March 18, 2017 - Spring Planting

Last week was hopefully Winter's last gasp. The grandkids came up for Spring break, but there was very little Spring to enjoy. It snowed off and on all week long. I put the chess pieces out and we did get a couple of games in...Gavin beat me again. The grandkids left for Houston on Friday. Of course, once they departed, the weather started to improve.

Yesterday, while still cool, it was warm enough for me to begin putting out the vegetables I had started indoors. I transplanted eight Peppadew and seven assorted pepper plants. The seeds for all the peppers were from our previous plants. In planting these in potting plugs inside, with few exceptions, all the seeds sprouted and I thinned each plug to one plant before transplanting outside. I also transplanted six blue dwarf curled kale plants. I planted seeds of two different varieties of Swiss Chard, "Five Color Silverbeet" and "Ruby". I had potted some Yolo Wonder Sweet Peppers inside, but none sprouted. I am also started soaking some heritage beets for planting today. At this time, the only other plants I certainly want to plant this Spring are some more okra (we really enjoyed the ones we had last year) and some magnolias (bunny prevention) around the kale and chard. No tomatoes this year. Don't want to deal with the squirrels! While playing the few chess games this week, we found some small black beans on the chess board. Don't know what they are, but I planted them in the potting plugs that contained the unsprouted sweet peppers. We'll see if anything develops.

Last summer, T decided she wanted more garden area than originally planned. I moved the demarcation line on the east raised bed to increase the garden size of this bed more than 50%. Now, I estimate that the east raised bed has about 250 sq ft and the west bed about 100 sq ft. Unfortunately, I found the expanded east bed was very dense clay. Last year I rented a tiller and tilled in ten bags of Scots Humus and Manure soil into the new section. We did not plant anything last year in this new section and I currently don't have any plans to plant anything in it this year. Yesterday I tilled another the ten 0.75 cubic foot bags of the same Scots soil into the new section. The soil should be getting better and better.

Snap Shot and Barley Straw - January 25, 2017

The weather this past week was very Spring-like with temperatures in the low 70's. I spent a good amount of time cleaning up the garden. On Friday, I spread Snap Shot on the mulched areas. Today, I put a 4 oz barley straw bale in the pond. The barley bale supposedly is an old apprach to controlling algae and keeping the pond clear. According to a Penn State paper:

Barley straw does not kill existing algae, but it inhibits the new growth of algae. The exact mechanism is poorly understood, but it seems that barley straw, when exposed to sunlight and in the presence of oxygen, produces a chemical that inhibits algae growth.

Barley straw does not reduce the growth of other aquatic plants. In fact, in some cases aquatic plant growth has increased after barley straw applications because algae are no longer present to compete with the aquatic plants.

With regards to where to position the bale, the Penn State paper recommends:

It is best to anchor the straw packages to the bottom, but provide a float to keep the straw near the surface of the pond where sunlight and oxygen are more prevalent.

This and other articles warn to replace the bales every six months. Otherwise, as the barley continues to decompose, they will eventually become a nutrient source for algae and potentially deoxygenate the water and endanger the fish population. I have put on my calendar to replace the bale In September.

I thought of placing the bale in the upper pond where it would get good flow across it and lots of sunlight. This is shallow water without the danger of the bale sinking. The other, less obvious location, would be at the intake to the skimmer in the lower pond. This is deep water so it has more of a potential to sink. The latter position is where it is starting out.

Monday, November 28 Winterization Checkup

This past Saturday, I winterized the water lines to the garage. The previous Saturday, I blew out all the irrigation lines. Today, Wally (irrigation) called and said he was in the area and wanted to stop by and check out the irrigation system. I told him I had already blew the lines out but he was certainly welcome to stop by and check it out. He arrived and said everything looked good. Whereas I purchased the plastic insert for the back flow preventer, which has a tap to connect to a compressed air source, Wally said he normally just hooked up to one of the cocks on the body of the preventer itself. He normally leaves the iron back flow preventer in place through the winter. He did suggest leaving water inlet and outlet ball valves one-half open and partially opening the cock on the inlet side of the preventer. I told him I used my high pressure low volume compressor instead of the low pressure high volume source recommended by Rain Bird. He said that was fine as long as I had air blowing out each of the heads, which I did.

Winterizing, Saturday, November 19, 2016

Today I winterized the irrigation system. This entailed removal of the back flow preventer and installation of a special adapter which permits one to hook up a line from an air compressor. I am disappointed that the guy who installed the system never bothered to teach us how to winterize it. I did the research to find out. Our irrigation system is a Rain Bird. They recommend using an air compressor that puts up 10-25 cfm of volume at no more than 40 psig. Our little compressor is rated for 2.6 cfm at 90 psig. At 40 psig, this flow rate is 3.5 cfm. A compressor able to deliver the volume rate recommended would cost thousands. Anyway, before starting, I ran each of the thirteen zones and documented on our map the location of each head in each zone. We have 13 independent zones with a total of 75 spray heads and two soaker hoses. Each zone was blown with air twice until no water was visible out of the heads. Have not winterized the water lines out to the garage. While night time temperatures have dropped below freezing a couple of times, we are not expecting a real freeze within the next couple of weeks.

Earlier this week I brought in all the tender plants we have had in pots around the backyard. Also I installed the "kayak" storage system in the garage. We don't have a kayak, but we do have a car top carrier. I have suspended the carrier right above the Audi. This not only gets it off the floor, but will also make it so much easier to mount the carrier on the car. I also hung a drawer storage rack.

We still have okra and pepper plants yielding fruit and some green tomatoes. The leeks are about 1" diameter and we are planning to harvest them to make a vichyssoise before too long. The pond water is still above 50F, so we are still feeding the fish.

Friday November 11 - Fence Gates

Over one month ago, on or about October 9, Steve (fencing) stopped by to look at the gates. He promised he would do whatever was necessary to make them work properly. He said it would not that week, but hopefully the following week. Today, he finally showed up and worked on the gates. This is at least the third or fourth time he has been out to work on them. When he was finished this time, he told me that the gates were not installed properly and now they were. The do seem to be closing properly, but we will see how long that lasts.

He gave me his card and told me to call if problems arise. I assured him I would do so. We have not had a freeze yet this year. In fact it has been unusually warm. We are getting some color changes and the ash in back has lost essentially all its leaves. The sweet gum in front has not even started dropping its leaves.

Junipers and Boxwood, Thursday, November 3

This morning I got a call from John saying the junipers had arrived. His crew came out about 10:30 and replaced the two junipers (southern most and second from north) and the one dead boxwood (fifth from south) on the west fence. Our east neighbor asked the crew what they were going to do with the junipers they removed. Apparently they told him they would just throw them away. He suggested that he would be willing to take them. They agreed and even planted them for him. I asked the crew what the specific mulch was that they used. They said it was a dyed brown or chocolate.

I had mentioned to John previously that two of the azaleas were mostly dead, but I did not press the point this morning. I need to make sure we know the exact variety of these in anticipation that we will need to replace them. I sent John an email today asking him for the exact variety of these azaleas and reminding him that he repeatedly promised to provide us with a complete and detailed list of all the plants he installed so we could replace in-kind if desired.

Tuesday, October 25

On Saturday, I went ahead and restained the west porch. This was originally done last fall. We used the same Penofin pretreatment and INTERIOR stain. Looks better than before.

I need to also restain the MIL second floor south balcony deck. I have essentially exhausted the Penofin stain. At $80/gallon, I think I may try a different product on the second floor deck.

Yesterday, I cleaned the deck around the hot spa and the entry deck with Murphy soap. Looks a lot better than it did.

Also yesterday I finished cleaning all the sunroom windows. It is not perfect, but it is much better and I learned a lot about window cleaning. The sunroom has 78 window panes (each with two sides to clean). I also cleaned the fireplace interior and exterior glass panels.

Friday, October 21

Three weeks ago, John said he would be out to address the items on our list, including the dead boxwood, the two dying junipers and the azaleas. On Monday, I sent him an email asking for an update. With no response, I called and left a message on his phone asking him to call. He has not. My patience is about gone. May go to filing complaints with the BBB next.

Dead boxwood

Two dying junipers (they are easy to pick out)

Early this week I decided it was time to plant the hollyhocks we grew from seed this summer. We had eleven. Five went along the west fence, two on the south face of the main house, two along the east porch of the main house (very shady), one on the southeast corner of the sunroom and one just south of the Canadian cherry.

Two hollyhocks and two dying azaleas

Today, I decided it was time to finish the staining and sealing of the Tigerwood decking. There were the boards that Mike replaced in front of the hot tub, the railing and steps on the west porch and the railing on the 2nd floor balcony.

This week we also received the Garage Gator I ordered. It is a motorized lift system which I intend to use primarily as a lift between the garage and its attic. We also received a hoist that we will install in the garage to store the car top carrier above the center bay.

One of the items on the list that John was supposed to attend to was to have Wally (irrigation) show me how to winterize the irrigation system. Today, I surveyed the system and could not find any point where I could hook up my air compressor to blow the water out of the water lines. The only thing I could guess was that the answer must be around the Wilkins back flow preventer. Sure enough, Wilkins sells a module that can be installed in place of the check valve component with two ports to which one can install a purge fitting. I ordered one today. Wally never mentioned this to us.

Friday, October 7 - Bat House

We have not heard from John (landscaping) since he promised to be out two weeks ago.

This morning, Morgan assisted me in installing the bat house on the side of the main house. He has a hammer drill and offered to let me borrow it to drill into the bricks. In retrospect, we did not use the hammer function as the bricks are pretty soft. It was good to have his help and advice however.

The bottom of the landing board is about 14 feet above the ground. Now we will watch and see if anyone takes up residence.

I also received and installed a photocell on the the landscaping lighting. The transformer is a Kichler 200W Pro Series SS (15PR200SS). The photocell is also a Kichler product (Photocell Remote
15534BK) which I ordered via Amazon.

It was easy to install. I've set the lighting timer to come on at 3:00 pm and off again at 11:00 pm. Then on again at 3:00 am and off again at 9:00 am. However, the photocell will not allow the lighting to turn on unless the outside ambient lighting is at a specified level. Tonight, T will tell me when the twilight is such that she wants the landscaping lights to come on. I will then close the photocell aperture until the lights come on. After that, in the evening, the lights will come on (and in the morning turn off) when that level of twilight is reached. This will eliminate the need to make seasonal adjustments to the timing of the lighting.

Yesterday, I got an email from Joann at the Glass House. This is the company that fabricated and installed our glass ceiling above the hot tub. Joann asked if we had any additional pictures of our project. The ones I sent previously were in the dead of winter. I sent her some pictures I took this summer.

We have been very impressed with the okra we planted this summer. The plants are about five feet tall, have blossoms that resemble hibiscus and have provided us with a lot of okra.

Monday, October 3, Weed n Feed

Started working on the garage interior today. The weather is cool and it is very nice out there with all the doors open. My plan is to have the garage organized and the basement cleared out before winter. Doing a bit every day or so will achieve this. I am still considering installation of a "heated" cabinet in the garage for paints or other things that should not freeze.

I applied the first treatment of Weed & Feed to the fescue grass. I am using a product which says to apply it in early fall while the weeds are still growing. I used our Scotts Easy Hand Held broadcaster on a setting of "2". The stated dosage rate was 2.8#/1,000 sq ft.

Yesterday, our new pond de-icer arrived. We bought one last year but it arrived DOA and it was returned. This new one is from a different company at about 1/3 the price. It is only rated for 250 watts where the other one was rated for 500 watts. Both had very good reviews. so I thought it was worth a try. So far, the only thing I am concerned about is that it only has a 12 foot power cord which may limit where I can position it. I also notice that, due to its design, this product may be more susceptible to problems of orientation. The other one I bought had a "just throw it in" design. Unfortunately, when I threw it in, it did not work.

I also applied the third and final coat of paint to the bat house. Getting close to the point of actually installing it.