A great Gardening and crop year here in Cen..NY pics

I know many are still strugling with wet fields, and trying to get their crops in.
Here locally, and I mean locally, we dried of in mid March and stayed that way until May. Had some rains thru May, and got a good week of haying in early June before a week of rain last week.
The uncles up on the farm hit the hay fields running and covered 225A in a week. There is a custom baleing crew that comes in and round bales the hay and loads and trucks it away shortly after it is baled. It is net wraped and then goes into the "big white snake" Depending on the fields, tonage was running 4-5 T/A Oats, corn, and beans were in by mid May, and looking real good. They baled again yesterday, but we had overnight T storms so didn't today. They should finish the other 175A by Friday, or Sat.
Our Garden looks the best in many years for Mid June. The wife and I have been using these raised beds for 20yrs now. Maintainance is easy and we can cram a lot of plants in a small area, with great results. Last weekend we spent the better part of a day doing a major weeding. From now on we only have to pull a few stray weeds on ocasion. The area between the boxes is covered with 6mill black plastic and covered with stone. Even if a weed starts there it doesn't grow well, and the roots don't penetrate the plastic, makeing them easy to pull.
Loren, the Acg.

Sure looks beautiful over there. But you're not central NY. I am!

I just helped a neighbor finish planting his soybeans yesterday. I didn't get any oats in. The first corn I planted was Memorial Day. And the conditions were none too great. By the end of that week(basically the end of May) the ground was finally coming around. I finished chisel plowing the last two days of May, and it was the only decent plowing I did this year.

Very nice. What kind of antenna is on the pole between the two little buildings?

Well Bob, I would say Leatherstocking Reigon, but I would have everyone on here but you and me confused.
Talked to John Saeli in Geneva, yesterday, and he is still trying to get beans in the ground.
Loren

That's alright. Let them do a little research and get educated. There's a lot more to New York State than many people realize.

You could also say you're in the Mohawk valley region, couldn't you?

Nice pic's. The Case family seems to be lurking in the background. Jerry.

Yeah, We had a very busy last ten days of May and planted some corn on June 2. The corn is looking good and the rain we received last night (7/10) is evening up the beans.
As far as region it is all in who you ask. I describe myself as being in Western New York though some might place me in Central New York. It seems over the years it as shifted as a person needs to be in Cayuga County or eastward to be claimed as a Central New Yorker with Syracuse being the hub for the region. Since the Finger Lakes region has gained recognition in the last couple decades more have described themselves as being from the Finger Lakes region which is very accurate for me. We all have a need to condense things down when speaking and I guess saying being from the Finger Lakes is a tad more clunky than saying Western New Yorker. I don't know if this offends those in Rochester or Buffalo. Geographically, I am closer to Rochester than Syracuse. A lot of family lives in the Rochester and Buffalo areas so I guess I identify with those two the most. The Southern Tier used to be the counties directly along the Pennsylvania state line but you hear more towns such as Watkins Glen and Dansville described as being in the Southern Tier even though their respective counties do not border PA.

Well Bob, I guess you could, but we are 1200 ft above the valley floor, and it is a totally different enviroment here. Storm patterns are very different. There is a marker and senic lookout just to my east which is the highest elevation on US RT. 20, east of the rockies. Our bad storms come in from your area. the bad ones in the valley come rite off the east shore of Onida lake. Last night we had T storms here with some wind, but across the river from us at about the same elevation they had a small tornado, and a lot of storm related damage. Parts of State Hwy 29 and 29A still closed.
Loren.

Beautiful garden indeed!

The antenna you refered to is a Mariah Vertical Axis 1.2K wind turbine.
Loren

Pratt's Hollow is the geographic center of NY, 20 miles north of me. 13 miles south of Oneida.
And that's the geography lesson for today.
Loren, I would call your area Leather stocking too. I was in Cooperstown Monday at the Bassett Clinic with my wife. And if I ever get up your way I plan to stop in or maybe at that little tractor show south of 20 where I saw you Case tractor but not you.
At the end of the month there is a show just west of Madison at Quaker Acres. I ordered a couple of YT hats for me and my grandson. We will be there if it doesn't flood like it did last year.
Pratts Hollow

Absolutely beautiful pics Loren! Love the pics of your uncle's farm very much. Thanks for sharing.
Kow Farmer Kurt

Your beds look great!!! My wife is a 4-H leader in Southern Illinois. We planted a community garden in 1999 and donate all the food to our local food pantry...25,000 pounds and growing. We started out with clay soil and had a traditional garden...lots of tilling, weeding and hoeing. We have amended the soil over the years, and finally had some great soil. Then my wife wanted to try raised garden beds to 1) reduce the amount of hoeing, weeding and tilling and 2) raise more food for the pantry by planting plants closer together. I built 8 4x8 raised beds out of cedar - lucked out and knew someone who had some cedar trees blown down during a huge storm. So, last year was the first time we planted in the beds. I laid geotextile fabric around the beds and in the walkways and mulched on top of the fabric. We filled the beds with 1/3 mushroom compost, 2/3 topsoil and added some peat moss. Of course the weather last year wasn't conducive to a good gardening season, and it was the worst garden we ever had. The plants all were light green in color (lack of nitrogen) and had no root system at all. We planted 16 tomato plants and they did not produce. We did add some 12-12-12 to the garden soil last year. This year we amended the soil with some cow manure compost from our farm. The plants are looking healthy with nice color and growing nicely. So far so good. I was just wondering with your 20 years of experience with raised gardens, what type of soil did you put in your beds, and how do you amend it each year? We do rotate our plants in the beds each year. Thanks for any feedback in advance. gwece

Place looks great. SWMBO finally put her tomato plants (all 2 of them LOL) in the ground this past weekend.

And here I thought I was in CNY. Snail mail address is Fulton, but I'm only 8 miles from Rt 81

Looks like the weather on that side of the hill is a lot different than up here in the Thousand Islands region. Wet, wet, wet! I'm on clay which makes it worse. We do have a half baked garden in but the weeds got ahead of me again and I have to get the kids out and do a little work. Lorens elevation is a help to him too, been very humid here.

Got some late tomato plants yesterday...well, not really all that late now that I think on it. Amish lady I talked to just 5 miles away on Mud Lake tells me their soil isn't clay at all, lucky for them. Some of the gardens and crops I see look great, others look dismal. I guess it's like most years, the pants will do what they do and not much we can do about it.

Took the old Gravely with the rotary cultivator through the potatoes. The Bindweed just loves to take over a field before the spuds really get going. The Gravely loves to eat Bindweed, one of those symbiotic relationships? I'm also supposed to be making some raised beds for SWMBO herbs. Shes getting back into medicinal herbs and is really into her Bees, a good thing in my book.

really nice! Everything looks great!!

looking good, nice pics, thanks for sharing.

I'm about halfway between Bret and Loren. Sandy soil here. (and wet this year so far) My gardens are looking pretty good here. Had some spotty germination on some things, but the garden is generally pretty good. 'Maters are starting to blossom, sweet corn is almost knee high. Taters are up and down because I had to replant some that rotted in the ground.

Jeff got his hay mowed today. Gonna be heavy. Quality will be down a bit, but it's all heifer hay anyway. he feeds the milking herd purchased TMR and the hiefers get the leftovers each morning, so they won't be hurting nutritionally.

Loren, I noticed you are using raised beds for your garden? That's something you almost never see in my area.