corn planting

It's a cloudy day, with thunderstorms forecast and sun tomorrow. Figured good time as any to set out the young corn. They're getting crowded in the coldframe

so I pulled them all out

and laid out in groups where the lettuce vacated (pollinates better in bunches than long straight rows).

first I dug the holes

and then I got the fertilizer ready: fish scraps! Last time we got fresh fish from the market the mackerel looked so good we bought whole fish, and I cleaned them at home. I wanted to compost the scrap and heads, but then remember how it's said that native americans used to plant salmon heads with their corn? and also I read somewhere about a lady who dug a hole by her rosebush and planted a fishhead there. The rose bush grew so healthy it had no bugs on it at all, leaves a beautiful lush color. When she experimented by picking aphids off other plants and putting them on this rosebush, the bugs scrambled to get off that plant! it was super-healthy enough to make its own defenses. So I save the fish to feed my corn, see how it goes.

I wanted to be really careful not to get scent of fish spread atop the soil or via my hands (which could attract rats, dogs or something else to dig in my garden!) so I chopped up the pieces nearly-frozen (not as messy, easier to chop) and covered my hand with plastic to drop each piece in a hole.

Then threw away the plastic bag and finished using my bare hands. Sprinkled a half inch of soil over the fish, set the plants atop it. They're already bigger than the plants that failed on me last year. (Carrots in the background here).

As a little precaution, since I don't want them buffeted by wind or attacked by bugs right after going in the ground, I've put them under cloches temporarily.

Just as I finished up the heavy rain started to fall.