May Dreams Gardens: After the Rain

Out in the garden today, if you hadn't been told or didn't see it for yourself, you wouldn't really notice that yesterday we had one of those 100 year rains.

Technically, we had a 95 year rain, since the last time it rained like that around here was in 1913.

I measured between 5.5 and 6 inches in my rain gauge once it was all over.

But it was much worse south of here, where people had to leave their homes for higher ground, with just what they could carry on a boat, and a hospital had to be evacuated. Places flooded that had never been known to flood before, or even come close to flooding.

My sister took some pictures on her street, which we all remember flooding like that once when we were kids.

It was quite a slow moving storm and just dumped everything it had on us.

And now today the sun was shining, and most of the water is gone, moving down river, so to speak.

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Yesterday, while standing in the back doorway, I took this picture of my vegetable garden. All the mulched paths were flooded, and my green tower had fallen over.

Today, the garden looks normal again.
I weeded all the beds and raked the mulch to fill in where some spots were left bare after the rain. Those twigs on that one bed are to keep the neighbor's cat from using that particular raised bed as a litter box. So far it is working.

I do feel like the vegetable garden is behind by at least a week over last year. Last year at this time I was tying up the tomatoes. This year, they are not nearly tall enough to try to tie to any stakes.

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The strawberries have been coming on strong and this is my best crop ever. The picture above are the berries I picked this morning from my one 4' x 8' strawberry patch. Yes, I count them as I pick them, and that bowl has just over 160 berries in it, bringing my total so far up to over 350, and there are more to pick.

I had so many strawberries that I used some of them to make strawberry freezer jam this afternoon. I just did a taste test and have decided that it is good. If I can keep myself from eating it all this summer, that jam is going to be a real treat this winter.

Strawberries are a crop that needs just a little bit of attention, a few times a year, but it is well worth the extra effort. I really don't have that much experience growing strawberries, so I refreshed my memory on what to do by referencing information from my local cooperative extension service.

By the way, when I need more information on something gardening related, I often check cooperative extension bulletins. People forget sometimes that "county agents" who work for the cooperative extension service are there to help not just farmers, but home gardeners, too, and they have written hundreds of bulletins about all kinds of vegetable and fruit crops.

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In other garden news, the spoons seem to be keeping the rabbits away from the beans, or maybe it was the rain? Regardless, the beans remain uneaten. However, a couple of the squash plants seem to have been nibbled on, so if it isn't too late, tomorrow I'm going to 'spoon' them, too.

And I've taken the first step on my plant cataloging project by gathering up all the old plant tags and receipts that I could find. They are all in one basket now, so tomorrow, I'll start sorting them, right after I pick more strawberries.