A Little Walk

It sure has been a long week around here. I have been kept busy with yard work, gardening and to many other things to mention. I worked in the garden a little this week and wanted to update you on the results of the Weed Free Raised Bed. Although I mentioned recently how it did not remain weed free but had developed a few weeds here and there. I want to let you know that I have not spent many hours weeding this year. I have over all probably weeded about three or four times. I would bet all in total I have not spent more than an hour or two in garden work.  I must admit I have not gotten as many vegetables as I had expected. But I believe the soil many need some amending next year. That may help it to produce a little more. While I have been busy in other parts of our yard I took a few pictures while I walked around our yard today. I just forgot to take photos of our garden. I will be sure to get a few photos of our garden before the season ends.

Our largest apple tree has produced well this year. I can hardly wait for the apples to ripen. They are almost ready. We have another apple tree planted at the same time but it has only started to produce this year. So we may only get a handful from the second tree if any at all.

While getting some photos of our flowers in the front flower bed I came across this dragonfly. It seems to be molting. That is if they molt. Does anyone know if they molt? I thought the wings were spectacular!

This is the grapevines on the left side of our home. They are hanging on an arbor and our gazebo. That is all from one vine. It started out on the arbor and has grown so much we added a fence to the side. When it out grew the fence we built the arbor to help support the vines.We have another vine on the right side of our home. I just forgot to take photos on that side of our home. I may do that in another post. Any how this vine has always produced well but not excessively.
Well, last year it did not produce at all. Not even one grape. I was happy to see this year that it has actually produced tons of grapes.

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I stood under the gazebo to snap this shot. This is just a small section of the ceiling in the gazebo. These grapes should be ready to harvest some time in September. They are just amazingly  beautiful! Don't you think?
Well, that is all for today. I hope you all have a great weekend. 

Growing An Apple Tree From Seed

Happy Easter

A few months ago I started growing lemon seeds after reading about growing a lemon tree from seeds on Pinterest. My lemon tree seedling are doing fantastic. So I got to wondering if I could do the same with some organic apple seeds I had on hand. I thought why not give it a try I had nothing to loose.
I started out with five little seeds from a nice organic apple of which I do not know the type. I was using the seeds from one of my grandsons apples he had from his home. First I washed the seeds gently. Running warm water over them while rubbing between the palms of my hands. I placed them in a bowl of room temperature water and let them soak for about five days. I them planted them in potting soil. I kept the soil moist but not overly wet. It only took two weeks for the seedlings to poke their little heads through the soil. Now I thought how nice and easy that was.

Then I decided to look up instruction on how to care for my seedlings. The funny thing is there is so much information on line and each has a different point of view. Many articles say you can't grow apple trees from seeds. The idea is you need to graft your seedling onto root stock of another apple tree. The root stock is usually a stronger, hardier tree type such as a crab-apple tree. Now folks I do not claim this information is correct it is just some of what I have read.
I know for a fact that apple trees can be grow from seed with out grafting. Growing from seed is how it was originally done back a long time ago. The reason commercially grown apples are a product of engineered grafting is because everyone wants to know what taste to expect from a certain apple. The taste of fruit from apple trees grown from a seedling is not predictable.
As for the care of my seedlings. I will be potting them in individual pots that I can keep on my patio the first year. I will do this to prevent a mowing accident or a critter from munching on them. On their second year I will plant them in a protected area away from the deer who like to munch on my garden.
apple trees that are grown from seeds should be able to produce fruit on or around their sixth year of growth. If I am still in the blogging world at the time they produce fruit I will happily blog about their progress.