I drove a short ways out the other side of town to a wonderful second-hand store that is thriving in our community. I had two boxes of "guy stuff" (is that being sexist?) to donate. All was accumulated from Papa Pea's current purging, cleaning and organizing of the garage and workshop area.
This business is located in a large building that is for sale. The ample parking lot is a disaster at the moment as it is in great need of gravel, but because the second-hand store doesn't own the property, they are not eager to sink a great deal of money (pun intended) into the parking area which is currently a virtual quagmire of icky, oozy mud. When I returned home, I was amazed to see how much of their mud I had brought home on the floor mat of our vehicle. But as I say, 'tis mud season and it's hard to avoid it whether in our own backyard or elsewhere.
Here's the picture taken this morning of the melting in the raised bed area of our garden. Lookin' good!
The back area where we drive in and out with the vehicles and where our main entrance is has had a terribly dangerous coating of ice covering it all winter. As you can see, even that is starting to melt. Even though the remaining white area looks to be slushy, it's still solid ice underneath but admittedly not as slippery to walk on. And that is a very good thing.
Now for the "but" part of my blog title. We are being told to be prepared for 8-10" of heavy snow over the next two-day period.
If the weather forecasters should possibly be correct this time (nah, it'll never happen), it will feel like the proverbial one step forward, two steps back in the progress toward spring. It's just a darn good thing I'm no longer putting any stock in what those whacky weather people tell us. Right? Right.
14 comments:
I agree on the "whacky weather people." I'm not sure I trust their predictions any more. It is mud season for sure. My dog's paws get wiped all day long.
Oh, that's such a chore I get tired of really quick! I can't imagine having to do it to . . . how many muddy paws do you have to clean all day long??
Oh no! Well, perhaps you are right! The weather people are wrong all the time.
Oh wait, I wanted to ask you a question. Do you plant your tomatoes in your raised beds? And if so, are those beds deeper than normal. For some reason, I was thinking tomatoes need lots of room for their roots....so, I had Cliff make one of my beds deep. But, I don't like that it doesn't match the other ones and hope I can make it shorter and still have the room I need for the roots. What do you think?
Well, they haven't been right very often this winter, have they? Let's hope that you get a nice, long spring with lovely breezes, lots of sun, just enough rain....wake me up, I must be dreaming...
Laurie - Until we have some kind of a grow house or hoop house to offer some warmth and protection, I've given up growing full-sized tomatoes. I do grow cherry tomatoes (with success) every year though and I always plant them in one of my raised beds.
When I was still trying to get the full-sized tomatoes to grow and mature, I planted them both in the raised beds and in the field garden. They never did well (lots of green tomatoes but the frost killed them before they could turn red) in either location.
I don't think you have to worry too much about providing deeper than normal soil for your tomatoes as the roots spread out to the sides more than going deep, deep down into the soil. My raised beds are 4' x 8' and I didn't plant more than two full-sized plants to a bed.
Hope this helps!
Susan - Yes, m'dear, you definitely are dreaming . . . or hallucinating!
Thank you so much! It does help. If I break down that one big raised bed, it will be 4 x 4 and 12 inches deep.
I believe a wise and wonderful gal once told me
FREE FERTILIZER FREE FERTILIZER
Please do not send the leftover to me. We are almost rid of the snow as well.
Good luck
Sue - Annnnd . . . as someone told me, because we're short on snow this year that most likely means a dry spring which leads to possible forest fire danger. So, ugh. Ya can't win fer losin'. They are still saying 8-12" of snow over the next 24 hours but not a flake yet. (Except those inside this house.) We can hear the wind roaring so I'm suspecting that's blowing "something" in . . . either heavy rain or snow. The rain would sure take care of most of the old snow left on the ground. And if we do get the moisture in the form of snow . . . are you SURE you don't want some of it??
Mama Pea,
RIGHT!!!!!
Here's hoping you don't get this bad predicted snow storm, and things continue to melt. This way you can start planting in your garden beds.
We used to use straw bales to help with the mud around the outside of the house.
Sandy - Yes, we use (a lot!) of straw to line paths to and around the chicken, duck and goose pens this time of year. It does help a lot. The area around our door (when it's not coated with ice!) is well graveled so that helps.
During mud season I tend to dream of asphalt surrounding the whole homestead. ;o}
Of all the times for them to finally get right. We have 6-7 inches on the ground-the, as of yesterday, bare ground.
With no frost in the ground, this snow should add some nitrogen to the garden and grain fields.
odiie - It's been snowing here most of the day (Wednesday), but I think we've only got about 3" so far . . . very, very wet and heavy. Going out in about a half hour for afternoon chores and will know more then. We've still got frost in the ground so this wet stuff, if we end up getting a lot of it, may cause a little flooding. Not good.
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