Ah, SPRING!

Hardening off onions, leek, parsley

Man, what a difference a day and a bunch of degrees can make! The temperature didn’t exactly shoot up, but it went from hovering around daytime zero, to around 10°C (50°F). This was one weather trend, predicted on the 15-day-forecast weather site, that I figured wouldn’t suddenly go south (it’s gotta warm up sometime), so I’ve been waiting for it, to the day, for a couple of days now. It’ll get steadily warmer for a week or so, than maybe drop a bit, but even if we get another BLIZZARD, the ground will have warmed up enough that new snow won’t be able to stick around for long. So, I do believe, SPRING IS HERE!!! I woke up to sunshine, and without even checking the temperature or confirming the forecast, set up a table outside the Milkhouse and out went the leek, onions and parsley for a little rapid hardening off. Getting them out to the greenhouse in a couple of days will free up a lot of rack space! Wandering around the field a bit, checking the melt-off’s progress, I poked around the edge of the Jerusalem artichoke bed. The ground was still fairly frozen, and had melted to clayey muck only in spots. Poking around in a soft spot at the base of one of the plants, I came up with a handful! First harvest! The tubers look beautiful, the ones in the front of the pic about marble size, the biggest in the back, like a golf ball. As seed stock, there’s going to be a ton from the 45 pieces planted last year. I didn’t end up harvesting any in the fall; now, I’ll get to for the first time eat ’em!

Freshly harvested Jerusalem artichoke

6 thoughts on “Ah, SPRING!”

  1. Hi! Looks like you have lots of experience with herbs and veggies. Your site looks yummy. I heard that yellowtail butterflies are attracted to Parsley and that they either eat it or lay their eggs there. I want to attract butterflies to a deck container garden this summer mainly just to admire them. Any suggestions?

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  2. PlantBuddy: I don’t know anything particular about attracting butterflies. We get a few different ones through the garden. Different butterfly species are attracted to different flowers as adults, and to other specific plants to lay eggs, so it sounds like you need a list! I tried searching for “attract butterfly garden” and found a bunch of pages… It sounds fun to try, except I wouldn’t want to be inviting…pests, so here I’d probably have to take care what I ask for!

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