More Rain, More Sun, More Food

More rain overnight, starting about 4:o0 AM; it woke me up, as the house was very quiet and the pitter pit pat of new raindrops set off the "parent sense" as a wrong noise.

Nothing wrong, just another fun rain. The last rain was followed by a day or two of warm sun; the plants are loving it. Today, more rain, with part sun for Saturday, sunny Sunday and more rain by Tuesday.

This keeps up, we will have a great spring crop, so more planting is in the works.

The broccoli has about petered-out; there are abundant lush greens, though, and I find on the web that the more tender, younger leaves are edible. May have to try them. I've never been one for limp piles of green stuff, but sometimes spinach or Chinese cabbage is good in a stir-fry, so maybe we'll try some of the leaves there.

It was suggested that broccoli leaves crushed up make a spray to keep down certain weeds, but I haven't been able to confirm that -- and seems unlikely for an edible leaf.

Meanwhile, the potatoes are going great guns. Last fall I planted a number of red potatoes that had sprouted in the kitchen, and the plot is bulging with potatoes. Alas, I wish I had held out and planted the Russian finger-lings or some of the richer golds out there, but these were what went off and volunteered to be seed.

New garlic in, and already 2 inches up; need to add some more garlic to the bed and some serious nutrition -- worm compost, some home-grown compost, and maybe even a little commercial steer manure for good measure. Garlic is said to really take it out of the soil.

Also planted a few red onion sets couple weeks ago and those, too, are pushing up. Only about half of the planter is planted, though. This weekend will have to prep and plant the rest of the spring garden. Provided the sun really does come out.