The "official" garden thread

You all are a couple weeks, at least, ahead of us.

Garlic is in and has shoots, but then again it's been in since November.   I don't quite trust removing their warm comforter of straw just yet. 

I need to clean out old plants to make way for tilling, fertilizing, and a planting a new crop of Italian green beans, yellow wax beans, tomatoes, peppers, and squash.

That is really cool!  I'm a sentimental fool - it is so special that you are able to have some of your grandfather's garlic.  I've been keeping a chive plant around that was my mom's as well as her hardy hibiscus (she passed away 9 years ago).  The hibiscus especially means a ton to me, she loved that plant.  When she passed, I helped Dad keep it alive. When he passed 4 years ago, I dug that sucker up and divided it so my sister and I could each have part of it.  Bent a shovel getting it out of the ground.  Worth it.   I'm really hoping one (or all) of my nieces or nephew will take interest in it once they have their own houses and I'll share part of it with them, too.

That's awesome....good work!!

Ok, not a garden, but still part of Spring's bounty that we take advantage of........stocking up the freezer with plenty of fish.  It's a yearly tradition and I like to try to freeze at least 20 gallons of fillets to get us through a year of fish fries.  This year it's been pretty easy so far.

Yesterday we caught nearly 275 crappie from a private lake......these will go good with the mushrooms we found on Saturday.

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Made the first picking of the year yesterday evening.  Fresh radishes with a bit of salt and pepper and a cold beer......perfect snack!

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No doubt.....when we start running the Mississippi this summer trotlining for flatheads it's all about the bait......we might spend half a day getting enough.  That's some fairly beer intensive work on a hot weekend....life jackets mandatory later in the day.....even on dry ground.  LMAO

Thank God for grandpas who teach their grandkids to fish and hunt! 

Post some pics and I'll tell you.  Some are obvious edibles.....I won't kill you. 

That was actually a bold move....I know that mushroom, but I have never seen them in the wild and would have said don't eat it. (I don't eat wild mushrooms that have gills....because alot of them are poisonous.  On the other end, mushrooms without gills are ALMOST always edible)  Here is a sample of what I found on your Santa Shrooms:

"Editor’s Note: I have said this a lot in the comments before, in person and in the body of this post. Let me say it one more time, right up here in the beginning: Unless you are an expert mushroom hunter and you can 100 percent identify this mushroom, DON’T EAT IT. I wrote this post for other experts, not for just anyone to think they’ve found A. muscaria. This is serious stuff, folks. Mistake this mushroom for another amanita and you can die. Seriously. ~Hank"

Glad you survived.  LMAO

First strawberries of the season....tomato, cucumber and peppers are growing like weeds. 

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Crazy water up here too.  Our duck club has been under water for a month.....no telling what it's going to take to get us up and running again.  The Mississippi is going to 2nd highest level ever recorded.  Our biggest lakes are basically all Army Corp of Engineer projects (except one, but that one is owned by the electric company) that provide electric and flood control.....they are anywhere from 18-30 foot high and can't really hold much more water before they'll have to flood some folks downstream.

It's armageddon  dammit!!! 

My seed potatoes finally sprouted last week, yay!!  Tomatoes are looking decent as are the peppers.  I have a baby delicata squash and the zucchini plant is looking fine as well.  Italian green beans and yellow wax beans have sprouted and are growing nicely but I need to put some spray on them - bugs are having a field day with the leaves.  Grrrr.  The groundhog has been eliminated from the equation.