May is - Popping!

First asparagus!

     Things are growing fast with the warm weather we've had in May. Every morning I go out and find things - that weren't there yesterday - up 20 cm. or so. The classic example of this is the Solomon's seal (Polygonatum multiflorum) which was invisible on Thursday and up fully 25 centimetres on Saturday. It's related to asparagus, and that's been doing very well also - we've eaten it twice so far. This is its third year, so apparently we can go crazy for 6 weeks, and then let the fronds open and grow.  I am planning to try shaved asparagus pizza this week. It comes highly recommended by Emily.
    Vegetable gardening is coming on slowly - I got all of the dandelions dug out of the raised beds and sent off to the government compost facility (ha! take that, dandelions) and put out the onion sets I had started in pots - I had just sprouted the red ones and a few of the whites, so now that the pots are empty I'll start the rest of the whites. It gives them such a great jumpstart. But that is all I have planted so far. My potatoes are chitting, though.

Sarian in pots in the greenhouse

    I bought 25 Kent strawberries at Veseys and plan to rip out the everbearing ones I got there and planted outdoors two years ago - they *do* produce fruit all summer, but only one or two at a time - and I want more productivity.  I still have the Sarian everbearing ones I got at Thompson and Morgan in big pots. Having hoiked them out of the raised bed where they spent the winter, they are now set up on the old deck steps at the back of the greenhouse and are starting to grow, and even bloom. I would like to to try the Beechgrove method of having indoor (June-bearing) strawberries, then an outdoor crop, and then indoors again, to stretch the strawberry season to the whole summer. But first I will have to see how Kent do in my fruit bed. And maybe collect some seedlings from them.
    Speaking of fruit, the hardy cherry bushes, babied along in the greenhouse last summer and planted out last September, are leafing out. And Veseys came through! and we have two Honeycrisp whips, being babied in the greenhouse in their turn. I have to get the posts set up so I can espalier mine. The other one is Anne's. And then, b*gger if there weren't Honeycrisps on sale at somebody's greenhouse opening - Kent I think. They were bigger than ours, and less expensive too. Ah well. We do have other apples for pollination on the property, but I want to get a couple more trees for the espalier - different varieties, but good new ones.  Anne had gotten three "Anne" raspberries from her friend Lise, sent from Veseys, and I potted them up for her to decide where to put them, when she gets back home. We are planning to stay over at hers and do some cleaning up tomorrow, so I must get myself organized. Much to do!