Yup, we went from thousands and thousands of tiny ones to about a 1000 or so little ones. They will keep reducing in numbers as they get bigger until there are just a handful or two that make it to adulthood. They don't stick around after that. The pond has about 4-6 permanent resident frogs. I think they are the "lease holders" and chase the others out.

I got behind on this thread but am all caught up this morning. I just love all the photos.

Companion planting - I've heard of it but without doing much with vegetable gardening in the past, other than tomatoes and peppers, I have no experience one way or the other. This year with expanding the vegetable garden area, I'll be planting more than my usual tomatoes and peppers. Things on the list are onions, carrots, lettuce, cabbage, beans, cucumbers, cantaloupes, garlic, maybe some corn. I had looked up companion plantings to check about planting carrots and cabbages together - most results said yes, good companions, but others said not. I see what you mean about conflicting information.

This is my first year for strawberries too, but I have them in two Greenstalk vertical planters on the back patio. The bare roots that I picked up from Tractor Supply and Lowes were a total bust - won't be buying bare roots from big box stores again, but the mail order bare roots of 'Seascape' are doing great. I just went to a local nursery on Sunday to get replacements for the total bust. They didn't have small starter plugs, so I ended up spending more $s on more mature plants. Bought half the number I need, thinking I could grow the other half to fill the planter pockets from runners.

I posted some photos from my perennial garden areas in the Mid Atlantic forum yesterday. Here is the link if interested
https://garden.org/thread/view...

Gorgeous area! Gorgeous property! Gorgeous gardens! Gorgeous pics. Looks so peaceful and serene.

Companion Planting in the All Things Gardening Forum. I started it there too. A lot of discussion.
The thread "Does Companion Planting Really Work?" in All Things Gardening forum

We were going to start some new strawberry plants this year, but you can see in the pics I posted, they have gone wild in growth because we let them out (they jumped out) of the planting beds into the food forest. We decided to wait and see this year. Maybe some "fresh" ones next year. I know a farmer who grows them in NJ. He plants all new runners each year. Says too many problems with Strawberry plants (bugs/diseases/less productivity with time) in this area to keep them for a few years, so he starts fresh each Spring.

20 new asparagus plants are arriving via FedEx tomorrow from Stark Brothers. We decided to plant more.

Took a gazillion pics on Friday. 2:45 am and I am just finishing some paperwork. Too late to post. Will post on Saturday.

Finally figured out what we want to do around the outside of the greenhouse. It includes a big storage unit for greenhouse supplies; finally installing the trench drains on either side of the greenhouse; running a drainpipe down into the field; grading in front of the tool shed next to the greenhouse; installing river rock around the greenhouse for drainage, looks, and less weed whacking right up to the greenhouse.

We started clearing the area. We started putting together the Suncast; it will not be completed until we install drains and stone on the northern side of the GH.

A lot of work to do. We thought we would just get the Suncast together today, but we came up with the plan as we worked. We turned one workday into about 5-7 more!

Tomorrow is rain all day. Plan to get more plants in the FF on Sunday before they outgrow their 2nd pots. Monday is already booked. So, Tuesday, we might get some more work done of the GH landscaping. We'll see. We are behind. It seems no matter how early we start, how much we plan, something always comes up around planting time. It was like this all week. Playing catch-up now.

I'll post with some pics today (Sat). Perhaps they will give you an idea of what we are doing.

Jim, I had to look up Suncast I've seen those before, just didn't know that is what they were called. Your plans for the greenhouse sound great.

It is raining here today too, again. It is putting me so far behind on what I want to be doing for the expanded vegetable garden.

I think everyone is behind, Terri. The weather has been so bad. Today, I was hoping to get a lot planted, but they put the on again, off again, on again rain back into the forecast. Never did any plants into the ground today. I figured we could plant all day tomorrow and maybe get most of the plants done. If anything was like today, I'm not too sure.

I still have even downloaded and resized all those pics I promised two days ago. Sorry.

Hi Everyone,

Horrible weekend and experience that will probably last a few days. No Pain, no disease, no injury. Sorry I didn't post pics, but there will be future pics!

What we first thought was a faulty phone that we would have to replace, then a faulty computer (the same day) only to have everything magically work later and then lose our internet that night, seemed too coincidental, too strange, like our equipment was haunted. Then, after the ISP said everything was alright; the problem was on our side, and fixed, they admitted they didn't know what was going on. Either sabotage, faulty equipment, lightening, or a heck of a lot of coincidences, they had no idea what was going on. That is why we pay a high price for crummy service, people who don't know customer service, to throwing up their hands, leaving us in a lurch. So now everyone is trying to get us online, trying to figure it out how to do so, figure out what happened/is happening. All we know is they don't know the "why" and keep fumbling along, promising us internet, and it comes/goes/is sketchy, and all sides are trying. They are trying me, and they will be trying to pry me off their font door and counter if we don't start to get some answers so.

In any event, I (we're) fine, and we are going to use the down time to catch up, especially getting the FF planted with veggies almost two weeks late, at the deadline, and don't know if we'll have interent in 5 minutes or 5 days.

I just don't have any energy to try and fight anymore, need to take care of the garden and out customers, and will see you soon (er) or late(r) or soon, or next week, or never cause we never get out internet back.

You can't make this stuff up.

I suspect the new online crew was the old weather crew that couldn't "get it right", got fired (YES!) and got new jobs working for my cable provider (NO!) ) and are still as incompetent. I may not have internet, but maybe the new weather crew will be able to forecast better, and then my getting internet won't matter or something like that.

See you in the funnies or at some point in the future.



Can't proofread. May have errors, but I wanted to let you know. Want to post to permaculture forum while I have internet, at least cover my two main forums (NE- weather/gardening same crew counts as one.) See you when I can see you! If one group gets this message, let others know, or don't, tell them I ran away with my secreatry (my wife would kill me and I don't have a secretary). Let's make it juicy and suspenseful because it is a mystery (NOT), just craziness and incompetence. Same day different story. It's always something. Role with the punches even if angry. (not) Bye!

Well Jim that is crazy.

The times that I've had cell and/or internet service issues has been related to Sprint/T-Mobile cell tower outages or maintenance. Sometimes it has been a complete outage for a few hours or even a few days, but other times it has been intermittent within a few days span. The customer service was always able to say it was related to cell tower issues in my area, but no real prediction as to when it would be over. I hope your mysterious problem just miraculously goes away - may not ever know what was wrong.

I just had another thought if your services are hard-wired. When we had a landline for our home telephone, it would sometimes go out after excessive rain and then start working again once things dried out. We suspected some kind of short in the long length of shallow buried cable, but never did pinpoint where. With all the rain that we've been having lately, and if your services are hard wired cable, maybe something along those lines?

See you when we see you.

Hope it's all back up and working soon, Jim!