Critters 2

I am now paying close attention to the bed in which I planted the garlic and Florence onion seed. Every morning, there is evidence of small critters burrowing just beneath the surface. I was careful to look for the animal's descending holes. There are more there than I originally thought. I'm not sure how many critters there might be, but I presume, given the distribution of evidence throughout the bed, that there must be several.

The photo below shows the size of the holes that go down into the bed. (That's a quarter next to the hole.) They are not large. I don't know what the animals might be living off of. I have had two garlic sprout. (The ones from the fridge.) That is all and those have been left alone.


If the onions will sprout and grow, I won't have a problem. My suspicion is that the critters are going to disrupt the bed enough, even if they don't consume the seeds, that sprouting will become a challenge. I planted a second bed with the Yellow of Parma seed. There has been no evidence of critters in that bed, so I may have something to compare productivity with.

I am getting myself prepared for a war. Right now I wish I had a pet black snake or something.

Critters

Every morning as I look at the bed in which I planted the garlic cloves and onion seeds last week, I see a strange pattern on the surface of the bed. I am guessing, but I think there are small animals that make foraging runs just under the surface of the bed, pushing the soil up slightly. As I water, I usually find a hole about half an inch in diameter on one end the goes back down underground.

I'm not sure my photography captures this well enough to see, but I think you can see one of the tracks I observed this morning. It goes from left to right from the top of the photo and then makes an abrupt turn that curves back to the left.

I thought initially that this might be evidence of a vole. We've seen voles in the yard before, mostly because of what the cats have dragged in. But voles are generally much larger. I can't imagine a cut worm that large. Whatever it is, I hope it is finding no food and decides to leave. I hope it isn't finding a meal on the garlic or clover.

Carts

Six or seven years ago, I bought an Ames Easy Roller cart to move mulch and dirt with. About 3 years ago, it developed a crack in the front face. The crack was caused by strain put on that side of the cart when I lifted the cart up over the front of the compost bins. Then, two winters ago, when the cart was left outside in the winter, water froze in the bottom of the cart after rain or snow and it cracked the bottom of the cart. Since then, the front of the cart has fractured even more. It still holds together to a degree, but it has become hard to use. I looked a while back at Lowes for a replacement, because it has been very serviceable otherwise, but when I looked last, I didn't see any Easy Rollers for sale.


I went to get some lime and fertilizer at Lowes this morning. I thought I would look in the wheelbarrow aisle to see what they had. Easy Rollers were there, but so was this little cart called an Easy Go.


It was a bit less expensive that the Easy Roller ($23 vs $34), but held nearly as much (2.5 versus 3.0 cubic feet). The handle is also a better height; I don't have to lean over to grab the handle, which wasn't the case with the Easy Roller. I thought about it and decided that, if I really need a new Easy Roller, I now know where to find one, but it would be just as good to try out the cheaper Easy Go.

Here's my one day review. The wheels are a bit small and so there is a balance problem. You have to pull squarely or the cart tends to tip. Something that can be mastered. Pulling it from the garden to the garage with a heavy load wasn't effortless. Filling it with compost was OK, but it tips over without a load in it, so it has to be set against something when you start. On the other hand, emptying it was very easy. So, I still may get another Easy Roller, but I am happy to work with the Easy Go for now.

Garlic and Onions

I started planting again. I started yesterday and it will extend for a couple of days yet. I bought some Chet's Italian Red garlic from Seed Savers Exchange. The variety is described as a "highly productive and adaptable strain. Heirloom variety from Chet Stevenson of Tonasket, Washington, found growing wild in an abandoned garden along the roadside. A good garlic for eating raw, because the flavor is not too strong." I guess I picked it to plant because it was not described as being overly spicy. I had my little pal Jacob over to watch the process, although I think his dad (Jonathan) got more out of it than he did. Jacob was into looking at the spider that has found an ideal spot in the doorway of the greenhouse and chancing the little dog.


From the two heads, I got 30 plantable cloves. I added to cloves of whatever it is we have in the fridge to make it to 32 (4 rows of 8). Seed Savers sent out explicit planting instructions to plant between September 15 and November.

I figure what must be good for garlic is good for onions.

I have started planting onion seed from my other order from Seed Savers. I ordered two varieties. I am working on the Long Red Florence seed now. Last year, I thought I would grow sets and then replant. So I planted closely. I was going to space the sets out in the spring. That didn't work for me. The Florence came up just fine, but I couldn't figure out how or when to transplant. So this year, I am just planting 9 seeds to the square foot. As you can see in the photo, I used my templates and a chop stick to make the holes for the seeds. I usually just use my finger, but I thought the chopstick would let me keep my finger clean, which would help me pick up the individual seeds. I turned out that the soil was so dry that I swirled the chop stick in the hole to make an indentation deep enough to plant the seed properly.

I have taken the rest of the bed that the 32 garlic are in (spaced 4 to the square foot) with the Florence. I calculate having planted 348 Florence if they all come up. If they don't, I have sufficient to plant again. The weather forecast for the next 10 days has no rain whatsoever. Fortunately, I have full water barrels to draw from. I have plans for the Yellow of Parma for a separate bed, but I need to clean it out first.

Tomato Harvest

The tomato harvest turned out to be a bit disappointing this year. Given all the plants, I expected that we would have between 30 and 40 quarts by the end of the season. It just didn't happen. We ended up with 15 quarts and a pint. (Kathy did all the hard work of actually doing the canning.)


Here's what I think I learned from this season. First, variety matters. The best producers, accounting for about half of what we stored, were Rutgers tomatoes. I only planted 6 of these plants, but they produced very well. The Marglobe split, were of a very uneven size (some more like cherry tomatoes). I only harvested a few Brandywines because the birds and worms got to them. Next season, I will try a mixture that will include Rutgers and maybe a hybrid just for the table.

Second, I've got to learn to control blossom rot. Dolomitic lime is cheap. I will double whatever I put into the beds this next year. The newest bed where the Rutgers were planted never experienced blossom rot at all.

Third, I've got to figure a better system for staking. The storm we had a while back had strong northerly winds that toppled all of the cages. I am still thinking about how to solve this.

Fourth, I won't plant as close next year as I did this year. I had about 15" between plants. I think 2' will be better. Essentially, as I finally get more beds, I will spread the 36 plants from this year into 3 beds instead of 2.

Requeening a Strong Hive

Doug Shaw got two queens from the Wally-Wayne colony. This is a strain of queens that survived the onslaught of mite infestations a decade ago and has some very desirable qualities. He convinced me that the queen in the hive at Clarence's has probably seen her better days -- she's been there a year and a half. So we went requeening yesterday after work.

There were a couple of challenges. First, we couldn't find the old queen. We searched through every brood frame and couldn't see her. Then we dumped every brood frame's bees onto the ground and didn't see any clusters. The super above the brood frame was full of honey (good for the winter) and so we left those frames alone. We installed the queen in her cage anyway.

Here are my after the fact thoughts. First, either one queen will kill the other and the hive will have a new queen or an old queen. The new queen is marked; the old queen isn't. If the new queen survives, I'm not sure how she will get inseminated. It's a bit late in the year for drones to be floating around. We saw very few in the hives we visited. I just hope some mating ritual can take place.

Other than that, the hive looked strong. There were a lot of hive beetles. There is sufficient honey for them to make it through the winter. We will check in a week or so and find out.

Pears

The pear trees are only two years old (at least planted in my yard), but they produced a decent crop of pears. I don't know what the off color spots are caused by. I guess some research is needed.


I harvested the pears several weeks ago to try to avoid damage by birds and bugs. I probably picked 20-30 (I didn't count and I didn't weigh them). They half filled a paper grocery bag. I let them sit to ripen. We waited a bit too long. By the time we got to them, half had spoiled. Kathy canned the good ones, getting about two quarts. Still very tasty.