Around the garden

We keep getting a raccoon visitor. I had a cob of corn attached to a nail on a squirrel feeder, and it ate it clean... caught it after the fact because I finally glanced out the window after hearing weird noises, but we were watching TV at the time, so I waited.

When I checked the greenhouse this morning I found that my first cucumber will soon be ready for picking. I prefer them not too large, I also noticed, on another plant, that there were three cucumbers swelling nicely. I visualise a fridge full of them within a week

Jen I am like you. I like to pick them before they get to big. 

I've found that leaving some things on the vine too long does  compromise taste. The one exception that I have found is tomatoes. I like to pick them at peak ripeness. That doesn't always work because I can get over a dozen hitting peak at the same time and I am not going to eat that many. So I pick some early and keep a few and give a lot away. 

Okay, I see what you are saying. Poor wording on. my part but thats not unusual. 

Sounds good, jen!

With all this heat my tomatoes are starting to wilt a bit. It's expected but surprisingly I have a few cucumber plants that are doing quite well. I'm hoping that they last but if history is right, they won't.

A baby deer is in the backyard sleeping.... lol I mentioned in Karen's diary how we mainly get them in winter (as in several making their way through).... well, aside from a random baby dropped off in the spring... they always get scared eventually from lawnmowers or fireworks, though, so it's brief

Taken with my phone from kind of far away, so not the best shots lol

imgur.com/3MobhyN

imgur.com/zI8r2WT

imgur.com/BIrJ5kx

imgur.com/ZpQ9DXJ

Now it was facing me through the window lol

imgur.com/RLvJzwN

imgur.com/E0BfCwc

My venus flytraps are coming along a bit now, at least three of the four pots anyway. The first photo below is an example of how the two pots were. It actually looks better than they were in the photo. The plants did look very poorly. The second photo shows the best of the repotted plants. It's looking far more healthy so hopefully will look very well withing a couple of months. The third photo is the one that I have put in the greenhous; hopefully to live outside all year. After checking it appears that the yearly weather in the Carolinas, where they originate, is not too far removed from here, in my greenhouse anyway, so it should do well. I only have room in the house for two pots. As you can see, it is tiny but looking healthy (I will put the third in the next post as over 1MB total.

As I mentioned in the buying thread, I have just bought another couple of carniverous plants for an outside bog garden. This will be in a planter in the greenhouse because I haven't really room outside and our soil is alkaline anyway so it would not be easy to create a long term acidic environment which most carniverous plants grow in. I bought hardy plants, the original intention to buy natives to the Uk, but it is late in the buying year and, with shows like Chelsea driving up sales, many plants are out of stock.

I bought a 'Drosera Intermedia' (a Sundew) which is native to much of Europe and the Uk as well as North and some of South America (for Karen - even Florida), and a 'Sarracenia Purpurea' (a pitcher plant) which is native to some of the north eastern states of the USA and some of Canada.

The first photo shows the pair, as I have repotted them. The second is a closeup of the Sarracenia showing free lodgers that came with the plant - see the tiny sundew . I have split one of these off when I repotted the main plant and potted it in it's own pot but it was difficult so I am not sure the tiny plant will survive.

Jen, what do you feed them?