collard seed

Harvested from my blue collard plant. I only gathered a fraction of the dry seed pod. These look nice, dry and mature

there's more that seemed to only have one mature seed, or looked musty.

I broke open and sorted the seed separately. Inside of the split-open pods there's little pockets left where the seeds had formed. The seeds grow in two rows down the length of each pod.

This handful is from the nice, mature pods

and this from the smaller and dingy-looking ones.

After sifting out the chaff and smaller, deformed or immature seed (there were plenty in each set of pods), I put them in separate seed packets in the fridge, marked accordingly. Curious to see if I get healthier plants from the nicer seed pods, but I'll have to remember to plant some from each group and label the seedlings to tell them apart.

a zucchini is growing

the good and not-so

Of my window tank. Next door in the 20H, white cloud fry look like neon tetras with red tails!

I did cull three more fry this week that are behind in growth and can't manage to eat gold pearls (half size to the others)

No great loss. Still loose count when I get over twenty-

Best photo this week of fry- in terms of clarity. They're eating mostly gold pearls and crushed flake or pulverized shrimp, omega one or NLS pellets. Starting to gather in the front corner of the tank when I feed, instead of being at random everywhere. 

Corner shot of the window tank, in sun. I've been culling out trumpet snails in favor of ramshorns and bladder snails, which are the spots on the rear glass there.

My paradise fish is back to hanging at surface lethargic, after two days of looking well and eating eagerly. He went half-heartedly for bits of shrimp pellet this morning, but spat it out. Had a worse bout of gasping with that odd noise. Now I wonder if he's got gill damage. I have dosed this tank with levamisole and prazipro before, Laddie is still ill. I'm looking for instructions on how to do a potassium permanganate dip, and take skin or gill scrapings to look under microscope (I've tried this before and wasn't able to identify anything, but gill flukes sound easier to see).

a lizard sunning

fishes update

My angelfish completed a second round of kanaplex. The fins are all growing back nicely. Still red around the pectoral joint. She comes eagerly to the front glass when I approach the tank now, and sometimes goes so avidly for food that water splashes out of the tank.

My fry are growing, growing. I'm feeding them four times a day now, usually gold pearls or pulverized regular foods but once a day the first bites still. There are a few fry half the size of the others, they can't eat the gold pearls yet. One looked like it had half its caudal fin missing with white on the edge- fin rot? I quick did a water test- nitrates below five so that's fine- and a three gallon water change carefully siphoning all the bottom. Also removed a few of the oak leaves that are starting to break down. Later in the day I can still identify that smaller fry with half a tail fin- but the whiteness is gone so hope it's better.

Guppies- all the same. No problems there.

Laddie looked so poorly most of the week, I was seriously considering giving him clove oil or the brick. He floated at surface, barely moving, didn't eat for days on end. Day before I was alarmed to see a guppy picking at his side, and he didn't react for a moment, then moved off but slowly. He looked more alert later in the day, tried to eat but spit it out repeatedly and then ignored food. But then he went for a snail. And later I heard him making that clacking noise, saw him gulping air.

Yesterday, surprised to see he greets me at the front of the tank, swims back and forth a bit, avidly ate omega one betta flake. I was so glad to see him eating I tried to spot-feed him more flake after the guppies and minnows had got their share- placing individual flake with tweezers right in front of his nose. The smaller fishes still grabbed some, but Perry darted and snapped up the food with eagerness I haven't seen in a long time. I spot-fed him flake several times through the day, happy to see him eating again, and also today is the same. He's eager to eat, he looks interested in things again, he's moving around the tank more not sitting in one spot for hours looking comatose. Even has a bit more color.

Has he beaten whatever was making him feel unwell?

new flowers- inside and out

Surprised and delighted- one of my young african violets has bloomed.

It's 'Bob Serbin'

I really thought they wouldn't bloom until a year old, but here we are!

Older purple one has been flowering more or less continually since March.

I've started cutting gladiolas to bring in the house. With a few hosta blooms tucked in.

Not so new, but I noticed the nicotiana 'peach screamer' opens pinkish,

and then they turn white later on.

Out in the yard, the first rose of sharon has opened!

and the second plant has plenty of fat buds, so not far off either.

outside today

I had a very satisfying, sweaty morning. Got up before seven, so it was still cool. Went outside and started digging up the end of last year's leaf pile. Tossed some into the compost bin and spread the rest on the garden beds- as mulch and feed. It took several hours, but looks great. Trickiest is mulching around the carrots and beets, without breaking a lot of foliage. Found some leaf hoppers- grr- pretty cobalt blue ones, pale grass-green and one grey. Didn't catch them all. Cantaloupe vine has grown into the roots bed- but that's okay because more turnips are coming out soon.

I have some baby cucumbers

Don't see any zucchini yet, although there are lots of yellow flowers.

Tokyo bekana is doing better

In spite of the pest damage, gonna start eating it.

Sunberries are growing!

Amaranth greens got taller- nearly up to my shoulder. Cut and ate some today. First tried four leaves in scrambled eggs, then topped all four plants and sautéed them lightly in butter as a side for pasta dish at dinnertime. It's good. Very spinach-like flavor, better even than the leaf beet chard. A new garden favorite.

Although the bug holes- a few caterpillars but mostly the pest seems to be false potato beetle, one I haven't seen before. They're quick to evade my hand-picking. Don't seem to be spreading disease though, just making lots and lots of holes.

The beans and peas are in terrible shape. I started cutting out dried pea vines, trying to leave the ones still holding seed pods- don't seem to be mature yet. But they also seem all diseased. I thought they were just drying out but they're mottled and some have got smushy. Then saw familiar discoloration and sickly look on my bean leaves. I threw soapy dishwater over the plants from the deck, a few days later started cutting out all the sickly bean leaves. Lots of new leaves sprouting that seem unaffected by the pest, so maybe will recover and I'll actually get some beans. It looks like spider mites.

wc fry update

My little white clouds are four weeks old and they actually look like tiny tiny fish now. I can easily see all the fins- anal and dorsal as well as caudal. I tried three times to get photos today and this was the best could do- because they never stop flitting around!

Had my first actual casualty- I did a water change and hours later found one dead fry in the tank- with edges degraded. At first thought maybe it starved, because I'd accidentally skipped one of the midday feedings. But later saw a very tiny one, so obviously if that one didn't die from missing a feeding this one wouldn't (it was as large as most). I think it may have gotten caught by the hose suction against the mesh side of the box when I siphoned water out.

The tiniest one I saw in the evening- most of the fry then congregate loosely about an inch under the water surface behind the mesh box. I saw one that was less than half size of the others- still just looked like a tadpole with spade tail shape barely visible. I culled that one

Few more blurry pics:

garden from above

Tomatoes

Zucchini, cuke, cantaloupe bed

Roots- turnips, carrots and beets

Herbs on the left, greens bed with leaf beet chard, blue collards gone to seed and swiss chard on the right.

Repeat of the greens bed on left, other greens on right- tokyo bekana (they're grown more now), glaze collards, yellow and blue collards (which are now cut back - I'm behind on uploading photos).

This is the one that was supposed to have peppers, but instead has marigolds, sunberry, amaranth greens and cosmos flowers.

Pole beans and drying-out sugar snap peas.

the whole garden

from afar

with my cat in it

he was staring at a bird

Angled view- rue in the front corner, marigolds and amaranth greens behind, green onions on the edge of herb bed across, other stuff kinda indistinguishable, pole beans in the back climbing.

That side of the garden from the back- this was taken a week ago, before I pulled the slo-bolt lettuce (bright green in center) and cut back the collards (large blue leaves on the left). Turtlehead is in the right foreground, and cosmos making the light ferny patch next to it.

Other side of the garden- the roots bed (beets, carrots and turnips), the zucchini and cantaloupe foreground, tomatoes in the back by the stairs. Those oddly angled white lines above the carrots and beets- I had a mesh panel in the back of that bed, and tied some strings down from the deck to try and extend it for the cardinal climber to go up. But for some reason cardinal climber seedlings didn't grow in this bed. Nothing's climbing it now.

I do have cardinal climber finally growing across from the garden against the boundary fence, though.