Warm days and nights of May. There are still some cool days and nights as we enter the month of May, but frost danger odds are getting less every day. It is still a good idea to hold off on setting out tomato and pepper plants or cucumbers, squash, or corn until the middle of May. A row of green beans can be planted because the ground will be warm by the time they pop out of the soil. There is still plenty of cool nip in the early days of May.
Dogwood winter is at an end. The leaves have covered the dogwoods and their white blooms have covered the forest floor and lawns. The leaves have passed the size of a squirrel’s ear, but it is still too cold to plant a crop of corn. Wait until the nights and soil are warmer. After all, corn is a crop that requires a 90-day growing season and you do not want to have to replant half of it. Wait until after mid-May to be assured of a great corn harvest in mid-summer.
Raising a row of royal burgundy beets. Beets love the mild temperatures of early May and respond well to soil in the May garden plot. Beets require a long growing season and should be planted soon in the spring garden. Beet seeds are very hard and need a little help to get them off to a good start. To plant beets, sow two seeds about two inches apart in a furrow about two or three inches deep, apply a layer of peat moss in the bottom of the furrow before sowing. After watering the seed and peat moss apply a second layer of peat moss and water it with the Waterwand. Add an application of Plant-tone vegetable food and hill up soil on both sides of the furrow and tamp down soil with a hoe blade.
Side dress the beets with Plant-Tone organic vegetable food once they sprout and about every 15 days and keep the soil hilled up after you feed the beets.
Setting out a container of American Bee Balm. American Bee Balm is a historic plant that we can trace all the way back to the Revolutionary War and the Boston Tea Party. During that event, the citizens of Boston raided British ships anchored in Boston Harbor and dumped their cargo of tea overboard. Then they boycotted the tea trade by making their own tea with leaves from American bee balm plants.
We wonder if it was a common wild plant in those days? You can still find this historic plant in nurseries, hardwares, and garden departments at Lowe’s, Walmart, Home Depot and Ace Hardware. They produce beautiful green leaves and some produce pink blooms and other varities produce lavender blooms. With just a little bit of protection they will endure our Southern winters, or you can set out these plants in large containers or pots. Water them and feed them twice a month with Flower-tone organic flower food for blooms and foliage all during the summer.
Buying packets of zinnia seed for colorful show all summer long. The racks in garden departments are filled with packets of zinnias at Walmart, Home Depot, Lowes, hardwares and at many supermarkets. They are available in every color of the rainbow except blue. Maybe some day some biologist or seed researcher will develop a blue zinnia like Burpee developed a white Marigold years ago.
Zinnia seeds cost less than $2 a packet in colors of red, yellow, white, orange, pink rose, green, purple, lavender, and peppermint stripes. Zinnias also are available in several different sizes. They attract hummingbirds, finches, bees, butterflies, and other pollinators.
Plenty of time to plant pots and containers of perennials. Earlier in the column we mentioned American bee balm as one of America’s great perennials. You can now plant these as well as other perennials such as the creeping jenny, daphnes, pink and lavender thrift, creeping phlox coral bells, veronica, columbine, diantos, candy tuft, dusty miller, hens and chicks sea thrift, and bugleweed.
They provide year-round greenery and flowers and they require very little care. Perennials can be found in most garden departments and are featured in a designated area apart from annuals.
The dusty yellow pollen of early May. The yellow pollen is dusty like fine flour and rides the breeze and makes everyone sneeze. Keep the leaf blower handy and blow pollen from the carport and driveway. Open the hood of the vehicles and dust the pollen from the engines and use window cleaner to clean the windshields. Wipe between the car doors and the dash to remove pollen. The dusty mess will be with us as one tree variety after another produces its load of pollen.
A simple cure to stir up the rabbit population. We are not referring to getting you to resort to the shotgun, but we have a simpler remedy that may move them to another location. Just take a few mesh bags like oranges come in. Leave the ties on the end of the bags. Scrape shavings of a bar of Dial Soap with a potato peeler and dump shavings into the mesh back. Place them in the area of the garden where you see rabbits and they will find another place to park themselves. If you have any pesky groundhogs (we hate these rodents), place some mothballs in a mesh bag and place them near the garden area.
Making A Pan of Ranch Biscuits. These biscuits are simple and easy to prepare for a quick supper. You will need two cups of Bisquick, 2/3 cup of milk, four teaspoons of dry ranch salad dressing mix, one tablespoon of mayonnaise, and half a stick of light margarine. In a medium bowl stir the Bisquick, ranch dressing mix, milk and mayonnaise until well-mixed. In a greased baking pan or sheet, drop heaping tablespoons of the biscuit mixture two or more inches apart on the baking sheet or pan. Bake at 425 degrees for ten to 15 minutes. Melt the margarine and spread over the baked biscuits.
Hoe Hoe Hoedown — Hanging around.
Prisoner: You mean they are going to hang me?
Guard: Yes, on Monday morning.
Prisoner: Can’t you hang me on Saturday?
Guard: Why don’t you want to hang on Monday?
Prisoner: Well, it seems such a terrible way to start the week.
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A Chinese observation of Americans drinking tea: They boil it to make it hot. They put ice in it to make to cold. The put lemon in it to make it sour and sugar in it to make it sweet!
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She’s a jewel. A woman arranged with an artist to paint her portrait. She wanted him to paint her wearing diamonds and much jewelry even though she had none. The artist said he could do this, but he wanted to know why she would do this since she had no jewelry. The woman told the artist she was doing this in case her husband ever remarried, she wanted his second wife to go out of her mind trying to find out where he had hidden all those jewels.
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