Showing posts with label gardening. Show all posts
Showing posts with label gardening. Show all posts

Wednesday, April 15, 2020

Day 30 and a word about gardens

Yesterday our county Board of Supervisors decided to reclassify local Garden Centers and Plant Nurseries from *essential* to *non-essential* businesses. Yes, that IS a big deal as non-essential businesses MUST close, must not deal with the public, must send all employees home for however long this shelter-in-place order remains in effect.

This means no vegetable plants for my garden. This means no paycheck for hundreds more people. And, since these businesses count on income from the Spring to see them through the year, this means many of these businesses will not re-open, will not be around for next Spring planting season. Downstream consequences include the wholesale plant growers as well.

Already, there is talk of food insecurity and more people are looking for solutions. For those privileged enough to have space for a food garden (and it can be done in pots on a patio) why take that away?

At least the Farmer's Markets are still open.

Today I'll be putting in a couple of cucumber plants and some Blue Lake bean plants I picked up at the hardware store. I hope they thrive.

Saturday, April 11, 2020

It's never to late to start, or Day 26 of Quarantine

When Gov. Newsom ordered a mandatory "Shelter in Place" on March 16, 2020, we thought it would be 2 weeks and then back to life as normal. I thought it might be nice to start a journal, but why bother? In 14 days, it would be all over and would only be a blip in the history books.

Today is day 26. Schools will be closed for the rest of the school year. Today the US logged 524,242 cases, 20,223 deaths, and 28,755 recovered; California had  21,505 cases, and 597 deaths. Santa Clara county had 1,442 positive tests and 47 deaths as of yesterday. It is time for me to start tracking this new normal.

Let's go back to Day 25, because that is a nice number and I still remember what I did yesterday. Day 25 was a gardening day. I planted 2 eggplant plants from Ace Hardware, and 6 Cannabis plants I had started from seeds. They joined the 2 surviving Blue Lake bean plants, a Jalapeno pepper and a Thai Dragon pepper planted a week or so ago. Hardware stores are considered "essential" businesses but Summerwinds and Yamagami Nurseries are not -- so we make do with "big box" plants and seeds, rather than the good nursery plants of yesteryear.

There had been 6 bean plants, one for each leg of my bamboo tepee but either worms or grubs got 4 of them. There are 4 Cannabis plants left for my niece and her friend to take. Out of the 12 seeds ($40), 11 germinated and 10 ultimately survived to transplanting size.

Today, Day 26 will be a baking and a sewing day. I have sourdough mixed up for bread and it is rising now. Each loaf I make is a bit different, but so far, most have been edible and one or two have been spectacular.

While the bread is rising, I will attempt to solve a setting problem with my latest quilt top (planned version below). The setting triangles aren't such a problem, but the sashing between them is driving me mad. Instead of calculating, I've decide to just go with the empirical method.


My Chickens' First Night

 Sunset  was at 8:11 pm so I went out to the pen a little after 8. The three chickens were milling around, scratching and peeping and seemin...