So with the broken shoulder, the garden did not get weeded since at least mid-August.  By the usual time to prepare for the spring planting (late February, early March in these parts) the weeds had taken over.  Of course the weather did not cooperate, so getting days when things weren’t too wet and / or cold to pull weeds, meant that it was the beginning of April before the  raised beds were ready.  There was a spell of nice weather then and I planted seeds and seedlings.

 But then the May Gray came weeks early.  It was too cold and wet to weed or do  much else.  The veggies did nothing while another crop of weeds took over.  A large percentage of the seeds failed to germinate.  For weeks it seemed the soil was too wet to weed.  We even had some late April rain.

It took several passes to get the majority of the weeds out and it will require another pass or two to deal with the ones that escaped.  At least now I can see the veggies and was able to plant additional seedlings.

Meanwhile, mice were getting to the strawberries as they ripened. The owls and hawks have not been doing a good job.  In the past week I had 15 caught with a live trap and removed them to the far corner of the property.   Dealing with the gophers will have to wait a bit.  We put hardware cloth at the base of the raised beds to keep them out and have bird netting to protect seedlings from becoming bird food.

Anyway, lots more to do.   Borders along paths and fence need weeding and trimming, stone fruit needs to be thinned and general maintenance is needed.  Maybe by Memorial day weekend it will look more like a garden than a weed patch.

It has been a cool, wet winter here and the stone fruit trees in our “orchard” are taking their time waking up.  There have been some years where they are almost all in bloom by the second week of February.  Finally the cherry trees are coming into bloom.

There are only a few cherry varieties that will grow in our climate because we do not get near enough winter cold temperatures.  The ones that do grow here require a second variety for pollination.  Initially we had the two available varieties planted together and after several years they finally bloomed and we got a couple handfuls of cherries.  Unfortunately, one of the pair died out over the next couple years as the other matured into a nice sized tree that is covered in flowers in the spring.  A replacement tree was obtained, but unlike some of the other types of stone fruit, cherries are slower to mature.  The newer tree started blooming a couple years ago — but too early for the older tree.  Thus only one or two cherries from all the lovely flowers.  Finally this year, the timing is overlapping.  Maybe there will be a cherry harvest in a few months.