Good grief, what a day!
It’s past 5:30pm as I start this, and we’re just now starting to cool down to what was or forecasted high of 28C/82F
Knowing today was supposed to be hot, I made a point of watering the winter sown chain link fence bed, where I’m happy to say, I spotted a first!
A very first pea shoot!
I have no idea what the other shoots are, yet.
As things got hotter in the afternoon, I headed out again, hooking up an extra hose to the front tap to water that bed again, as the winds are drying everything out. Inside the portable greenhouse, it was above 50C/122F. Since this is just a plastic covered frame, there is no way to vent the heat, other than to keep the door tied fully open. So I misted everything in there, several times, to try and cool things down. Even the chitting potatoes got misted, a little bit.
The wind was threatening to blow away the plastic covers in the East garden bed and on the high raised bed. The heavier plastic on the old kitchen garden bed cover was handling things much better, even though that cover is slightly elevated by bricks and whatnot, allowing some air flow underneath. I did open up one end and gave it a watering, too. Normally, I would have lifted the cover off completely to water that bed, but that was just not going to happen with this wind!
The covered raised bed in the East yard was getting hit the worst. I ended up tying some more sticks together to drape across the top, but they were still too light. This bed did get a watering, too, and I kept tucking the excess plastic under the frame itself, but the wind kept blowing it loose. I even tied it down around the entire base of where the mesh connects with the frame, but that just got blown loose, too. Eventually, I raided a pile of rocks I’d taken out of the sun choke bed and stacked against the garage, grabbing the larger ones, and using them to weigh down the edges more, rolling them up in the excess plastic where I was able.
The high raised bed was also being blown around like a balloon. Even the extra hoops on the outside of the plastic were getting pulled loose from the stakes they were set on. I used the 3′ extra piece of pipe at one end to give a bit more something to keep the plastic from ballooning in the wind. Between that and the stone and board I already had to secure it, it finally held.
This bed got a pair or sticks joined with twine draped over it, too. These sticks were heavier, but still not heavy enough. I had already used rocks rolled up in the excess plastic as weights, but they were not heavy enough, so I raided another rock pile for larger ones to weight the edges. One of the hoops on the outside kept getting blown loose and I finally had to find a longer piece of bamboo stake – going from about an 8″ piece to one almost 2 feet long – before I could finally secure one end enough that it couldn’t get blown loose again. Once that end was secure, the other end was no longer being pulled loose.
In between fighting with the wind, going back and forth between the two beds, I also set up several hoses from the back tap to the main garden area and got a daughter to open the valve in the basement. I managed to water inside the high raised bed cover first. I’ve got one of those long reach spray guns and the sprayer end can be adjusted up and down. I had it spraying upwards, into the plastic, to rain down, so I wouldn’t accidentally damage the sprouts under there with water pressure. The weight of the water also helped with securing the plastic cover a bit.
The garlic bed also got a thorough watering, including the end that has the same mix of seeds as the high raised bed. The bed winter sown with summer squash got a thorough watering, too. There are things sprouting in the squash bed, but definitely not any squash seedlings, yet!
The one bed I didn’t have to do anything with is the one with flower seeds winter sown into it. When my daughter and I covered that one with plastic last night and weighted down the edges with bricks, I ended up using the mulch set to one side and basically burying the edge of the plastic along that side. That was all it took to keep that bed’s cover from being blown around! I could also see condensation inside the plastic, so I knew it wasn’t going to need watering yet.
Tomorrow, we’re expecting heat again, so I’ll be doing more watering early in the day. I’m hoping the wind will die down by then. One of my weather apps says possible rain tomorrow might, but looking at more detail, it’s only a 1 or 2% chance of rain. So I’m going to keep watering.
Weather willing, I am hoping to get to the outer yard and transplant that Walnut sapling. The way things are going, I’m going to shoot to do just one planting out there a day, starting with the sapling that should have already been planted by now. The walnut seeds are less urgent for planting. Each is going to be a big job on its own. I’m rather dreading to see how many roots I will be hitting when I try to dig transplant holes!
I watched this video this morning, and I might be changing up a few things.
After watching the video, I checked and it seems our last average frost date has changed from June 2 to May 21-31. This is based on the town to the north of us, which is now the same as the town to the East of us. The town to the East of us had a last frost date of May 28, so it’s still in that range now.
This means that, once I get the beds ready, we should be able to get things into the ground about a week earlier than I expected to. Some of the direct sowing can be done now, if I had beds ready for them. I’ve got a couple of beds solarizing that will be easier to prep, and I want to get the potatoes in soon. We still need to finish building the trellis supports on one of the low raised beds, but the climbers I want to plant there can be planted before the trellis is ready.
We’re supposed to cool down to more reasonable temperatures in a few days, then get hot again. The overnight lows are still expected to drop to just above freezing a few times. We’ll see how it actually turns out, when the time comes!
For all the fighting with the covers in this wind, I’m glad we got them on.
On a related note, the water table is high enough that I had to set up a the blower fans in the old basement, where water is starting to seep through. The sump pump has even gone off a couple of times, which will be great for the bed in the old kitchen garden it is set up to drain at. My brother came over again today and checked on the ejector; the stand pipe still has ice in it, but with this heat, I’ll be testing it more often, to see if we can finally start getting through the venturi pipe. Even if it’s just a dribble, once fluid starts going through, it will thaw out faster at the bottom.
It’s hard to imagine, with how hot it is today, that the ground is actually still frozen further down!
The Re-Farmer
The Re-Farmer 
Here, it managed to get up to 11C here today and the wind was strong enough to blow the empty wheelbarrow, despite it being turned upside down, into the driveway.
All of the gardening news for my area indicates that this year’s “don’t worry about frost” date is May 15, which is far earlier than usual. Considering that this past week’s morning low temperatures have been between -2C and 3C, I wonder about the correctness of their forecasts.
I’m glad you talked about carrots as I had forgotten about them. I will get some tomorrow when I go into town to the post office.
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Yikes about your wind!!!! And yeah… I wouldn’t trust any of the forecasts much, either!!
I’m just learning that we have some major fires happening up north. Several people on the reserves have lost their homes. The water bombers are out, but the lake still has ice on it. One of them, at least, was caused by a tree blown over by the wind, onto a power line. The wind, of course, is making fighting the fires extremely difficult.
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Wind driven wildfires are difficult for firefighters, especially if water isn’t available to slow the fire. Trees into the power lines are a recurring problem. The power line protection systems work quickly, but often not quickly enough to prevent arcs and spark that can start fires.
I just saw a “letter to the editor” in the local newspaper where someone was complaining about the electric utility “ruining trees” near the power lines…sigh…..
It looks like Winnipeg will be celebrating. It was very refreshing to see a “politics didn’t make it onto the ice” match.
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Since last year, our electric company has been clearing trees from power lines all over our region. They’ve made their way to our own gravel roads a few weeks ago. They’ve gone along under the lines with some sort of industrial mower/chipper to clear away underbrush in some areas. In others, they’ve got a contacting company with the biggest industrial wood chipper I’ve ever seen to cut the larger trees away from the power lines. A few months ago, I got a call from the company saying they would be working in our area and asking is we were okay with them going onto the property to cut back trees to our power pole. Their power pole, I should say. There are two that are theirs to support the coming in, and one that is ours to support the line to the garage.
When we first moved out there, we were getting power flickers, then finding burnt branches in the snow. We’d called the electric company, only to be told they no longer cleared trees from their power lines on private property, so we had to pay to get it done ourselves. When I got the call asking if we wanted it done, at no cost, I happily gave permission for them to come onto the property! So far, it hasn’t happened, though, but it’s been long enough that it should be done again.
The very idea that someone would complain that the trees are being “ruined” blows my mind.
What happened in Winnipeg? Oh, was there a hockey game? I don’t follow any sports at all. 😄 I enjoyed playing them, not watching them! I’m surprised they weren’t made to get political. Even I’ve been seeing our new Prime Dictator pretending to be Canadian by inserting himself onto the ice with the Oilers. Maybe it’s just because they’re in Alberta. Very cringe.
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And…we just got the electricity back on. This time it was only 5 hours.
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