Oregeno and Thyme

We finished processing the herbs that have been drying about our dining room table from November 7.

We got a jar and a half of Thyme:

And decided to finish crushing the oregano as needed:

Apricot Harvest 2020

We harvested our apricots in May and June. I wanted to keep a record of our yield so I can compare to future years. In addition to eating lots of fresh apricots we preserved:

• 24 dehydrator trays of fruit leather
• 3 cookie sheets of flash frozen fruit
• 27 cups of blended fruit, frozen

Used fertilizer spikes on the trees

We bought Jobe's Organics Fruit & Nut tree spikes and I put three around each of the fruit and nut trees.

It's getting hot and the sunflowers look like they're thirsty. There are only one or two that are flowering.

We harvested a nice little bagful of peas and started trimming back the grape vines.

Can we save the ash tree?

We had a professional come and look at our trees.

He said it might be possible to save the ash tree and injected fertilizer.

He suggested transplanting the pecan to where the fig died in the fall.

They also added 3 extra emitters to all our fruit and nut trees so they get watered at the canopy instead of just at the base of the tree.

He said to make sure the trees weren't getting watered every day, even in the heat of the summer. And to do one long deep water in June, July and August.

Last Spring Planting

One of the sweet potatoes we got at Home Depot finally started to sprout. So today I split it in two and planted them in the front yard. We haven't had any luck with anything there, so maybe that was a bad idea.

I also planted seeds of the following in the garden:

• Blue bush beans
• The last few garden beans
• The last few melon seeds
• Winter squash
• Armenian cucumber
• Dark star zucchini
• Summer crookneck squash

And in the front yard by the volunteer pansy/violets I planted some Blue flax and Showy Desert Penstemon seeds. Maybe this year they'll actually come up?

None of the tomato and pepper plants look like they're doing very well. Even though it rained last night. I switched the watering from once every four days to once every three. And it's nowhere near the heat of the summer yet.

Planted the starts

• We weren't super consistent with the hardening off, but we did get the starts outside for several hours each day.
• The peas are getting close to needing to be trellised somehow
• There are carrots and spinach and onions starting to come up
• Lots of weeding to be done, particularly in the bed with lots of sunflowers last year
• I love all the volunteer greenery and feeding weeds to the chickens!

Darren Pearce starts

Early Girl Hybrid - Indeterminate - 52 days
Phoenix Hybrid - Determinate - 72 days
2 Sweet banana peppers - 72 days
Yellow pear tomatoes - Indeterminate - 78 days
Orange sun peppers - 80 days
Italian basil

We are going to harden them off for a week before we plant.

Spring planting

From Home Depot:

• Cherry tomato
• Jalapeno hot pepper
• Sweet basil
• Green bell pepper (2)
• Fresh bites orange pepper
• Better bush tomato
• Onion set
• There were a 100 of these and I planted them all over
• Sweet potato
• Supposedly the ones in the super market are treated so they don't sprout. We put these two by a window to see if they'll start sprouting in the next two weeks.
• Raspberry
• I'm not sure if they grow in our climate, but we decided to try it.
• Grape (Tami G) Hybrid tomato
• This was a big plant in a planter for almost $20. I'm not sure if it was supposed to stay in the planter but I decided to try transplanting it.

A lady there said that it gets too hot here for the big slicing tomatoes to grow well and only the smaller cherry or grape varieties work well.

I also planted some spinach and kale and probably a few other things.

The peas I planted a while ago have started to sprout.

I don't feel like there were a whole ton of blossoms on the apricot tree so I'm a bit worried we might not get a big crop this year.

But the little apricot sapling from the seed I planted made it through the winter!