“When the world wearies and society fails to satisfy, there is always the garden.” ~ Minnie Aumonier
February got off to a great start and I have been the busiest I have been in my garden since, well, ever. I have never taken on this scale for my garden. Between still managing debris and repairs to my home, property, fence, etc., and building the infrastructure, I haven’t had a moment to get bored. Of course, I typically don’t get bored. This year, though, I am really planting and doing more in my garden than ever before-whether here or anywhere else I have gardened! I always wanted to do all that I am, just wasn’t sure it would ever be possible. Now, I see it is and I couldn’t be more grateful.
I really have become a planting and transplanting fool. Not to mention trying all of the new things that I am trying including the WORMS! You can learn more about the process and progress and where I got them here. There has also been a re-development, can you guess what that is? We’ll get to that in a minute.
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It is such a blessing to be enjoying the process of full-on gardening now. I am still building the garden but it has been nice to be planting so many seedlings. So many new experiments. It has also been wonderful to plant transplants and some of the seedlings from January. I feel like this new garden really is going to be the best one I have ever had! I am so happy that I decided to go forward with rebuilding on such a scale!
So, the re-development? Well, my Monarch Butterfly ladies have apparently been rather busy laying eggs all over my milkweed. I kind of felt I had to protect the caterpillars and so now, I have a whole brand new bunch of Monarchs to raise, possibly double what there was before if the ones outside make it. This bunch has been more ravenous than the first! I haven’t wanted to say anything about them because I wasn’t sure how they would fare.
Before I realized that they were all over, horrible, awful aphids moved in all over my milkweed and were wreaking havoc on them, the caterpillar eggs, and some of the caterpillars. I kept removing them from the milkweed but they kept taking over. I have done what I could. I did bring in quite a few to ensure more of them make it all the way. However, I did leave some on the milkweed inside the lanai and outside in the garden. All have been happily enjoying themselves and the milkweed. So, we shall see how it goes.
Hopefully, in the next week or two there will be a big bunch of magnificent new Monarchs to release and welcome spring into the garden. Meanwhile, they are completely depleting all of the milkweeds that I have planted! So, I am planting even more! It looks as if I have enough to get all of them to chrysalis, so that is great. Hopefully, enough of the milkweeds will have grown back by the time they eclose. Really, they have just been getting a hard prune!
The first one went into chrysalis yesterday morning and most that were in the fifth instar went into chrysalis between yesterday and today. The ones that were in the lanai and outside in the garden are traveling to j-hang wherever they choose. It will be interesting to see if I can spot them throughout the lanai and garden. I have already found a few.
How did all that I planted and transplanted for January go? Well, I tried a new planting method for January. More on that in an upcoming post. Most things went very well. However, some of the seeds did not germinate. That’s okay though because the things that didn’t germinate I was kind of pushing for this time of year anyway, plus the seeds were a little older.
So, now the month is nearly over and I haven’t discussed what I am planting here in zone 10a! So, here is a list of what I already have planted and the few things left that I will be planting more of. Back to what I already have planted in my garden for February. I went to a plant sale at the beginning of the month and visited a few nurseries to get some transplants. I have a ton of seeds planted but I also wanted to get a head start since I lost so much time. I think it is great that we have options, I like options. For February, I have added the following for my zone 10a garden (or will be adding):
Veggies & Herbs
*Arugula *Basil *Carrots *Cilantro *Chamomile *Cucumbers-Ashley, Bush Crop *Dill-seeds from old garden and also Elephant Dill *Eggplant-Black Beauty & Little Fingers *Elderberry *Lettuce-Merlot & Buttercrunch *Luffa (seeds from luffa grown in my garden) *Melons-Cantaloupe, Honeydew & Sugarbaby Watermelon *Okra-Orange Jing & Clemson Spineless *Oregano *Parsley *Peppers-Cayenne, Grand Bell, Purple Beauty, Jalapeños, Datil, Cubanelle, Aji Charapita, Sugar Rush Peach, and Tobasco *Radish-Purple, French Breakfast *Sage *Seminole Pumpkin *Summer Squash-Zucchini & Yellow Straightneck *Tomatoes-Large Red Cherry, Sweet 100, Beefsteak, Mortgage Lifter, Chadwick Cherry, Brad’s Atomic Grape, and Roma (already have Everglade’s doing great from January) *Thyme
Flowers:
*African Iris *Alyssum *Echinacea *Gaillardia *Lavender *Marigold-Orange & Yellow, also Orange Hawaii Variety *Morning Glory-Moonflower & Carnevale Di Venezia *Milkweed-Tropical, Pink, *Nasturtiums-Orange Cream & Tip Top Mahogany (to start) *Porterweed, *Snapdragons, *Sunflowers-Autumn Beauty, Lemon Queen and Mexican and *Zinnias -Mazurkia & Polar Bear.
Between all of that, continuing the build on the garden, the worms, and the Monarch Caterpillars, I am a little behind. I am still moving forward though so that has to count for something!
It’s just a bit of a race right now to be able to get the tail end of the best part to grow here in Southwest Florida. Since I missed out on the best–fall–I really want to get as much as I can out of this last bit of the better planting time here. So, hopefully, it will all work out! I will do my best to keep things going on here and continue to build social channels. I am really looking forward to being mostly set so I can start doing some YouTube videos as well. So many, many blessings!
Thank you so much for taking the time to visit my website and taking the time to read this post! I’m so happy and grateful to have you here!
Happy Gardening,
Jennifer