Lemons

Picked "some" of the lemons last weekend. Two buckets held about 400 and we just grabbed the quick and easy low hanging fruit. The tree is laden this year, and probably won't have any lemons next year due to the cold weather we are having. It doesn't hurt the tree much but it does kill the fruit buds on new growth.

The first 200 lemons yielded 20 quarts of lemon juice, which we froze in bottling jars. In past years we have frozen the juice in plastic bags, bottled it in mason  jars, and made lemon jam. All of the bottling experiments turned brown from oxidation within a few months and those with added sugar went more quickly (so much for instant lemonade concentrate...). Freezing is definately the best option although doing it in plastic bags can make for a sticky mess. Thus we tried bottles this year for the first time. Oh - and one more thing. We screen off the seeds in a collander, then run the juice through a sieve to get the pulp out and we save this pulp. It is GREAT in recipes calling for fresh lemon. Our favorite use is to make cheesecake - the unbaked version.

Yes - those are onions and garlic growing in the background and the recent 20-degree temperatures did not bother them at all.

Pruning

Thus far we have pruned the Pomegranate and Pecan trees. We've also pruned the roses and pulled all the brown plant material out of the Iris and Asparagus beds. The branches and leaves all go through the chipper to reduce it to a nice mulch, which then goes around the roses and along walking paths into the garden. The birds love it - which is the one drawback to making our own mulch. They seem to come from all over to find the perfect twigs for their nests, and remember to come back when the Apricots and Grapes are getting ripe.

In the next month or so we'll prune the grapes and the frost-bitten citrus trees, and perhaps thin out the bamboo to keep it under control.

Garden Preparation

Today, if I can overcome the cold, the garden will be tilled and the pile of grass clippings and the mulch pile will be mixed into the soil. We've had an old bit of wire fencing tied in a circle holding a very large pile of grass clippings since October (from when we dethatched the lawn) which is now ready to go into the soil. In past years we made the mistake of putting this directly into the garden - not a good idea because the grass will grow.

Cold!

These few days of cold weather will likely burn some ficus trees and freeze the buds on lemon trees. This is the third or fourth time in 10 years that it has been cold enough to damage our Lisbon Lemon tree. We'll prune it back and have a year of nearly no lemons (as opposed to this year when we have a few hundred). These cold spells don't bother our grapefruit tree, perhaps because it grows in more of an umbrella shape that holds in heat better.

After spending several years nurturing a plant to maturity and losing it to one night of cold I surrendered and put in something better suited to our climate. We can't cover our lemon tree because it is so large, but it gets along fine.

One thing we will cover is our backflow assembly on the irrigation line. We've had that freeze before and it was no fun buying a replacement - since thousands of people in the southwest had the same problem and the stores were out of stock. So there is a painting cloth over our water pipes for the next few days.

Getting Ready...

It's time to get planting areas ready for vegetables. For those who are interested in flowers the big box stores (Lowes) just got in their flower bulbs. We put in some Gladiolus this year.

Vegetables are not really available yet. Bear in mind I say that because we are looking for 6-packs of tomato plants. We took a hiatus from planting tomatoes from seed this year so are really hoping to see the seedlings show up in nursery's soon. I did start some seeds yesterday as a backup plan and to keep my anxiety level down...

Bare root fruit trees should be arriving in stores this month if you are looking for apricots, pomegranates or the like.

Now is the time to plan what you want to plant and where, and get the soil ready. We usually till the garden and add a bit of fertilizer a couple weeks before setting out anything. The weather should be warm enough in about 4-5 weeks to set out tomato seedlings.

Irrigation Maintenance

Now is a great time to do irrigation system maintenance. Things to check for include bad valves, timer settings, timer backup batteries, leaking lines, broken or plugged emitters, damaged or plugged sprinkler heads (especially if you overseeded the lawn) and broken pressure regulators on drip lines. Our half-inch drip lines are ten years old and one has been splitting seams. My mission yesterday was to replace that entire line. However, upon opening the control valve boxes I discovered that the valve feeding the drip line to the trees had gone bad. We hadn't noticed but I'm sure the trees were feeling starved for water. There was also a bad pressure regulator on the line feeding our grapes which was responsible for flooding the irrigation valve box.

Instead of laying new drip line, I re-built the valve and backflow assembly on the two damaged lines. This is the third time the smaller, cheaper pressure regulators have failed, so I spent the extra money for a larger, better quality regulator (I have three of these that have gone ten years with no issues). Done! Now I know plants are getting water when the timer says so. Next weekend we'll do the line replacement.

Onions

The box stores have onion sets for sale. For $2 you can plant 60 onions, so for our family $4 means we'll have fresh onions for another year without purchasing any more from the store.

These are different than the ones sold in the spring. These are like very small onions, while the ones sold in spring look more like tiny leeks.