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Post by heavyhitterokra on Apr 18, 2021 20:28:31 GMT -6
Time to Turn Things Under? I think I'll be turning my cover crop under this coming week. My clover is 25" inches high right now. (Taller than the geese). We've had rain here for several days. There is a freeze warning in the forecast for Wednesday morning. If I time things right, maybe, I can get my Plasticulture laid between storms. I think I'll lay the black side up this year. I laid the white side up last year and we ended up having such a cold Spring that my plants suffered as a result.I spread about 3,500 pounds of seasoned chicken litter a few weeks ago, along with about a ton, or so, of leaf mold, then, I spread 400 pounds of pelletized lime, and about half a dozen bales of mildewed wheat straw. I think by the time I've got my cover crop turned under, I ought to be in fairly good condition as far as nitrogen and minerals are concerned.
When using cover crops such as clover for a source of Nitrogen, one has to be wary of the fact that evaporation can rob your soil of the valuable Nitrogen that you are trying to harvest, if you let the sun get to it for too long after tilling it under. Therefore, you have to raise your beds in a timely manner and plant your veggies soon thereafter. Turning a cover crop under too early in the season defeats the purpose of growing the cover crop in the first place. For that reason, it is only my best guess as when to do it to reap the maximum benefit.I took a few more photos of the winter cover crop this evening. I think it's about time.What a lush, sea of green!The week long rainstorm has really perked this clover up. It's so dark green that it almost looks blue.It will be a shame to have to turn this under. Funny how the cover crop has been almost as satisfying as a garden this winter. I'll sure miss it.
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Post by heavyhitterokra on Apr 19, 2021 21:17:37 GMT -6
Turning the Cover Crop Under. I finally got my cover crop turned under today. Now, I've just got to take my tiller off and re-attach my Plasticulture mulch layer and lay off all of my rows before it rains. If it rains first, I'll have to start all over again.This is what my garden looked like this morning. That was some of the prettiest stuff I've ever had to run over with the tiller. This is what it looked like this evening when I was done. It took about 5 passes to work all of the cover crop into the soil. The first pass just looked like I was bailing hay, but by the third and fourth passes, it was beginning to look more like a garden again. Finally, after the 5th pass, I was finished for the day, and in more ways than one. All that rough ground really jarred my poor old spine until it feels like bone on bone right now. I thought I was never going to get all those raised beds from last year flattened out! For reference to distance, that's my little blue GMC pickup truck on the far side of the garden, about 200' feet away. This is Bandit, looking to see if the chickens left him any 'Scooby Snacks'.
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Post by heavyhitterokra on Apr 20, 2021 21:42:58 GMT -6
Blackberry Winter All of my years growing up, my Grandma Fannie would forecast "Blackberry Winter" just a few weeks after she had forecast, "Easter Storm." She would say, "It will be a bad spell of cold weather that is going to last about one full week. She'd say, "Mark my words. It will come in late-April or early-May, about the same time as the blackberries are in bloom. It will for sure bring freezing weather our way."
She'd always warn her neighbors never to plant warm season crops like tomatoes or okra until after Blackberry Winter had passed. Every year, people would ignore her advice and plant anyway. Almost every year; she would be right and they'd lose everything they planted.
Yesterday, I noticed on my way home from Tahlequah that there were blackberries blooming alongside highway 82 (dewberries, technically) but close enough. I also noticed that it was snowing so heavily, that I could hardly see around the corner ahead of me. Just day before yesterday, it was 73 degrees. I even got a little sunburn while working out in my garden all that day. I'm glad I took the time to do that, because yesterday morning the thermometer was hovering right around freezing, and by noon, it was snowing like crazy out there!
This morning's low, following the snow, was recorded at 23 degrees. We've no doubt lost our apples, peaches, pecans, and walnuts again this year, due to the freezing weather. My pawpaws have already set fruit, but I'll be very surprised to see any of them make it through these lows in the low twenties ... Of course, there are sometimes exceptions in the case of heavy amounts of moisture. Sometimes, when the fruit is covered in ice or snow, the insides are protected from temperatures that would normally kill them. We'll just have to wait and see.My garden yesterday afternoon, during the freak snowstorm. I just plowed this day before yesterday.The trail out by the goose pen. The geese were actually enjoying this weather. (If you blow up the photos, you can see the flakes falling.)Our 'icy' bearded irises.Say, "Goodbye" to the apples.Say "Goodbye" to the apples once more.Oh well, what can you say? "It's Oklahoma." Good thing no tomatoes were planted yet! Thank you, Grandma Fannie, for that sage advice.
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Post by heavyhitterokra on Apr 21, 2021 20:40:45 GMT -6
Aches and Pains I went for a walk in my garden this afternoon. It's so full of organic matter, that it feels like a freshly baked loaf of homemade bread underfoot. What wonderful tilth all that cover crop made!The soil is just the right moisture content to be raising my planting beds, but I got my second Covid Vaccination just before the snow yesterday and haven't felt worth two-cents all day long. My bones are so achy that I've hardly stirred today. Very frustrating! The crazy swings in weather don't help things any either.If I don't get my beds raised by tomorrow afternoon, it looks like I'll be delayed by rain indefinitely.
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Post by macmex on Apr 22, 2021 5:58:49 GMT -6
Hope you feel better real soon, Ron. I know the feeling.
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Post by heavyhitterokra on Apr 22, 2021 17:26:43 GMT -6
You sound like me, Bon. I've got three metal plates in my head. When the weather changes, I sure can feel all the screws! Glad you got some pain meds and muscle relaxers.
I got all of my beds raised today. I don't know if I'll get them all covered before dark, but at least I have them raised. I got 3 & 1/2 of them covered by 6:00 pm, then ran out of drip tape right in the middle of the 4th row. So, I had to stop and come home to try and find a coupling to splice the drip tape and load on a new roll.
It looks like a pert-n-near 100% chance of heavy rain coming our way by tomorrow evening, so I can't quit now. I just have to finish this breathing treatment first, so I'll have enough wind to walk back down there to the tractor and get started again.
Wish me luck, I'll need it. I think I have 8 & 1/2 more rows left to cover. The after effects of that 2nd Covid shot are killing my aching joints. My back feels like a train wreck right now and I have a lingering migraine that just won't stop.
Don't fret the okra, Bon; it can wait until June if need be. Take care of yourself first.
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Post by heavyhitterokra on Apr 22, 2021 17:41:40 GMT -6
Yeah, that's one of the big drawbacks of raised beds; they suck down a lot of water if they're not covered in plastic. Mine wouldn't make it through the summer without drip irrigation.
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Post by heavyhitterokra on Apr 22, 2021 22:19:13 GMT -6
With potatoes, the more you cover 'em, the more they produce. They'll like that mulch. Don't forget to mix the green grass clippings with something dead and brown; they need the carbon to balance them out so that they don't stink up your yard like a rotten pumpkin.
Well balanced mulch doesn't stink. It took me several years of failures to figure that out. Actually, I probably never would have figured that out on my own; I just do a lot of reading to pass the time in winter.
Charles Wilber has a really good paperback book on that subject, called, "HOW TO GROW WORLD RECORD TOMATOES." It's about $15.00 on Amazon, or about $6.99 Kindle, but worth every penny and then some.
www.amazon.com/How-Grow-World-Record-Tomatoes-ebook/dp/B00V5IE63I
I wonder if there might be a copy in the Library? If so, it would be worth the gasoline to check out a copy. I've referenced that book several times over the years. It's one of the rare gardening books that actually gets the results that they claim on the cover.
Charles Wilber got four plants to yield 1,368 pounds of tomatoes.
Of course, he lived in Alabama or somewhere that had a much longer and more stable growing season than we do here in Oklahoma, but if you follow his compost recipe, you'll still get crazy good results (even in Oklahoma).
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Post by heavyhitterokra on Apr 22, 2021 22:21:02 GMT -6
It took me until 11:00 pm, but I finally got all of my Plasticulture laid. Thank goodness for rear-facing work lights.
By golly, I'm takin' tomorrow off!
These beds are laid on 10' foot centers. When they are empty, it looks like there would be no way that a person couldn't drive between them by August, but it never fails that when I'm trying to till later in the year, I hook plants with my back tires and break off branches.This is what the same spacing looks like in August.
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Post by heavyhitterokra on Apr 27, 2021 15:55:10 GMT -6
Season Opener! I planted my first 200 pre-germinated, Heavy Hitter Okra seeds for the 2021 Season today.
The forecast calls for a 100% chance of rain in the next 24-hours, so I thought I'd better get anything done in the garden that I could, while it was still dry enough to get out there and do it.
I'll plant more every week or so until I run out of ground or run out of seeds.
I planted cucumbers, zenias, and dill, yesterday.
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Post by heavyhitterokra on Apr 28, 2021 21:02:28 GMT -6
Yep, we've gotten close to 3" inches of rain, on top of already soaked ground with a 90% chance of more heavy rains tonight. The geese will be very happy about all that.
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Post by heavyhitterokra on Apr 29, 2021 7:17:19 GMT -6
It rained so hard last night that it pounded my ground hard enough to walk on without sinking in, so I might be able to plant a few more things later in the day, or maybe tomorrow.
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Post by heavyhitterokra on Apr 29, 2021 16:49:19 GMT -6
Way, Way, Early Planting
If all goes according to plan, I ought to have my first fresh okra pods sometime around the last week in June.
(55 days from germination to blossom, plus 4 days to grow the tender pods large enough to fry). ETA, June 28th, 2021.Despite the heavy rains last night, I ended up planting pre-germinated seeds for most of the day today. (Edit here, seed count correction). I've got right around 652 already sprouted seeds planted, (originally, I thought I had counted 800, but this morning, I discovered one row had been counted twice).
It's way, way, too early to be seriously considering planting that many seeds, normally. I usually only plant a couple hundred this early, just taking a gamble that things might turn out for the better. Then, later on, say Mid-May, when things warm up a little more, I go ahead and plant the lion's share of my seeds, when the growing conditions are a lot more favorable.
Several times in the past I've had these early plantings not turn out too well, because of late freezes, or just because of nights that get down below 45 degrees and stunt my plants. Most times, these early plantings provide early okra, but not really the best looking plants.
(However, back in 2011, everything I gambled on planting, came up cherries and some of the okra seeds that I planted on April 15th that year, went on to become my best specimens to date). That was the year I grew the State Record highest producer, having 65 branches and over 250 pods that had been harvested for market before October frost.
Ironically, we had 65 consecutive days over 100 degrees that season (2 weeks of that being over 110 degrees and the hottest day, August 2nd, was 115 degrees). Thank goodness for drip irrigation! Even with that, I had to stop watering in August because our neighbor's well was getting muddy and I thought my pumping may have caused it. But it turned out that the muddy water had come from a cave-in on his property and was probably not a related incident.
This year, however, (2021 planting season) the reason for the high number of pre-germinated seeds is this ... I found a whole paper grocery bag full of mature seed pods out in my summer kitchen that I didn't even know I had. They were harvested back in 2018. So, I figured the germination rate would be very, very, low, and I put a couple hands full of them in various ziplock bags along with warm, wet, paper towels, and waited overnight. The next day, it rained about 3" inches, so planting was delayed by 24 hours.Well, as luck would have it, the extra day of waiting caused germination in the high 90% range. So, I ended up with a little over 650 of them needing to be planted. Can you say, "D-D-D-Da-Dumb-kid!" That's gonna hurt!
That was way too much crawling around on my poor old hands and knees for one day! I'll be sorry for sure tomorrow! This was my State Record, heavy producer, planted on April 15th, 2011. This photo was taken in October of 2011 when representatives from OSU came out to verify it.
This is that same plant in August of 2011, the day I harvested 44 tender pods from it in a single day. Sometimes, when I tell people that, they think I'm pulling their leg. For that reason, it's always best to take a few photos.
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Post by chrysanthemum on Apr 29, 2021 20:01:32 GMT -6
We got some much needed rain at last, about an inch and a half from last night through this afternoon. Thankfully the hail and possible tornadoes missed our immediate area, though we did spend some time hunkered down in our hallway last night. This was the first really significant rain my garden had had, and I was very pleased that most of the plants stayed pretty well upright. Some potato stalks were broken, and the the onions are lying down, not due to maturity but just due to having fallen. It was also the day that the first of the Heavy Hitter Okra popped through the soil. I had soaked seeds overnight on Friday, kept them in a moist paper towel on Saturday during the day, and planted them that evening. I planted a grand total of SIX (not six hundred, sixty, or even sixteen) seeds. Three were up this evening.
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Post by heavyhitterokra on Apr 29, 2021 20:18:21 GMT -6
chrysanthemum,
Speaking of hailstorms, I heard on NPR this morning, that there was a record hailstorm in Norman, Oklahoma last night, (April 28th) with golf ball to baseball-sized hail. Millions in property damage, in most places very few cars or roofs were spared. They reported the air smelled of new mown grass from all the damage to trees and lawns.
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