Gardening – Page 2 – Mary's Musings

Can I Protect the Garbanzo Beans with Essential Oils?

There is nothing more frustrating than finding a deer decided to use the garden for their salad bar! We have invested time, energy (mostly Bert’s) hopes and dreams (mostly mine!) in the garden this year. The Garbanzo beans have been especially fun to watch.

Can you see the tiny marble-size garbanzo bean pods?

I am so looking forward to seeing how they were going to turn out and yesterday morning Bert said ne noticed a few places where the plants had been chomped right off! Oh no!

They were not chomped off at ground level and there was no evidence of an animal coming from underground like a ground hog or vole. Rabbits cannot get through the fence but a deer could probably jump over the fence. We do have a walkway between the fence and the garden which keeps deer from just leaning over the fence for a snack. We’ve never had a problem before but who knows! Nothing else in the garden was bothered so far.

We do have lots of deer wandering through the yard at night and we often see them at the bird feeder, cleaning up what has spilled underneath. If a deer decided to jump over the fence for a snack, I would have thought other plants would have been damaged.

So…we have no idea what we’re dealing with. Last night, I just wanted to deter any animal from causing more damage, so I grabbed some extra cheesecloth I had and spread it on top of the plants. At least if it happened again, we’d see some damage to the cheesecloth. If this continues, Bert will set up his trail camera to check it out at night.

If the damage is being caused by something at ground level or from underground, there might be more damage without bothering the cheesecloth. This morning, I lifted off the cheese cloth and set it aside to see how the plants are this morning.

I really hate the idea of putting poison around the garden when I don’t know exactly who the culprit is, so I did a search online to see if any of my essential oils could help.

I found one very helpful article about using essential oils to deter deer. After describing the many ways to protect garden produce from deer, like having a 7-foot-high fence to having a dog wander around the garden fence and mark (pee) on the posts, the article clearly identified scents that deer don’t like…peppermint (actually any of the mints), lavender, thyme and oregano. At the opposite end of the garden is my whole row of lavender in bloom…maybe that kept animals away from the plants at that end.

Since I don’t have a dog and don’t want to count on my neighbor’s dog to be available, today I’m going to mix up a spray with water, lavender hydrosol, lavender oil and peppermint oil and spray it around the garden fence and garbanzo beans. At least it isn’t poison and maybe it will help keep animals away.

I’ll continue to cover the plants at night…at least until it rains and I’ll spray around the fence and plants. Here’s hoping my dreams of garbanzo beans will continue!

If you have any suggestions, please comment or email me directly at marykisner@comcast.net.

Garden Update July 2, 2022

This is the point in the growing season that we start anticipating signs of actual produce coming from the garden. We’ve eaten lettuce and radishes, picked lavender and echinacea flowers but we’re ready to peek under the leaves to see what might actually be growing there. Thought I’d share what we found!

Echinacea is just starting but the potential for much more is visible.

Lavender flowers are now opening so the bees are very busy.

Here’s a view of the whole garden on the hill this 4th of July weekend.

Here’s the view of the backyard planters from the hill.

At the close up level, under the leaves, we found what’s coming!

So far, strawberries have blossoms. Down at ground level, not sure if any actual strawberries will survive the wandering chipmunks!

Most of the cucumbers are about 1″ long…except this one! There is hope!

Painted Pony beans are starting to be big enough to see.

Green beans will be ready in a week or two.

Yellow beans will turn yellow when they are ready to pick.

So that’s the overview! Sort of in a holding pattern, making sure the rain is timed right and the bugs stay away. It’s called gardening season in Pennsylvania! Enjoy!

Please comment or email me directly at marykisner@comcast.net.

Garden Update June 16, 2022

This is about the time the garden gives us hope for a good harvest! If a plant is going to die, right about now is when we know for sure that it’s time to replant something else!

The hopes for abundant strawberries have been dashed, as one by one the plants withered and died. We started with a 5-tier tower, an extra bucket of 4 plants and a separate pot with 3-4 plants.

We took apart the tower, thinking they weren’t getting enough sun, or water, or something. This is what we have left:

The one in the middle actually had a strawberry…and a roving chipmunk took a bite out of it!

Moving on…the cherry tomato plant is doing well.

I just discovered the first tomatoes tucked in the middle.

The lettuce and radishes at least are doing well. We’ve been eating the lettuce, one bunch at a time and that is the second planting of radishes.

This planter has the 4 kinds of shell beans. Luckily, I stuck my labels in the ground when I planted the seeds because they all look alike right now.

Delicata squash is determined to be bigger than the cucumbers!

Up in the big garden, some of the lavender came back fine. A few plants are still thinking about it! The carrots next to the lavender did nothing. We had to replant.

I have started to collect the stems. By the end of the summer I should have enough buds to make my lavender-infused oil.

The row of carrots (and weeds) on the right are actually growing. Tomorrow, I’ll plant more green beans in the empty row on the left. They’ll be ready in late August.

Green beans on the left; yellow beans on the right. Starting to make blossoms.

Most plants had at least one tomato and some had more. They all look like yummy pizza sauce in the future!

And my crazy garbanzo beans (chick peas). They just make me smile!

The echinacea looks impressive. All different stages after wintering over. We’ll just leave them alone and enjoy them.

We have had so much rain we haven’t had to water much. But, who knows, at any time the rain could stop and move us into a dry spell. We’re ready! Enjoy!

Please comment or email me directly at marykisner@comcast.net.

Garden Update June 7, 2022

Did you know garbanzo bean plants look nothing like standard bean plants? What a surprise! We are growing seven different kinds of beans this year…two standard snap beans we will pick at their peak of freshness; plus five shell beans we will let mature and dry on the plants right in the garden until fall. Today I just want to share how all the beans are doing.

All the bean plants are now about 8″ tall and look really healthy, but I’ve been noticing how different the garbanzo bean plants look. Check it out:

So, I tried to do a little research about garbanzo beans but could not find anything that explained why the leaves were so different. And then I found a picture of what the garbanzo bean pods will look like. I was so glad to have a heads up on what to expect!

The rest of the garden is coming along fine…more about other parts of the garden soon.

Please comment or email me directly if you know more about why the garbanzo bean plants look so different at marykisner@comcast.net.

Garden Update May 26, 2022

Our weather has flipped from very hot to quite cool, dry to pouring rain for days. By today, I wasn’t sure what I would find as I finally wandered outside. Bert has already pumped the water twice from the rain barrels by the shop up to the larger one by the garden so we’re ready to water as needed.

Because of all the crazy weather, we found the strawberries were not doing well in the tower, so we had to take it apart to give the plants more light. A few plants didn’t make it, but others have already sent out runners, so we’ll have to wait and see what happens. Here is what they looked like two weeks ago:

By this week they had changed. The two pots on the left looked great!

I couldn’t get the other big pot photo to download here…it was just better than 2 weeks ago.

But the tower had to be taken apart:

Continuing to the rest of the patio plants:

All the other beans look about the same as above…I can’t get the pictures to download! Grrr! Very frustrating!

So much for trying to show you everything! These are the only pictures that will download today! Luckily, all the other sections have pretty small plants, so hopefully by the time there’s something to see, the pictures will download! Check back in a week or two!

Hope you’re enjoying your May weather. Email me directly at marykisner@comcast.net.

Garden Update May 15, 2022

Surprise! The whole garden is now planted! Just a week ago we were thinking we weren’t going to be able to do that for another week or two. We were still anticipating a few nights with below, or near freezing temperatures; and then the days of rain made it impossible to even get into the garden. So much difference a week can make! The long-range forecast does not show any below freezing temperatures, so we decided it was safe to plant the things Bert had started in the shop under grow lights.

In the last few days, Bert set up the rain barrels and I didn’t even know it! (See last year’s detailed post about how that is done (https://marykisner.com/setting-up-the-rain-barrels/). It finally stopped raining…and now it probably won’t rain for a week or two!

Yesterday, we got to work. A few things just needed to be moved outside to the patio, like the strawberries:

I put seeds in the raised planter for my lettuce and radishes two weeks ago and all the rain must have really helped get things started.

I bought 6 tiny Swiss Chard plants and a single Cherry Tomato plant at a local greenhouse tent set up near the mall to round out the patio plantings. It felt good to see something already growing, while we wait for seeds to sprout in other areas.

I did plant Spinach seeds here…but nothing interesting to look at yet!

The rest of the planters down near the patio are not quite as interesting, but hope springs eternal in May!

I planted a few seeds each of four different shell beans in one planter…just to see if they will work here. I’m sure I won’t get much, but I should learn something about what I’d like to grow next year.

The Cucumber plants (2 kinds) were small but healthy and the Delicata Squash looks very similar. They are in the second fenced beds so they will have wire to crawl up.

The upper garden looks pretty barren, but hopefully in a week or two we’ll see evidence of all the seeds we planted. I’ll try to document the growth in the same order each time so it makes sense as things grow.

Two rows of carrots and the lavender coming back from last year.

Garbanzo beans (not sure how they will do, but we’ll leave them in the garden until fall to dry).

Now the challenge will be to keep up on watering. There is something about the anticipation of sprouting seeds that keeps us going this time of year! I am jealous of all you folks that live in places where you can garden all year. On the other hand, after a long cold winter spring anticipation feels pretty good too! Enjoy!

Please comment or email me directly at marykisner@comcast.net.

Garden Update May 6, 2022

Seems like it’s time to share our beginnings of this year’s garden. It is still too early to put plants in the ground because we could still have a frost over the next few weeks, but Spring is definitely making obvious inroads.

Our Redbud trees are beautiful and the grass is so green.

Redbud flowers are so stunning in the spring!

The hummingbird feeders are ready and the birds have found them. The geraniums are beautiful this year.

I planted lettuce and radish seeds in the raised planter on the patio.

The Super Sauce tomato plants have thrived under grow lights. Now a little sunshine and wind will toughen them up.

The strawberries are determined to get on with making berries, so off they go!

We’ve got to get the ones in the bucket into a different planter soon!

The cucumbers, Delicata squash and zinnias are still under the grow lights.

Up in the main garden the Lavender is showing signs of surviving the winter. I’m not sure what to trim away, so I guess I’ll just have to wait!

The Echinacea came back so that end of the garden should be pretty this year.

So that’s the tour of what’s happening right now. Soon it will be time to get the rain barrels set up, but we’ll wait another week or two. We set them up last year on April 27, 2021, so we must have been optimistic that the really cold nights were over. If you’d like to read about how we set them up, you can see it here: https://marykisner.com/setting-up-the-rain-barrels/.

Please comment or email me directly at marykisner@comcast.net.

Garden Update April 16, 2022

Looking at our gardens yesterday morning, you might lose all hope that garden season is right around the corner! However, we still have below freezing nights and the ground is either still frozen or at least pretty COLD! Not quite time to put seeds in the ground!

All weeds in the raised garden beds have been removed. Bert will run the small rototiller in here before I plant.

Bert will rototill this garden and then put the boards back down so we can walk between the rows.

Lavender and Echinacea

When you look really close, guess what! There are tiny sprouts of Lavender at the base of last year’s plants. There are new shoots of Echinacea coming up too!

So, at least outside, things are happening!

Tomato Plants

Bert started the tomato seeds in the shop under grow lights the last week of March, so now 3 weeks later, we have plants!

Strawberry Plants

I ordered strawberry plants from Burpee in January hoping they wouldn’t arrive until I could plant them. Of course, the arrive in late March all smooshed together in a plastic bag. A week later Bert opened the bag and discovered they were trying desperately to grow so we had to get them into pots. Luckily, I wasn’t sure where I would plant them so I had ordered these stacking pots. He got the plants into the soil and can now move the whole stack outside when the days are warmer and can move the tower back into the shop at night. We will put these pots on the patio and try to keep wandering bunnies and chipmunks from munching on them as they cruise by!

I had just one of these pots. It could be up on a small table or block on the patio.

This many plants didn’t fit in the other pots, so I’ll have to transplant them when the weather warms up. I might move the whole bucket full into a large planter, or I may tuck the plants into our raised garden beds. We’ll see!

So even if the gardens look like they are still asleep, preparations are underway and Mother Nature is noticing the weather is warming! April is always filled with hope for a great garden season! Enjoy!

I’d love to hear about your garden plans! Please comment or email directly at marykisner@comcast.net.

Final Garden Signs for 2022

As a follow-up to my post about making garden signs from polymer clay, (see https://marykisner.com/polymer-clay-garden-signs/), I thought I’d take a minute to share what I ended up with.

I was not happy with the colors of clay I used and the shapes I experimented with in that previous post. So, I pulled out the Pearl clay I had and started over.

I decided to make rectangles that were 2″ x 3″. I did not have a cutter that size so I made a cardboard pattern from an old tablet back.

I rolled out a ball of clay and placed the pattern on it. Then I used a zig zag cutter and just cut around it, like this:

I made about 20 of these rectangular shapes. Some ended up closer to 1 1/2″ x 3″ and a few were round circles. They baked for 50 minutes at 265 degrees in my old toaster oven.

Next, I printed out pictures of the vegetables we are going to grow. Even though I know what the common vegetables look like, I wasn’t sure about the various beans we were going to try.

Then, I pulled out my various bottles of acrylic paint and brushes.

I started with two of the round circles to see if I could make a representative picture of a radish and a strawberry. Those two, plus the lettuce and spinach, will be in the planters on the patio so they didn’t need huge signs.

Luckily the paintings are pretty small, so they didn’t have to be perfect! I’ll glue the signs to the wide craft sticks and then spray them all with a polyurethane spray. Hopefully, that will help them weather the outside summer temperatures and moisture.

Here are all the finished signs:

NOW I’m ready for gardening season! Enjoy!

Please comment or email me directly at marykisner@comcast.net.

Polymer Clay Garden Signs

Before I invest in more polymer clay to make my garden signs, I thought I should figure out if it will even work. I collected up my pile of partially used bits of clay leftover from other projects and spent the day making some samples.

I haven’t worked with clay for many months but the clay seemed to survive just fine in plastic bags. My first goal was to see if one color worked better than others and how I should write on them. My second goal was to figure out what shape worked best and how to attach the stick that will go in the ground.

The first color I chose was a pale pink. I thought I could write on it with a black marker. I also didn’t need anything too large because five of the signs could be small…they will be in the smallest planters on the patio. These small signs would be for the Radishes, Lettuce, Spinach, Radicchio and Swiss Chard. I put a piece of clay on the back that would make a pocket to hold the stick.

I used the flat end of a marker to tap down the edge of the pocket…hoping it would stay put after baking. I left the stick in the pocket while it baked to keep the pocket from collapsing.

After baking in my toaster oven (275 degrees for 30 minutes), I wrote Radish on the sign with a permanent marker. The sign looked like this:

I added glue to the end of the stick and stuck it in the pocket to harden.

Just for fun, I chose a cookie cutter of a gingerbread man to make a larger sign. I added the pocket piece to the back and tapped the edge down.

After baking, I glued the stick into the pocket using fast-drying E6000 glue. These are the ones I made today:

When the signs were cool, I turned them over and wrote on the black ones with yellow paint. I may have to make the rest larger than the round one above…too much to write so they need to be bigger.

After writing all the words with yellow paint on black I think I like the light color clay with writing in black marker. It’s much easier, especially as the number of letters increase.

When they are all done, I’ll seal them with an acrylic spray to make them waterproof. I’m sure they could also be more decorative too! I’ll have to look up some ideas on Pinterest! Enjoy!

Please comment with suggestions or email me directly at marykisner@comcast.net.

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