Fruit Trees
This is a picture of the apple tree on 4-19-14.
Here is another view of the same tree. The section of the tree where you can see the branches in the sky above the fence on the left side of this picture are part of a different type of apple.
Here is my poor dying cherry tree. The blossoms on the left are sour cherries and the blossoms on the right are sweet cherries. Picture taken 4-19-14.
The pictures from here to the end are taken 6-15 and 6-20.
Some of the apples up high.
Apples that are easy for me to reach.
More apples up high. I can reach a few of these if I pull the branches down.
This is what the apples are like in most of the places on the tree. Two next to each other, but the are three and even four in some areas.
Here are some of the apples that have fallen on the ground by themselves. Hard to see because of the shadows.
More apples that have dropped.
This is what I picked to thin the apples so there was one about every fist distance apart.
My husband set up his scaffolding so he could thin the apples at the top.
More thinning of apples.
This is the 5 gallon bucket after he finished. Now hopefully we don't have any broken branches this year. The apples should be nice and big this year too. I didn't spray dormant oil on any of the trees this past winter, so I hope there aren't too many bugs.
Here are half of the pears on my pear tree this year.
These two are right next to each other, but I am not going to thin them since there are only 6 pears total. One lone pear is in another part of the tree.
Here are the sour cherries. Remember the left side of the tree from the picture above. The left side is sour cherries and the right side is sweet cherries.
A closer look at the sour cherries. This seems to be the year for cherries. Everyone I talk to has cherries this year. There seems to be more than the birds can eat too. We didn't net our tree this year, because we weren't expecting any cherries, so I hope that the birds don't show up now that I said that.
There are only 4 cherries on the side that is sweet cherries.
Here is my poor peach tree. A lot of branches broke and died. I didn't see any blossoms on the tree this year.
To my surprise there are a lot of peaches at the top of the tree.
The never ending critter problems!
This cat doesn't care where it goes to the bathroom. Pine needles are as good as soft dirt. Last year it even went in the middle of my grass. There are 3 or 4 spots like this.
Behind the shed is a favorite spot. The pine needles were thin, but how they look terrible. We finally trapped the cat last week. It is a feral cat and mean. We took it for a ride and dropped it off about 6 miles (as the crow flies) from our house and it was back in three days.
Today (June 20th) I cleaned up the cat mess and sprinkled some granules around the yard that are supposed to keep cats and dogs away and another that is supposed to keep various rodents away.
I noticed that I didn't do a very good job of cleaning up the cat mess while sprinkling the granules. I guess I can blame that on my Easter Bunny helper, who doesn't stop talking and having something to show me every few seconds.
My Easter Bunny helper.
Here is where a squirrel has dug up flowers and eaten the Grape Hyacinth bulbs. I found one bulb on the ground and I think all the rest are finally gone. I am not happy about having to sift the dirt out of the rock, replace the dirt and then put the rock back on top.
I am standing on the bridge to this patio and looking to my right. You can see the screens on top to keep the birds out and the squirrel trap is set. See the other hole near the bottom of the picture. There was a stray Grape Hyacinth there.
Still standing on the bridge to this patio and looking to my left. See the hole by the third chair back. There was a stray Grape Hyacinth there too.
Still standing on the bridge and facing across from the little fenced area there were some stray Grape Hyacinth in the corner of the iris bed.
Now that the trap is set up the squirrel probably won't come back. I also put the Animal B Gon where the bulbs where just in case some still exist in the ground.
I put the Dog & Cat B Gon everywhere the cat goes and where the ground is nice and sandy. I put the Animal B Gon where the squirrels come into the yard and where I usually see them around the yard. The Animal B Gon smells very strongly of Rosemary, which is its first ingredient.
I bought these at Wal-Mart along with some grass killer and found everything I bought at Home Depot, which was my next stop, for $1 less per item. That was a surprise to me. So if it works I will buy more at Home Depot. The B Gon products are supposed to work for 30 days.
Note: As of July 7 both products don't seem to be of any use. The squirrels climb over the fence from the neighbors yard, so that could be the problem with it. As for the cat nothing will stop it. I haven't seen any sign of it in the last few days. Maybe it found a new bathroom. I can only hope.
NOTE: July 15. The cat came back for a couple of days, but only left footprints on the opposite side of the yard. It has now been 4 days and I see no sign of the cat. Maybe the Dog & Cat B Gon really does work and it just took a while for the cat to give up. The squirrels are still coming in.
A couple of weeks ago my dear husband got my mailbox for my gardening gloves and hands tools set up for me. As you can see by the blue bucket, my Easter Bunny helper figured out how to get her own gloves and shovel to help me work. Now if she would learn how to put them back it would be great.
There are about 5 of these under the grapevines. There are always a lot of aphids and this year they were under plants all winter too. Supposedly aphids are attracted to yellow. We bought yellow cups, covered them with Tanglefoot and tacked them to wooden stakes. So far they are working great. Tanglefoot has be be bought at a plant nursery. It is very sticky and does not wash away. Wear disposable gloves when using it. I had to use an SOS pad to get the stuff off my finger tips.
This used to be where the raspberries were. They were not getting enough sun, because of the fruit trees. I moved the raspberries to a new area and created a new cat bathroom once they were gone. You can see in the picture above where the row of rocks edged the gravel. I am now filling in the area from the rocks to the fence with gravel. Will I ever get enough of my 1/2 acre of sand covered to keep the cats away?
Back to plants around the yard
This is a carrot going to seed that I saved from last years planting. It is almost ready for a bag to go around it, so the seeds can fall into the bag and be saved.
The blue potatoes are starting to flower.
A closeup of blue potato flowers.
My strawberries are not looking too good. Now that I don't have to go to work every morning they are getting watered better. If too many die I still have some in the front yard I can move to the backyard.
These are the only plants that survived when I was out of town in April and had a black thumb plant sitter.
Like always I have to have something on the bare ground to keep the birds from digging bowls in the cool ground to sit in. I'm wondering if the B Gon products will keep them away from some of the other plants. It can be used around plants that are for human or animal consumption as long as the product does not touch the plants. I will not use it my vegetable garden. Screens and rocks work fine for keeping critters away there.
The Wandering onions are growing great. I like to dry these. I am not an onion fan and these are very mild tasting. They are a pale lavender color on the outside edges and are pretty in a glass jar after they are dried.
I love my Hostas, but it loves shade. I dug out my Elderberry plants that shaded this so now I need to find a new shady spot or create some shade. The Elderberries were always eaten by the birds when they were still green and nets don't work since the berries are on the outside edges of the plants facing outward. Maybe I'll plant raspberries or just let the strawberry plants keep multiplying there.
The yellow flowers are Tickseed and they multiply faster than weeds.
You can see the tips of the Hollyhock leaves on the right side of the picture above. It isn't where I would have planted it. It planted itself. The good thing is that the kids can't run out the door and try to jump over the flower bed now. A few years ago I made it wider to keeps the kids out and all that happened was the challenge to get over the flowers was better. I need to think like a kid.
One of my students gave me this the last day of school. I put some soil sulfur in the dirt to lower the PH. I decided I better double check my notes before writing this and found out what I was going to write was wrong. A high PH (alkaline soil) is needed to make Hydrangeas pink and a low PH (acidic soil) to make them blue. Well it will be interesting to see what happens to this plant now. It will probably have blue flowers by the end of Summer.
