This past Saturday and Sunday were the nicest days we've had so far this spring. Lots of sunshine and temps that must have been in the 50s in the sun even though our thermometer (in the shade) registered only the mid-40s.
This lovely weekend, I had a goal of removing the winter mulch from the strawberry rows, getting the plants cleaned up and pathways weeded, and the "aisles" covered again with mulch. Didn't quite make it, but gave it a good try and felt I got the majority of it taken care of.
In the above picture, the mulch is removed for the most part with just that section down on the left to do. That was as far as I got on Saturday.
Finished the mulch removal on Sunday and found many more weeds happily having set roots and growing than I would have liked, but the strawberry plants look pretty good. I think we lost only two over winter.
There are three rows and the one on the left (that looks as though it might win "the least likely to succeed" award) is the row I planted just last year after removing a variety I wasn't happy with. The plants are much smaller than the other two rows of older plants but, with luck, will catch up to the "big guys" before the summer is over.
We got a nice, gentle rain for the first half of this day (Monday) which is what the ground needed. I just went out to take a picture of the weeding I accomplished yesterday.
I got the pathways either side of the middle row done, but have yet to work on the outer sides of the first and third rows. The row on the right butts up to the field garden and isn't bad, but the one on the left side of the newest plants is next to sod and that darn sod tries its best to creep into the strawberry bed every time I turn my back on it.
Looks like it will be until Wednesday before things dry out enough for me to finish the job as the forecast for tomorrow is foggy and cloudy. By then, maybe my hands, wrists, elbows, knees, hips, back and earlobes will be recovered enough. The first couple weeks working in the garden never fail to show there are many muscles that have had too much rest over winter.
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