Unfortunately, last week the weather prevented me from doing any work at all. This week wasn't much better for time, as work had me running hard, but today I spent about 3 hours working the land. The land is-almost-ready to go, after I made a snap decision to double the size of the garden by moving large rocks around and dig-dig-digging. It's just gonna be flowers and herbs for now. I'll do a larger vegetable garden when I fence in the rest of the back yard, and it's getting late in the planting season, so probably next year unless I magic my way into an extra 4 grand to do everything else I need to do first, lol.
So far I have planted nothing, but I have about a kajillion seeds to choose from because they were cheap at Lowes. I've opted only for flowers and herbs this go 'round, as I mentioned, and I have the soil all nice and broken. I'm heartened that it's really good soil! I wish it were more on the peaty side, but beggars can't be choosers. It's dark and fairly loamy, and goes down about a foot in most of that area. I have not rigged up the Depeagravelifier 9000 yet, but doubling the size of the garden allowed me to bury some biomass underneath the newer side (where the soil isn't quite as good) to try sort of a compost-in-situ. We'll see how that goes.
I found and salted several slugs, and a freakin' termite nest! My house is termite free, but it's too close for comfort. I'm taking a day off this week or next to have pest control come back out and run some necessary errands. I nuked the termites with Spectracide (it's super effective!), and will be reapplying diatomaceous earth soon. Ahh, the unending battle against the bugs. My mantids are on backorder, so that's sad.
I deployed an army of beneficial nematodes (thanks, internet!) to the yard, so we'll see if that helps any. Allegedly these little nematode-parasite-bastards will kill off a number of foul insects and slugs, yet they're relatively harmless for beneficial insects. I read about people using them for flea control, which is interesting.
I've finally made peace with the wasps. Sadly, they did not sign the peace accords, but so long as they stay out of my house, I'll leave them alone. They're one of the garden's best predators.
Speaking of...if you ever see bugs that look like yellow-jackets but tend to hover in one place and have a wide-wingspan and giant eyes--they won't sting you and they're awesome. Hover-flies. They will chase you sometimes, but they're harmless...and they kill everything from aphids to cockroaches.
Next on my list of things to buy?
A composter. I found a really awesome one that looks like a steam-engine boiler (a riveted orb, in other words). I'm going to buy it, paint it dull brass, and have a steampunkesque garden. I have scrap copper and an old HAM Radio tower. I figure what I'll do is cut up the tower into segments and use those segments to train peas, tomatoes (which I only eat fried and green, but they're good gifts for other cooks) and peppers when I do vegetables. Weld on of the copper and brass tubing I have lying around...apply paint...build some sculptures....and dude, what would really kick ass would be if I built my own watering system into the copper tubing and such...which sounds like just the sort of thing I'd do, in fact. Forget about just looking steampunk, functional art is where it's at. Fits right in with building Theremins (time+money is all I lack, the legal hurdles are nonexistent) and other projects I'll finish as soon as I have the vast amounts of free time I've worked so hard to achieve...which is looking to be very soon--thank God. Plan for 3 years, do it in 1, maybe 1 1/2....knock on wood and by the grace of God, hehe.
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