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Judith's garden plans, records, results, hopes.....

Posts: 10747

Location: a temperate, clay/loam spot on planet earth, the universe

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thank you Christopher!

my pergola discussion is here now https://permies.com/t/378355/Judith-cedar-pergola-top-bamboo

"We're all just walking each other home." -Ram Dass
"Be a lamp, or a lifeboat, or a ladder."-Rumi
"It's all one song!" -Neil Young

Chance Lunceford

Posts: 294

Location: Payson, Utah, US of A - Zone6B/High Desert/4500' /14" Rainfall

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Judith Browning wrote:so happy to hear that May!
My peach seedlings are popping up also...more than I need but it doesn't look like my bearing trees will have many fruits this year and I'll need some replacements for the ones I expect to die soon from bore damage...I'm determined to get out ahead of the borers one day.
It will be interesting to see how your pears turn out...maybe you'll have a winner!

Our last apple died from borer damage. The pippin I started from seed ten years ago and had hopes it would make it but I didn't take any proactive measures. It does have three nice sprouts at the base and I have three tiny trees from last years seeds so the 'trip apple' is still in the works.

I have way too much elephant garlic planted but I really love it to 'mark' young plants visually and the blooms are so striking and popular with the pollinators.

Are you opposed to pheromone traps? A funnel trap with a bucket catchment used in conjunction with the pheromone trap will draw all the males in the vicinity.

Then you can smash 'em and/or feed them to your chickens (if you've any).

You need to run the traps continuously from end of May through the first several frosts, and you need to run them for at least three years, since the larvae don't develop into beetles for 1-3 years as they eat their way through the roots and into the trunk.

The funnel bucket traps are the most effective method I've discovered for trapping the males. If you get all the males, no breeding can occur.

The traps are $5-$10 and last for three months. Assuming some overlap time, you'll need three per year. With the cost of a large funnel, a five gallon bucket, and your traps, you're looking at $100 spread over three years in order to annihilate your local population.

If you then keep the traps running in perpetuity, you should significantly decrease/entirely remove your bore beetles from your system.

Finer Points:

- One trap should cover between 1-10 acres, but plan on one trap per 1-2 acres if you want to maximize your effectiveness
- The traps should be placed at least 20' away from the trees you are trying to protect, just to make sure you're not inviting the problem to the party
- The trap needs to be low to the ground, so dig a hole to set your bucket in until only an inch or two is exposed above the ground
- They're active around dusk, so check your traps in the morning
- They're also drawn to light at dusk, so you can create light traps too, and these will also attract the females, but you'll attract all the other light-attracted critters too, so be careful how you design your trap
- They'll also sometimes fly into the electric bug zappers if they have a light kute, but that's not ideal because they're giant and stinky when fried
- The calufornicus ones are hissing beetles, and they fly, and if they fly at you you're gonna shit your pants (heh) because they're like 2.5" (I've included a picture) long
- Their larvae can grow more than 4" long

BONUS: I've included a picture of a much less obnoxious borer beetle that I see everyday on the milkweed, the Milkweed Borer Beetle.

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Judith Browning

Posts: 10747

Location: a temperate, clay/loam spot on planet earth, the universe

3957

posted 1 month ago

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Thanks Chance!
I'm not opposed to pheromone traps although I've never used them.
I used to spend a lot of time, not money, scraping bark, shaking for curculio, etc and just decided I would consider the trees temporary since it was easy enough to start more from seed....I was given some tanglefoot one time and used it on yellow cardstock and I seem to remember we had no curculio that year.

Thank you for the detailed helpful 'how to'!

We have had a real problem with borers of all sorts in this area recently.

"We're all just walking each other home." -Ram Dass
"Be a lamp, or a lifeboat, or a ladder."-Rumi
"It's all one song!" -Neil Young

Chance Lunceford

Posts: 294

Location: Payson, Utah, US of A - Zone6B/High Desert/4500' /14" Rainfall

159

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They make traps for several species, including grape vine borers, so you could look into it.

Or, you know, you could keep doing what you're doing and you might even discover a seedling that doesn't attract the borers and maybe that's an inheritable trait...or maybe not, but since you're growing seedlings there's always the chance of something interesting happening.

Judith Browning

Posts: 10747

Location: a temperate, clay/loam spot on planet earth, the universe

3957

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I thought the rain had stopped for the usual summer drought but we had a nice little half inch shower mid day.

I am done with cucumbers and so are friends and family...I don't can them and we eat a lot fresh and a few in vinegar with onion in the refrigerator to stretch the season.
I brine some but we never eat them before they soften and they are too salty for our taste...so, as much as I looked forward to the first one I think I could live without them until next year.

Long beans are producing and enough to dehydrate and eat lots, green beans are done except for seed....what I'm really determined to have a lot to harvest in the fall are sweet potatoes, both purple and orange so I did water them some early today before the rain.

Eating a lot of moringa, purple sweet potato leaves, lambs quarters and a bit of new growth on the chicory that has not gone to seed.

passion flower vine everywhere....maybe we'll do something with the fruit this year...I'll share seeds if anyone wants some?

The hummingbirds have been busy at different flowers but mostly the hyacinth beans (and tithonia, of course)....they are ignoring those bright red scarlet runner bean blooms though!

the row of flowers and sweet potatoes pictured below has filled in a bit more than I expected with all these rains...I kept planting and everything took for a change. The test will be whether the sweets produce as they are the important 'crop' in that row.

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"We're all just walking each other home." -Ram Dass
"Be a lamp, or a lifeboat, or a ladder."-Rumi
"It's all one song!" -Neil Young

Judith Browning

Posts: 10747

Location: a temperate, clay/loam spot on planet earth, the universe

3957

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nice surprise while picking cucumbers and long beans this morning....I love seeing these moths!
I think this one was newly emerged as it's wings look perfect and every so often it flutters a bit...with at least a 6" wingspan.
I expect it to be gone when the sun hits that spot.

I think it likely was from a cocoon in a pear tree that is on the edge of the garden near by.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antheraea_polyphemus

Polyphemus moths inhabit deciduous hardwood forests, orchards, urban areas, and wetlands.[3] The caterpillar can eat a total of 86,000 times its weight in the first eight weeks after it emerges.[4] Polyphemus moths are considered to be very polyphagous, meaning they eat from a wide variety of plants.[5]

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"We're all just walking each other home." -Ram Dass
"Be a lamp, or a lifeboat, or a ladder."-Rumi
"It's all one song!" -Neil Young

May Lotito

gardener

Posts: 2305

Location: Zone 6b

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posted 1 month ago

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How are your Maypop doing? I found some vines growing along a chain link fence amidst lots of poison ivy. It was loaded with egg-sized fruits and still pumping out those pretty flowers. I carefully picked a few ones and opened them up. Slightly under ripe one tasted sour but the fully ripe ones were so good and they reminded me of mangosteen. Another wonderful wild fruit to add to the list.

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Zone 6, 45 inches precipitation, hard clay soil

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Judith Browning

Posts: 10747

Location: a temperate, clay/loam spot on planet earth, the universe

3957

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May, ours look good this year too and maybe we'll do something with the fruit....I do love the taste but to get any amount of juice takes some work and a lot of fruit.
We have a lot of the vines indoors drying for tea though.
Are the ones you found white flowered?
I can't remember if I sent you some of the purple flowered seeds? Those are all I'm saving for seed now since the white ones seem to show up on their own.

this vine is doing a better job of covering the new hoop house than the hyacinth beans.

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"We're all just walking each other home." -Ram Dass
"Be a lamp, or a lifeboat, or a ladder."-Rumi
"It's all one song!" -Neil Young

May Lotito

gardener

Posts: 2305

Location: Zone 6b

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I just swallowed the pulp with seeds altogether. It will take huge amount of fruits to make a cup of juice. Wild fruits have much bigger seeds than the cultivated one. I tend to find elderberry bushs and passion fruits coexisting with poison ivy along fences by the ditch. I figured they are more of the bottom land plants so I haven't tried growing any yet. I can save the seeds of the purple-flowered ones, haven't seen any white ones.

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Zone 6, 45 inches precipitation, hard clay soil

Riona Abhainn

pollinator

Posts: 1682

Location: Milwaukie Oregon, USA zone 8b

213

posted 4 weeks ago

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Hi Judith, do you think passion vine would be happy in my yard here in zone 8b? Are the fruits the same as the passion fruit that people have in tropical drinks? We have rainy autumn/winter and spring it depends and our summers are dry. We aren't arid in our air but we're not very humid either, people who have lived in both say we're inbetween and pleasant.

Celtic/fantasy/folk/shanty singing at Renaissance faires, fantasy festivals, and other events in OR and WA, USA.
RionaTheSinger on youtube.
Pop-up garden/vintage+ yard stand owner.

Judith Browning

Posts: 10747

Location: a temperate, clay/loam spot on planet earth, the universe

3957

posted 4 weeks ago

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Riona,
What I grow and what May has is Passiflora incarnata
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Passiflora_incarnata
commonly called maypops around here.

The tropical one is different but I don't know the plant.

The one I have is easy to grow but does spread by runner so if it's happy you will find it popping up everywhere😊
The bumble bees especially love the flowers but so do hummingbirds and other things.
The fruit is very flavorful and quite seedy so we hardly ever do anything with it but enjoy a few fresh at the end of summer.

I would be happy to send you some seed.
I'm sure it would grow there but might spread more than you want?

"We're all just walking each other home." -Ram Dass
"Be a lamp, or a lifeboat, or a ladder."-Rumi
"It's all one song!" -Neil Young

Riona Abhainn

pollinator

Posts: 1682

Location: Milwaukie Oregon, USA zone 8b

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posted 4 weeks ago

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I read the article, there's a dryer place in back of my house (small wraparound yard) and the last thing I planted there didn't grow, but maybe this will. Can you send me a few seeds, I will pm you my address, and I can send you some calendula seeds or red and white radish seed mix from my yard, or if you want to wait I can send you mini-white pumpkin seeds, the pumpkins are small and no good for eating but lovely for decorating the porch for autumn holidays, and pumpkin leave recipes and stuffed flowers.

Celtic/fantasy/folk/shanty singing at Renaissance faires, fantasy festivals, and other events in OR and WA, USA.
RionaTheSinger on youtube.
Pop-up garden/vintage+ yard stand owner.

Judith Browning

Posts: 10747

Location: a temperate, clay/loam spot on planet earth, the universe

3957

posted 3 weeks ago

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Riona,
Would you like the vine with white or purple flowers?
Both are p.incarnata.

Am just now harvesting a few fruits and will start saving seed...I process like tomato seed because of the gel so it will take a bit of time before I send.

I brought the white ones (seed) with us when we moved here and bought the purple seed from Richters
Both of them I started in pots in the late winter early spring I think?

I'll send enough seed that you can experiment😊

"We're all just walking each other home." -Ram Dass
"Be a lamp, or a lifeboat, or a ladder."-Rumi
"It's all one song!" -Neil Young

Judith Browning

Posts: 10747

Location: a temperate, clay/loam spot on planet earth, the universe

3957

posted 3 weeks ago

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100 degree days and the rains have stopped....thankful we had good rains through June and even some in July!
Watering something everyday and the extra water from the well 8s going to make all the difference as we are running short on rainwater and are determined not to use municipal water.

Who knew broom corn would get so tall...these are 10-12 feet tall!
I wonder when I harvest it? can I save seed and make a broom?

Have been watering the tithonia and zinnias and seeing a few more butterflies around....so few compared to several years ago.

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"We're all just walking each other home." -Ram Dass
"Be a lamp, or a lifeboat, or a ladder."-Rumi
"It's all one song!" -Neil Young

May Lotito

gardener

Posts: 2305

Location: Zone 6b

1525

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posted 3 weeks ago

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If you want fully matured seed heads, just let them be. Otherwise, for better quality broom making, the stalks need to be tabled now. Bend them so the weight of seeds won't make the tassels curvy.

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Zone 6, 45 inches precipitation, hard clay soil

Judith Browning

Posts: 10747

Location: a temperate, clay/loam spot on planet earth, the universe

3957

posted 3 weeks ago

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Thanks May!
I have been leaning towards just savng seed this year and doing a larger patch next year.
There's probably only enough for a cobweb broom now.

I am glad to know how to 'table' the stalks.
I was unaware of that step and term.

I have more planted at the front porch.

"We're all just walking each other home." -Ram Dass
"Be a lamp, or a lifeboat, or a ladder."-Rumi
"It's all one song!" -Neil Young

Judith Browning

Posts: 10747

Location: a temperate, clay/loam spot on planet earth, the universe

3957

posted 3 weeks ago

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have shifted from harvesting vegetables and fruits to seed saving.

I cut the volunteer black sorghum before the birds ate it all.
I had intended to do a large space for it but ran out of room so I only have a few volunteers.
...it is hard to remove from the seed heads...maybe needs longer to cure?

I did the same with the cow pea mix...meant to plant a full row but did not so I have only a few plants...plenty for seed just not enough for soup.

We have trays and bags and bowls of seeds drying everywhere.
so far there's.....
bright lights cosmos*
parsley
blue/purple morning glory*
a nice red dahlia
okra*
squash
sunflower variety*
common milkweed*
yucca*
four scarlet runner bean seeds from the one pod that a dozen vines produced
tithonia
cucumber*
melon
black beans*
black locust*
balsam*
hazelnuts
marigold
comfrey
dill
long beans (mostly because I keep missing the green ones and they get too big, so more seed)
black sorghum*
cow peas*

will be cleaning the white* flowered passion fl. fruit soon
and then the purple* flowered.

And a lot of parsnip seed!

astericks added for seeds I have enough to share.

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"We're all just walking each other home." -Ram Dass
"Be a lamp, or a lifeboat, or a ladder."-Rumi
"It's all one song!" -Neil Young

Riona Abhainn

pollinator

Posts: 1682

Location: Milwaukie Oregon, USA zone 8b

213

posted 2 weeks ago

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Purple please.

Celtic/fantasy/folk/shanty singing at Renaissance faires, fantasy festivals, and other events in OR and WA, USA.
RionaTheSinger on youtube.
Pop-up garden/vintage+ yard stand owner.

Judith Browning

Posts: 10747

Location: a temperate, clay/loam spot on planet earth, the universe

3957

posted 2 weeks ago

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Riona Abhainn wrote:Purple please.

The purple flowered fruits are falling now so I've been gathering them daily😊
Let me know if there's anything else on my list above you might like?

If anyone else wants a few seeds from my list above I can share....just in the USA though because of shipping costs.
I've added astericks to the seeds on the list above that I have enough to share.

"We're all just walking each other home." -Ram Dass
"Be a lamp, or a lifeboat, or a ladder."-Rumi
"It's all one song!" -Neil Young

Judith Browning

Posts: 10747

Location: a temperate, clay/loam spot on planet earth, the universe

3957

posted 2 weeks ago

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FIGS!
The first two ripe ones of the year.

We have grown this same variety since around 2012 and have brought cuttings here when we moved to town.
The one that's thriving is next to the porch. We covered it last winter and it has a lot of fruit that should have time to make before a freeze.
The ones that ripen in the fall are always better since ants cause us to pick summer fruit a little early. Fall fruit can almost dry on the tree and is so delicious.
This variety is Texas Pink Dawn.
more recently we've planted brown turkey and a celeste from cuttings....they are slow and it's probably the location. The Chicago Hardy died🫤

here's a couple other threads I have here about our figs...
https://permies.com/t/149842/figs-frog
https://permies.com/t/40316/ripe-figs-splitting

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"We're all just walking each other home." -Ram Dass
"Be a lamp, or a lifeboat, or a ladder."-Rumi
"It's all one song!" -Neil Young

Judith Browning

Posts: 10747

Location: a temperate, clay/loam spot on planet earth, the universe

3957

posted 1 week ago

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hot, dry....still.
BUT, having a pump on the well is a game changer! https://permies.com/t/179996/Sprinkler-pumps-shallow-pumps-irrigation
200 gallons a day so far, 1400 a week...5600 gallons a month........
I'm expecting the water table to go down because of the drought not our use of it.
We are still letting some annuals go where no amount of water will give them a boost at 100F days....but for the heat loving plants and young trees and shrubs this well water has been lovely....especially as we are low on stored rain water and can save it for the blueberries.

and then there's the woodchuck who cleaned all of the leaves off the big bed of sweet potatoes. https://permies.com/t/380224/bait-livetrap-woodchuck-sweet-potato
The bed now has wire tunnels and chunks of wire fencing working to prevent more damage ..so far so good and the leaves are growing back quickly.

more figs ripening and fewer ants on them ...this is the tree by the porch that we covered over the winter.

sweet potato greens(close to the house that the woodchuck has not discovered) and moringa are our hot weather greens ..a few dahlia flowers to eat...the long beans are about done, lambs quarters about to flower, cosmos and tithonias getting some water where usually I have to let them go about now every summer
Broom corn seed is close to mature and my indigo is ready (but I'm not quite) for a dyeing project May has lined me out with😊

here's a couple bugs hanging out in my zinnias....sitting still waiting for their lunch to drop by🫤
and my favorite spider guarding the garden shed!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phymatinae

Ambush bugs occupy a similar niche to that of the crab spider, camouflaged with their host plant and lying in wait for pollinators and other invertebrate prey to come within range. These hemipterans often attack prey many times larger than themselves, which they subdue with an immobilizing venom.[14]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomisidae

Members of this family of spiders are ambush predators and do not spin webs. The two front legs are usually longer and more robust than the other legs. The back two legs are smaller, and are usually covered in a series of strong spines.[7] Their coloration may be dull with colors such as brown or grey, or very bright green, pink, white or yellow to match their flower. These spiders are quite easy to identify, though can occasionally be confused with the usually larger huntsman spiders.

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"We're all just walking each other home." -Ram Dass
"Be a lamp, or a lifeboat, or a ladder."-Rumi
"It's all one song!" -Neil Young

May Lotito

gardener

Posts: 2305

Location: Zone 6b

1525

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This flash drought in the Ozarks is really bad. My SIL is commenting how we are hotter and drier than Arizona. Year to date rainfall total might not be low but check out the soil moisture map. Lots of my indigo leaves have mite damage with mottled look and a quick test showed that they lost the pigments. I am watering them so they can grow back healthy leaves. Figs are ripening quickly but they stay on the small side. It's nice you have free well water going. That's a life saver.

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Zone 6, 45 inches precipitation, hard clay soil

Mark Griffin

Posts: 57

Location: Piedmont, North Carolina - 7b/8a

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Some notes for your future Celeste fig harvests - I usually pick Celestes a little early, with just a bit of color and softness, which is before the birds have any interest in them. I find they ripen up nicely in 2 or 3 days on the counter and then are deliciously sweet to eat. Once ripe they can be put in the fridge for a few days if necessary. The main harvest is over 2 or 3 weeks and I usually have enough to dry a few batches. They are excellent dried, like candy almost. This year was a little unusual. There were a couple of months of very hot and dry weather. The figs were tiny and green getting close to normal harvest time, quite a few were dropping and I thought there was going to be no harvest. Then there was 5 inches of rain over 2 or 3 days and the figs were literally exploding on the tree. It was a real mess, but I harvested what I could (about 8 lbs), put it into the crockpot with some sugar and cooked it down until 'jammy' (around 7-8 hrs, I think). I'm happy to say that Celeste also makes great jam.

My neighbor usually shares her Brown Turkeys with me and so far they don't compare to Celeste. Maybe I just need to figure out some new ways to use them. These two varieties are the main ones in my area, but the Texas Pink Dawn sounds intriguing. Not that I have room for another fig

Judith Browning

Posts: 10747

Location: a temperate, clay/loam spot on planet earth, the universe

3957

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Mark, I hope our Celeste bears fruit one day but so far, as with all of the figs we do not cover, ours dies back every winter and starts over....and I don't water them except just today I gave in and watered celeste and the brown turkey as they were both looking stressed.
I remember that the brown turkey fruited one year and they were very small but good.

I think we'll cover more of the figs this winter and try to get some reliable fruit.

At our old place we had the burst fruit one year also...I don't expect rain here for at least another month now though.
fig jam sounds delicious!

some of our best tasting figs were later on the fall...almost dried on the tree early november...hoping for those again this year.

"We're all just walking each other home." -Ram Dass
"Be a lamp, or a lifeboat, or a ladder."-Rumi
"It's all one song!" -Neil Young

Joylynn Hardesty

master pollinator

Posts: 5457

Location: Due to winter mortality, I stubbornly state, zone 7a Tennessee

2432

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May Lotito wrote:This flash drought in the Ozarks is really bad. My SIL is commenting how we are hotter and drier than Arizona. Year to date rainfall total might not be low but check out the soil moisture....

It's nice to know it's not my imagination. We had a late start to spring thunder storms this year, and much later beginning of the seasonal drought. But it is soooooo dry. I should have watered the garden. We lost a bunch of stuff.

'What we do now echoes in eternity.' Marcus Aurelius
How Permies Works Dr. Redhawk's Epic Soil Series

Judith Browning

Posts: 10747

Location: a temperate, clay/loam spot on planet earth, the universe

3957

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Joylynn, we would be in the same boat if we had not finally got a pump for this well.
Municipal water is just not an option for us because of cost and all of the water treatments on top of that....and, more importantly we are both here every day so able to schedule the well water use...I think that's called retirement🙄
Before well pump, other years, even with stored up rainwater and additional grey water very few things would get watered this time of year.
You might be surprised what plants, perennials anyway, survive a drought.

May, looking at that map and others I've seen, we are in a very dry area but not 'drought' again yet...I think we had some good pop up showers into july, the kind that seem to drop on one place and not another close by...1.5" in august that helped,

"We're all just walking each other home." -Ram Dass
"Be a lamp, or a lifeboat, or a ladder."-Rumi
"It's all one song!" -Neil Young

Judith Browning

Posts: 10747

Location: a temperate, clay/loam spot on planet earth, the universe

3957

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drought prognostication....

sdohomeweb.png

"We're all just walking each other home." -Ram Dass
"Be a lamp, or a lifeboat, or a ladder."-Rumi
"It's all one song!" -Neil Young

Judith Browning

Posts: 10747

Location: a temperate, clay/loam spot on planet earth, the universe

3957

posted 6 days ago

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Watering everyday ....me hourly from dawn with the hose watering plants until about 9:30 or 10am and then the rest of the day filling barrels that Steve has bucketed out to plants over the morning.
We think it's making a big difference, hopefully for at least the sweet potatoes and peanuts.

Have not caught the woodchuck yet...but wire tunnels help protect sweets and others I've dusted with wood ash. We have them planted several places and some closer to the house have not been touched ....they need just a few more weeks.

crab spiders catching unidentified moths.

chance of rain tomorrow has dropped to 60%.
edit....crab spiders often change color to match their chosen flower hang out ..I've seen them yellow and orange and wondered what this white one might do on the purple zinnia....I'm slow to notice the purple stripes it has...hahaha...so cool😊

Added a better photo to show the stripes

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"We're all just walking each other home." -Ram Dass
"Be a lamp, or a lifeboat, or a ladder."-Rumi
"It's all one song!" -Neil Young

Judith Browning

Posts: 10747

Location: a temperate, clay/loam spot on planet earth, the universe

3957

posted 4 days ago

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Rain!
overnight and still early morning!

hoping it will replenish our 600 gallon rain water storage.

cosmos have been busy with bees and butterflies and crab spiders.
I think I came close to an ID for the two moths in my last post and if so I'm happy they have a preditor https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noctuidae

The Noctuidae, commonly known as noctuid moths or owlet moths, and their caterpillars as cutworms or armyworms, are a family of moths.

It will be nice to have a day without watering something.

will ash the sweet potatoes again when the rain stops even the caged ones...this seems to deter the woodchuck and shouldn't hurt the sweet potatoes.
we picked the dry tepary beans yesterday before the rain and looks like some more coming on.
Forgot to take pictures of figs and now we've eaten them...the ones away from the house, in the old hoop house do not have ants so ripened perfectly.

nice catkins on the hazelnuts...I've been giving them some water hoping they don't lose most of them like other years.

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"We're all just walking each other home." -Ram Dass
"Be a lamp, or a lifeboat, or a ladder."-Rumi
"It's all one song!" -Neil Young

Judith Browning

Posts: 10747

Location: a temperate, clay/loam spot on planet earth, the universe

3957

posted 4 days ago

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after the rain stopped (2") and it was still cloudy I came across this bit of excitement on a passion flower vine...I missed the first shot when there were two skippers and the spider almost caught one of them. The one that was left seemed oblivious and they kind of danced around for a long while at a distance....jumping spider of some sort?
It let the butterfly get away eventually.

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"We're all just walking each other home." -Ram Dass
"Be a lamp, or a lifeboat, or a ladder."-Rumi
"It's all one song!" -Neil Young

May Lotito

gardener

Posts: 2305

Location: Zone 6b

1525

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posted 4 days ago

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You are so lucky to have the rain! Unfortunately the storm missed my area so I decided to go ahead with indigo harvest as their condition has been deteriorating. I will post the final result in the other thread so here just to share some snippets. I was worrying about the quality so I did three small batches: first soaking with 7 liter water for 12hr, 2nd soaking with 11 liter water for 12hr too, third one is another 7 L overnight. So far so good, color is pure and yield is decent.

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Zone 6, 45 inches precipitation, hard clay soil

Judith Browning

Posts: 10747

Location: a temperate, clay/loam spot on planet earth, the universe

3957

posted 3 days ago

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May, sorry you did not get this rain...it was a surprising amount and will give everything a boost here although I'm sticking with my watering schedule.
The ground is so dry I imagine this 2" will not even reach the water table.

My indigo is in three pots and I've been watering them almost every day and sometimes they get the pee bucket. I have them in a place where they get some partial shade when the sun is overhead. I'll find out how growing conditions effect color soon.

I have one plant in the ground that has bloomed and I hope will make seed.but have had to water frequently or it looks really stressed.

I'm looking forward to my dye project...I just need some time to give it my full attention😊

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"We're all just walking each other home." -Ram Dass
"Be a lamp, or a lifeboat, or a ladder."-Rumi
"It's all one song!" -Neil Young

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