The last of the garlic was harvested today. Haven't counted it up yet. Lots. I do know that I harvested more Red Russian than we planted, with two of the cloves splitting to form two heads each, one larger and one smaller. So we started with 6 cloves and ended up with 8 heads! Originally, I thought one of the cloves hadn't survived the winter, but all 6 did survive and thrive.
The 400 onions are going to be on the small side, thanks to a two-week drought right as they were maturing, plus the too-tight planting and some lapses in weeding toward the end. Also, just in the last couple days, it appears that bunnies have been nibbling on the onion greens. I harvested about 40 onions today (mostly to get them out of the way of the encroaching squash vines), and about 15 were medium-sized, and 25 were small. The ratio will improve with more medium-sized ones overall, but there won't be more than one or two large ones. Still: 400 onions!
The green beans are peaking now, and I just harvested a colander full of them. The plan is to blanch and freeze them, since I won't have time to eat them all before I leave town for a week. I like this variety. Plants are just the right size and reasonably e asy to harvest, not too close to the ground. I have them supported slightly by abandoned political signs' stakes. The metal kind, sort of H shaped.
The butternut and kabocha squashes are going berserk, thanks to the drenching rain we had a couple days ago. At least a couple kabocha fruits have set, while the butternuts are still intent on growing the vines. The timing for the plants in the garlic bed was perfect, with the last of the garlic coming out today, but perhaps a week or two too soon for the onions, which could use another week or two in the ground or drying on top of the ground, without being covered by the vines. Yellow squash is slow this year, so we're just now seeing some flowers and no set fruit. Two yellow zucchini, though, to be made into zucchini bread on Monday. I want to make bread & butter pickles with later-season zucchini.
The cucumber vines are also doing nicely. Some small fruits are set. They're growing up tomato cages. I'm hoping that will help them avoid the wilting virus that usually ends the season too soon.
Cherry tomatoes are starting to ripen. Good number of green tomatoes on the JetStar plants. Unless we have a late first frost, the pepper harvest may not be particularly good. I've had some small peppers, mostly to encourage additional fruits to set, but the drought set them back too. A couple plants died, although it appeared to be for reasons other than the drought. Not sure what, but they were just sickly. The banana peppers are producing nicely, though. Probably have quite a few when I return from vacation.
Swiss chard is still small, but promising much bigger harvests in the fall. I've had about half a dozen leaves so far. Someone suggested eating the stalks raw, sort of like celery. I tried it, and was not enthusiastic about it. I'll stick to the leaves. It's not like I'm wasting the stems. They get composted.
Friday, July 18, 2014
Sunday, May 25, 2014
Planting all the things
It's Memorial Day weekend, a bit earlier than usual, but the weather forecast looks reasonable, so I went ahead and planted all the things.
Already doing well are 400+ onions, a couple hundred garlic plants (not counting the thousands of volunteers, but including the 6 Russian Red that seem to be thriving), the asparagus, a few snap peas that the bunnies haven't found, and the previous years' rhubarb plants. The jury's still out on whether the new variety's last plant standing is going to survive. Next door, the tatsoi plants are hitting their stride.
This weekend, I got and planted:
The seeds that were planted include:
I'm still waiting to see if the yellow squash (basic crookneck) will germinate. The weather was colder than I'd expected this past week. I may need to re-plant them.
There's a small colony of feral cats living somewhere near my house, and I spot them in my garden frequently. They seem to be doing a good job of scaring away the bunnies. Far less nibbling on greens, at least so far.
Already doing well are 400+ onions, a couple hundred garlic plants (not counting the thousands of volunteers, but including the 6 Russian Red that seem to be thriving), the asparagus, a few snap peas that the bunnies haven't found, and the previous years' rhubarb plants. The jury's still out on whether the new variety's last plant standing is going to survive. Next door, the tatsoi plants are hitting their stride.
This weekend, I got and planted:
- 24 New Ace peppers (a little anxious that "New" Ace won't be as good as plain old Ace, but I'm trusting my local nursery for now)
- 6 yellow bell peppers (just in case the New Ace aren't as good as the plain old Ace, and also because they looked good and I can never have too many peppers)
- 6 JetStar (Except I think there were only 5 in the pack, which is okay)
- 6 grape tomatoes (not sure of the variety, 4 of them planted in containers)
- 6 broccoli
- 6 marigolds
The seeds that were planted include:
- Butternut squash (throughout the allium bed)
- yellow zucchini (leftover seeds from last year)
- Scarlet Kabocha winter squash (var: Sunshine), because they looked interesting
- Bush beans (var: Provider)
- Swiss chard (Northern Lights)
I'm still waiting to see if the yellow squash (basic crookneck) will germinate. The weather was colder than I'd expected this past week. I may need to re-plant them.
There's a small colony of feral cats living somewhere near my house, and I spot them in my garden frequently. They seem to be doing a good job of scaring away the bunnies. Far less nibbling on greens, at least so far.
Saturday, April 5, 2014
Costs 2014
Breakdown of this year's expenses for the garden:
Johnny's seeds (seeds, onion plants): $56.40
Territorial Seeds (rhubarb plants): $28.50
2 bales of straw: $20.00
Plants from local nursery: $24.00
Note: cherry tomatoes were the variety "Sugary"
Total: $128.90
Expenses yet to be incurred:
Composted manure:
(updated May 25, 2014)
Johnny's seeds (seeds, onion plants): $56.40
Territorial Seeds (rhubarb plants): $28.50
2 bales of straw: $20.00
Plants from local nursery: $24.00
Note: cherry tomatoes were the variety "Sugary"
Total: $128.90
Expenses yet to be incurred:
Composted manure:
(updated May 25, 2014)
Wednesday, April 2, 2014
Crimson Red Rhubarb
I've had the worst time growing rhubarb. I have two different varieties: one plant that I think is Victoria, and two plants that are Chipman's Canada Red.
The Victoria produces nothing but seed stalks and a very few really puny edible stalks. The Chipman's Canada Red was only planted a couple years ago, and so far, it's been pretty puny, but at least it survived some challenging growing seasons.
Last fall, I did some research to see what other varieties were out there. There's a repository in Palmer, Alaska that has well over a hundred varieties, but less than a dozen are available commercially, and really the number is probably about half that, in terms of varieties that are reasonably available. Locally, all I can get is Victoria, which as noted, hasn't done well for me.
A few suppliers offer Crimson Red, including Territorial Seed, where I've bought other products, and had a good experience. I ordered two plants, and was a little miffed, because the shipping was supposed to be mid-to-late-March, and I received them a little bit before March 15th, which would be fair, except that the whole country has had an extremely tough winter, so I would have thought they'd wait a little bit, closer to the end of March. At the time I received the plants (which were supposed to be planted ASAP), the garden was covered with six inches of snow, and the ground was frozen solid.
It wasn't until March 29th that I could dig more than an inch below the surface, and plant the rhubarb. Given all my bad luck with rhubarb plants, I worried the whole time that the plants would die before the ground thawed. But finally, I could dig holes (three, as it turned out, since one of the plants had a chunk of root that had separated from the rest, and seemed to be viable), just in time for some rain in the forecast, so they'd get well watered in. Of course, the rain turned out to be torrential, so then I fretted that my new plants would drown (since rhubarb doesn't do well without good drainage).
At least so far, all is well. A couple of the leaves that had sprouted and were most advanced at the time of planting did die, probably from dehydration during the two weeks of sitting on the kitchen counter until I could plant them. But the rest of the emerging stalks look promising.
ETA: As of May 10th, only the plant above survived, of the three Crimson Red roots I started with.
The Victoria produces nothing but seed stalks and a very few really puny edible stalks. The Chipman's Canada Red was only planted a couple years ago, and so far, it's been pretty puny, but at least it survived some challenging growing seasons.
Last fall, I did some research to see what other varieties were out there. There's a repository in Palmer, Alaska that has well over a hundred varieties, but less than a dozen are available commercially, and really the number is probably about half that, in terms of varieties that are reasonably available. Locally, all I can get is Victoria, which as noted, hasn't done well for me.
A few suppliers offer Crimson Red, including Territorial Seed, where I've bought other products, and had a good experience. I ordered two plants, and was a little miffed, because the shipping was supposed to be mid-to-late-March, and I received them a little bit before March 15th, which would be fair, except that the whole country has had an extremely tough winter, so I would have thought they'd wait a little bit, closer to the end of March. At the time I received the plants (which were supposed to be planted ASAP), the garden was covered with six inches of snow, and the ground was frozen solid.
It wasn't until March 29th that I could dig more than an inch below the surface, and plant the rhubarb. Given all my bad luck with rhubarb plants, I worried the whole time that the plants would die before the ground thawed. But finally, I could dig holes (three, as it turned out, since one of the plants had a chunk of root that had separated from the rest, and seemed to be viable), just in time for some rain in the forecast, so they'd get well watered in. Of course, the rain turned out to be torrential, so then I fretted that my new plants would drown (since rhubarb doesn't do well without good drainage).
At least so far, all is well. A couple of the leaves that had sprouted and were most advanced at the time of planting did die, probably from dehydration during the two weeks of sitting on the kitchen counter until I could plant them. But the rest of the emerging stalks look promising.
ETA: As of May 10th, only the plant above survived, of the three Crimson Red roots I started with.
Friday, March 14, 2014
Spring? Please?
After a brutal winter (that isn't over yet), I'm starting to think that maybe, just maybe there will in fact be a planting season this year. Just got a notice from a plant supplier that rhubarb roots are on the way, even though the ground is too frozen to dig a hole and likely will be for another ten days to two weeks.
The one encouraging note: the new variety of garlic (Red Russian) that I planted this past fall has sprouted (5 plants, out of what I thought I recalled as 6 cloves, but I may have remembered wrong, and even if we lost one, it's hardly surprising given the intense winter) and they're a good 3" tall. In contrast, our regular variety, German Extra Hardy, hasn't sprouted yet.
ETA: I just found my planting notes: 68 German Extra Hardy from full-sized heads, 86 German Extra Hardy from 2-clove heads (wild plants) and 6 Red Russian.
The one encouraging note: the new variety of garlic (Red Russian) that I planted this past fall has sprouted (5 plants, out of what I thought I recalled as 6 cloves, but I may have remembered wrong, and even if we lost one, it's hardly surprising given the intense winter) and they're a good 3" tall. In contrast, our regular variety, German Extra Hardy, hasn't sprouted yet.
ETA: I just found my planting notes: 68 German Extra Hardy from full-sized heads, 86 German Extra Hardy from 2-clove heads (wild plants) and 6 Red Russian.
Tuesday, November 5, 2013
Red russian garlic
I took this picture to document the difference in the two varieties of garlic I planted this year. Note that each square of the grid = 1".
The one on the left is German Hardy, and the one on the right is Red Russian. The German variety is obviously smaller, although the cloves are comparable in size. The Russian variety has more cloves -- 6 or 7, compared to the usual 4 (sometimes 5) in the German variety.
Saturday, September 14, 2013
Harvest 2013
The season is pretty much over. Tomatoes got hit by blight, squash were exhausted, and all that's left are the pepper plantation going strong, and a couple butternuts still maturing.
At the beginning of August, I estimated we'd harvested about a hundred bucks' worth of produce, roughly equal to what I'd spent on seeds, plants and supplies (although I actually spent about $9 more than projected, but getting extra manure).
Total summer squash, 20 pounds, for a total of $40 for the season.
Garlic (3 heads for a dollar for main crop only) = $20
Plus about 60 smaller heads from the volunteers
Onions (guesstimating at $1 a pound) = $10
Cucumbers (6 at $1 each) = $6
Banana peppers (82, probably 14 pounds, $1/lb) = $14
Ace peppers (150, some small, so let's say 4 for a buck) = $37
Jetstar tomatoes (70), at least $35
Butternut squash (23, each at least two pounds), $46
Green tomatoes, 6 pounds (made 4 quarts of mincemeat, with enough tomatoes to make two more batches in the future), $6
For a total of about $215. With another $50 or so of peppers and squash to be harvested, plus the peak of the swiss chard still to come, and some assorted lettuces and herbs. All told, probably $300 worth of produce, against $100 in expenses. Probably the best year in quite a while for the recovery garden. It doesn't sound like a lot, but a) the prices I used were quite conservative, so it could easily be twice that in value, b) the dollars don't take into consideration the value of flavor and freshness, and c) there was additional value in the getting me out into the garden for sunshine and a little activity.
We've eaten most of the produce, except for the garlic, the butternuts, ten peppers that I dehydrated, and about 30 peppers and a similar number of tomatoes that I froze. I've still got some pickled peppers, and a bunch of frozen zucchini for winter zuccini bread.
Addendum on November 3, 2013:
We harvested an additional 60 (sixty!) banana peppers, for a couple quarts more of pickled peppers, and some were sauteed and frozen with the Ace peppers
We harvested an additional 130 Ace peppers (for a total of close to 300!), many of which were sauteed and coated in tomato puree and frozen for future soup/chili. I also dried another 20 or so peppers, in addition to the original 10, for when I run out of the sauteed/frozen ones.
I had frozen enough zucchini for three batches of bread, and I've got a monster yellow zucchini still sitting on the counter. I only realized last year just how well over-sized zucchinis will store on the counter. This one should be good until December or possibly January, if I don't make it into zucchini bread for holiday giving.
I also made green tomato jam from the left-over tomatoes. Might try green tomato relish next year instead.
Swiss chard is still producing. Not as luxurious as in some years, since we'd been in something of a drought throughout October. Depending on the weather, though, there should be a nice little harvest for Thanksgiving.
The variety of sage that I stumbled across this year is particularly pretty -- very large, rounded leaves. Dries nicely.
At the beginning of August, I estimated we'd harvested about a hundred bucks' worth of produce, roughly equal to what I'd spent on seeds, plants and supplies (although I actually spent about $9 more than projected, but getting extra manure).
Total summer squash, 20 pounds, for a total of $40 for the season.
Garlic (3 heads for a dollar for main crop only) = $20
Plus about 60 smaller heads from the volunteers
Onions (guesstimating at $1 a pound) = $10
Cucumbers (6 at $1 each) = $6
Banana peppers (82, probably 14 pounds, $1/lb) = $14
Ace peppers (150, some small, so let's say 4 for a buck) = $37
Jetstar tomatoes (70), at least $35
Butternut squash (23, each at least two pounds), $46
Green tomatoes, 6 pounds (made 4 quarts of mincemeat, with enough tomatoes to make two more batches in the future), $6
For a total of about $215. With another $50 or so of peppers and squash to be harvested, plus the peak of the swiss chard still to come, and some assorted lettuces and herbs. All told, probably $300 worth of produce, against $100 in expenses. Probably the best year in quite a while for the recovery garden. It doesn't sound like a lot, but a) the prices I used were quite conservative, so it could easily be twice that in value, b) the dollars don't take into consideration the value of flavor and freshness, and c) there was additional value in the getting me out into the garden for sunshine and a little activity.
We've eaten most of the produce, except for the garlic, the butternuts, ten peppers that I dehydrated, and about 30 peppers and a similar number of tomatoes that I froze. I've still got some pickled peppers, and a bunch of frozen zucchini for winter zuccini bread.
Addendum on November 3, 2013:
We harvested an additional 60 (sixty!) banana peppers, for a couple quarts more of pickled peppers, and some were sauteed and frozen with the Ace peppers
We harvested an additional 130 Ace peppers (for a total of close to 300!), many of which were sauteed and coated in tomato puree and frozen for future soup/chili. I also dried another 20 or so peppers, in addition to the original 10, for when I run out of the sauteed/frozen ones.
I had frozen enough zucchini for three batches of bread, and I've got a monster yellow zucchini still sitting on the counter. I only realized last year just how well over-sized zucchinis will store on the counter. This one should be good until December or possibly January, if I don't make it into zucchini bread for holiday giving.
I also made green tomato jam from the left-over tomatoes. Might try green tomato relish next year instead.
Swiss chard is still producing. Not as luxurious as in some years, since we'd been in something of a drought throughout October. Depending on the weather, though, there should be a nice little harvest for Thanksgiving.
The variety of sage that I stumbled across this year is particularly pretty -- very large, rounded leaves. Dries nicely.
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