The sun rose this morning at 3:31 and will set 20 hours and 48 minutes later at 12:19 tomorrow morning. We’re losing 5 minutes a day, and a week from now the sun will be rising and setting on the same day. The sun is still high in the sky, though, more than 45° at noon.
Mints (no two are the same variety) with weed-stop fabric. I’m missing two I really like (lime and strawberry) as they weren’t available this year; banana and grapefruit are new.
The weather has remained dry with areas of smoke, but the forecast suggests increasing showers and even rain next week. I certainly hope so; there are evacuations strongly suggested within 20 miles of my house.
I’m trying to get weed-stop fabric around the mints and other herbs, and flowers planted in the hollows in the cement blocks making up the raised beds. I doubt I’ll feel like it once chemo starts, so I’m getting as much as I can done while I’m still feeling decent. At least the intense heat seems to have faded – forecast high temperatures for the next week are high 60’s to low 70’s.
I need to drag out the other hoses and water more than the vegetable beds and potted plants. The lilies are barely breaking the ground – probably lack of water. But I may not feel up to watering once I start chemo, and I don’t want to start if I’m not continuing.
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The plants will grow big and strong with heavenly sunlight and you are now part of my morning prayers.
Thanks. Our plants definitely respond to long hours of sunshine.
You have your cold to deal with and here in So. Florida we have the outrageous heat – whatcha gonna do?
Don’t mention outrageous heat–we just got through that. (Though “outrageous” for us is anything over 85°F.)
Weed block is good stuff. It has a myriad of uses, from keeping weeds down to backing a wall, to stabilizing soil, to, well, a bazillion things — more than you’d think; we’ll get into them. It’s a material that will keep weed and grass seeds from germinating while allowing air, moisture, and nutrients to pass through to the soil and nourish the roots around your plantings.
I am always in awe of your weather posts. Does continuous sun bother you? Or the opposite–no/little sun? It’s like living on another planet, and good fodder for your writing I am sure!
Continuous daylight, not sun–and no, it doesn’t bother me. Winter darkness does, if only because my vision will no longer allow my driving in the dark, which means in midwinter I have about 3 hours a day.
I have always thought that you don’t have to love gardening to enjoy your gardens. Here in central Florida it can be unbearably hot outside and I don’t want to spend my weekends fooling around with newspapers and pulling weeds or using lots of chemicals or fabric in my garden beds. (I’m a landscape manager the rest of the week.)I have found that using a heavy layer (6″) of pine needles, which contain a natural pre-emergent herbicide, directly over the soil and then just spot spraying with Round-up is the best method for my garden. The pine needles come in bales at the garden center for about $5.00 and it lasts for 12 months or more and it’s a renewable resource.