At the Farm During the Coronavirus Pandemic March 21 - April 8, 2020

• Saturday rained all day and it was cold.  I alternated between staring out the window and watching Netflix.  We did go in to town and buy signs because two dogs wandered up last week - a blue heeler and a chihuahua.  We put the signs up around the area.  And the owner did call Sunday morning and picked up the dogs.  Yay!  Bert and I were worried to death over what to do with those dogs!
• Sunday morning.  No rain, but grey and cold and wet.  I pruned all my azaleas back pretty hard.  I have never done that in the entire time I have been growing them.  So, they were pretty leggy.  They didn't bloom this year because we had a hard freeze when they were covered in buds. But timing-wise, they would have just finished blooming, so it was the right time to cut them back.  I have eight George Tabor azaleas - two in the Greenhouse Gardens and six in the Shade Garden.  It was good to get in there real close.  There were some green briar vines in there that I need to cut and poison and some dead debris that needed to be cleaned out.  
• Turned over the compost in both my bins.
• I pulled up the last mustard.  It was gross, full of holes and slimy after all this rain.  There is one growing outside the fence in the compost pile area, and it is beautiful,  I'm wondering if the pine straw mulch was a worm haven?  I didn't plant anything there.  I think I sowed some seeds, but I've already lost track, I've sown so many.  I dig around in the two spots where I planted potatoes and nothing came up.  In one spot I found the potato and it was rotten.  In the other spot there was no potato at all.  Apparently I forgot to plant one.  That was a bucket that I had prepared especially for my potatoes so that I could be assured the voles wouldn't get to it.  Too bad.  I had a jalapeno pepper plant, so I planted it there.
• I pulled up a bunch of spent purple phacelia, smoothed out the soil and planted an African Blue basil plant that I brought with me.  I also sowed some French marigolds and some basil seed.  I tossed all the greenery in the compost area.  
• I went down to the Orchard and pulled some weeds, sprinkled ant poison on some piles.  I decided to dig up a bunch of my Ehrlicheers.  They have gotten really crowded and they are using up very valuable real estate.  I dug up 60 or so.  Hmm.  Where am I going to plant all those paperwhites?  I stuck six in the bed with the Nikko Blue hydrangeas along the side of the Greenhouse.  Only 54 more to go...
• I pulled up more purple phacelia - it has not yet set its seed, but I have so much of it that I can afford to yank it up and move on to other plants.  I pulled it up in the sweet almond bed.  I have not sown any seed yet because it is supposed to rain tonight.  But there is no rain in the forecast for the rest of the week, so I will get out there some time and throw some down.
• Monday after work I planted 10 more Ehrlicheer bulbs in the Rose Edge Border.  That's where I will probably plant them all.  I pushed aside the leaves, dug a big hoe and stuck them all in the hole.  It took less than 3 minutes.  Only 44 more to go.  
• For some reason I decided to buy some Siberian iris last week.  I bought 3 Gull Wings, 3 Happy Ever After, and I received 1 Laughing Brook as a gift.  Not sure where I'm going to plant them.  It was definitely an impulse buy.  The 6 I purchased are all white flowers.  The Laughing Brook gift is deep blue.  I learned the hard way that they absolutely cannot get dried out.  I bought many last year, and I think only 4 made it.  The rest gave up the ghost.  That's why I say I'm not sure where I will plant them - because they have to be planted in a spot that gets really good water.
• Tuesday lunch hour - I planted 10 more Ehrlicheer bulbs in the Rose Edge Border.  Again, only took a few minutes.  That soil is like butter, very sandy.
• I planted all the Gulls Wing Siberian Iris in the Back Bed as well as the Laughing Brook and one Happy Ever After.  I planted the other two Happy Ever After in the Jujube bed in the Orchard.  Watered them in really well.  I will continue to hand water them every day while I am here.
• Watered the pots around the pool.
• Picked some asparagus.  
• Back to work.
• Took a break around 3 and walked around the Rose Garden for some minutes.  It was loud with the buzzing of the warring bumblebees - furiously chasing each other from plant to plant.  There were many varieties of butterflies in the garden - Buckeye, Monarch, Painted Lady, Red Admiral, and Tiger Swallowtail.  So pretty.  The Johnson Amaryllis are beginning to bloom.  The Fortunes Double is also beginning to bloom, that is always a special thing because it is a once-blooming rose.
• I had six yards of pine bark mulch delivered. $338.  It will be good to have some around for when I see a problem spot.  I can dump a wheelbarrow-ful onto the spot before it gets out of hand.  Six yards doesn't go far, but it will help for sure.
• I've been having long chats with Mom - all the time in the world all of a sudden.  And Josh and I spoke on the phone for a long time about the situation.  So strange.
• Wednesday - worked and strolled the gardens at various times.
• The armadillos dug up two of my new Siberian iris.  I re-panted them.
• I sowed more beans in spots where they didn't come up.  That is all about the heavy rains we had right after I sowed the beans.  Some of them rotted in the ground.  Jacob's Cattle Beans (a bush variety) and more Sunset runner beans.
• A lot of my cucumber and zucchini also did not come up, that could have been about the cold weather.  I have more zucchini seeds that I can sow, but the cucumber seed is gone.  Maybe I can go in to Carmine on my lunch hour tomorrow and buy some at the local hardware store.
• Thursday.  Woke up to find there was no water.  None.  Called Bilski Water Wells first thing to try and get them to come out.  They got here by 8:30 and fixed whatever it was.  Crisis averted.
• Turned my compost piles.
• Picked more asparagus.  We are behind on eating it.  It is our best year yet.
• Watered the Siberian iris.
• Watered the pots around the pool.
• A little wren has made a nest in a pot of fennel next to the front porch.  I watch her out the window as I work from the dining room table.  
• Friday.  I managed to get one truckload of mulch laid down before 8:00.  I mulched the large bed right outside the dining room window since I look out that window all day - I want it to look extra pretty.
• Friday evening Nathan, Jess and the boys arrived for the weekend.
• Saturday morning.  The dogs showed up at our door again (the blue heeler and the chihuahua).  We called the owner and they came and picked up the dogs again.
• Sunday.  After Nathan and family left, I worked in the Orchard.
• I loaded the cadet twice with mulch and spent several hours mulching in the Orchard - weeding, cleaning up then laying down mulch.
• Monday - weeded here and there.
• Tuesday March 31 - I sprayed herbicide here and there, only in trouble spots in the Orchard, the Medicine, and the Star Garden.  It was windy, so I didn't do much spraying.
• I moved some basil seedlings from the path in the Vegetable Garden over to the Star Garden and to a spot in the dry part of the Vegetable Garden.
• Cut away some leggy Moss Verbena and Homestead Purple that were crowding my Carefree Beauties.  
• Wednesday April 1 - Cut back some more leggy Moss Verbena and Homestead Verbena in the Rose Garden. 
• Sowed a couple of squash seeds in the spot where I pulled up the mustard.  I didn't prep the soil at all, just stuck the seeds in the ground.  If I can get a few squash blossoms, that's good for me.
• I weeded a bit in the Vegetable Garden.
• Sowed the rest of the zucchini seeds in spots where nothing germinated.
• Sowed French Marigold seeds in various spots in the Vegetable Garden.
• I see that some tomato seedlings have sprouted where I used my own compost.  I guess that means I'm not composting correctly, but I've never made a study of composting.  Oh well.
• Watered my seedlings in the Star Garden.  Sowed a packet of Purple Prince zinnias in the Star Garden.  Remembering where I put them so I can water is always the challenge.
• I turned over both of my compost piles.  
• Spread mulch in several places in the Star Garden.  
• Watered all the potted plants.
• I planted 10 more Ehrlicheer bulbs in the Rose Edge Border.
• Thursday April 2 - I laid down several wheelbarrows of mulch.  Happy hour via Zoom with the whole family including the New York bunch.
• Friday - did no gardening.
• Saturday and Sunday April 4 and 5 - Blake and family came to stay.  Poured rain on Saturday, long walk on Sunday.  Lots of family time.
• Monday April 7 - did no gardening.
• Tuesday April 8 - deadheaded roses in the Star Garden.
• Cut away spent verbena around my Maggie rose in the Rose Garden.  Used it in my compost pile.  
• I cut away collard leaves with holes in the Vegetable Garden and layered them in the compost piles.  Turned the compost piles.