I've had that nursery rhyme in my head, running on a loop, the past couple of days. I thought you might like to see what's coming up in my gardens.
One of two self-fertile cherry trees. This one blooms first, sometimes too early for the bees.
The tulips that I planted last autumn. I had forgotten what I'd chosen, so this was a delightful surprise!
One of five apple trees. This is the first to bloom and will give us fresh-eating, red apples in late August.
A very unpretty garden area. I worked on this most of yesterday morning. It was back-breaking work for this old biddy. (I plan on milking my old lady status as long as I can, that is until someone mentions putting me in a "home". Then I'll become capable and able-bodied once again!) I cultivated the weeds out, brought in 5 bags of top soil, raked it well, plopped down some stepping stones, then planted pole beans, 2 kinds of bush beans, some pumpkins, and have the row cover on to warm the soil for tomatoes seedlings. This is a temporary garden area. Eventually I'd like to add a small garden house to this part of the yard (my term for a shed with a window and covered front porch).
Next month's salads -- leaf lettuce on the left, spinach seedlings on the right.
The shallots that I planted in October. The bulbs will be ready to dig in July.
The blueberries are about to bloom.
I am trying out a new kind of pea for our garden. These are self-supporting. The packets say they don't require any trellis. We shall see. I've planted both snap and shell self-supporting peas up against the low stone wall that I built a few years ago from found rocks.
The rhubarb is so ready to pick. I just haven't had time to make anything with it since Easter and rhubarb pies.
Lemon balm can be cut for tea any day now. It's the first of my tea herbs every spring.
This is the small pond in our yard. There's a large, natural pond at the back of the property.
We have a pair of ducks who like to come up to the small pond to sun themselves in the afternoon.
The strawberry beds and raspberry beds. My husband is working on paving the walkway between the berry beds.
This is a boxwood hedge that is near the street edge of our property. I grew that hedge from cuttings off of 1 bush. On the other side of the hedge are two pear trees, on either side of a crabapple tree.
The pear tree on the left is just now in bloom. This is the tree that gave us those beautiful pears last September.
The hostas are just now coming up. These are the earliest of the different varieties.
The Italian prune tree is just now leafing out, and has a few blossoms forming. Last year was a bumper year of plums, so this year may be leaner. Fruit trees sometimes get into alternate-year bearing habits. There is a way to break that cycle. Thin the blossoms in a bumper year, before fruit forms.
The red and black currants are in bloom now. Their blossoms are not at all showy.
The red currants do rather well in the shade of a cherry tree.
The bleeding heart is in bloom now. When I bought this plant, it was touted as a May bloomer in our area. But here it is in bloom in April. Go figure!
I dump all the coffee grounds at the base of the blueberry bushes. The grounds acidify the soil and add a mulch to hold in moisture. Blueberries don't like to stand in water, but they do like a steady level of moisture.
My parsley that I started from seeds was way overgrown for the light garden. I finally got it planted out into the herb circle.
And, of course, I found several of these! I popped the tops off, to keep seeds from spreading, until I can get out there with a shovel and dig them out.
So, what's coming up in your garden?
