Highlights of Gardening in Mid Coast Maine {Zone 6a} Early May
Things are beginning to pick up in the gardens here at Camp Butterfield. The 200 vinca minor starts I ordered online arrived in beautiful condition. I planted 144 of them in some larger seed starting trays and will get them in the ground once they start making baby roots. What a great way to start early may gardening in Mid Coast Maine.
As for the others, I planted filled {8} 1 gallon sized pots and will sell them at The Duck Lady’s stand later this summer once the containers fill out a bit. I figure if I sell 8 pots at $6 or $7 each it will pay for all the vinca plants and I won’t be out a dime. đ
Pretty clever don’t you think?
Use what I need, sell the rest and get free plants in the end. Yipee!
The apple orchard has been planted. Well, if you can call 6 apple trees an orchard. I figure we should be able to see some apples in about 2-4 years. đ Who knows, maybe even sooner.
Trees we planted:
- 4 Rhode Island Greening {for apple pie filling}
- 1 Liberty {for applesauce}
- 1 Fuji {for eating fresh off the tree}
The pear and plum trees that we planted last spring are beginning to flower. {We planted 2 pear and 2 plum}.
This brings our fruit tree count up to 10. Which I think is a pretty solid number. Peaches grow surprisingly well here in Maine though so I may get a few of those. We’ll see.
Meanwhile, the religious family sized garden is starting to dry out. This means that hopefully by the end of next week the HH will be able to start moving the 20 yards of garden soil I had delivered while he was away down to the plot.
Once that’s done, we’ll be able to start planting.
I told him the more food we grow the less grass he’ll have to mow. đ
Miss Lucy sunning herself on the patio. She’s such a sweet girl.
Current view of the kitchen garden.
It’s a bit of a mess with all the raspberry and blueberry plants {that belong down in the religious family garden} and the plant starts I have in trays and pots, but everything should all be moved and in its proper place by the end of the month.
The garlic is up!
And the rhubarb is filling out nicely.
And the asparagus has gone mad.
The HH thinks we should put a time lapse camera on it and film it growing. We planted the asparagus crowns last year and really, you’re supposed to give asparagus a few years before you start harvesting it {to help the root system become established} so we only harvest 1 small batch this year.
Last fall I started some chive seeds in a few flats… And look at them now! Once they get a little bigger I plan to repot them and sell them for a few bucks each. Yee-Haw! These should give me my “seed” money for next year’s garden.
And our tulips! They are finally in bloom. I’ll have to plant a few hundred more this fall though as they’re so pretty to look at.
And last but not least, check out this weather forecast. Above freezing temps and sunny skies for the next 10 days. It doesn’t get any better than that if you ask me.
I’m hoping I’ll be able to start hardening off my tomato and pepper plants next week.
How’s YOUR garden doing these days? What’s coming up?
Have a good one,
Mavis
Kim says
No matter where you live, you always have beautiful gardens! Such a pleasure and inspiration to see them.
Here in a suburb of Dallas, TX, we have harvested asparagus ( which is finished now) and are presently enjoying sugar snaps.
Planted are: tomatoes, bell peppers, red potatoes, sweet potatoes, green beans. As soon as the snaps are done, we will plant purple hull peas (a cousin of black eyes) and okra.
As always it seems, we are praying for rain.
Rosemary says
The âtoplessâ greenhouse is doing well so far. I have been picking red leaf lettuce for several weeks now and yesterday I picked some romaine for the 2nd time. No need to buy lettuce this week! I also picked one radish . . . not sure why the rest arenât doing well. The stems and leaves look great but no radish. My tomato plants have tomatoes on them, and the bell pepper, eggplant, cucumber and green bean plants all have flowers. The sunflowers and corn are growing tall. Speaking of tall, the tomato plants have reached the roof line of the greenhouse and are peeking through the top. I have 2 plantings of onions and will be doing a third planting this week. I gave up on the beets â only one plant left and it doesnât look good. And I will be pulling up the spinach and giving it to the chickens. I am not sure what kind of spinach I got but it is not what I usually get and the leaves were small and it bolted really quick. All in all, I am pleased with the âtoplessâ greenhouse â it has kept the animals out (except birds). We are about to enter our really hot season (North Florida) and I am hoping it will continue to do well.
Mel says
Our CSA uses greenhouses but also uses shade cloth in them when it gets too hot in summer. I wonder if that would help if it starts overheating.
Angelia says
I have shade cloth I use on my greenhouse and put on my beds hoops when it gets hot.
Margo says
Iâve harvested quite a few artichokes this past week or so. I blanched most of them and froze them so we can feast on them for a while. My tomatoes are coming up well, but something is eating my green bean plants. Planted some sunflowers this week. I love sunflowers, canât help but smile when you see them. The summer and winter squashes are also growing well. Finishing off one batch of little gem lettuce and looking forward to start using the mesclun salad mix soon. Also have a lot of nesting birds on our property, and I enjoy watching them work at feeding their babies. They eat the bugs and I get to enjoy their company. Win win!
Jennifer says
Mavis,
I’m curious if you will (or have) put fencing around your religious-sized garden. You seem to have so much wildlife in your area. Do you worry about critters enjoying the harvest before you? Or do they leave you enough to harvest?
Tammy says
You’ve got a great idea about planting seeds/plants and reselling them! I have been trying to economize this year by growing almost everything from seed. Plants are just crazy crazy expensive this year! I don’t understand it in the least!
Mel says
Our baby started napping in his crib, so I was able to prune our herb garden and seed some flowers. My husband planted some tomato starts as well. We still need to weed a raised bed to seed some cinnamon basil, but otherwise that’s about all we have planned garden-wise this year. Our blueberries are also looking great, but our strawberries are taking a beating I’m the rain and rotting before they can ripen.
Diana near Atlanta says
Everything has been put in the galvanized tubs I’m using as raised beds – cukes, tomatoes, zucchini, watermelon, gourds, pumpkin. All of the potatoes I potted up are growing well. I planted a couple of Greenstalks with spinach, lettuces and various pepper plants and they’re all looking good. Will bel planting one up with strawberries today. Blueberries are getting big and will ripen soon. I succession plant carrots all year in pots and have one about to harvest and one getting true leaves. I’ll probably start another one here soon. Peas finally bloomed and set pods and they’re about ready to harvest.
There won’t be any fruit on the trees this year since we had a late frost after everything had bloomed and set fruit – 3-4 nights of mid 20’s knocked it all out. Thought I lost my mulberry as the leaves all died as well. It has releafed and I think even bloomed and set fruit again. We’ll see.
Citrus trees in pots were put out and 3 of them are blooming. I might get some fruit out of them this year.
Waiting for the young guys I’m contracting to build a greenhouse to get back to me with a labor estimate. I’m hoping I can get that put up this summer then attach a chicken coop to it and get some chickens late this summer/early fall.
I still need to plant the sweet potatoes, but they’ll go in today. Still want to start some flower seeds and I’ll probably get that done this week, too. Working on a plan for a small kitchen garden with a fence surround. I’ve got pots of berries – blackberry, several varieties of raspberry and boysenberry – to put in raised beds around that fence. Busy, busy, busy, lol.
All in all, we’ve had a relatively cool spring here in GA and everything is growing well.
YAY!
Ca says
Many years ago my husband and I dug up some vinca minor and transplanted them in our yard (Northern California). After just a few years it had invaded a large part of my yard and weâve been trying to get rid of it ever since. Only wish my other âcropsâ did half as well!
It is very pretty especially when the flowers bloom just hope youâre planting it as a ground cover where it wonât invade the rest of your gardens.
Jeanine says
YesâŚit can be very evasiveâŚ.beware!
Chyrl says
Your tulips are beautiful! Harvested our first tomatoes this week, we got a late start this year. Love seeing Miss Lucy!
Jules says
My parsley survived the winter (I didn’t think it would) and I already have enough to snip and dehydrate! I wasn’t prepared to do that until fall but I will be changing that plan to do it this week. And my chives are growing great too. I wonder how they taste dried….or frozen.
Potatoes are planted, sweet potatoes this weekend and possibly tomatoes.
Dawn says
Looking lovely, Mavis! I’ve struggled with my seedlings this year. I don’t think they like the wax lined cups I transplanted them into. I usually use the hard plastic solo cups, but I had these left over from a party and thought they’d work fine. So after all this work, it’s looking like I might have to go out and buy all of my seedlings. Uggh. Lesson learned.
Mavis Butterfield says
Oh that is awful. Getting those seedlings going is such a major prodcution. đ
Ilene says
How are you protecting the apple trees from deer?
Sherry says
You are definitely my favorite Renaissance Woman!!!