As I suspected, it gets a lot harder to keep up with this blog once the season kicks into gear. Third week of June and I've already started slacking off. At least I have some video and photos from the farmers market today, another cold and rainy Saturday.
So, the sunflowers that were planted two weeks ago? About half did not germinate. Were they planted too deep, was it too wet/dry, did some buggy type thing eat them? They were not eaten by deer, turkeys or crows because we covered with remay right away.
Anyway, I reseeded that bed yesterday; also threw in some beans (Jade, bush) and ornamental wheat. Don't have much more time to direct sow for this season, but I will be starting more biennials throughout the summer.
Other updates: the ranunculus is hanging in and should be putting out blooms for a while, although the later plantings are less vigorous. Stock in the hoophouse is starting to bloom. The cosmos is coming up, and I saw the first few daucus 'Dara' sprouting (finally!) Best experiment so far this year: putting Cherry Caramel phlox in the hoophouse quite early - have harvested at least 50 stems already. And the peonies are delayed, seemingly. Lost some buds to frost, but the healthy ones haven't gotten to the marshmallow stage yet.
At least I have this:
