[Garden] Sunday report, June 14

[Paul Nijjar]

I went to the garden this afternoon. Our groundhoggy friends have been
at work again -- I think they breached one fence, and they decimated
brassicas that were not fenced. I once again attempted to fortify the
fencing that we already have in place. Saddest of all is that some of
Angela's new transplants got munched. I think there is not much point
in putting new transplants that groundhogs find tasty unless the area
is protected. 

Our peas are doing well, however, and it looks like the kale that was
munched last week is coming back. Our beans are still mostly okay, but
I think it won't be long before those get munched as well. I was
considering moving some of the row cover to the beans, but I did not
do this because I did not want to leave the lettuces or carrots
vulnerable. 

As Dave suggested, I worked on the fence (I hope that my last post did
not suggest that we should delay this further -- although we should
get the papers in the hands of Plant Ops it is clear to me that the
locates are pretty much done). I started digging a trench between the
posts Dave put in. I did not get that far, however. It was lonely
work, and would have been a lot more fun with some company. 

While digging I have been hitting some tree roots. I am not sure how
to deal with them. In the worst case I guess we can leave them in.
More worrying is that there is a baby tree right in the middle of the
path between the two fence posts. 

I also took a look at the composter situation. I think that the best
approach might be to move the composters forward and to put the fence
behind them. The next best approach might be to build the fence in
front of the composters. I think we cannot build behind the treeline. 

I think that we might take the approach of digging the trench and
putting as much fence as we can, using whatever good stakes are in the
shed. We can then fortify the stakes later if we don't have them ready
now. 

One thing I am reluctant to do is take the fence away from the
brussels sprouts and kohlrabi. We had been intending to use those for
the bigger fence, but the plants are thriving now. My fear is that our
perimeter fence will fail for some reason and these plants will get
munched. I am fine with getting more fencing to cover the shortfall. 

In vegetable news there is a LOT of lettuce available. It is still
good but I think it is going to start going bitter soon. I think that
the gardeners should harvest what we can, and that Food Not Bombs
should take some too. (Is anybody from FnB still reading the list? If
not maybe Evan could get us in touch?)

We will need to thin the radishes. The greens are edible,
although they are not my favourite. Soon we will need to thin the
beets as well. Maybe we should thin the peas but I am inclined not to. 

Garlic scapes are starting to grow! They are not curled around yet,
but they will be soon. 

I am wondering whether we should have a big fencing party on Wednesday
evening. Wednesdays are generally bad for me but if I know that
several other people are going to be there then I might try to get off
work early and help. 

Otherwise I definitely intend to be there on Sunday, and could be
there on Thursday as well. 

- Paul