Things are growing….
And not just my beltline. 😉
It doesnt seem like its been a month since my last post, but the date in the header doesnt lie. The medlar tree has flowered. They are good size blooms, around an inch across. Since I put this tree in the ground in Feb it has taken to the spot and out performed all expectations. Here is what the flowers look like…..
Neat flowers and they were at the end of every branch.
I couldnt sense any fragrance or smell from them, nothing at all. I was sad when they started to wither after barely a week, but then I noticed that they didnt go completely away….
All of them shed their petals and pulled back to this. Some were more closed then others and as the week passed they all closed up tight. This week I netted the tree and noticed that it was getting bigger…
Im now fairly sure that this tree is setting fruit. The pic was taken today, the day this is posted.
Speaking of netting trees, my trees are starting to all look like ghosts for Halloween…
I noticed a few full grown crickets around and want to make sure my trees have a fighting chance this year. The grasshoppers/crickets/locust killed about half of my trees and all but one blueberry last year. I also made screens for the greenhouse so its enclosed but can still circulate plenty of air…..
There is a mix of solar shade screen and plain bug netting screen. Im trying the sun screen to see if I can mitigate some of the direct summer sun here in the central valley. As far as the plants are concerned, they seem to be loving the greenhouse….
Those are all the same plants seen in the previous post. All of them have grown a bit and look healthy. I even found some blueberries on one of the bushes that are starting…..
Since the greenhouse is doing well I am going to give a try with a raised bed idea I have. I found a good location for a test bed and asked dad to bring in the tractor to scrape away the tall grass. Here is the spot…..
And here is what it looked like after Dad brought the tractor in…
I got the first row of blocks done and need to bring more up. Im going to use the blocks for the raised bed portion to see if I can keep the wild pigs from destroying it…..
When I go up next weekend with more supplies I will adust and level the base layer a bit more, I ran out of time on this trip.
Hey Rob,
Love this post. I just have to know, do you worry a bit of the dead grass catching fire, either from natural source or accident? We burn our dead grass here just to be safe.
Wish you all the best, look forward to next post on progress.
It is always a concern that we will have a fire here. Last year a section across the creek burnt, so fire has been close by. Unfortunately we can’t do a burn here because that would violate the air pollution restrictions. We do cut fire breaks, and most of the area is cut down with a brush hog except where the hills are too steep or I don’t want to destroy the irrigation lines (which is exactly where those pics are taken lol). There is only around 10 acres around the shops and wells out of the 280 acres that is fenced so cattle can’t get in. All of the grazing land is kept short by the cattle, and the added bonus is there is very little poison oak around. It only manages to grow in rocky areas the cattle cant get to it. It is almost the time of year we go around and re-scrape the fire breaks, everything has been green and wet up to about two weeks ago. If we scrape before it dies out a bit, then all of the growth is back by the next weekend.