Tag: Gardening

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What Did Vinyard House Garden Produce?

It has been a long hot, dry summer, so I was not always out in the garden as often as I would have been in previous years when the heat spells were broken up with cooler weather. Never the less, things did grow with or without me. Besides what we ate fresh, I was able to can the following: 8 pts. strawberry jam, 2 qts. refrigerator dill pickles, 15 pts. green beans, 6 pts. beet pickles, 7 pts. raspberry jam, and a jar of syrup, 11 pts. garlic dill slicer pickles, 9 pints of dill relish, and 7 pts. of sweet relish, and 13 pints of diced tomatoes.

We also ate fresh cabbage, rhubarb, pulled about 20 garlic bulbs, 48 red, yellow onions, 15 pumpkin pie pumpkins, peppers, peas, cucumbers, tomatoes, and lettuces, and spinach, strawberries, raspberries, and corn. My garden journal has a long list of “no-nos” for next year, and suggestions for improvement. Still waiting on the two melons who decided to appear finally. I only got two carrots seeds to germinate after several plantings, but those two were the most perfect, beautiful carrots I have ever grown, really.

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National Pick A Strawberry Day – May 20

The strawberry patch didn’t get the memo.  Tonight, as I was doing a slug check on the strawberry plants, I found one “wanna be” for the celebration, and I decided it deserved some recognition even though it was a couple days late.  I am glad to have a strawberry from my garden any day, so this is close enough.  There were a couple more contenders with yellow tips on them.  Strawberries are one of my favorite plants to have in the garden. Generally, things go well for me in the small fruit department.

First Strawberry of 2020
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Arbor Day

Have you ever planted a tree on Arbor Day? 

I have planted a lot of trees over the years, but I can’t recall doing so specifically for Arbor Day. I don’t remember even doing anything special for the day when I was a youngster in school. 

According to the Arborday.org web page, a Nebraska pioneer, J. Sterling Morton, is responsible for the original Arbor Day recognition on April 10, 1872.  Having driven through Nebraska quite a few times, I can understand the need for thinking about tree planting.  On that first Arbor Day, more than a million trees were planted in the state. In 1885 the governor of Nebraska made April 22, Mr. Sterling’s birthday, a legal holiday for the state. Since then other states have done the same, choosing days best suitable for setting out trees in the spring. Not to be out done, Oregon has designated the first full week of April as Arbor WEEK.  

With the COVID-19 lockdown, there were probably not a lot of trees planted then.  I planted two fruit trees in my yard last fall, a yellow delicious (on the right) and a McIntosh (on the left).  I am counting them as my 2020 Arbor Week contribution. They are both blooming now, a respectful nod to Nebraska’s Arbor day holiday on April 22.