last pear thinning

thinned 5 more pears from the luscious tree. last thinning. only 13 pears left on the luscious tree. they are still the smallest of all four different trees.

a little bit of everything

thinned 5 more luscious pears off the tree. they're only 1" long. down to 18 on that tree.


the first green beans of the season


new pushbutton doorknob lock from the garage to the backyard. i'm always finding myself locked out of this door without the key, wanting to get from the backyard into the garage. then i have to go around thru the porch into the house and back out thru the garage. then i end up forgetting i unlocked it and leaving the stupid door unlocked. this way i can get in and out easily, keep the door locked, and not be so frustrated at being locked out again.


the first zucchini i harvested. i got 7 cups of shredded zucchini out of this one.


the three sedum i bought this year. two are doing great, the bottom one seemed to be dying, but then put up new leaves in the middle.


homemade strawberry pie (in a store bought shortbread crumb crust, like a graham cracker crust, but better for strawberries)

harvesting rye

i harvested the rye. pulled it out by the roots, dragged it over to the shade, and used a scissors to chop off the heads.


puppy came to investigate while i was trying to take a picture




my old camera wasnt cooperating, this was as close up as i could take a photo. i'd have liked to get a REAL close up of the seeds as they stuck out of the husk at the time when they were good and ready. something to reference if i grow rye again. but i couldnt.


after, i laid the stems back over where they were grown, to help prevent weeds from sprouting. this is only about half the stalks, the rest went in my compost bin.


the rye seed i harvested. this was as close up as my old camera could get.


the jar on the left is a quart size canning jar. picture from my dads camera since the buttons on mine werent working

mid july pictures

close up of zucchini flower


raised bed garden, sugar beets down in front, ground cherries on left, zucchini on right,


bellflower


raspberries


more sunflower pictures. you can see the heads forming


sugar beets starting to get big


the monster volunteer sunflower, and the zucchini behind it


it has 6 heads! and it kept growing more! i had to start pulling the extra heads off so it'd put energy into the ones it already has.


tomatoes. these 'iron lady' must be determinate. they're SO SHORT compared to indeterminate amish paste tomatoes i'm used to growing.


the end of the peas


the two metal trellises i got to shore up the mesh trellis that slid down under the weight of the beans


i planted some purple coneflowers for my dad. the seed packet said to start in summer. well i did, and they're just not doing much of anything. over a month along here in this photo.

MORE pear thinning

parker pears


17 more parker removed - 39 remain
12 more luscious removed - 26 remain

this time i thinned to 6" between each pear.

i still think i need to thin the luscious more. think the parker might be ok now.

with all i've taken off the parker tree, it looks like the tree had closer to 218 pears to start with rather than the 179 i thought i counted. its HARD counting the pears on the trees.

the luscious tree was closer. i thought i had around 65 to start with, looks like it might have been 79 or so.


parker pear tree


summercrisp pear tree


summercrisp pears


patten pear tree


patten pear


luscious pear


nylons and rocks are working well as weights on the branches of the luscious pear tree


the same tree last year. this tree in particular seems bound and determined to be as vertical and crowded as possible.

baby squash, zucchini and watermelon

baby spaghetti squash


baby watermelon


baby zucchini


the beans. you can see in the corner, the mesh trellis has slipped and sagged down with the weight of the beans.


tomatoes


spaghetti squash


monster sunflower and zucchini


dying peas on the left, black eyed peas on the right


watermelon vines


cabbage, brussels sprouts, cauliflower, broccoli


sunflowers


sunflower bud (old camera wouldnt focus)


gigantic sunflower, multiple buds

pear tree shaping

pear trees tend to grow vertical, to the extreme. which is NOT whats healthy for a fruit producing tree. a tree that is spread out more horizontally, a tree that is more OPEN to the air, AND the sunlight, its healthier. but pear trees if left alone will grow all its branches straight vertical. and the crowding promotes disease from poor air and sun circulation.

so you have to train pear trees. have to push or pull those vertical branches out and down. i've been trying branch spreaders, but that hasnt worked on all the branches. some branches will continue to try their damnedest to grow vertical at the ends even if the crotch of the branch is at a nice angle. so i used old nylons and rocks to weight the outer edge of those overly vertical branches to help to make them less vertical.






looks pretty funny, but its doing exactly what i want it to do.