Tasted our first Green Doctor’s Frosted. Wow.

PlainJane wrote: ↑Sat Apr 22, 2023 4:17 pm No sooner did I plant out the ‘Incense’ and ‘Inspiration’ passion flower vines the Gulf Frits found them. I don’t have the heart to remove the caterpillars so I’ve ordered 2 more vines in hopes I can get ahead of the game.
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Yeah I gave up the things ate everything to the ground.
Unbelievable how something you never see shows up when you plant the host plants..
How on earth do they do this?

Passion flower is a native. There was a 30 acre lot nearby that had the cattle off for a time, passion flower covered about 90% of it. Where the seed came from, I’ll never know.

I’m growing strictly for butterfly hosting and not fruit. And I have the roots confined to large pots sunk in the ground so hopefully no shoots popping up yards away. These 2 varieties are acceptable to both zebra longwings and gulf fritillaries. Haven’t seen any zebra longwings yet but lots of gulf frits around. Several different swallowtails are covered between the parsley, fennel, citrus and Aristolochia fimbriata.

Every year the window box of parsley gets visited by several swallowtails and the resulting caterpillars munch the plants down to the crowns. The parsley will take a good while to regrow so I've learned to have another round of plants ready to plant in another box. So far the parsley is safe but it's a bit early yet.

I always offer both parsley and fennel but last couple of years they’ve gone for fennel and left the parsley untouched.
The milkweed I put out was promptly attacked by spider mites; that was annoying. May try growing from seed.

A good rain and a couple of weeks in their new digs has everything showing new growth. Bush beans should be up any minute now.

First batch of slicers hitting color break!
Here’s 3 Grandma Oliver’s Chocolate, Amalfi Orange, 2 Hoosier Outlaw Black Cherry and 2 Cherokee Carbon.
And I think I have an eggplant just about there plus a couple of peppers. Fun times!

I was thinking about this, you are probably about 3 hrs north of me, and it seems like the beginning for you, but it seems like the beginning of the end for me. We are getting the summer rains already, although it hasn't been too hot lately.

Yes @Barb_FL, we are just starting to see the start of humidity creeping up and rainy afternoon weather coming in. This has been a strange growing season for me. I started seed the same time I always do but planted out a full 2 weeks earlier. I’ve never had large tomatoes ripe in April before. It’s crazy!

The weather has been devine but we’re about to shift into a stretch of high heat and humidity. I will miss these last few days of breezy dry cool weather.
This is Pamplemousse du Grande Pere getting some big fruit.

Work on the raised bed garden has been fits and starts what with everything else going on. Since we have a big mulch delivery scheduled today DH moved the remaining compost over to this area. Makes it easy for me!

Seems like ages since the first 2 beds were planted.

PlainJane wrote: ↑Sat May 06, 2023 7:17 am The weather has been devine but we’re about to shift into a stretch of high heat and humidity. I will miss these last few days of breezy dry cool weather.
This is Pamplemousse du Grande Pere getting some big fruit.
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Those look great! I almost planted them this year (seeds from MMMM), but I ended up going with Lucky Cross, Pineapple and Oaxacan Jewel for my bicolors. Lucky Cross is new to me; Pineapple and Oaxacan Jewel are repeats.

Hope you'll post photos of Pamplemousse du Grande Pere when they ripen! Inspiration for 2024.

@Seven Bends I will absolutely post the fruit when it’s harvested at color break and again when ripe. I’m really excited about it!

I'm loving the look of the raised bed garden. Gonna be great... !!

Lots of progress, PJ!

Yep, today begins the shift from 70's to 80's with one 91 in the forecast for later in the week. Oy! May has finally decided to arrive.

Last of the radicchio until fall.
This was ‘Delta’ from Uprising Seeds.

DH dug out the irrigation area so he can replace the manifold (giving us a new zone) and fix some leaks. Thankless job.

And final 2 beds are in place. Now that we’re not clambering all over the place I can plant some beans and cukes to grow on the double arbor while the permanent vines are filling in.