We've had the strangest weather this year. Bear in mind that Ohio weather is unpredictable to begin with, but this year, it's just plain odd. About a month ago we had a warm snap of nearly 90 degrees, tomorrow night they're calling for a frost. Sigh. Crazy Ohio weather. Makes me want to pack up and move to a slightly warmer clime....
Anywho, in an attempt to combat the frost and save my garden, I'm going to try the old 'hot water in the milk jug' trick. I've been saving milk jugs for ages in anticipation of using them as pseudo-ollos (underground waterers), but in light of the pending frost, some of them are going to be sacrificed for the good of the cause. My plan is to cover the more tender plants with plastic bags/jugs/fabric, and to protect the other plants, fill up jugs with water and allow them to soak up the sun throughout the day. In theory, the water should retain the days' warmth, slowly radiating heat to the surrounding plants and raise the temperature *just enough* to save them from a frost. That's what we're hoping for anyway. I'll let you know Monday if it worked.
Tomorrow is looking to be a pretty busy day. First thing, we have weeding and mulching to do. And when I say weeds, I don't mean cute little clover or dandelions. I mean frickin' wheat grass from that doggone straw and thistles as big around as your thumb. I might put Jeff on weeding duty ;). Then we have some raised beds to deliver to a dear friend who is testing the waters of home gardening. THEN, we were blessed, blessed, blessed with compostible goodies from a couple of freecyclers...bagged grass clippings and 20-30 gallon bags of leaves. Whoot whoot!!! All that mulchy-compostiness really does make a huge difference in the quality of the garden and above all else, leaves and grass clippings don't tend to sprout in your garden. The lesson here is to check the quality of your straw before you spread it on your garden. If it's full of grain (as this straw was), it's going to grow.
Lesson learned.
5 comments:
Sounds like a good plan, I hope all goes well. We have some kind of weed-grass that grows by spreading runners, terrible stuff. It grows like 10 times faster than regular grass. Then there's some kind of weed-bag weed I call it that chokes out anything it can. I really need to learn their names!
I grew up in a rural area near Canton, OH. They say if you don't like Ohio weather, wait a few minutes!
We're about an hour north of the Ohio River between Dayton and Columbus...Canton is up north isn't it???
*Supposedly*, once we get through tonight's cold snap, we're supposed to be back to more normal temps. Sure hope so.
Hope your cold snap does not hit your garden very hard.
If it's any comfort, wheat straw weeds are very easy to pull out - shallow rooted - and make excellent additions to the compost pile.
(I know because I have been there and done that!)
It's in the Northeast. Cleveland and Pittsburgh were both about a 2 hour drive each. My grandfather's family was from Portsmouth, that's where I get my Appalachian accent! People here in MA think I'm from the deep south, kind of funny.
I learned about a weed I have along my property line today, it's called garlic mustard weed and it is a super invasive weed. Not in the garden though, but I need to work on it when I get a chance!
That's funny Heather! Now, let me hear you say "Pahk the cah in Havad Yahd". I asked a friend/Bostonian once to say that and all he'd say was 'Whaaat, are you retahdded?' Kinda took the joy out of things. I grew up in the Outer Banks, my mom is from the hollers of eastern Kentucky, so I've been told I talk funny sometimes. I don't hear it. But I can hear it in Mara...when she asks to 'paiynt' and tells us she's a 'beeg gurrel'.
We're still working on weeding! We were blessed, doubly, triply blessed with 2 dump truck loads of pine chips/mulch/shavings from some downed trees in the neighboring cemetery. It's nice to have connections in the township LOL. Hopefully 5 or 6 inches of pine shavings between the rows of raised beds will take care of the wheat grass. It pulls up easily enough, but there's sooooooo much of it.
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