What have you done today in the Garden?

We have both kinds. The Himalayan blackberries, with canes as thick as my thumb, can grow 20 feet tall up a tree, and make gigantic impenetrable thickets. For those, I use a power lopper and chop a few feet at a time, continuously shortening. A thicket can require an afternoon. Or power hedge trimmers, faster but can't handle the thickest canes. With a rake, I remove the cut canes. Then it depends. If it's an open area, I can just keel it mowed until the crowns lose energy and die off Otherwise, I have to dig out the crowns.

We can thank Luther Burbank for those Himalayan blackberries. He thought they would be a good crop, then they spread like kudzu.

Then the true native blackberry. These are much more viney, rambling around the ground like strands of barbed wire. They grab my ankles and tear the flesh. I could swear they are carnivorous, trapping animals and people and wrapping around them, tripping their victims and preventing escape until the poor souls are composted and feed the vines. For those, I use a clipper similar to this, cutting close to the ground.

I sit on my garden stool or use a kneeling pad. It can be tedious, but it is doable. I can clear about 400 square feet in a couple of hours, and with minimal profanity.

Once they are eradicated from an area, it's not too difficult for me to keep it cleaned up. The challenge for me was I was unable to keep up last year, and they got out of hand.

 

Daniel W said: "Then the true native blackberry. These are much more viney, rambling around the ground like strands of barbed wire. They grab my ankles and tear the flesh"

I lived in a town that was origionally named "Scratch Ankle" due to the wild blackberry vines growing everywhere. The ones in our back acre were all growing in semishade and the berries were excellent !!

 

Ah ha…!!! Great story @Daniel W . You had me at Himalayan on pins and blackberry barbs waiting for the conclusion to your battle with these monster whips. They are actually the greatest enemy in my garden & in the western PNW. They are not just across open untamed areas or reaching out from the woods, as the winter wind currents also spreads the brambles seed. The lovely birds drop blackberry seeds in all the flowerbeds. Then the deer appreciate the salad bars as an exclusive 5 star meal for the entire mule deer tribe that teaches each generation where the goods are located. I only see the deer snacking on the berries in June thru August.

These Himalayan plants have no diseases insect issues or other creatures that chow down on this plant from hell. This berried wild plant has free rein to spread and root anyplace the canes touch the soil. In many cases the canes are 2-3” thick resembling a war time tool with spikes and chains from the Flintstone’s. And when my arms or legs get caught up in the thorns and long brambles I’m afraid I’m not quite as polite as Daniel while trying to ground level them with his special hedgers. I will scream out in pain using a lot of unflattering suppositions. I have nightmares where I become swallowed up in thorns & horrible brambles that can make humans shrivel up into empty husks and their souls or essences turn into glowing floating orbs that are stored and fed to these brambles . Or in the case of the body snatchers humans stored in pods like the SciFi movies of the 80’s.

I am 77 yrs old going on 49. My children, 5 grown young men always tell me they are thankful I have the garden to keep me active. Most of the time I am too , but… of course there is always something busting at the seems that needs attention or trimming . Yet the constant aggravation of something that haunts me more than anything else are the dog gone brambles from hell that will keep marching on way after I have gone from this planet taking over everything in it’s path. Leaving nothing but a thought of the garden I toiled in for over 30 years coping with many battles along the way, such as rare weather events, deer, way to many more critters to name , intrusive tree trimmers , destructive insects and invasive plants. All the plants I have planted I hope will always shine thru leaving a trail of happiness & satisfaction while marking a special place designed of my own free will, without a bossy residential ‘HOA’, while establishing a tiny calming oasis of peace and uninterrupted serenity .

 

I have no idea what kind of blackberries I have, but they are wild.

I have wild black raspberries, and tame raspberries. One of my raspberry bushes is a fall bearing one.

I forgot to mention that I have been eating ripe strawberries with my breakfast for a few days now.

I did do some more digging on that ditch today. Son will be home later this month, so hopefully we can finish that project when he is here.

I have been tempted to get rid of those pecan seedlings, but one has a couple of tiny leaf buds on the tip. I sure hope it grows! I hope the other one puts out new growth also. I don't think the new persimmon trees have any growth yet.

 

Only had time to do the watering today.

 

It wasn't quite as warm today, although golf was "shirt sleeve order" again.
I may do some watering after watching the golf and tennis on TV. So it will be pretty late.

 

I picked Courgettes. I got 6 last night and six more this morning, all from one plant. The other one in the bed is encroaching on my cucumbers !! I planted it 3' from the cuces and it has crawled east towards them and is now prohibiting the air circulation. So, since it is about done, I will pull it out and compost it.

I potted on 3 more Courgettes that will go in the bed, at the opposite end, in a few weeks once it's ready.

I had 4 grow lights set up for my seedlings and put two away as almost everything is outside hardening off and I only need two now.

It's 89°f right now and later, when it cools down and my yard is shaded, ( around 6 pm when the sun is behind all the trees that are on the West end of my yard) I have to cut grass.

 

Ta Annie

From what everyone is saying we've got off lightly without the Himalayan ones Sound like a nightmare. I have a type of Pineapple that's called "The Sheep Eater" (Puya chillensis) that supposedly traps sheep in it's barbed leaves and then feeds off their rotting corpses

 

I would not want such a pineapple @Zigs.

I tried to mow with my push mower today. I got a wee bit done, but it needs something as it wont stay running, and I did something to my shoulder trying to restart it. I will try the heat pad on it in a bit when I go to bed. And some Bengay salve. After a hot shower. It has a brand new spark plug. The carb was rebuilt last summer. So no idea. The air filter is also brand new, and the oil is good.

A female raccoon who has nursing babies (she did not bring them) has been visiting my front porch and enjoying the cat food. My kids' cats refuse to come indoors, likely because of the newbies and the kids moved into their own place next door, and have to be fed outside. I gave her some dog kibble this evening. I noticed later that my DIL had given her some old strawberries in the pan... I guess she or another coon will find them overnight if they have not found them yet.

Otherwise, I worked indoors most of the day and did not get much done.

I did see yet another video on how super easy it is to grow rhubarb --for everyone but me... So far, my 2 new rhubarbs look nice. (they say the same about hollyhocks and other plants that I have a difficult time with...)

My wild elderberries look great. At least they are not finicky like the tame ones.

 

I completed the fourth branch of the drip irrigation line. I tested it, the emitters work fine. Ready for summer. Here are some squashes, I won't have to hand water.

 

Yeah squash with a self watering system. Good job. That’s something I need to figure out too.

 

Sowed a few more cucumbers and another tray of lettuce yesterday. Sowed another batch of Wallflowers after learning that when they bloom depends on when they are sown.......so now staggering the sowing for a longer display. Continued moving all young plants outside to continue hardening off. Will delay in planting anything out yet as the ground is way too dry and they will struggle.
Hubs did a lot of trimming shrubs and boundary hedging.....checks carried out first to ensure there were no nesting birds.

Nothing today off out for the day.

 

I've been cleaning up the spring bulbs around the path and did the weeding there, i haven't finished it yet.

 

Planted my Brandywine, Abe Lincoln, Black Krim, Early Doll and Beefsteak tomatoes. Also a bunch of Hyssop and Milk weed. Plan on planting my last two tomatoes Grape & Sungold along with my assorted cumbers this weekend with a flat of assorted perennials I did from seed.

 

I picked two cucumbers and 3 more summer squash. When it cools down I'm getting on the riding mower. Yesterday took me 2 1/2 hours to do all the weedeating, but of course, when I saw a weed I HAD to stop and pull it out, and had my secateurs in my back pocket and deadheaded everything too, so it took longer. Mowing should take around an hour tonight including cleaning the rider afterwards.