Ping songbird

  Just a heads-up , the Mattie Beane bush beans I planted had a less-than-stellar germination rate . Looks like around 50-60% , so be prepared for bare spots - I have no idea how old the seed is . Got my re-wire trellis up for the white greasy's today , just in time too because they've started to run . Spent most of the day building a new chicken run ... we ran across someone who is selling some chicken of the breed my wife wants , so we're getting back in the chicken owner's club .
Reply to
Terry Coombs
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i'm just hoping for any at all to see how they do. i'm glad to hear you got some going so perhaps between the two of us we'll have enough seeds for next season again...

they'll go up quick too! :)

i haven't planted a thing yet. one project keeps bringing on others (as usual) and i'm going to have to put my foot down and say "hold on here." for a while so we can get plants next week and start getting things in the ground. if i have everything planted by the first week of June that's usually good.

i got the largest wall of the shed mostly done with tile (other than cuts along the bottom and one edge). hope to finish the other walls tomorrow, we'll see... i'm trying to keep the rainy day projects so i can do other things outside, but as of yet, the rains have been enough to keep the ground too wet for some of the deeper digging i need to do.

at least i got most of the spring whitlow-grass weeded and found out the other day that the seed pods i thought had a single seed in them really had 20-50 very tiny seeds in them instead. which explains how it spreads so easily. i kinda like it. a very tiny and harmless plant... early spring insects find it very useful when not much else is blooming yet. i'll bet the bucket of weeds i took out of the one garden (of 15x15ft) had several million seeds in there...

that's pretty much all i've gotten done the past few weeks besides some very simple other weeding (a few minutes) and some digging in of ashes (i still have buckets to use up).

looks like a mixed bag again this week for weather, but i hope i can get the fencing and poles picked up the next few days so i have that on hand for when i get other things done and have enough time to do it.

songbird

Reply to
songbird

forgot to ask how the germination rate for the greasy beans?

i tried to send fairly recent seeds, but i wasn't completely sure how long ago those were grown. within the past four years for sure and some were grown last year so i knew at least some would sprout. :)

songbird

Reply to
songbird

  I got around 80% or better . Some didn't come up so I replanted , some of those didn't either , so it may not be just the seeds . For sure I'll get enough to eat some and save seed . I got the chicken pen pretty much completed , just the area where I'm putting the door left to do .
Reply to
Terry Coombs

Terry Coombs wrote: ...re: greasy germination rate...

i have plenty more. with my recent gains in pole beans in my collection i'm skipping growing any greasy beans this year so i can get the new ones grown out.

i have one bean where the guy only had one left so i'm a bit nervous about growing it, i have some wire mesh to put around it to make sure the chipmunks leave it alone.

it's nice to get done with something. :) i hope it goes well.

was happy last night to have the largest wall done, but my hands and arm were sore from trowelling glue. i'm not sure i can get the other three walls mostly done today, but i'll try. the real fun will be doing all the cuts. i don't have a simple snap tile cutter so i'll have to spend more time with a wet tub tile saw and a diamond blade. going to take a lot more time. tempted to try to score with a glass cutter and snap them myself, might be able to get that to work instead.

songbird

Reply to
songbird

  They make a hand held version that uses a cutter wheel and snapping thingy . Under 20 bucks when I bought mine , but that was last century ... If you're careful with getting a good score you can snap them over a 3/16" dowel laid across a piece of carpet padding . Lay a strip of wood over narrow cuts to spread the force out over the length . If I had a nickel for every piece of tile I installed I'd have one gigantic pile of nickels ... I have one of those wet tub saws , and would rather use it for nicer cuts - my big tile cutter also dates from last century .
Reply to
Terry Coombs

I have a set of carbide tile nippers. Useless waste of money, and score and snap has never worked all that well for me either (indeed, i think I bought the nippers to fix where the break went despite the line.)

I work **faster** and waste a lot less tile with a dry diamond blade (I'd use a wet one, it would be less messy, but at the time I needed one the dry blade was a heck of a lot cheaper than a wet saw, and works in a tool I already own, albeit it makes a mess and requires a bunch of dust gear.) Wet saws are cheaper now, but the dry blade I already own is less money than a cheap new wet one.

Reply to
Ecnerwal

...re cutting wall tiles...

my entire family was in commercial flooring, wall tile, etc.

as a teen i hauled many many tons of materials and cleaned up jobs and did whatever else needed to be done.

when i could i got out of there after high school to college. i knew that i didn't want to work in the family business my whole life.

after the past few days i'm clearly reminded of why... various previous injuries really do not like what i'm doing now.

today it took me way too long but i've got another wall up and cut the all the pieces i need to glue around the edges once i get back to it. likely tomorrow.

i'd much rather be in the gardens, and soon will get back to them. :)

songbird

Reply to
songbird

Ecnerwal wrote: ...

i'll be very glad when i'm done, not that it has been particularly difficult, but because my back isn't happy with this kind of crouching/bending/etc. gardening is so much better for it.

raining again, i'm done with everything for the day. i could go back out there and glue some pieces on the walls that i cut but i don't want to clean up the trowel yet another time.

songbird

Reply to
songbird

  I reckon I'll spend some time in mine tomorrow . Got the hens - she said "there might be a rooster , I've heard crowing" - and 3 , yes THREE of the eight were roosters . And she damn well knew it , they've got too many chickens to not know . Anyway , got them installed in their new digs and they seem happy enough .
Reply to
Terry Coombs

i just put in some of them today. looking pretty closely i'd say those beans were spoiled, got wet or the harvesting conditions were poor/wet or something because not many of them looked viable. some were pre-sprouted and then dried, so those won't go, some had fungus on them. i'll be surprised if many grow. we'll see. if they don't i always have plenty of other beans to go in that spot.

finally got some of the beans planted today, the pole beans and the bush lima beans since they have the longest season it helps to get them going first. would have liked to have had them planted last week, but too busy with other things...

possible rain today/tonight/tomorrow. things are coming along ok.

first strawberries picked today. :)

songbird

Reply to
songbird

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