Weeding

You can't tell from this photo but I had a lot of weeding to do under my row covers. I finally finished the cabbage bed and I weeded by the compost piles. But I hadn't opened up the chard and broccoli bed for a long time. The chard was getting out of control. I'm supposed to pick it at least every two weeks once it gets big. As you can see it got big without me noticing. Row covers are like that you can lose track of how things are doing underneath.

Close up you have a better view of the weeds. The chard was so tall that it was blocking the view of all the weeds, but there were plenty there and some were starting to go to seed. I try never to let that happen.

I hate putting the noxious weed seeds into my compost pile. The pile isn't hot, so I separate my weeds. The ones that are flowering or have seeds on them go in one bucket and the second bucket is for everything else. It goes into the compost. The other goes to the town's yard waste pickup. They compost things at high temperatures.

Since the chard was getting out of control I chopped it back. I harvested just over 10 pounds of it. That is a lot of chard. I had to send out to my email list to get rid of it. I only had one response, but Allie took all 7 lbs of it. Thank goodness. I do want to freeze more chard, but I'm pretty busy this weekend and into the first half of the week. And there will be much, much more chard over the summer. I'll have plenty of time to do it when I'm not as busy.

This bed contains one row of chard along the long end of the bed. I plant at about 9" centers. Last year I put in two rows, but I think the other row wasn't doing much as it was shaded too much by the broccoli. And as you can see one row of chard is more than enough. Dare I say too much? I suppose not though if I can keep getting rid of the extras. As long as someone is eating it. Oh and as I was picking the chard I was noticing how much dirt had splashed up on it. So I'm experimenting. I put some salt marsh hay on one side of the row and not on the other. I'm hoping the slugs don't take up residence. I often forgo mulches to keep them down.

The other side is the broccoli. Last year I had two rows, one with 5 and one with 4. This year I still did two rows but only with 4 and 3. So again less crowded. As you can see my first head is forming. It looks like it is going to be just huge.

In the middle of what should be my broccoli patch I found this. One huge kohlrabi. My other Winner kohlrabi are so small. I only gave them an 8"x8" spot and they still haven't grown large. But this one had a 2'x 1.3' spot and it was so much larger. I hope it isn't woody at its center. I'll have to remember next year to give them more space if I like the taste of this variety. Kohlibri grows well in the smaller space, but this one seems to need a little elbow room. So now I have only 6 broccoli plants. I really should pay more attention to what is going on under those covers.