Mulching the paths of the garden is not my favorite garden chore but it's one that makes me feel really good when I'm done because it makes the garden look so nice. When The paths are finished being mulched you see a path of straw. You don't see the newspaper (for the most part). The newspaper is to kill out any weeds that are there by cutting of the source off their food supply...aka sunlight. The main purpose of mulching the rows is to keep weeds down. As the plants get larger inside the beds I will mulch them too with a combination of compost and straw. I don't ever use hay! Hay is full of perennial grass seed. Straw is full of seed as well but it's annual seed. So as the season progresses I'll see grass (oats) coming up but I'll yank them. And if I miss some it's no big deal; they will die back over the winter.
I say never yet last year I did use hay for the paths. A friend gave me about 10 bales of really old hay so I used it. It wasn't old enough! Weeds from the hay were already beginning to take hold big time. After a week of rain the rain barrels are full and the weeds are really visible.
Last year I didn't mulch the strawberry bed because the runners had taken root all over the bed. We had great strawberries but this year, the 5th year of the bed, the old strawberry bed is beyond hope. As I tried to free it today from the witch's grass I found myself pulling up as many strawberry plants as I did weeds. So that didn't go so well. Good thing I planted a new bed this year. But I can tell it's going to be too small. Only 30 plants. I will dig up runners from the old plants and replant them next weekend. Next weekend is a 4 day Memorial Day weekend!! I can't wait!
This is the first year I've been able to cut the asparagus. It's the third season of this bed. I had another bed for a few years but it was in too much shade so I started this three years ago. To be honest I'm surprised by the purple color. We are eating these tomorrow for dinner so we'll see how they taste. One thing I noticed was that the taller asparagus that got by me were tough to cut but the ones that were just 5 or 6 inches tall were so tender. I bet these will taste great.
A few herbs that we've been enjoying are chives and chervil. YUM!! I love them both on eggs in the morning. I also made a sorrel soup that was pretty good. I'll post that recipe later.
This week we are suppose to have another week of unsettled weather. In between showers I'm hoping to get under the remay hoops and look at the radishes and kale. Each time I've peeked I've seen a ton of flea beetles. That's disappointing as the reason I put them up was to provide a barrier against flea beetles! They do such a number on my radishes and kale. I'm beginning to think the flea beetles emerge from the soil. If that's the case then why would these remay row covers be recommended to provide a barrier against flea beetles? I'll have to check into this some more.
Well, that's it for now. Happy late spring gardening!
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