Berries

Our raspberry patch was horribly overgrown. I’ve been trying to clean it up over the past couple of seasons but it has been slow going. The canes took a beating from all the snow this winter. I decided that was a blessing in disguise. I cut almost everything back to the ground, even the bearing canes. That means foregoing a berry harvest for a season or two, but the result should be a neater raspberry patch that is easier to manage. I can dig out the quackgrass, too. And the ground squirrels will lose any cover from which to launch their mid-garden assaults—for this year, at least.

Down in the right front corner of that photo is one of the currant bushes Cathy gave me. It produces prolifically every year.

I pruned the grapevines and saved the cuttings for my friend, Ginger. She makes lovely wreaths out of them.

The new strawberry patch is looking great. That spot had potatoes two seasons ago and was mulched with a lot of rotted straw. Last year, I put down black plastic and planted three rows of strawberry starts in holes. Yesterday morning, I cut the black plastic, folded it back, and anchored it down so that it continues as weed control. Now the plants have a bit of room to spread out:

Black plastic has been a game changer for weed control. I haven’t found anything else that works as well, and judging by the number of gigantic earthworms I saw yesterday, it doesn’t seem to hurt the soil. The snakes also like to sun themselves on it. I am waiting for the big Montana racer snake to put in an appearance.

I need to put some painted red rocks in the strawberry bed to discourage turkeys from eating the berries. The turkeys are becoming almost as much of a pest as the ground squirrels. This is what the ground squirrels have done over by my grape vines:

They live in the woods by the house, but this is their off-ramp into the garden. That post is holding up my grape vine trellis. (The husband put it in, so it isn’t in any danger of falling over.)

The guys finished work a little early yesterday, so one of our employees came over after lunch to get a few more hours on his time card for the week. He helped me dig out some unwanted raspberries. We also spread out the rest of the black silage plastic. The garden is now ready for planting.

Hopefully, peas will go in today. I also might try to get a row of lettuce and some cabbage and broccoli starts into the ground this week.

This physical activity feels good. I am tired at the end of the day, but it’s a good tired and the work keeps me limber.

The pigs are thrilled to be out rooting around the pasture all day. This group is still rather skittish around people. If I crouch down on the ground and wait, though, eventually one or two will come over to see what I’m about.

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The Juki 1541 is scheduled to arrive next Wednesday. It may be another week or so before we get it assembled and running, depending on how things go. I ordered a whole slew of industrial and outdoor fabric swatches from Seattle Fabrics to keep in my swatch library. I have some thread on hand, but I need to go through it and organize it according to size. I am hoping that once the garden is in, things will ease up enough for me to do some sewing again.