Typical Sierra Spring

Thursday night, the weather changed and temperatures dipped down into the high 30's.  That is Mother Nature's punishment to me for my impatience!  During that false spring last week, I planted most of my tomatoes.  I should know better....  When I did the same thing last May 15, my tomatoes had 8 inches of snow cover them and subsequently had this nasty black spot fungus.  They did eventually recover, but were stunted most of the summer.

 Yesterday, we had what is famously, or infamously called "wintry mix."  That means the temperature is too warm for it to really snow and stick, but way up in the sky, it is cold enough.  We had some sleet mixed with corn snow, while the temperatures bobbled between 38 and 42.

The first rumble of thunder alerted me to impending tomato disaster, so I hustled out and improvised a tent over the tomatoes, eggplants and artichokes.  A few years ago, I picked up a couple brass headboards that were sitting at the end of someone's driveway with a "free" sign.  Pushed into the soft ground, then tented with some visqueen, they made a quickie row cover.

When I checked my little deck greenhouse, it seemed a tad chilly in there, so I dug through the Christmas decorations and found a string of the traditional mini lights (not the new LEDs) and rigged them up inside my tiny greenhouse.

I bet this will look really festive at night!  The greenhouse was a bargain at Raleys, for $59, and will hold quite a few trays.  It will not hold up to any snow load, so the broom is handy.   In the open center, I have rolled in a cast off rolling cart from the dumpster of a local hardware store.  That rolling cart triples my growing space and easily rolls out.

If you are wondering what is in the blue dish pans, that is my latest horticultural experiment with hydroponic barley fodder for my aging horse.    More on that in the next post.