Gnomes and Cukes

Well the little gnomes are making themselves right at home, actually they've made themselves a home; went outside and found this little house hiding among the flower pots on the porch, so it looks like they plan on staying long term.

The larger gnomes have decided that they like living under the shade of the nectarine tree in their version of a "Tramp Camp", but also felt it necessary to forewarn trespassers that they may be met with something less than a friendly greeting.

Checked on the cucumbers today and despite the heat, I found two cukes that should be ready to harvest soon, one slicing variety and a lemon cucumber.

The red corn is starting to tassel, so ears shouldn't be too far behind and this time they should all make it as I'm controlling the water and the plants are staked so they won't blow over.

Surprisingly, the roses are still blooming, although they're smaller than they were when it was cooler, so hopefully I'll get some nice bouquets come Fall.

Succulent Day

As I've come to appreciate succulents more and more, I've been adding more of them to my garden, but strictly in containers at this point.  When we started cleaning up the patio at the kid's new place, we had to decide what to do with an old concrete water feature that was missing the top piece that the water cascaded from; it was way to heavy to put in the trash, so of course, I took it home.  Today I was at the 99 Cent Only Store and they had hens and chicks in 3.5" pots for just 99 cents, so I bought 3 to plant in the concrete basin.  I planted a few sorry looking moss roses, Portulaca grandiflora, that I had lying around and the 3 hens and chicks.  I also hit a few thrift stores today and found a pair of faux stones with faces for $0.99 each that I just had to have, so I added them to the planter as well.  I think I'll go back and buy 3 or 4 more hens and chicks to fill it in more.

Here's an overview of the planter; it's next to the wheelbarrow succulent garden and the yucca in the milk can.

Here's a close up showing the 2 faces.

This one is totally ringed with chicks.

I had mentioned in an earlier post that my neighbor had given me an arm that had broken off of one of his girlfriends cacti and that I'd potted it, even though cacti aren't "my thing" and was planning on giving away at the Fall Plant Swap.  Well, today when I watered it, I noticed it had developed two pups, one on either side of the base, so now I'm thinking I like it a bit more and may not give it away after all.

At the Spring plant Swap I got cuttings of a couple of succulents and while the Stapelia isn't doing real well, the Orbeopsis malanantha is thriving to the point of growing another "arm" and showing growth at the tips of the original ones.

The new "arm" is the lighter green one against the pot rim.

English Lavender and a Color-crossed Snapdragon

As I mentioned in an earlier post, I bought a couple of urn style planters at Target on clearance and was planning on buying something to plant in them.  I'd kind of set my heart on doing a spiral topiary with an evergreen, in the classic Italian style, but wasn't able to find the right plant, so after much consideration, I finally settled for English Lavender, Lavendula angustifolia.  Now that they're in the pots, I think it was a good choice, as the blue-gray tone of the leaves are a nice counterpoint to the color of the urns and the upright nature of lavender will give me somewhat of the same profile I was looking for.  The blooms will be an added bonus that I wouldn't get from the evergreen, plus I'll be able to use lavender in cooking and baking.

I got a pleasant surprise from the snapdragons I planted from seeds saved from the ones I had planted in the tipsy planter this Spring; a cross pollination between a red and a yellow blooming snapdragon that resulted in a flower with a yellow center and red petals edged in yellow.  I'm hoping they will produce seeds and that the seeds will bloom true, with the ultimate goal being to produce enough seed that blooms true to develop a new cultivar, which I plan to call "Sunset".

Weekend Update

Went to Yuma to visit the in-laws for the weekend and between Saturday and tonight, we got another 0.26" of rain, with the bulk of it yesterday night; tonight's top winds were 18 mph and we just missed a major dust storm that hit about an hour after we passed through Maricopa.  Speaking of Maricopa, I stopped along the highway just west of town where there was a row of wild sunflowers about 40' long beside a ditch and collected some seed heads; my wife thought I was crazy to stop, but I'd seen them on our way to Yuma and was determined to stop on the return trip.  I got 4-5 dozen seeds for my efforts and will plant some in the morning to see if they'll sprout.

I harvested the first sunflower seed head from the front yard on Friday morning and it was 7.5" across; not bad for a 6' plant, but the one on the 8' Mammoth looks like it'll be at least 10" across when I harvest it in a couple of weeks.  I put the seed head in the feeder for the doves and in the morning I'll check to see if they've eaten all the seeds yet.

Tipsy Planter Re-do

Back in February I made my first tipsy planter and it did well until the heat came and the difficulty with watering it caused the plants to expire.  After some months of having it sitting dismantled on the back porch, I finally came up with a solution for the watering issue; build it with a drip system integrated within it.  The new and improved version of the tipsy planter came together today with the following modifications:

I traced out two cardboard circles the size of the pot base with holes in the center just big enough for the rebar and a drip line to go through; this will hopefully prevent grass from growing up into the planter.

I inserted 1/4" hose through the bottom of each pot, with a hose connector on the bottom end, "T's" at the soil level in each pot with 1/4" soaker hose (plugged at the other end) to water the plants, allowing each plant to get its' fair share of the water.  Now I no longer have to worry about whether the soil is getting good and wet or if the water is just running off to the next level below.

I planted the following flowers, from top to bottom: zinna; lisianthus; nierembergia; dahlberg daisy; globe amaranth.

It may not look like it, but each pot is the same size.

I also added about 50 lbs of sand to the brick path I laid yesterday and now it looks like it has been there for a long time, since that's part of the beauty of using reclaimed brick.  Now to find some more of that free used brick to build the path throughout the side yard.

Wheelbarrow Succulent Garden Update

Well, not everything in the wheelbarrow succulent garden survived the various watering (lack thereof) mishaps, so I've had to replace the lost plants, but decided not to use the same ones.  I added a couple of Cel's Agave Agave celsii and an aloe 'Walmsley Blue'.  Here's a picture of it as it is now and as you can see most of the ones that survived have done rather well.

The other mystery seed, the one I planted in the window box, bloomed today and now I know that it's snapdragons.  Next time I plant seeds, I better make a written note of it until I can write it in this blog, as the memory just isn't as sharp as it used to be.

Got some used bricks from one of my neighbors a while ago and decided it was about time I did something with them, so I laid down a double layer of weed blocker cloth between 2 of the raised beds and laid the bricks on top in a basket weave pattern.  The bricks don't fit perfectly, but play sand should fill in all the gaps and holes in the bricks and make a perfectly serviceable path that will keep my feet dry and mud free when working in the beds.

Monsoon Dust Storm and A Man Down

We had another doozy of a dust storm this afternoon, with gusts up to 31 mph and average winds speed of 10 mph, this one came on us pretty quickly.  Managed to take a short video of it approaching before I decided the prudent thing to do was go inside. Only got .05" of rain even though radar showed heavy rain headed my way.  Watching a time lapse of the storm, it parted and went around us almost like there was some sort of force field surrounding the neighborhood.

After the storm passed I went outside to check for damage and found we had a man down.  Larry had to be taken to Scarecrow General for repair work, as the storm took him apart at the pelvis, but a quick surgery and he was back on the job.

Other than a lot of pine needles from the neighbor's tree scattered around the yard, there wasn't any other damage, so tomorrow I'll be raking up the mess and adding it to the composter.

Since the yard has been invaded by so many gnomes, I decided to go ahead and put out the welcome mat, so to speak, with this sign I found on clearance at Hobby Lobby.  Not sure if this is where it'll stay, but I wanted to get it placed before the storm hit.