The Fruits of Mother Natures Labor

Although I would love to take credit for the health of my plants I can't.  Mother Nature is truly the worlds best gardener.  She provides the rain, and the sun.  The 2 essentials for growing plants like this Blackberry vine.

The vine is along the back fence of our yard.  Most of it is actually on our neighbors side but as it is a big bush/vine they can't reach it all...so by default I say that means it is part ours.  I love looking at the vine (from a distance) and seeing all the different colors of the berries.  Some are green, some are white.  Red today black tomorrow.  The more rip they get the easier it is to pick.  Giving us a cup full of blackberries

for the kids to eat.  Even the berries that fall off easily are different shades.  Some are more red than black. Some leave juice on your fingers while others don't.

Each day the Grapes seem to get bigger and bigger.  Soon they too will begin their change of color.  After all the trauma from last year the vine is back and healthy as ever.  See we had some major wind storms last year that knocked the arbor the vine grows on over.  They grew grapes last year but they never ripened or got as big as they are now.  But it seems Mother Nature understood that the vine just needed to stop working so hard to produce grapes last year and work on healing it's self.

After many attempts last year at trying to grow strawberries I finally have a small garden with some plants.  And they are slowly producing berries this year.  I chatted up a lot of folks over at myfolia to find out what in the world I was doing wrong.  Seems the advice worked cause they are thriving this year.

I will never (try my best not to) talk bad about Mother Nature again.  She knows what she is doing and has for some time now.

Thriving Thursday - The Gardens

Welcome to another addition on Thriving Thursday.  Today I would like to show off the over all views of some of the gardens today.  Being June and just about summer many things are Thriving around the gardens so why add pictures of them all individually when I can show them off together.

 This is the new garden in town...hard to see what all it's growing but I will just tell you it is doing great.

 If you have read any of my blog then this picture needs no explanation....thats right it's the Greenhouse.  Getting very green.  There are flowers planted in there too....somewhere under the herbs I am guessing.  Anyone need some herbs?

This is another little garden up front.  Most of which was there when we purchased the place but on the lower right is my newest Rose of Sharon bush.  But the true star is actually the Yucca plant....it's beginning to grow on me.

Last but certainly not least is the Grape arbor.  This guy clearly took a break last year from all the wind damage and had a wonderful winters nap as almost every day I am having to go out and retrain a few branches so they don't reach for the trees.

So now it's your turn show off what is Thriving in your gardens.  Leave a link with Mister Linky below and leave a comment.  Don't have anything to show off?  Thats ok too...read what other put or just leave a comment.

Thriving Thursday - Fruits

Welcome one and all back to another week of Thriving Thursday.  A day to show off what is Thriving in your gardens.  Being so close to summer many things in Irishgardens are thriving but only a few are truly worthy of this post today...well at least in my mind.  This week my theme is Fruits.  Don't have fruits thats ok....show off your Thriving plants anyways.

 My pride and joy this year is this White Strawberry plant.  Last year I had the hardest time growing strawberries....this year armed with knowledge and lots of TLC I have my first seed grown strawberry bloom.

 A strawberry plant I purchased....getting ready to ripen.

 After last years major wind damage my grape vines are showing the true definition of Thriving and showing signs like this all over.

Click the picture to see it bigger and you can tell the grape vine is very happy this year.

Please feel free to join me this week and add your link below or just leave a comment.  Come back and see if anyone else joined in this week.

Thriving Thursday

Repost from Thursday @0800


Welcome one and all to another edition of Thriving Thursday. No theme today other than show off what's growing well in your garden.

Remember a few posts ago those large leaves of lettuce.  Well this is where they came from.  It was just getting too big so out it came.  Not a great picture but shows it's size well as thats my hand.

 Those herbs I planted in the Greenhouse that I didn't think would make it....yea this is some of those.  From left to right Sage, Summer Savory, Parsley, Chives, and Basil.  They need to be thinned still but they look so healthy I don't want to.

 My most favorite tree I think that came with our house....the Lilac.  Looking wonderful and smells even better.

 The old Grape vine that also came with the house is finally waking up and doing so quickly.

 I bet if you have this plant in your yard just seeing the ant on it will give it away....if not it's a Peony.  Ants love them.

And finally my Purple colored rose bush.  This was planted last year as well and didn't look like it survived the waist high pile of snow from the side walk.  All winter she was covered and had more piled on as the sidewalk was cleared.  But after finding a few signs of growth she took off and looks better than last year.

So now it's your turn.  Show off what is growing well in your gardens.  Seedlings with their 2nd set of leaves, a favorite tree that is full of leaves.  It doesn't matter what it is.  If it is looking good show it off.  Then stop back by and add your link and see who else has a Thriving Thursday Garden.

Oh the Gall

What you see here is Grape Gall made by Phylloxera. A pest of Eurpean Grape vines expecialy here in the North East of America. Basically these little guys live in the bark and roots all winter and when the folliage starts to come out they awaken and this is what can be found.



This is what Gall looks like on a leaf. It goes thru both sides. Kinda funny looking but not good for the Grape vine.









This is actually a Gall that was formed over a Grape bunch. If left on the vine it will essensially kill it. The fruit will not get the chance to come to it's full potential. Unfortunatly the only thing to do is to cut off the infected sections and clean up the vine as best as possible. Be sure to prune after the harvest is over to prevent reinfestation.


Being a curious bunch we before we even knew what it was we cut off a small branch with a Gall on it and cut it open. This picture here is what we found and thankfully it helped us find out what it was that infested the poor grape vine. This little red-orange worm is just a baby and if we hadn't found it, it would have grown to infest the rest of the vine. An interesting fact was that American hybrids like out Concord is resistant to this pest. So it only seems to be effecting the old vine....guess we know it is not and American hybrid one.

Grape Vines...another stage

The flowering stage of these area's is complete and as you can see the Grapes are starting to form. Some of the Grape's look much bigger than others. A clue to their ripe size? Or just a clue as to how far alone they are in the rippening process? To be honest I don't know. But I think that it is how far they are as I did find other bunches that were just starting their flowering stage.

Something else that I have noticed in taking time to take these pictures is that although their is green leaves from begining to end of the older vine it seems that fruit is only at the end. Not sure if this is normal or not or just the way it is this year. Given the fact that the vine did have a few issues this year with wind it may just be that those area's just aren't strong enough to support the fruit.

Grape vines

In July 2009 we purchased our current home. It came with a Grape vine attached to an arbor. It did produce fruit that year...Dark purple Seeded grapes. They were very sweet. This year after a bad wind storm that we thought may have killed the vine we purchased 3 other vines. 2 may not have made it....but thats why we got more than one. So now we have to healthy thriving grape vines. One is the Dark purple seeded grapes and the other is Concord. After a lot of pruning and reteaching the old vine is once again thriving and producing grapes....or at least the beginings of.


Grape vines need to be taught how to grow. In other words they are vines that if not given something to climb on and shown how too they will not produce as much grapes. As you can see from the picture the vine on the left (the older vine) has some interesting twists and turns. Because the growth can be fast on these vines every few days I will go out and take the new growth and send it back thru the holes on the arbor...basically telling the vine that no I want you to grow around the arbor not the trees...cause it likes to do that. Anything to get closer to the sun.






As the season presses on there is new growth everywhere on both vines and the grapes them selves go thru different stages. First the fruit flower will appear. They can be hard to see or find but this is essentially where the grapes themselves will apear.

The actuall flowering stage of the fruit is not always like most flowering/fruit trees or plants. This one well it's just different. But equally important. After this stage we shouldstart to see the Grapes themselves forming.