I tried switching spots for the beans this year, to where mom had placed salt in the past. I had to replant this year, transplanting some stuff, as well as planting new stuff.
I grow broad beans because they are good for me but also because they fix Nitrogen in the soil and leave a lot of plant residue to till under. Next year I will plant potatoes where they were. Next year instead of summer fallow where the potatoes were I will plant broad beans to the whole patch. Four rows at least. I try to rotate top crops with root crops. The pole beans will move to the top of the garden where I had squash because Squash is a heavy feeder. Squash will go where the carrots and onions were and I will dig holes and fill them with manure and start the squash on top of these under upside down white storage bins. Three plants under each. Everything else will go where I summer fallowed. I'm down scaling by putting everything far enough apart to weed between the rows with a tractor. It means I won't have much to give away anymore but it will be easier for me. Squash and pole beans still need to be hand weeded. Next year I have to spread lime also. The soil is getting hard. I may do it this fall. I have too many flower beds, I need more time for them. Anyway that is the plan. I have a very lovely Hollyhock I need to collect seed off since it is huge and impressive. I sort of messed up by not planting more this year so I would have flowers each year since they are biannual. Well I'll fix that the year after. As for now well it will be long days harvesting and watching the weather. Time to bring in the onions.
It has cooled off so I can go get a little bit done before dark. Time to switch sprinklers too.
I got more technical information of the difference between the morning glory and pole bean plants, but there's not much left of the pole bean plant. I guess I'll have to make the most of the beans. They certainly were a favourite, and helped digestion last year.
The plans of mice and man oft gang aglee. (probably not spelt right, I'm not a Scot.) But Robby Burns got it right. This morning there were apples on the ground, so I guess they won't wait. But I'm busy so I'll just process them as they fall till I catch up. Seems everything comes at once in the fall even though I know it doesn't. And it isn't even fall yet. Looks like it will be another one of those days that runs into night. Luckily some things can wait like the weeds in the manure spreader flower bed. The flowers are all annuals so they will come out with the weeds after first frost. Speaking of flowers I have to go collect lupin seeds. Well that only takes a minute. But all those minutes add up. I'm sitting here typing because I can't drink tea and weed at the same time and I do take tea breaks. Besides it is still hot, but not as bad as it was earlier this month. Hottest driest summer in ten or more years. Last time it was this hot I was still making hay and My blood pressure went through the ceiling. I've been on a beta blocker since then. I sure used to love that fresh cut hay smell. But then I don't have allergies. Now I cut it to smell it. I have no way to pick it up anymore. I'm working on that though because I'd like to compost it and put it in the garden.
Well tea is done so it is off to weed for a bit, then water. There aren't many weeds, I just don't want them seeding. It is a good day to sit and scratch in the dirt. At the next break I get to have a brownie as reward.
It was a little hotter than I like today as I mowed lawn so I quit for a while. And then I removed a cherry tree that was basically only held up by the bark and a bit of wood on one side. I love tractors. I pushed it over and chopped up all the branches and the stump with the Brush hog on the back of the tractor. I had to make a few passes till all that was left was the trunk which I dragged away. There is not much on my place that will stop that thing. Yet it mows lawn too. I have to go to the neighbours and cut down a bunch of trees that are coming up in another of his fields. I already did one for him. I figure it is a fair trade since he clears the snow in my driveway when he does his. It is time to weed again. This will probably be the last time before harvest. I'm starting on thinning out the bigger carrots before they split too. Fall is coming early, Raspberry leaves are turning and I see a few trees doing that also. I have to watch for frost and get the onions out before then. Lots of nice 3" onions but frost would ruin them. I have some eight ball zucchini I will stuff. They are round instead of long. I'm tired tonight but it is a good tired.
I assumed your pole beans were climbing up the support and morning glory's were doing it also. I assumed they might be tangled together. So I figured it would be better to follow them back to the ground and cut them off so as not to disturb the beans. They do look different besides having a smaller stem. I guess I'm just used to knowing what they look like. I don't have a lot of it and that, that I do usually shows up late when everything else is well established. My beans are all the way up the six foot teepee's and flowering. The flowers are different from morning glory. Here we only have the wild kind but some places might have the tame kind which is a bigger plant. Morning glory divides and covers a large area from one root. Tame ones can reach 15 feet, wild ones only about 3. Wild ones flower much later. They are annuals but self seed readily. Birds won't eat the seeds, they are poisonous.
Still raining here. Supposed to quit tomorrow.
Davit
Ps. I planted my beans about half a finger deep, they don't need to be that deep but I have light soil.
Are you saying I should be able to follow the morning glory to it's root in the ground? It seems that there may be more of this weed than I thought. Some of this is just since the pole beans were washed too deep into the ground, and never could surface, after some heavy rainstorms.
There are some pole beans than seem to be sprouting, but there are a lot of visiting sparrows...
The morning glory has a pretty flower and if not for the fact it spreads and chokes other things out before it flowers I could enjoy it. If you cut it off at the ground it will be set back but pulling it out would be better if you can do that without pulling out the beans too or pulling them off the trellis. A weed is just a plant growing where it should not. Poppies which are not heavy feeders are okay mixed in as are marigolds but chickweed and thistle are not acceptable because they are heavy feeders. Surprisingly though because the thistle feeds so far down it is not as hard as chickweed or grass that feed in the same area as domesticated plants. A weed growing where there is nothing else is okay as long as it doesn't seed. If it isn't crowding a plant it just becomes green manure when tilled under. But that is my experience. A garden still looks better weed free, but isn't necessary.
Yes because watering is so simple it could be a source of a break instead of a chore. It works for me. There are probably other things too. Digging potatoes is a chore but it is still a chance for me to be outside. Something I will lose soon.
I'll try following the morning glory's and see if they go to the ground. If they don't, how much would I snip off?
It's a beautiful name for a plant anyway.
I watered the plants this morning, since mom persisted, and I got my two main tasks done easily this morning, since a nurse and contractor got back to me.
Watering could be something I do in between my tasks, as a break, instead of a chore that saps me of energy I need in the many other tasks that I never get to, as you suggested in another post.
