Garden Strategy In Action
This morning it is already quite warm. It is predicted that it's going to reach 80°. It is so strange to have gone from the high forties last week to this sudden summer leap into heat. I've been waiting to get out in the garden and all at once it's dry and warm- so warm that I'm hiding from the heat inside.
The shirt sewing project has been temporarily derailed by a pant sewing project. No, I don't want to sew pants. So seriously depressing! However- it has become an urgent matter as I know have only two pairs of pants that don't show off my underwear! I can mend two pairs of my ripped pants and wear them to the gym...the third pair which expired on Friday, are beyond hope. Beyond decency...even for a mending project. It is really lucky for me that I already have the pattern, four lengths of bottom weight cotton twill, and zippers.
We are really broke now and hoping to make it to the next paycheck without having to beg Philip's bosses for an advance. Surprisingly, this is not stressing me out. It should be, but I've decided that we're going to be just fine Of course I will have to cancel Max's psyche appointment and reschedule for when we can afford another one.
I'm really excited about my garden. Last year was so barren, so sad with all the time spent looking for work, working in the community garden, and my spindly little roses...this year the roses are enormous and all of them are budding right now! The garden is planted up with fava beans (all up and getting taller), peas (not very large, planted too late I think), pickling cucumbers, slicing cucumbers, tomatoes, summer squash, cilantro (has leaves now!), runner beans, pole (green) beans, cayenne peppers, shallots, kale, swiss chard, and lettuce (some is ready to eat now).
I will be planting more pole green beans, some winter squash, and leeks (for winter harvest). I also picked up a vervain plant and a skullcap plant which I am going to plant in my monastery garden. Those will be permanent plantings and I will mark them with some copper plant markers I bought a few years ago and never used. If you have medicinal herbs, especially ones that require care in using, I think it's important to be 100% sure which ones are which. A practiced herbalist doesn't need to do this, but for someone like me who is just learning- I don't have access to very many esoteric herbs so identifying them could be trickier.
Later in the gardening season, in late June I think, I'll be planting an entire bed of beets, and entire bed of carrots, and an entire bed of chard and kale for winter eating.
I'm evaluating my food preserving needs for this year and have come to the conclusion that I don't need to make a lot of dill pickles this year because I have so many left from last year. I think (though I'm not positive) that 12 quarts is probably enough for a year. 2 seasons ago I grew my own pickling cucumbers and canned 12 quarts of them- these were even better than the ones I picked from the u-pick or the ones I bought by the box from the big local farm. My goal is now to always grow my own pickling cukes and can whatever I get. (A realistic goal. I can't have the same goal with regards to tomatoes. Not yet, anyway.)
I'm not growing eggplants, which is a piece of strategy, because I can't grow them as well as my favorite local farm, and in the height of the season my favorite farmer Chris often sells her eggplants u-pick for 25¢ each- which is unbeatable. The quality of her eggplants are unmatched and at that price I can fill my freezer with grilled eggplant rounds.
By the way, if you don't grill and freeze eggplant rounds- I suggest you do it this year. (Provided you like eggplant, of course.) They have proved so useful in my freezer and given such a nice bit of variety to my food I can't reccommend it enough.
Anyway- if I can get them for such a good price at the u-pick farm and they are so good, it isn't worth taking up space in my own garden for them. Tomatoes are more expensive and I need such an enormous quantity of tomatoes that it makes more sense to grow as many paste tomatoes as I can. I'll still be buying from the farm, but hopefully growing 16 of my own paste tomatoes will offset the year's tomato expenditures.
This year I plan to try drying vegetables like carrots and summer squash (like my friend Lisa B. did) and use them for soups in the winter. If anyone has thoughts on whether it is better to freeze or dry dark leafy greens, please share them, I am probably going to do both (just to see).
I should shower and get outside before it heats up much more. I can hid in the house and write later if I want.
Oh- if anyone has any ideas on how to get rid of flies (with a trap of some kind) please share. We have a sticky fly strip out, and another fly trap (luring them into a plastic jar with something), and neither of those is working well.
So how are all of you doing? Tell me how your garden grows and what you're up to. Please.
The shirt sewing project has been temporarily derailed by a pant sewing project. No, I don't want to sew pants. So seriously depressing! However- it has become an urgent matter as I know have only two pairs of pants that don't show off my underwear! I can mend two pairs of my ripped pants and wear them to the gym...the third pair which expired on Friday, are beyond hope. Beyond decency...even for a mending project. It is really lucky for me that I already have the pattern, four lengths of bottom weight cotton twill, and zippers.
We are really broke now and hoping to make it to the next paycheck without having to beg Philip's bosses for an advance. Surprisingly, this is not stressing me out. It should be, but I've decided that we're going to be just fine Of course I will have to cancel Max's psyche appointment and reschedule for when we can afford another one.
I'm really excited about my garden. Last year was so barren, so sad with all the time spent looking for work, working in the community garden, and my spindly little roses...this year the roses are enormous and all of them are budding right now! The garden is planted up with fava beans (all up and getting taller), peas (not very large, planted too late I think), pickling cucumbers, slicing cucumbers, tomatoes, summer squash, cilantro (has leaves now!), runner beans, pole (green) beans, cayenne peppers, shallots, kale, swiss chard, and lettuce (some is ready to eat now).
I will be planting more pole green beans, some winter squash, and leeks (for winter harvest). I also picked up a vervain plant and a skullcap plant which I am going to plant in my monastery garden. Those will be permanent plantings and I will mark them with some copper plant markers I bought a few years ago and never used. If you have medicinal herbs, especially ones that require care in using, I think it's important to be 100% sure which ones are which. A practiced herbalist doesn't need to do this, but for someone like me who is just learning- I don't have access to very many esoteric herbs so identifying them could be trickier.
Later in the gardening season, in late June I think, I'll be planting an entire bed of beets, and entire bed of carrots, and an entire bed of chard and kale for winter eating.
I'm evaluating my food preserving needs for this year and have come to the conclusion that I don't need to make a lot of dill pickles this year because I have so many left from last year. I think (though I'm not positive) that 12 quarts is probably enough for a year. 2 seasons ago I grew my own pickling cucumbers and canned 12 quarts of them- these were even better than the ones I picked from the u-pick or the ones I bought by the box from the big local farm. My goal is now to always grow my own pickling cukes and can whatever I get. (A realistic goal. I can't have the same goal with regards to tomatoes. Not yet, anyway.)
I'm not growing eggplants, which is a piece of strategy, because I can't grow them as well as my favorite local farm, and in the height of the season my favorite farmer Chris often sells her eggplants u-pick for 25¢ each- which is unbeatable. The quality of her eggplants are unmatched and at that price I can fill my freezer with grilled eggplant rounds.
By the way, if you don't grill and freeze eggplant rounds- I suggest you do it this year. (Provided you like eggplant, of course.) They have proved so useful in my freezer and given such a nice bit of variety to my food I can't reccommend it enough.
Anyway- if I can get them for such a good price at the u-pick farm and they are so good, it isn't worth taking up space in my own garden for them. Tomatoes are more expensive and I need such an enormous quantity of tomatoes that it makes more sense to grow as many paste tomatoes as I can. I'll still be buying from the farm, but hopefully growing 16 of my own paste tomatoes will offset the year's tomato expenditures.
This year I plan to try drying vegetables like carrots and summer squash (like my friend Lisa B. did) and use them for soups in the winter. If anyone has thoughts on whether it is better to freeze or dry dark leafy greens, please share them, I am probably going to do both (just to see).
I should shower and get outside before it heats up much more. I can hid in the house and write later if I want.
Oh- if anyone has any ideas on how to get rid of flies (with a trap of some kind) please share. We have a sticky fly strip out, and another fly trap (luring them into a plastic jar with something), and neither of those is working well.
So how are all of you doing? Tell me how your garden grows and what you're up to. Please.
Comments (10)
Hmm. Peas, and garlic. And rhubarb. And herbs.
And I'll put in a tomato or two. But mostly we'll rely on the CSA for our produce.
Incidentally, I still have fine carrots in the fridge from last fall from the CSA. Why would you need to freeze or dry carrots at all?
I blanch & chop my extra leafy greens and freeze them in ziplocs with all the air squeezed out.
Posted by Anonymous | May 17, 2009 12:56 PM
Posted on May 17, 2009 12:56
That last one was me - I hit return without filling in the boxes!
Posted by magpie | May 17, 2009 12:57 PM
Posted on May 17, 2009 12:57
I tried keeping a bunch of carrots in a bin in my garage a couple of winters ago and they sprouted and then started rotting. I don't have room in my fridge for lots of extra carrots. Hopefully the bed of carrots I grow will keep me in carrots too but I'd like to have more on hand. I don't buy very many fruits or vegetables out of season so when the CSA runs out of carrots I do too. No carrots is so sad!!!
Yeah, freezing greens seems like a good way to keep them.
Posted by angelina | May 17, 2009 1:38 PM
Posted on May 17, 2009 13:38
My head is full of gardentopia right now!! This is a trial year for me on a few things. I planted my beets already and am hoping that by being diligent in thinning them that they will grow for me because I've never been able to grow them. I have two beds of leeks...why? Because I LOVE leeks and use them all winter long and at $3.00 lb I need to grow them-1 1/2 beds of potatoes, my first year of growing more than one plant. I have 10 tomato plants with more to put in. Probably around 15-20 kale and equal fennel bulbs. My plan is to blanch, then freeze this crop of kale and also the fennel. My peas are about 18in high and probably were planted too late too. Lettuce and spinach is out there and almost ready to harvest. I have Cucumbers, summer squash and kentucky pole beans to plant at the new moon. Then, late June or early July I'll plant for winter harvest...carrots, winter squash, more kale, spinach, garlic and more chard. I love eggplant but haven't grown it successfully so I'll be looking for a farm to pick from. If Sauvie's doesn't grow it I think I'll make a day of it and head your way...wouldn't that be fun! My main goal is to have as much food put up for the winter, whether that means growing it here or u-picking it but I need to stay on task because here it is nearly Memorial day but my head is still in April thinking I have all the time ahead of me to plant...I need to focus!
Posted by Kathy | May 17, 2009 3:04 PM
Posted on May 17, 2009 15:04
I was outside all day today planting.
Currently, we are harvesting cilantro and spinach. The cilantro was all volunteer from last year. I'll have to re-plant later in the season if I want to have some when the tomatoes are ripe.
I planted a wax bush bean this year (just because I had the seed and didn't want it to go to waste, although I really don't like wax bush beans that well). Pole beans (Kentucky Wonder), tons of corn - both early sweet and later Jubilee. Three winter squash (delicata, winter meat, and butternut) and two summer squash (green zucchini and another I've never tried before - Papaya Pear Hybrid)
And of course all the other usuals like lettuce, cabbage, kohlrabi, and beets (which are up), carrots, cukes, tomatoes and peppers (which we bought from Nichols yesterday). I have 6 paste tomatoes and 6 other varities. I hope it is enough for all the canning I am planning!!
I still need to plant my dill and basil. For some reason I can't grow basil from seed. It never works for me. I have to go buy plants.
Posted by Karmyn R | May 17, 2009 6:26 PM
Posted on May 17, 2009 18:26
Oh - and we planted our peas in March but something munched all over them and they look absolutely HORRIBLE. (It was not slugs because I totally slug-baited them to no effect) So - I replanted them 3 days ago. I know it is too late, but if I can get at least a little crop out of them, I'll be happy.
Posted by Karmyn R | May 17, 2009 6:28 PM
Posted on May 17, 2009 18:28
We are harvesting tomatoes now...at least when we can beat the squirrels to them. We have to pick them green just after they turn a bit of color and ripen them indoors. Even with this precaution I find half eaten tomatoes (sometimes green, too!) strewn on the ground every day. It is very discouraging. Today we put netting over our plants but a neighbor walking by said that his tomatoes had been devastated by the squirrels and the tomatoes were in raised beds covered by netting. This does not give us much hope.
Herb wise we are well. We had some French tarragon tonight for a poached salmon recipe that my husband cooks and it was delightful.
Posted by mss @ Zanthan Gardens | May 17, 2009 7:53 PM
Posted on May 17, 2009 19:53
Kathy- I know how you feel! It sounds to me like you're getting plenty done. My friend Lisa E. and I were talking about Oregon spring yesterday and how it's impossible to work in the garden for weeks and weeks because of the sodden ground and then suddenly it's: WHAM! You have to get out there and do everything all at once to get the most from our short growing season.
Karmyn- I'm so happy you're getting your garden planted this year! It was so hard for me to garden when Max was really small. I think the color of wax beans is a little off-putting but I grew them one year and I have to confess that they tasted really great. I haven't successfully grown basil from seed so far either but I have promised to try this one last year. I better get the seeds out tomorrow.
MSS- that is so upsetting about the tomatoes! It sounds like if you want to grow AND harvest them in your neighborhood you have to lock them up as tightly as a flock of hens. I'm glad you're getting herbs though. Even if you don't get a lot of vegetables- fresh herbs are so indispensable in the kitchen and such a pleasure to grow and taste.
Posted by angelina | May 17, 2009 10:51 PM
Posted on May 17, 2009 22:51
I have collards [homegrown] and kale [bought] in my freezer from winter, but I have not tried reconstituting them. I suspect the kale will not be good for kale chips, but might be ok for something like a soup.
This year, we have ~40 tomato plants. Some will be ready for harvest in a couple of weeks. We also have bell peppers, hot peppers, crookneck squash, cucumber, green eggplant, strawberries, peaches. I harvested herbs yesterday (basil, sage, parsley, rosemary, lavendar, chives, catnip, arugula) and everything smelled so lovely!
Posted by Jade | May 18, 2009 12:13 PM
Posted on May 18, 2009 12:13
OH MY GOD! So envious! With 40 tomato plants you will have enough to preserve a year's worth of tomatoes plus have plenty for fresh in season eating! Wow. that wasn't a typo, was it? That is fantastic. I love harvesting herbs too. I got my spring harvest of thyme and it is now dried. I had meant to harvest my oregano this morning but stayed up stupid-late and consequently woke up late too. I like to harvest it only in the mornings during warm weather. What region do you live in? How do you almost have tomatoes ready to pick? Greenhouse? (I want one!)
Posted by Angelina | May 18, 2009 1:10 PM
Posted on May 18, 2009 13:10