We had a few very nice days (except for the mosquitoes and sand flies!) so Will and I were very busy planting. He set up five stock panel trellises and I followed by planting several varieties of pole beans. Yes, pole beans will cross. But I separated species by a trellis, so it went like this: One common bean, one runner bean, one common bean, one runner bean, etc. I also planted four more rows of bush beans between the potato rows and onions. Then, as we don’t have any forecast frost in sight, we set in planting our tomatoes. Whew! We planted six rows, each 100 feet long. I went ahead with the golf cart and tomato plants, then stripped off the lower leaves of each over-grown plant, pulled it out of the cup, made a temporary plastic label and handed it to Will. He had raked a nice spot in the furrow and crawled down the row, planting tomatoes. As they were over-grown, he laid them down, gently curving the stems upward. The roots and much of the naked stem were then buried and the label was put into place. Onward for three days!

Will, planting long stemmed tomatoes by laying them in the trench and bending the top upward.
The stems of the buried part will make roots all along it.

Will was digging in the last furrow when BANG, the middle buster broke the share off. We went home so he could weld it back on and I picked out another (and hopefully last) bunch of tomato plants. We’re planting in alphabetical order for better organization later on. After he got it fixed, we went back out to the Wolf Garden. Will dug and dug, finally exposing a huge rock! It’s the size of two 100-pound sacks of grain. No way to get that out of the ground by hand. He went and brought the Kubota into the garden and dug with it. Finally, it came rolling out of the hole. He carried it to our boulder pile outside the garden, filled in the hole, then tilled the area. Then, hooking up the middle buster furrower to the Ford, he finished up the trench that was only partially dug.

This is the big boulder Will dug out of the tomato row!

By evening, we had planted the very last tomato. Yea! Today, it’s raining a bit and is supposed to rain all day. Perfect! It doesn’t take much to make homesteaders very happy.

With the warmth and rain, our flowers are awesome.

— Jackie

10 COMMENTS

  1. Beautiful lilacs!! Wow that is a Rock. 1 5 7 tomatoes. hope you are both doing good after all that transplantin/rock removal. i too got in the last transplants followed by a couple days of nice cool showers. gardening. its the life :)

    • We love the lilacs!! The whole yard is fragrant. We’re pretty sore from planting but we got a nice heavy rain last night so they’re very happy today.

  2. Wow that is some rock. Mine are fist size and plenty of them. I’ve been plagued by voles. Any suggestions? The eat off my new transplants. Now I’m placing wire mesh around them. It’s a royal pain. I’m nearly done with all planting. My beans never came up-? too much rain or low soil temperature. At least I can replant the beans. Always new challenges.

    • That’s for sure!! It keeps us on our toes and weeds out the “poor me’s” really quick. We have smaller rocks too. We took probably three tons out of the corner of the Sand Garden, truckloads of baseball to basketball sized ones out of the Main Garden. Now, it’s just a few, here and there. Whew!! Are you sure it’s voles? Sounds more like ground squirrels. I baited and tried to draw them to the edges of the garden while also live-trapping them. You also might try spraying one of the animal repellants on your transplants. They work for a while and that may buy you more time.

  3. Our lilacs have way gone by in Maine!!!
    We have rocks galore in our rocky soil up here……
    How many total tomatoes….about?

    • Ours are starting to fade : ( We have planted about 234 tomatoes, in all. Then I have some extras I haven’t told Will I may also plant. I hate to waste them……

  4. We’ve dug out some of those boulders too – not out of the garden area (thankfully) but from the woods. People pay good money for boulders that size. The challenge is figuring out how bit it actually is – width and depth.
    And always most welcome when it rains after you plant. Our garden area is small enough to water after we plant.

    • Around here, nobody buys boulders; everyone has them!! That would make a good cash crop for those who have them in a “good” area.
      We got our rain. It’s good for the plants and seeds we have set in, but the gardens are way too wet to plant in today.

  5. That is some rock pile! Our rocks in MO are a bit smaller, but the pile is higher. LOTS of rocks. How many tomato plants do you think you planted? …in ONE day? Yikes! Blessings as you look forward to a fruitful season.

Comments are closed.