early June it was clear some drastic measure was needed to allow the plants to grow so that the plants were planted to a 15 gallon pot!

The begonias along the road and entrance driveway have also grown “abnormally” well in that their genetics “program” the plants for gigantic growth. They are known as Begonia ‘Surefire’.

The cool summer is heaven for various conifers as they suffer from too much heat as was the case in 2012 when many even died. With high temperatures consistently above 85ยบ F in the summer of 2012, conifers closed their stomata (breathing pores) so that no exchange of gases could take place for the process of photosynthesis to occur. The cool weather too has caused harmful spider mite species to languish as they just love the heat and dryness in order to colonize various plants  exponentially! The European two-spotted spider mite is one of the worst as it just loves to suck plant juices from its host plant which include a myriad of annual flowers, house plants, shrubs and even trees.

It won’t be long that the first tomatoes will be ripening in quantity at produce farms and backyard gardens then the question will be as to what to do with all of them.
Tom

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