May is our wettest month of the year.  The best thing about it is how green everything gets, how much everything blooms, and how much it reminds me of home.  Not the landscape, certainly, which is mostly flat until the mountains.  But the green, the flowering trees, the verdant look of it all.  With it comes what I call our “early monsoon season.”  We have a true monsoon season in late July and early August, but in May, Colorado acts for all the world like a tropical paradise.  We wake up to sunny skies and a quick warmup, but by noon clouds are building, and by 3 p.m., there is rain.  The rain is spotty, sometimes merely a few raindrops, but the clouds are angry and dark, bubbling with mammatus-shapes, thunder rolling.  And then there are the funnels.  I have seen two funnels already this year.  The picture above is not mine, but similar to one I saw recently.  These little funnels would strike fear into the hearts of many a Midwesterner.  Little funnels never stay little, in the Midwest.  Here, they dangle for a few brief moments, then work their way back up into the cloud.  Later, further east, they may redevelop, but this close to the mountains, we never see more than what you see above.  We are just too high up, and there is no room for the high development and instability that is needed for true tornadoes.  It happens here so rarely, maybe once every 20 years, that one will actually make it to ground.  It is one of the advantages of living six miles from the mountains.

I spent my weekend working my plot in the community garden.  With Tater’s help, we put in the corner posts that were removed for the path rehab work that was done, dismantled the fencing I’d been using for pole beans and tomatoes and recreated it as an enclosure for pumpkins, and planted peas and kale.  We readied the potato basket for the potatoes that will go into it this week.  I found this website about making one from poles and willow or vines, but mine is just a bit of large-gauge wire, lined with a double-thickness of row cover, and staked to the ground.  We started with some composted alpaca manure, layered with straw.  I will use straight compost or potting soil for additional layers.  Last year’s experiment wasn’t hugely successful, but it was successful enough that I want to try it again, this time with a bigger basket.  I bought Kennebec potatoes this year.  I grew reds last year.

Back at home, I have planted kohlrabi, cauliflower (an accidental purchase), lettuce, and a few herbs (parsley, thyme).  I still have two huge parsley plants from last year, but as they are biennials, they will just go to seed in a month or so and not be good for much.  I have one basil plant to go in the ground, but it’s too early, although I did sow the seed I kept from last year’s batch.  The raised bed I built last fall is full of compost, bunny poo, leaves, and good dirt I had to by at the store.  It could use another layer, but I’m going to work with it as-is this year.  I will plant the tomatoes there, and probably a squash or two.  I already have the squash and pumpkin seedlings ready to go.  It’s just not warm enough yet.

I will also add cucumber, and will soon plant beets and parsnips.  Parsnips take the entire summer to get big enough to dig.  They are still small, but so sweet and wonderful, it is worth giving up the space for them.  I grew way too many turnips last year, so this year I will plant fewer.  Much fewer.  We will have beans, of course.  Lots of yummies to eat!

I will take pictures next time I go over. Right now everything is bare.  We had to dig up so many weeds, as I’d use alpaca manure on top of the garden last fall.  It is full of weed seeds!  And the mint that had happily stayed in one tiny corner had suddenly taken over about 1/5 of the garden.  We dug it all up, but put a small batch in a pot for Tater to are for at home.  But we have to remember that here, despite the fact that there are solid signs of spring, we should plant no warm-weather items until after Mother’s day.  Even later if we can stand it.  We will likely get one more freeze this year, if not more.  But the rain?  Even with the little funnels?  We’ll take it!

What’s growing in your garden?  What are you most anxious to begin harvesting?

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