Recently in The Garden Category

This is a collage of flowers in our yard. The 90+ temps last week really made the flowers pop. Thanks to Annie for all her help and ideas(something new every year!).

Summer 2009

CrabAppleLane Tomatoes - June 7, 2009 I guess you'd call these vine-ripened tomatoes. They fell off of the bush on their own. They're a variety of tomatoes called Celebrity. They're what's for dinner.

CrabAppleLane ginger - September 21, 2008 These came up in my garden this year for the first time ever. Not sure how. If I planted them, it was a long time ago because I don't remember it. If I didn't, I have no idea how they got here. They're not like anything I have in my yard and they're in an ideal place. Tis a mystery and I wonder what they're eventually going to look like. Looks like we have about a dozen blooms and they're huge.

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Are almost ready ...

CrabAppleLane Tomato/Eggplant Garden - May 11, 2008

CrabAppleLane Tomatoes - May 11, 2008

CrabAppleLane tung nut blossoms - March 30, 2008
For Carol You guys missed this by just a few days.

Sign of spring - February 24, 2008 This is one of the CrabAppleLane mirliton vines. It is just now peeking out for 2008. It is a sign that spring is just around the corner. The definitive sign is when the pecan trees start to bud. We had a disappointing mirliton season last year. I think we only picked about a half dozen. I don't know how many mirlitons three vines should produce but I'm certain its substantially more than that.

This is the fun time of year. A little bunny scooted out of my tomato garden the other day. I think its been nibbling on the lower tomatoes that it can reach. I lose 10-15% of my tomatoes every season to insects or critters. I still have enough left over and they gotta eat, too, so I don’t bother trying to keep them away. The only way to do that would involve pesticides. I prefer to just grow more than I need. I was offered a fantasy football player for some of these yesterday.

First tomatoes of the year. Picked yesterday afternoon. Didn’t want them staying on the bush overnight. The night critters like red tomatoes. There were four but one had a good-sized wormhole in the top of it. Naturally, it was the biggest and ripest of the four. We’ll be off later to get some bacon and bread for sandwiches. Bacon and tomato sandwiches for dinner tomorrow night or maybe even tonight.

The picture below demonstrates the problem with growing tomatoes. They tend to ripen all at once. Patsy and I are serious tomato eaters but even this is more than we can handle. In a day or so, we will be totally overrun. Some of these are destined for Janine a little later today after we see the new Harry Potter movie.

The picture below demonstrates my need for a new digital camera. The Hewlett-Packard C200 is a fine starter camera but it has limitations. It has auto-focus but it, not you, determines what it focuses on. The Celebrity tomato below gave its life for the ham and turkey po-boy I just ate with Baby Swiss cheese and Dijonnaise. Patsy will finish it off with some liver cheese shortly.

I picked most of these yesterday between thunderstorms. Most of the cherry tomatoes are ready to eat now. The ones that aren't quite ready (They're the ones that are more orange than red) either fell off during the storm or fell off when I was picking others with my oversized, for this, hands.

The larger one is a Creole tomato that was crowding some larger and prettier Creole tomatoes. I picked it a tad early but we'll eat it later when it reddens.

What you see here is my Valentine’s Day gift from Patsy next to my birthday gift from Katie. I hope to plant both today.

The red and white tulips are gorgeous. Tulips are my favorite flowers since I was a kid. I remember Grandma Tompkins tulips as well as Mr Magee’s next door but Mom will have to help me understand that. When do they bloom in Minneapolis? I don’t ever remember being in Minneapolis in the spring. This picture might have been better a couple of days ago but I prefer sunshine for some pictures. I only see sunshine during the week at work.

The big leaf magnolia is also a treat. A friend of mine up the highway from me has one. They’re also known as calcumber trees here. They have big long leaves almost as big as banana tree leaves and their white blossoms are gigantic. What I mean by gigantic is they are almost “punch bowl sized”.

The weather outside is gorgeous. It is sunny with blue skies, 60 degrees and low humidity. We get maybe three days a year like this. After I post this entry, I am out in it!

After many futile attempts to grow carrots over the years, I have found the secret. Ignore them! These picked this morning. The bunnies will eat good tonight.

This lovely camellia bush was seen from my computer room window just basking in the sun yesterday morning.

I decided to go out and take a picture of it. This image illustrates our need to get a better camera. My original image is very large in size and looks quite good. Reducing it pretty much destroys the quality of the image. Still, it’s not all that bad.

It was given to me by Katie about 8 years ago. A drought and my subsequent neglect probably stunted its growth somewhat. I take much better care of it now and it seems to be thriving where it is. I also have another one she had given me the year before. It is thriving on a much grander scale but it is only in the early stages of blooming right now. I will take a picture of it later when it is covered in blooms. It is quite magnificent in its sunny location. Conventional wisdom says camellias don’t like a lot of sun. My experience says otherwise.

One of my variegated gingers. Took this photo this morning. It is happy in the new big pot I put it in. It outgrew its original container in no time and I waited too long to transplant it. It took a good couple of weeks to get to this state of foliage. This supposedly tropical plant wilts in the Bush heat. Closeup of one of the leaves here.

Welcome aboard, Janine. And, minutiae is welcome here.