Tuesday, May 11, 2010

Disappearing Lights and Walking Cucumbers

Today my daughter asked me what was going in the empty spot in the garden. Well the one she meant is the solanum bed, which will get the tomatoes and peppers. Those seedlings are well on their way. Or so I thought. I went down to check on them. Their automatic light was off. Several of the hours in the middle of the day were pushed down on the automatic timers so they have been getting very little light since it happened. But I have no clue when those got pushed down. I know I've been on steroids from my doctor and it is supposed to mess with your mind when you taper off, but I swear there is a ghost in my plant room. Who else would be playing with my lights?

And that is not all. I was down there to check on the other seedlings. Sunday I finally planted my cucumbers and squash in some soil blocks. I was only two weeks off of my written schedule. Sigh. I've been a bit slow at getting my gardening work done. Anyway today I saw signs of life, but not like I wanted.

This is what I saw. My cucumbers and squash were pushing themselves out of their containers. It looked liked they were trying to escape their soil blocks. Maybe they were trying to escape the ghost?

They are growing roots outside of the soil and trying to heave themselves up and out. This one pushed itself all the way out and had massive roots all along what ought to have been its stem. I wish I had better photos, but as soon as I saw it I took the worst ones out and covered up the roots of the ones that weren't as bad. Only after I had repaired what I could from the ghost attack, did I think of documenting it. Maybe I should feed them some chamomile tea to calm them down? Or maybe I should be the one drinking it.

Such strangeness going on and it isn't even close to the full moon.

15 comments:

  1. We have a self proclaimed "paranormal expert" at my place of work, if you want me to send him up there. Ha!

    ReplyDelete
  2. Hopefully those walking cucumbers will behave when they are planted in the garden :)

    ReplyDelete
  3. I love the shot of your garden. Angles. Love it.

    ReplyDelete
  4. We have (generally) come to accept the presence of a ghost at our hose. Opened doors, moved objects, spontaneous music playing... My husband convinced me that we have a friendly ghost and it's no big deal. Therefore, he says, I shouldn't be afraid.

    I'm still not positive it's an actual ghost, but sometimes there's just no other explanation...

    ReplyDelete
  5. Cue the twilight zone theme.

    ReplyDelete
  6. OOOhhhhh, how spooky and exciting. Maybe Mother Nature thinks you've almost outdone her so she's throwing you for a loop to prove she's still got it.
    :)

    ReplyDelete
  7. Very strange. I noticed that some of my seeds would try to push themselves out of the block if I didn't lay them perfectly flat in the hole. I realized that I had been pushing the wrong end down into the block.

    In your case, I think you have a ghost. :)

    ReplyDelete
  8. Erh, have you consult your astrology chart lately? Maybe the stars are not lining up the way they should ;)

    ReplyDelete
  9. Daphne, I'm SO glad you posted this. The same thing happened to me...twice. I planted several cucumber seeds. A few didn't come up, some grew normally and then two of them did exactly what yours tried to do...walk themselves OUT of the soil. I wonder what that means!

    ReplyDelete
  10. Nice pic of the garden!

    Showing an interest in plants is a good start. With a little training the ghost could become a good garden helper...

    ReplyDelete
  11. EG, well I've got to do something since its making my my seedlings want to leave ;>

    Robin, I hope so.

    Sylvana, I'll miss those weird angles in the new garden. They do make for hard planting spaces though. I won't miss that.

    Jackie, I've never suspected ghosts here before. Yesterday was just a really weird day. Today they are coming up like normal thank goodness.

    Miss M, lol

    Ribbit, Oh I could never outdo her. She gets all the credit in the garden. Really I swear I give her all the credit (hope she is listening).

    Thomas, Maybe that was it? The seeds that are doing the most walking are the zucchini seeds which are huge. I did lay them flat, but put two in each hole. Maybe one is pushing the other out. Though that still doesn't explain why the both sometimes come out when they were flat. The Armenian cukes have no excuse. There is just one in each since I had few seed. At least the Diamant cukes and Butternut squash are behaving themselves.

    Mac, I've never done a chart before. Maybe I should?

    Kalena Michele, I think it is a portent of strange things to happen in the garden this year.

    Angela, Hmmm if they could quit scaring the seedlings it has possibilities.

    ReplyDelete
  12. Strange day in the seedling room! My husband turned my light bank off on my seedlings a month or so ago. He was doing something and needed the plug in and "intended to plug it back in when done" but never did. Luckily I saw it almost immediately and got it taken care of.

    ReplyDelete
  13. Good thing you are moving :-)

    ReplyDelete
  14. We have light problems like that sometimes. My cucumbers have been behaving, but the basil and indigo aren't. Go figure.

    ReplyDelete
  15. So odd, all of it! Why would the seeds try and get away from the soil? Hmm. Were they walking towards the light?

    ReplyDelete