April 16, 2016

transplanting tomatoes

photo by Amelia Fannin A group of volunteers from my community garden got together and transplanted tomato seedlings yesterday. We do this every year. They are late blight resistant tomatoes: Jasper, Mountain Merit, Defiant and Iron Lady. We transplanted about 360 seedlings. We raised them at home under lights and now they’ll be raised by Sandra Curro at Underwood Greenhouses. They’ll be distributed free to any of our 135 gardeners who want them. Extra plants will be for sale at Underwood Greenhouses beginning May 7: 20 School St, Belmont MA.…

April 15, 2016

hive boxes flipped

In addition to freeing my stuck queen, I also flipped the boxes on my older hive today. I did a full inspection of the hive. There are several frames of brood and capped brood and obviously more bees than last time. They are only using the top box and going in and out of the top hole. So, I reversed the top and bottom boxes. Probably no real need to have done this. I just thought they should be using the bottom board for entry and exit. Switching boxes gave…

April 15, 2016

queen stuck in cage

I checked on my newly installed bees this morning. The queen was still in the cage!! There was no sign that the bees were eating the candy plug at all! I can’t believe it. I was so pleased that I installed the package right this time and now the bees didn’t do their part! Unfortunately, it’s been 4 days since I installed them. (I had a busy week.) I hope the queen is OK still. I let her out. She looked fine. Small. I think what happened is that the…

April 14, 2016

sprouting my seed potatoes

I like to sprout my seed potatoes before I plant them. They’re all sitting on my kitchen windowsill now. I’m looking at them and wondering: does a watched potato sprout? (silly…) Potatoes are hardy enough to be planted outside now. One reason I’m sprouting them inside is I haven’t prepared my potato beds yet. It’s been chilly and I’ve been busy. But I have been researching how to prepare the beds. (They’re at my community garden.) I looked up whether potatoes like a fertile soil and I found all sorts…

April 14, 2016

seed potatoes arrived today

My seed potatoes from Moose tubers arrived today. My plan: let them sprout a couple weeks, while I amend their beds, then plant them. I have the tubers on my kitchen windowsill so I can watch them sprouting. To amend the beds, I want to add a good 2 inches of compost and dig it in. No scimping this year! I want my spuds in happy soil.

April 13, 2016

crazy weather – lost hives

This crazy weather has had bad consequences on many things, including bees. It’s halfway into April and our weather is still chilly – rainy, dark and cold. What an odd year. After our incredibly warm February, I thought spring was here early. But now March and April have been wintry. Our early flowers were hit by frost and are now brown mush. A friend of mine lost two hives recently and she said others have had the same problem. Their bees broke their clusters in February and didn’t reform when…

April 11, 2016

new package installed

To prepare my new hive, I set up a deep box with four new frames (the ones with wood edges) in the middle and six drawn frames (the ones with black plastic edges). The two adjacent to the new frames were extracted, the other four were full of honey. I’m glad to be able to feed the new bees honey. (It’s from my hive that died in the middle of the winter.) I think they’ll like this better than sugar water. They were very nice bees. I dumped them all…

April 7, 2016

Master Gardener class

I’ve signed up for a Master Gardener Certification class. My first class is tomorrow. It’s a class offered by the Massachusetts Master Gardener Association held at the Massachusetts Horticultural Society Horticulture Center at Elm Bank and includes 60 hrs of volunteer time and 80 hrs of class time. I’m excited to learn everything about many topics including composting, turf, weed ecology, botany, soil science, etc, etc. All taught by experts in the fields. I am excited about the first class tomorrow – Soil Science by Dawn Pettinelli. I love soil!…

April 7, 2016

asparagus ordered

I finally remembered to order my asparagus crowns. 25 Jersey Supreme from Johnny’s. They’ll be delivered April 25. I’m planting a new bed in my backyard garden.

April 6, 2016

it’s a bluebird day!

Well, “a bluebird day” is supposed to mean a beautiful day. I can’t say it’s that today. Low temp was 16F last night. Still snow on the ground. The magnolia blossoms that were just opening have turned mushy brown. And I don’t think the forecast is looking very good. But, yippee for the bluebirds! They are beautiful. (So are the gold finches that are turning bright yellow now.) I’m hoping a bluebird pair will nest in one of my bird boxes this year. Last year I had both my boxes…

weeks and counting until my last spring frost

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