May 7th: Tackle Weeds NOW

05/07/23 • 39 min

Official gardening recommendations from OSU’s garden calendar: Manage weeds while they are small. Plant beans, broccoli, Brussel sprouts, cantaloupes, pickling cucumbers, kale, parsnips, corn, squash, tomatoes when soil temperature is consistently above 70 degrees for squash, melons, tomatoes, cukes, and eggplant. Lot of specific recommendations for pest management.

Soil temperatures: Soil temperatures have been in the high 50’s this past week.

Next week’s weather: mid 60’s to 80’s by the end of the week. No rain forecasted. Make sure to water, especially if you have seeds in the ground - soil should be consistently moist until germination. The rain gauge I use.

In the garden this week: Brassica transplants, Runner beans, Ginger, Stayed inside and made lilac jelly and nettle tea, weeded, joined a P-Patch.
Brassica transplants - broccoli (Waltham 29 variety) and cauliflower (Amazing variety), both from Rare Seeds.
Ginger from Spice World in Puyallup.
Video I used to learn about planting ginger.
Making nettle tea and lilac jelly.
P-Patch: city and county resources.

The Dirt: How to Weed an Overgrown bed. Hoe it and sift it OR cover it with woven plastic held with fabric staples.

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Soil temperatures: Soil temperatures have been in the high 50’s this past week.

The Dirt: How to Weed an Overgrown bed. Hoe it and sift it OR cover it with woven plastic held with fabric staples.

Previous Episode

April 30th: Beans and Corn and Pumpkins, Oh My! (The Veggie Season Has Started)

Official recommendations from the Seattle Tilth’s Maritime Northwest Garden Guide: plant out your beans, pumpkins, and corn. Too late for onions. Too early for peppers and tomatoes.
The weather this week: Sunburn gardening this past weekend weekend, but this week is looking more like a typical Northwest spring. Great for planting! Evening temps are 45 degrees plus. Wednesday will be the hottest at 72 degrees but otherwise in the mid fifties to low sixties. This weekend looks like rain. Soil temperatures took a massive leap this last week - from mid 40’s to mid 60’s - ok to start planing some of the early summer items.

What’s popping:

Tulips
Rhodedendrons
Hostas
Strawberries
Lilac just starting, red flowering currant just starting

In the garden this week: What was planted: beans, corn, tatsoi, pumpkins, asad gardening fail, finished up the flower beds particularly with marigold and zinnia, look out for nasties (botanical and animal kind), start cucumbers and watermelons inside.
Uprising Seeds: https://uprisingorganics.com/
Adaptive Seeds: https://www.adaptiveseeds.com/
Baker Creek Heirloom Seeds: https://www.rareseeds.com/

The Dirt: Nitrogen fixing - what is it and how does it happen, best cover crops and when to plant.

Next Episode

May 14th: It's Tomato Time! 🍅

Welcome to Gardening in the PNW! If you like what you hear, leave a review and email me at [email protected] for a free seed packet snail mailed from my garden! Yup, I mean it. 🐌💌
Each week we cover timely gardening topics for gardening in BC, Washington, Oregon, and Idaho. My zone is 8b; know your zone to compare your climate! Our flow goes: official gardening recommendations for the week, the soil temperature and weather for the week, what plants are in their prime, what happened in my garden, and The Dirt, a deep dive into one gardening item. This week we are talking TOMATOES! 🍅
Official gardening recommendations from Seattle Tilth’s Maritime Northwest Garden Guide: Plant beans, Brussel Sprouts, Cucumbers, Eggplant (transplant), Ground Cherry (transplant), Peppers (transplant), Pumpkins, Squash - Summer and Winter, Tomatillos (transplant) and Tomatoes (transplant). Flowers: Direct sow Nasturtiums, Marigolds, Zinnia, and Calendula. Make Chive Vinegar.
Soil temperatures: Soil temperatures have gone bananas into the 70s and low 80s.
What does this mean? Planting time!!!
Next week’s weather: mid 80’s through Thursday dropping to 70’s by the end of the week. No rain in sight, so water your babies every day. Vent your hoop and green houses.
What’s popping:
Oranges are popping! Calendula, California poppies. Lupine and Columbine. Flowering Dogwood and a whole new set of Rhododendrons. March Spinach has bolted.
In the garden this week: Deer attack!, pumpkins and beans emerged, all my indoor starts germinated (including 7-9 year old zucchini, cantelope, and pickling cuke seeds) and got planted out: cucumbers, summer squash, fuzzy sunflower, winter squash. Worked at the p-patch with my son, planted peppers and tomatoes. Lots of happy volunteers: mignonette, purslane, ground cherry, sunflowers. Aphids. Dealing with shade (the people kind).
Deer proofing: Stakes, Netting, Zip ties, Chip clips
The Dirt: How to plant tomatoes: Get heavy duty cages - worth it for multi-season use, Fertilizer

Hi folks! Recording PNW Gardening was a fun experiment, but as a hobby it was a lot of work... and cut into my gardening time. Thanks for tuning in from April 2023 - July 2023.

Pacific Northwest Gardening - May 7th: Tackle Weeds NOW

Transcript

Hi, and welcome to Gardening in the Pacific Northwest. I am your host, Elise. This is the Sunday, May 7, 2023 edition of the podcast. Did anyone else have a really sleepy week? I feel like things were just so slow and tired around here, but as I took stock of what actually happened in the week, it was a lot more than I thought it would be. But it definitely has felt a little bit more mellow, a little bit more gray. 1s And I think the activities in the week definitely reflect that. We have been