Planting in the Rain

Bunching onions and parsley

Yesterday was a nice drizzly spring day. Usually this weather is pretty normal in the spring. I just wish the temperature had been normal. It was a chilly day and the next few will be chilly too. Drizzly days are great for me to get out and plant a few things. I planted up the leek and herb section of the garden. I have three major rotations in the garden. The warm weather crops have two rotations - solanums and the three sisters crops. The last major rotation is my leafy vegetables, peas, and root crops. Within that rotation has its own rotation. One is my brassicas, that have a bed of their own so they can be covered. Another is my lettuce, garlic and onions.

Bed that was planted up
Left to right, seeded dill, celery, leeks, cilantro (hard to see), an empty spot where the cumin goes, parsley, and bunching onions

But the bed I planted up this time was the one with all the leftovers. So it is a mish mash of a bed. Already planted were my peas, favas, and carrots. Yesterday I planted up the leeks, celery (though am I too early for that? I've never planted it before and they were big enough to go out so I did), bunching onions, and some herbs. The herbs that go in here are the annual herbs. I'm still debating how I want the rotations to go, but for now I seeded some dill and transplanted some parsley and some cilantro. The cilantro was just barely up as the tap root doesn't like to be disturbed. the funny thing is that I could see the root coming out of the bottom before the top shows.

Favas coming up

The fava beans in this bed are starting to come up. As I said before after I planted them I mixed in the fertilizer forgetting they were there. So I was hoping some at least would still be close enough to the surface. I didn't really turn the soil over, but did use the fork. So far I have about half a dozen coming up. I planted 32 so I still hope for more.

Spinach is getting its first true leaves

On the next nice day I have to get row cover over the spinach. I don't want to have to pick off the leaf miner eggs from 50 sqft of spinach. That would just be too much of a chore. So I'll put on a row cover. I didn't do it before because it is so much easier to water without a row cover. I would water every day when they were germinating. They seem mostly up now. There are a few gaps as to be expected, but in many places they came up well.

And in other news, I no longer hate the UPS man. My arm doesn't hurt anymore and I'm looking forward to my next package. I hope it is the apple and plum trees. I hope they come this week. And the rose. Yes I'd love to get the rose in. Hmm and my mints and herbs would be nice to get. OK so I'm hoping for the UPS man to come this week. I miss him. I'm fickle.

Seedlings

The start of the seedling season is well on its way. We were away for a long weekend at a little bed and breakfast over Harvest Monday, but before we left, I planted up some more seedlings. I put in eight varieties of lettuce: Red Sails, Deer Tongue, Little Gem (from Dan), Freckles (from Emily), Paris Island (from Granny), Tom Thumb (from Stefaneener), Dazzle (from Jody), and Bath Cos (from Jody). As you can see they are already up and growing well. I put one seed into each tiny 3/4" block. I wasn't perfect. As you can see Bath Cos on the right isn't coming up well, but one of its seeds is coming up from the side and another from the bottom of the dish. I have trouble seeing those little seeds. I should bring my glasses down when I sow. In a week or two I'll pot these up into 2" blocks, but I'll only take the best two of each variety.

I also put in some Evergreen White Bunching onions and five kinds of leeks. Four of them are from Miss M. I sowed ten each of the varieties she sent and 20 of King Sieg that I bought from Fedco. They are not yet up as alliums usually take a week or so to germinate. I expect to see something happening over the weekend. Some of the leek seed is older, so may not germinate, but hopefully I've planted plenty of seed so it shouldn't matter.

When I got back, I had a nice surprise. My backorder seeds from Fedco arrived. I'm not sure if the onions will have time to grow, but I seeded them anyway. They are about a month behind schedule. I seeded them in the 1 1/2" blocks with four seeds to a block.

The other onions that I planted a while back are doing well. I seeded them at the same rate and today thinned them to two per block. There were five blocks that didn't have any seedlings in them. You would think at least one of the seeds would have come up, but no. In most of the other block most of the seeds came up. I often had to thin out two seedlings to leave the two strongest.

I didn't turn the flat for quite a while and this is what it looked like last Friday. You can see one side is much less vigorous than the other. That side was the side closest to the window. The window gets cold at night and the cold inhibits their growth. My laundry room where they are located gets to about 57F at night and about 62F during the day. I'm guessing those closest to the window see even lower temps at night.

I did one more sowing today. I'm not sure if I'm really up to it or not this year, but I started it. Early tomatoes. I've done them in the past, but find them way too much work. They tend to get diseased more and don't grow as well as the tomatoes grown in the correct season. But wintersown.org sent me Siberian Tomato seeds. These are really early tomatoes. They set early, but fade quickly. I would never put them in the main garden, but in a pot might just be the ticket. I seeded four seeds into the little tiny 3/4" blocks. I'll pot up the best two and if I can bear killing one, I'll only put one in a 5 gallon bucket to grow.

2009 Overview Alliums

This year I grew bunching onions, leeks, garlic, yellow storage onions, and red torpedo onions. I'm going to take them one at a time.

Nabechan bunching onions

I'll do the best first. The Nabechan bunching onions seemed to love this year. They were multiseeded early on 2/21 with about four seeds to a cell. They all came up on 2/25; were hardened off starting on 3/13; and planted on 3/25 and 3/28. So they had about a month of indoor growing, but only under the LED lights that were so dim. They were pretty small when they went out, but did well over the season. I picked them all summer long and they are still a few left out there. Right now they are about an inch wide at the base. The current harvest is at 2.4 lbs and with I think three or four huge ones left I have 12-16oz more. I loved the planting and will do it again. Multiplanting worked well for them if they were given space. Single plantings work better if I put them between the lettuce as I often do. Bunching onions for me don't get their own spot in the garden, they just get scattered around here and there. Some multiplants got too big as time went on. I dug them up and separated them before planting again (not easy late in the game as their roots tangle). They sulked for a couple of weeks then took off again.

Lincoln Leeks

The leeks were not happy this year. They were very stressed out. Seeded: 1/23. Germinated: 1/31-2/4. Transplanted: 3/27 six inches apart in a trench. I picked the first half in during the beginning of October and the second half is still in the ground. A 1'x3' section gave me only 1.1 lbs of leeks. This is a pretty crappy yield. Part of the problem is that a lot of the leeks had gone to seed. I had to throw a lot away. A leek's seed stalk is too though to eat. Though thinking back I should have saved them for stock since they would be good for that. They may have been planted too early. I was trying to get all the alliums out from under the lights that I needed for other things. Next year I need more lights so I won't have space issues. However the issue might have been weather related. A lot of plants got stressed from the weather.

Tropea Onion

The Tropea onions (red torpedo onions) were not much loved. They didn't grow well, but they at least didn't try to bloom on me. Seeded: 1/15. Germinated: 1/22-1/29. Transplanted: 3/25. I didn't like their taste that much. So they won't be grown again. If I want a red onion, I'll just grow a regular one. This one was too hot. They produced 2.1 lbs from about 3 sqft. I multiplanted some and they don't seem to like it much. Most of the good onions I got were from singly planted onions. These and the Copras were planted 4" apart if singly planted and 6" apart if multiplanted.

Copra Onion

Copra onions are yellow storage onions high in sulfur but still with a high sugar content. So they are tasty little things. Sadly little is what they were this year. I've been told that this was a very bad onion year. Also they tried to bloom so those won't keep well. I'll eat them up first. My harvest was 3.9 lbs from about 6 sqft. I will grow them again. I loved their taste. Next year I'll start them a bit later. And like Tropea I won't multiplant. They were all seeded and transplanted on the same schedule as Tropea.

Garlic

Last year I planted the garlic six inches apart at the end of October: German Extra Hardy, Georgian Crystal, Bogatyr, and an Unknown from the grocery store. Only one showed its head before the ground froze - my unknown grocery store variety. I mulched with 3-4 inches of hay. Over the winter it matted down and some of the garlic had trouble coming up. When the others were up I dug down looking for them. They were all scrunched up under the mulch. This year I planted with a compost mulch which should be easier on them. All the garlic survived the winter except the unknown. Two of the eight cloves of that variety didn't make it. I harvested early on July 3rd because I was afraid of rot with all the rain.

Harvest:

• German Extra Hardy 1.2 lbs total - 1.5 oz per head
  
• Georgian Crystal 0.5 lbs total - 1 oz per head
  
• Bogatyr 1.1 lbs total - 1 oz per head
  
• Unknown 0.6 lbs total - 1 oz if you count the dead cloves, 1.5 oz if you don't.

This year I didn't plant the Georgian Crystal again. It didn't get any bigger and others preformed better. Bogatyr is on notice. If it doesn't shape up, it will be replaced. Its seed cloves were really small when they were shipped to me. This year they were bigger. I hope they get even bigger this year.

So was it a good year for garlic? I haven't a clue. I got what I thought of as a good harvest. The supermarket variety was a softneck garlic. This year it turned into a hard necked garlic (it bloomed). It also didn't have its cloves in layers like the initial bulbs did. It had fewer but bigger bulbs. I'd say aliens came down and swapped them, but I have read that softnecks can turn into hardnecks when they are stressed. It could have been a bad year. They might hate the constant rain. Or they might be a southern variety that just doesn't do well here. Time will tell.

A Tour Around the Fall Garden

I probably have two or three weeks before a big freeze in the garden. Usually in the middle of November I get all excited thinking I can pick lettuce for Thanksgiving dinner. It never happens. We always seem to get a freeze by the third week in November which effectively ends the gardening season (though this year I have kale which will extend it a bit). I still have plenty of vegetables that are going strong.

I have two sections of brassicas. This is the biggest. Still growing strong are: purple mizuna, tatsoi, komatsuna (one is flowering - but I can eat the flowers so it is good), Chinese cabbage (the one by the fence never headed up - deep shade), broccoli and one kale. My other bed has broccoli, one Chinese cabbage (the other two were picked) and one kale. The brassicas in this bed grew much better then the bigger one. The bigger one was in mostly full shade for the last couple of months. The other got at least some sun. It really appreciates what sun it does get.

The chard is always a favorite of mine. You might notice that something is munching the leaves. I think I'll have to go out and strip the plants tomorrow to prevent more damage. I mentioned to Dan the other day that his red chard had really dark leaves and mine were more green. Well the weather sure has changed that. Now the red leaves are dark red.

I still have some alliums growing. Bunching onions like this are scattered here and there around the garden. Wherever there was a touch of space they got put in. These are in front of the few leeks I have left. It is really sad when your bunching onions are larger than your leeks. The bunching onions are huge and the leeks are smaller.

I've been picking my carrots every week now. I'll keep doing that. I still have about 7' of carrots left. They aren't as big as my spring carrots, but they are still tasty. The Danvers didn't like the conditions much. They grew about one or two inches long at most. Plus they don't taste all that good. They have a bitter edge to them. I won't grow them ever again. The Sugar Snax were great though. These were shorter than the spring carrots too, but most were between 6-8" long.

Last but not least are two crops that were sown very late. My spinach is growing OK. They did much better in the spring. I have a lot of empty spaces here. It is hard to get them to surive the slug attacks, but some did. I haven't made up my mind yet whether to eat them this fall or see if I can get them to survive the winter. The mache has started germinating in patches. I'll have to fill it in next spring. Right now they are tiny little things.

A Switch to Fall Crops

My summer crop harvests have been slowly disappearing. Yesterday I pulled up the first four peppers plants. They had no chance of more peppers so there was no reason to leave them in. I pulled all the bean plants but one. It has four pods left drying. Soon it will be pulled too. The tomatillos still give me a few, but a lot of husks are dropping now that aren't ready. The plant is yellow. Really only the cucumbers and the remaining 8 pepper plants have some life left in them and the cucumber doesn't have much time left. Then again it isn't summer anymore. It is fall and it is time for the fall plants to start being picked.

Once I started I went a bit wild picking them. The first to come up were the leeks. I had two small sections of leeks. I picked the ones over by the chard (which was mercifully spared my picking frenzy). The other one will be left for colder weather.

A few leeks were freaky. One looked red and slightly shriveled. It had some weird fluting around the edges. That one was escorted to the compost pile.

Another was trying to send off little babies from its roots. It wasn't succeeding well. The new shoots were compacted into the outer layer of the mama leek. Above is what it looked like once taken apart. It was usable after a few sections were cut out.

A third succeeded in acting like a multiplier onion. It didn't have any large shoots, but some small ones around the slightly bigger shoot. I've never had leeks act so strange before. I put them in the ground very, very early. Maybe they are doing strange things because it was too early? Next year I'm going to wait to put in my alliums until April.

The leeks were promptly made into leek and potato soup. Yum!

Then I thought that I still haven't tried kale yet. Not ever in my life. I wanted to taste it. So I went to the two plants I have and picked some leaves. Any recommendations on how to prepare it for my first time ever? I have to say the leaves don't really look edible. They seem more like plastic than food.

While I was over by the kale I noticed that my Chinese cabbage heads were firming up. I have five of them all planted on the same day. I thought it would be good to pick one a bit early and harvest them slowly over time. If I wait until they are all as big as they can get, I wouldn't be able to eat them fresh as they would go bad too quickly. So one head got picked. I picked it in the middle of the day, but still it was covered in slugs. I ripped off the outer leaves that were shredded and kept the nice inner leaves. There were a few slugs way in the middle, but very little damage. I did open the whole head up and washed each leaf really well.

Then I figured a few carrots would be a nice addition. I might put some of the Chinese cabbage into a stir fry and carrots would go well.

I probably should have picked one thing and used it before picking another, but I do tend to get carried away. I'm sure by the end of the week it will be all gone except for some of the leeks. This week I'm I'm dreaming of stir fry, oriental salad and potato and leek soup. Yum!

More Spring Planting

This is really a continuation of my last post about what I planted in the garden yesterday. . . After planting my peas I wanted to get all my hardened off transplants into the ground. I measured out the rest of the bed and stuck in labels so I would know where to plant each crop. Labels are an issue for me. Most people have issues because their labels get lost or they can't read them anymore. I have issues because I just don't. I don't label; I don't keep records; I don't remember.

This year I'm really trying to change that. I'm writing things down *gasp* on a printed out record sheet *gasp*. So far I've been keeping up *cheer*. In the hazy past I used to do things like this. As I got to know my garden better over the years, it became less necessary. Last year however I couldn't remember which peas I planted where. It wasn't the only issue, but I've forgotten all the others, so lets just say that as I age, I ought to write things down more. So far so good. And now I have cute little labels on almost everything. The labels remind me of my kids. They are left over popsicle sticks from my kids' crafts projects. It's nice to have the labels bring up memories of little kids now that my kids are gone.

But I digress. I made four rows for my lettuce transplants. I'll put in a row every two weeks. By the time I need the fifth row the first one ought to be empty again. At least that is the plan. Later I'll have five varieties in each row, one of each kind. For now I just have three, two of each. I planted two Red Sails, two Merveille de Quatre Saisons, and one New Red Fire. I did have two transplants of the last one, so just stuck the other in the tea garden. One of the lemon balm plants died and I put the lettuce there. If that lettuce lives great, but I'm not holding my breath.

Oh I didn't label each lettuce variety. So I'm already falling down on the job. Right now I have Red Sails in the back and New Red Fire in the front. Those two plants look identical right now. Though the other is also a red leaf lettuce, its leaves are more rounded so I can tell it apart. The last thing I did for my lettuce was water it in and put a row cover on it. The row cover won't last long, just a couple of weeks, but it will help if we end up with another bad cold snap.

Next to go in where my bunching onions. I had five multiplant blocks of them. I never have a spot for them. They are little orphan plants. I just put them here and there between the other plants. I put two in the lettuce bed between rows. One where I'm putting some coriander, one in the herb garden and hmm I forget where the last one is, but I'm sure I tucked it away somewhere.

My leeks were the last of the transplants to go in. I planted them just as I did when I planted some earlier. My greens and pea bed is finished until the other cold weather crops are ready to go in a a few weeks.

You would think that would be enough to do for the day, but since we had nice weather and some rain predicted for last night and the coming weekend, I also sowed some carrots in the lower bed. I prepared the bed laboriously a week ago. Yesterday I just had to measure the rows out for four kinds of carrots. Yup I labeled each kind: Danvers, Big Top, Atomic Red, Sugar Snax. I covered the seed with some fine soil. Then covered the area with burlap. Now it is just wait and see if they germinate. I often have to resow parts of the rows.

The last two carrots on the above list were bought this year from Pinetree. I'm surprised that Atomic Red, which is an open polliated plant had so few seeds in it. Sugar Snax is a hybrid and looks like it has more (though it could just be because the seed is bigger). Both packages cost the same. Surely it is easier to make open pollinated seed.

It was a long and pleasent day yesterday in the garden planting everything. Now I have a while to watch it grow before the next major planting. I love to look out my dining room window at the garden. This view lets you see everything. The top bed on the left has the lettuce, leeks and peas and will contain my brassicas. The middle bed has the spinach under cover and will be the three sisters garden. The part in front of those two beds is my herb garden. The bottom bed has the carrots and brown burlap. The plastic tunnel at the back is just warming up the soil and holds the rest of my cool weather seedlings. This bed will have all my solanaceae family plants (tomatoes, potatoes, etc) The little bed by the fence is where my garlic and onions are planted. I'm so happy to see the start of the garden. This week we have seen a real change in our weather. We are back to our average temperatures and no longer have weather 10°F degrees below normal. Whoohoo! Things ought to grow well in the low to mid 50°F (12°C).

Rites of Spring

According to my planting schedule my onions were supposed to go in the ground on March 20th, but my trusty weatherman forecast lows in the teens so I waited. Those really low temperatures didn't quite materialize. We only had lows around 22°F (-8°C), but still too cold for my poor little onion seedlings. So I waited. Yesterday we started warming up and the weathermen (I actually look at several sites) agree that for the next week we would hover in the low 50°Fs (10-15°C) for about a week and rarely dip below freezing. We won't be quite as sunny as we have been, but we really need the rain right about now. We are way below our normal rainfall for March. We usually get over four inches of precipitation in March and have only gotten about one so far. We are in need of a good soaking.

Yes checking the weather several times a day is a rite of spring here at Daphne's Dandelions. Other rites include planting the first seed, which happened on St. Patrick's Day, and planting my first transplant. Yesterday that rite was lovely preformed. It started by me getting home from the store tired, but it was only 3:30pm so I wandered into the garden. I didn't change, but was wearing my skirt. I rarely wear anything that can't get garden dirty. This skirt was a stone washed grey peasent skirt made of cotton. I wasn't sure I really wanted to dig, so I just sat in my garden for a while enjoying the sun. I have no chair in my garden so when I say I sit in my garden, I'm right down in the dirt. I checked my spinach that still wasn't up. I put my hands in the dirt and broke up a few winter clods.

After a while I wasn't as tired. It was time. I took the onion packs out. Usually I would water them before planting, but somehow that was forgotten. I started preparing the soil. I forked it without turning it over, just to let a little air down to the root level. I put down a couple of handfuls of fertlizer and raked it over. The sea breeze was a tad nippy, but still it was warm and sunny enough that I took off my jacket while preparing the bed for my onions. The cool breeze felt wonderfully nice.

Then I planted out my onions, Copra, a storage onion, and Tropea, a red onion for fresh eating. I debated spacing. Both Mel Bartholomew and John Jeavons, masters of intensive planting, say to plant onions only 4" (10cm) apart. It seems so close to me. I buy onions that are 4" wide, but then they are the huge sweet onions. The onions I'm planting will probably only be 2-2 1/2" in diameter - 3" if I'm lucky. So I listened. Sort of. I have cells that have one onion in them and some cells that have two onions in them. If one onion needs 4", two need 6" to get about the same square footage. So the multiplanted onions were spaced 6".

I had one 6" space left over to finish a row, so I put a multiplanted soil block of bunching onions in. This had four bunching onions in the block. The blocks are so much easier to plant. The other onions you have to loosen the bottom and try to get the plant out without grabbing the stem (which is really bad for the plant). I've always found the process frustrating. Soil blocks are just plopped right in. No fuss at all.

There was one foot left in the bed. I wasn't going to plant leeks here, but I had them ready to go in and a leftover bed to put them in. I dug two small trenchs, then in the trenchs I dug holes and tried to bury about three inches of the stem. I wasn't perfect at it, but no big deal. I hope the leeks grow big enough before the rain washes all the soil back in. The rows are only 6" apart so there is not much room to put the extra soil.

To finish them off I watered them all in well and topped them off with a row cover. I will mulch them soon, but I want to wait until after a good rain which should be Sunday or Monday.

I contemplated my pea and lettuce bed, but it was 4:45pm and it was starting to get chilly as the sun went down. I wasn't sure I'd finish in time. And as planting peas is also a rite of spring. I'll enjoy that another day.

Monday Seedling Update

I'm still doing my seedling update every Monday since there is no harvest to be had yet. The ground is still frozen. We have gotten three snow storms in the last week, though none very huge, each just a couple of inches. Which is enough to make my back yard pretty again (by covering the frozen dog poo), but not enough to annoy me with too much shoveling.

The onion seedlings got their first haircut a few days ago. I lowered the lights back to their lowest setting. They payed me back by growing back to their old height in just three days. The lights are back to where they started. I see the leaf area near the soil is very yellow, while the ones right against the light are bright green. Hmm I think my LEDs aren't quite intense enough to go very far, or it could just be that they are onions and the bulbing part just never turns as green. The onions keep growing though. They are getting stronger and stronger.

The leeks are also doing well. They are the smaller plants to the left of the onions. They were planted a week after the onions, so it is no surprise they are smaller.

There is no sign of life from my bunching onions or my extra, extra early lettuce. Also not surprising since they were only planted two days ago. I need to learn patience. Opening the top to check for growth on the day after planting is very silly. Or should I call it rampantly optimistic?

Monday Seedling Update

The cute little onion and leeks seedlings are getting stronger. Or at least some of them are. The onions all have their second leaf and are reaching up to the lights. I raised the light last week just a bit to accommodate them. Now they are hitting the lights again. I'll either have to raise the lights again or snip the highest inch off.

I've noticed that some of my seedlings are very strong, and some not quite up to par. I wish I had sown about a third more cells with seed, so I could just pick the strongest. The really weak ones I've pulled out but there are still the almost OK ones. I noticed when I planted those kind of leek seedlings last year they just didn't perform. The strong ones got over an inch in diameter, the weaker ones only got to be pencil width. I'm sure my onions will behave about the same. I need a little more will power to make my onions better, but I also need more onion seedlings.

I'm also still debating with myself what to do with the cells that have more than one strong seedling. I can plant them as a unit. Though I've never done it, supposedly bulbing onions grow fine next to one another. They push each other apart as they grow. Or I can transplant strong seedlings to an empty cell. Hmm decisions, decisions. The part of me that is itching to garden wants to transplant them now - not to mention the obsessive part of me that wants nice neat rows all alike. The scientist in me wants to see what happens when I plant two or three onions right next to one another. I think the scientist part is going to win out, but the gardener part might sneak up the scientist someday while she isn't looking and just do it.

Monday Seedling Update

Phil is telling us that we have six more weeks of winter. Personally I think Phil was more freaked out by all the people than by his shadow. Pennsylvania rodents notwithstanding, New England spring never gets here in February - though I do seem to recall one February day with a high of around 80°F (27°C). I don't remember precisely what happened the day after, but it probably snowed. Spring just doesn't blossom here until March.

So while I wait out our long and unusually snowy winter, I'm growing onion and leek seedlings under my new blue lights. I love how alliums grow. They stick just an elbow up to start before the rest is willing to follow. They are such tentative little seedlings. My leeks are just starting to come up. I've got those little upside down U shapes all over the 12-pack. Their germination is a little more consistent than my onions were. I put them behind my monitor which is the warmest spot in the house right now. The laundry room where my seedlings are is only 50-60°F. Even my cool weather crops like it better when it is not frigid.

My onions have stretched themselves out. They are still reluctant to get rid of the little black seed caps. Not all of my onions have germinated. I have a few empty cells. I'll have to deal with the issue later.

Onion Seedlings

We have had some really frigid temperatures since I planted my onion seed on January 15th. My blog says I planted on the 16th, but it lies. Never trust a blog where you can schedule your posts for another day and the blogger is going on vacation.

Anyway I digress. Our temperatures have been frigid and my poor little twelve-packs have been pressed against the window pane shivering. I don't like to get up on cold days either. I stay under my warm covers and hope it will get warmer. However a few hardy souls popped up on the 22nd. Slowly over time more have been emerging. Yesterday I moved the ones near the window, that had very spotty germination to the back row, where most of the seeds are already up. In the above photo the ones that were in the back are to the right and the ones that shivered are to the left.I'm hoping now that they have moved around the other packs will germinate.

Yesterday I planted my leeks and decided to forego the freezing window in favor of behind my computer monitor. The heat comes up there and it is much warmer. I'm thinking their germination will be quicker. Even cool season crops like lettuce and alliums prefer to germinate in the mid 70°Fs. It isn't worth bringing out my heating mat for them, but I will do that in March when the first warm weather crops get seeded (chili peppers).

Preparing for the Storm

I've been sitting in my family room working in front of the TV. The weatherman keeps telling me about the "wall" of snow that is just about to hit us. It so makes me want soup for lunch. And, lucky me, I have some leeks left from my harvest in November. So Potato and Leek Soup is on the menu. I can smell it simmering from here. Yummy.

That is about as close as I've been getting to the garden recently. It is the busy time for work (don't lecture me about taking vacation in the middle of the season), so I've been just glancing at my seed catalogs. But food is always important and I still have some fresh produce left. Ok I confess, now I just have carrots and a couple of sad green onions left in the fridge. They have been used recently in a Thai fish dish. Most of it was from the store, but the carrots, onions and frozen basil all came from the garden. Whoo hoo.

Last Harvests?

The weatherman was not my friend over the weekend. Our average low for this time of year is about 29F. Enough for the nights to freeze, but to have everything defrost in the sunlight. Fall crops grow well if protected from the freeze-thaw cycle with row covers. However we had been experiencing lows that were about 10F above that. We even had one day where the low was 50F. Things grow fabulously in this weather.

I was thinking I would have fresh lettuce on Thanksgiving. Then the weatherman said the weather pattern was changing. Cold was coming in. We might even have a low in the teens this week. Ack! This is 10F below average and too cold to keep things alive even with the row covers. I'd need a good cold frame to keep my plants growing in this weather. The ground could freeze solid for the year if the weather pattern doesn't break.

So Sunday I went out and harvested the root vegetables: carrots and leeks. I wanted them out of the soil before a total freeze over. Some of the carrots were huge, 1 1/2" in diameter at the top. There were also a lot of deformed ones. I'm guessing nementodes. I perpared the bed exceedly well. I didn't even need a shovel to dig them out. Just pull the tops and out they come. The leeks had both the small and the large. The largest was about 1" in diameter; the smallest was about pencil sized.

Today at noon I decided to go out and pick whatever elese might be ready. The sun doesn't hit the garden until about 1pm so nothing was defrosted. Moisture had condensed on the underside fo the plastic row cover during the previous day. Overnight it had frozen. So as I pulled the cover off, shards of ice flaked off.

The bunching onions were half frozen as was the bok choi. I picked them anyway. I hope they weren't frozen too much to defrost well. The lettuce seemed remarkable unfrozen. I picked most of it. I don't need it yet. I still haven't finished what I picked last week, but with lows in the mid to low 20s and highs in the mid 30s, they won't last very long. I left five plants just in case they survive the cold snap.

Everything else I left. Unless the weather changes back to warm weather, this was probably my last harvest in the garden. No more excitement until the seed catalogs arrive. I can't wait. And speaking of seeds, I have way too many parsly and dill seeds. More than I'll need for next year. If anyone wants some, email me. I'd be happy to ship some out.

Fall Garden Update

This weekend I was busy cleaning up the garden. The dead tomato and pepper plants were pulled out. I chopped up the tomatoes and buried them under the soil. Tomatoes are so disease ridden here. I don't like to put the vines in the compost and spread it around the garden. I leave it in the place they grew. By spring everything will have disappeared into the soil and next year the tomatoes will grow in another spot. I keep a strict 3 year rotation for all my solanaceae crops. I wish I could do a four year rotation, but I like to grow too many of them. And next year I want potatoes too.

While the weather was nice I pulled off the row cover for a few days. The nights were in the 50s all weekend and the days were in the 60s, perfect for my fall crops. They are growing well, but the slugs are competing just as well. One Chinese cabbage (4 plants on the right) has just started to form a head, but the rest won't make it. In fact that one probably won't make it either, but I can always hope. My tatsoi (the large really dark green plants in the front) is doing fabulous. The slugs don't like it as much as my Fun Jen (light green shredded plants) so it is growing huge. I think a stir fry is in order later this week. And as always my mizuna (back left) is doing fabulous, which is par for the course this year. It grew well in the spring, in the summer and now in the fall. I've definitely found a keeper with this plant. It goes in my garden every year from now on.

My first broccoli plant was ready to pick. The head is not huge, but it is obviously at that state where if I don't pick it the flowers will open. There are lots of little florets all along the stem. I hope they have time to grow before everything freezes over. Next year I have to plant earlier. These are just like my Chinese cabbage, planted too late in the season to produce well.

My peas were still growing, but not really producing anymore. The plant handles the freezes just fine, but the flowers don't set well. Powdery mildew has set in and taken over, so it seemed a good time to pull the plants up. I cut them off at ground level and tossed the dying foliage into the compost bin. Spring is really the better season for peas, but fall is such good stir fry weather, I couldn't resist the snowpeas.

Now I have no trellises left in the garden. It looks rather sad and lonely out there. But there are still plants to pick: leeks, carrots, lettuce, broccoli, onions, and all my Asian greens. I probably only have 2-3 weeks left of growing season before everything freezes hard. I'll have to time digging my last carrots up. It would be sad to have them permenently frozen into the ground.

Leeks

Today had two momentous things happen in the garden. The garden has officially been frosted and I picked my first leeks.

I wasn't sure about the frost until I went out for the leeks. But yup the peppers are officially dead. The Sungold tomatoes have been looking pretty bad recently but they still have been producing about 5 tomatoes every day. No more. I need to find a warmish day to go out and pull them.

The poor garlic bed, with one garlic leaf popping up out of the soil, was actually frozen over. The ground was hard as a rock. Yes I did say the ground. I hadn't mulched the garlic yet. I've been avoiding the garden because its been so cold and windy. I confess. I've been a slacker in the garden recently. There just isn't much to do, so I've been doing nothing. I have rectified the situation and gave the garlic a nice hay mulch.

The bed the leeks were in - just two feet over - hadn't frozen, so they were easy to dig out. I didn't pick many, only three. The recipe I was making only called for one, but the leeks were so small. The largest was only 1" in diameter. While I was out I picked some green onions. I've been wanting them while cooking for the last couple of days, but I just couldn't bring myself to go out and pick them. Too cold.

I used the leeks to make Cheesy Delicata Squash and Potato Soup. I hadn't planned to make it, but I had just pulled a tray of Delicata squash out of the oven and was reading Jennifer's blog while I was waiting for them to cool. She had a new recipe for cooking my favorite squash. Of course I had to try it. I made it with real cheese however and soy milk since I've never even heard of hempmilk before. It was good, but it still doesn't trump plain leek and potato soup.