Cucumbers, Peas, and Amaranth

I keep my cucumbers under a row cover when they are young. The cucumber beetles around here can be vicious. And wilt is common. So it gives the cucumbers a head start all safe and sound. Eventually the beetles will show up as will the wilt they carry, but for their early life they are protected. I took the covers off on Monday. Some of the cukes were starting to run. I like to grow mine up a trellis, so that had to be constructed.

In past years I've had a very vertical trellis, but this year I built it on a bit of a slant. I'm hoping it will be easier to find the cucumbers amid the foliage. I know it is a futile effort. I will miss picking some cukes. But it can't hurt.

The zukes behind the cukes were trying to burst out of their row cover, but it is still squash vine borer season, and I've seen several of them recently. So I rearranged them and added a separate row cover for the biggest one.

I had peas blooming in two spots, but since I can't eat peas and I want more greens, I've decided to rip them out. This spot mostly was done with its first flush. The harvests all went to my townhouse mates.

The other spot was near the parsley and celery. Since I had planted two extra celery plants and they were in the way, I harvested them. I'm surprised at how well they are doing now. I've never had such nice celery so early in the season. The beds were seeded with amaranth, both a green and red variety. I also started just a few upstairs under lights. The red ones have already sprouted, but not the green ones.

While I was near the parsley I noticed that the plants were getting huge. If I don't pick the leaves they turn yellow and die, so I picked the oldest ones and dehydrated them. I use a lot of dehydrated parsley over the winter. It isn't as good as fresh, but it isn't bad. I'll freeze some too later on.

Whats in a Name?

So green!

I always hate when they change the name of a family. The Apiaceae family will forever be the Umbelliferea family to me. I have a bed of miscellaneous Apiaceae in one bed. I love their different green textures.

The fennel has been slowly sizing up. I pick a few each week to use in my salads. Since these were sort of self sown - I tossed old seed heads on the bed - the plants are way too close together. So eating is my way of thinning. Eventually I'll let some of them go and flower.

The celery on the other hand were sown indoors and spaced fairly far apart. Celery hasn't done so well for me in the past. I've gotten the plants to grow but they never produced that much. This year I have a lot more plants and I've given each one ore space. They are growing better. I've started harvesting the outer most stalks. each week. So far they have been small, but the newer stalks are getting much bigger.

Also in the bed is some celeriac that won't be harvested until fall. But the parsley right near it is doing very well. I pick a few leaves every couple of days to use in the kitchen. I keep a bouquet of them on the counter so I have some fresh during dinner. I find I'm more apt to use it if it is always there.

I'm obviously not the only one to like this family of plants. I've got a small praying mantis patrolling for bugs. I've seen them here and there in the garden earlier on when they were tiny. It is nice to see them growing. I also saw one in the raspberry patch today. When they get full sized they will freak me out a bit. They do get huge. And they look so much like sticks from a distance that I won't notice them until I'm almost touching them. Gack! But I love them anyway. They are such cool creatures.

I do have a plant from another family in this bed. The peas which are in the Fabaceae family. Again they changed the name on me. The name legumes are in common usage here, but it is no longer Leguminosae. Why oh why do they do that? Since I can't eat the peas, they are going to be pulled out. I was just waiting for some seeds to show up.

And they did today. I wanted some amaranth seed. Ones that were bred for greens and not flowers. Though I'm sure their flowers are pretty enough. I've been wanting to try them. I figured if they had calliloo in their names they would make good greens. I've had calliloo in the Caribbean, but most of the time they made it with dasheen leaves. I wanted to know what dasheen looked like and one of my guides pointed out the plants. I'd always called them taro and hadn't a clue until then that you could eat the leaves too. I always thought it was a root vegetable.

I think tomorrow I'll get out and plant my seeds. Though I'm still contemplating starting them indoors first. I could always do it both ways and see what works. I have absolutely no experience with these plants. I just hope I can keep them small enough. The packet says three feet apart, but they are talking about for seed. Hopefully if I keep cutting it, it will stay smaller. Or I can start new ones on occasion. If anyone has any hints, let me know.

Feels Like Summer

Beds 1 to 3

We have had a long stretch of warm weather here and it is forecast to go on for about another week. Yesterday it got up to 89F which is about 20F above the average for this time of year. I'm hoping today we don't get quite as high as yesterday. 70Fs would be really nice. In addition we haven't been getting our usual rain. We have had maybe an eighth of an inch in two weeks. So I found the sprinkler and watered the garden. Even with that, the poor Asian greens looked a bit wilty in the afternoon heat.

Beds 3 to 8

Since it has been so warm recently the soil has gotten hot. Usually I don't sow corn until mid May as germination in cold soil is iffy. Well the soil is not cold at all. So I soaked some seed overnight and planted it yesterday afternoon. I only planted one bed - Bed 3W. I have two open right now and five total will get planted once the other crops have been picked (spinach and baby Asian greens). I figure the next one will get planted in a week or two. I want the last set of corn to be planted in mid June. My mom is visiting in August and loves corn. I think that last planting will be ready when she is here. I've got my fingers crossed.

I always do a two sisters planting with corn. The other is squash. I put the seed in a container to sprout indoors and once it does I'll plant it outside. This patch will get some Upper Ground Sweet Potato Squash. It gives large squash that looks a bit like a pumpkin. I'm hoping I like it. Like all squash I plant it is a C. moschata so it is resistant to the vine borer. Supposedly the vines are pretty aggressive. I'll see if I can keep it in bounds and see if it plays nicely enough under the corn with the butternut that will be planted at the other end when I plant up Bed 3E. Waltham butternuts do very well here. Squashes for me have to be able to grow under the corn and thrive, or they aren't worth it. They have to produce before it gets too cold. Our season isn't all that warm or long compared to the south or farther inland. They have to store well. They have to taste good. And the yield can't be low. I've got my fingers crossed with the two squashes that I'm trialing this year.

Circle garden

I noticed that the cilantro isn't coming up much this year. Usually it just volunteers for me. It didn't set enough seed last year I think. So I was out and sowing some in the flower bed near the driveway. I use a lot of cilantro over the year and a decent amount of coriander. So I need to get some plants up and going. It is late for it though. I doubt I'll get much of a leaf harvest especially if the weather stays hot. But even if I only get seed that would be something.

In addition I put in the second succession of peas. I'm just growing them for pea sprouts or I would have put them in ages ago. My first sowing is growing really slowly this year. The row cover next to it is really blocking the light. Except in the morning and late afternoon the light has to get through two layers of it to get to the peas. The peas aren't in a row cover, just behind it. Next year I ought to put them at the other end of the bed so they will grow better.

Growth

This week has been below normal in temperatures, but it hasn't stopped the garden from popping up in growth. This is especially true of the spinach in the Circle Garden. A week ago I might have found a leaf or two to pick. Today once it warms up from its low of 34F (1C), I'll get to go out and make my first picking. I'm dancing with joy over that.

The lettuce on the other hand is just sitting there this week. It has made some progress but not enough to want to harvest anything from it. You can tell it has been cold as the Red Sails lettuce is all red. When it gets warmer it will be a lot greener.

Right next to the lettuce are my radishes. They have all popped up. I've thinned them out to about 4". That is enough space for them to grow quickly this spring. I could have left them closer, but I didn't. Impatience for my crops is winning out.

Off in the main part of the garden (going from bed 8 to bed 1), the peas have started to come up. Really I saw the first little green bits a week ago. I see more now, but they haven't really unfurled. They are being slow.

In the same bed but under cover my turnips are coming up. Around them are my Chinese cabbages that are doing well. I like to put the turnips down the middle as the cabbages take up so much space, but when they are young they don't. I'll have to get in and thin those turnips soon. I probably won't give them as much space as I did my radishes. These will mature in spurts over time.

I have spinach coming up in a lot of beds, but the best is the one by the brick path. The beds closer to it are always warmer and it isn't just the bricks. They get more sun here. I can even see little tiny true leaves starting to form. There is good germination in one of the other beds too, but one is being slow about it. The ground was still frozen 4" down in parts of that bed when they were planted. So it is taking a while to warm up. The warmer parts are sprouted but the parts closest to the fence are not. But spinach I've found doesn't rot out easily. So they will be up when the ground is warm enough.

The allium bed is doing very well. The garlic all came up. And the onions that I planted a little over a week ago are starting to break dormancy.

I think the hard winter really hurt the kale. I'm still going to get a decent harvest from the dwarf curly kale as it is so hardy.

The Winterbor kale didn't fare as well. A couple died outright. The tops of all of the plants died. But I cut the dead parts off and the rest of the stems are starting to sprout leaves. I'm not sure what the harvest will be, but I'll at least get some kale raab. But that is weeks away.

And last but not least, my best hope for early harvests - my baby Asian greens. They always do so well in the spring. Except for the few larger plants they were put in a week an a half ago. And even with our cooler temps this week, they have kept growing well.

I have other things in the garden growing too. The carrots started sprouting a couple of days ago. So they have taken two weeks to germinate. Some years it is three. The umbelliferae bed is growing slowly and the fennel has started to sprout. The broccoli and other brassicas are doing very very well under their row covers. The chard is surviving. It survives quite well at these temperatures, but it doesn't like them. It wants warmer weather. Which it will get come Wednesday. It looks like that is the turning point to better weather. At least for a short time.

Planting Peas

Today I got out to plant my peas. Usually I do them as a double row along the long back of the bed. But I don't need as many peas as I can't eat them. I'm just going to eat the pea shoots. So I'm planting them in two separate patches along the short end of the bed. The first patch was three short rows. I'm not sure if doing three rows 6" apart is a mistake or not. I won't know until they grow if I can get in to pick them well enough.

I put some nitrogen fixing microbes in with them as I do every year - well every year that I remember. But also this year I wanted to try out some mycorrhizal fungi. But to test I only put it on the northwest side of the bed. If the north side grows a lot better I'll have to keep doing it.

I did the same test with some lettuce. Today I planted the two bottom rows and the bottom most one (again the northwest side so I wouldn't forget) has the mychorrhizae on their roots. The other one doesn't. I have a feeling that right now the soil is too cold for the fungi to really grow, but it will be warming up in no time.

The last thing to get planted was the Asian greens. The pretty celery and parsley on the right side of the flat sadly must wait a bit longer for the ground to thaw out more. Hopefully it will be soon. But the Asian greens joined the earlier planted ones in the bed. The endomycorrhiza does not grow on any of the brassica family, so I couldn't expand my experiment.

I've got some more Asian greens and other brassicas hardening off on my back steps. So the next round is soon to join this round. Usually plantings don't come this quickly together, but the seedlings needed to stay indoors longer than normal. I tend to like brassica seedlings to grow no more than 2.5 to 3 weeks before being hardened off. But Mother Nature doesn't always cooperate with me.

Goodbye Peas, Hello Beans

Peas are interesting. Their harvests come in waves. Some years I get three waves of peas before they need to be pulled out. Each wave of peas is half the size of the previous one. The peas are smaller each time. And sometimes they are deformed or diseased. But mostly the extra waves past the first are worth it. Sadly this year with the late spring, I only had time to let one wave produce. They need to be out by the 15th or the fall brassicas won't have enough time. If any had been in bloom I would have let them stay, but here were no flowers and no buds. It would probably take another week or so to get that second wave starting, which would be too late. Plus we had 90F degree temperatures foretasted for the week. Peas do not like hot temperatures. So it was time to rip them out.

Considering the single wave of snap peas, the weight of the harvest wasn't too bad. Last year I harvested 12 pounds. This year just under 11 pounds. Not too bad. Of course it is the worst pea harvest I've ever had. The best was the year without winter (2012). I harvested 20 pounds that year. The year before was almost 19 pounds. This year I'm not saving any pea seed as I want to see if new seed will help with the production. But I'm not really complaining much this year as I had plenty to share with my townhouse mates and gave a lot to another friend. I still have a pound or two in my fridge. They keep pretty well, so I'll dole them out over the next couple of weeks to add a little variety and sweetness to my meals.

Once the peas were gone the half closest to the fence was planted in Kentucky Wonder pole beans. They will be my fall beans. The closer half still needs the carrots in that bed to be pulled before I can plant the fall brassicas. Those I want to give more time to. Some are still sizing up. But it won't be long. I need them out by the end of the week, or when the storage carrots start to germinate (I'll move over the row cover), whichever comes first.

Bad Sprinkler

Yesterday was the first day I watered the garden as a whole. I put a big sprinkler on top of an upside down trash can (to get over the foliage). Sadly I did not remember that I NEED to put bricks on the side to keep it up there. When I found it on its side, the onions had been dug up.

But did I learn my lesson. Oh no I did not. I put one brick to keep it from falling on that side and it fell on the other digging up some carrots. I repaired the onions as best I could. But I harvested the carrots. They are Mokum carrots and nicely sweet.

The peas have started to come in so I've started to eat them. I haven't tried them since taking all the legumes out of my diet. I hope I don't get sick on them. I so love snap peas.

Trellises and Pests

Yesterday I put the strings on my trellises. The fava beans get a grid pattern to hold them upright in the wind. As they grow I'll put more layers onto the grid. Eventually I'll have three. The peas have one that is two dimensional. Just lines of string between the T-posts. I'll have to force them on it though. They would really rather climb up the carrot row cover than up the trellis.

While I was weeding the carrots I noticed a couple of spots that had plants like this. It is a classic sign of the cutworm. Cutworms hide just under the soil near where they pull in their stolen leaves. So I rooted around in the soil until I found them and then squished them. They really took down a lot of the carrots, but I wasn't paying enough attention. I should be more careful.

I'm also noticing some root maggot damage in the cabbage patch. I cover to keep those flies out, but obviously I wasn't 100% successful. The two plants that are wilting might live but I doubt it. Sadly such things are all too normal and I'm sure they won't be the last plants to bite the dust this year.

Today I was out weeding just to be outside and decided the lettuce was big enough to plant. This is my third secession so far this year. I hope I keep it up, but the odds are I'll forget about it at some point and then the lettuce will be over. Maybe tomorrow I'll get the next succession started.

Strawberries and Peas

No photos today. I was rushed to get some gardening in yesterday and I never even thought about photos.

Thursday my strawberry plants showed up on my doorstep. I had ordered Surecrop strawberries. I have some disease in the strawberry bed. Last year I got barely any strawberries. I figured Surecrop might be able to out grow the disease. Sadly most of the strawberry diseases that it might be will stick in the soil for years (a decade even). So removing them and waiting isn't an option. If I can't find a variety that will grow here, then I can't have strawberries. That would be so sad. I love strawberries. One variety that I have - Earliglow - has decent resistance. We will see if they do OK this year. They produced a bit last year. Sadly the Sparkle is susceptible to a lot of things. I still have a few plants of that which seem to be doing OK. I'm not going to rip them out, but if they fail again this year, I will.

I also prepared one more 4'x 8' bed. This has peas along the back foot of the bed and mixed herbs and greens in the front. I planted 4 Ventura celery, 4 Tango celery, 4 celeriac, 6 fennel, 12 lettuces (Red sails, Deer Tongue, Little Gem, and Paris Island), 4 parsley plants, and 4 marjoram. I also scattered some winter savory around the garden. I hope some of it tastes like it is supposed to. Last year the one plant that survived tasted like lemons. I suppose that isn't a terrible thing, but it wasn't what I was going for.

I'm running out of transplants. I have three things left that I grew from seed. I have chard, broccoli, and zinnias. I'm going to try to get to them on Sunday and Monday. I also have to start my basil plants. Basil is the only summer plant that I grow inside as a transplant. Though I suppose the zinnias probably count too. I never really noticed it before but all my summer plants (corn, beans, cucumbers, melons, squash, sweet potatoes) I either direct seed or they don't grow from seeds. OK only the sweet potatoes don't grow from seeds. I know a lot of people start the summer crops indoors, but I've never done that. Sometimes I chit the seed, but that is far as I go for those seeds anymore. They are just too easy to direct seed and I've found that getting the early start really doesn't help them all that much.

Weeping Plum

Yesterday a package showed up at my door. It was my Weeping Santa Rosa Plum tree that I ordered last winter. I'm a bit under the weather right now as I have the flu, but that didn't stop me from going out to plant it. I don't have a lot of space in the yard for more trees. But this one is a small plum it only gets 8'-10' tall. It doesn't produce quite as well as a Santa Rosa but most people think the plums are tastier. It isn't supposed to require a pollinator which is good as I don't have another Japanese plum.

The space I'm growing it in is just three feet wide and the first half foot doesn't really have any soil as it is by the brick path. But it has a nice long area it can spread out into. So I put the roots going along the long part. This section used to contain my self seeding sunflowers. But I've grown a little bored by them especially since I don't really eat sunflower seeds all that much. I was really just feeding the annoying squirrels. I probably will have one sunflower growing though near the corner of the house. At least if the transplant takes.

I'm not going to prune it like a normal tree. It really has to grow linearly so it doesn't block the path. I'm going to try to prune it to two side branches that stay over the bed and not in the path. So it will be interesting to see if I can do it. Trees always reach for the sun which would be the direction of the path. I've put in some T-posts that I'll use to train the main branches and keep the tree growing upright. But I'm not putting in a full trellis. Hopefully it will work.

I figured that I wouldn't want to be outside long as I was coughing and the weather was cool. But my lungs seemed to like it so I did another chore that I hadn't gotten around to.

I wrap up my bamboo in the fall to keep it dry and put it on one of the beds for storage. I had to take it apart and put the poles by the shed so I can use them when I need them. This small chore left my muscles aching and me very tired. I really shouldn't be working outside with the flu. So I spend a few minutes exploring the garden before going in.

The good weather earlier really warmed up the soil and my peas are starting to come up. I'll have to take the netting off soon so they don't get tangled.

The radishes came up a few days ago. I'll have to thin them out soon. Though I didn't sow them too thickly so it shouldn't be too much of a chore.

My romaine lettuce has really grown well. If it would warm up again (and it is supposed to), it won't be long before I can steal a little.

And I was ecstatic to see how well this sage was doing. Sage doesn't like to grow here for some reason. So I think I put five plants in the garden last year. I was hoping to find a place that it would be happy. I seem to have found two places where the sage is growing well. Which is good. I ran out of sage the other day and really need to be able to pick more. This seems really healthy and pickable. I was afraid I'd have to go buy it.

Unfrozen

Well the ground is starting to unfreeze. It unfreezes from the brick path and works its way toward the neighbor's fence. I was being optimistic and uncovered the whole length of the pea bed and fertilized. Then I started to turn the soil over. Well the first 9' were unfrozen. So I decided to at least plant half of the bed.

Don't you just love that people take photos of their dirt this time of year. I have no real pretty plants to show you, so I show you the dirt that I planted in. It does show you that I put in my supports before I seed. Putting them in after destroys roots so I like to get them in early. I only plant peas in a one foot strip along the back of the bed. You can see that I've sloped the soil to catch the sun. I'm hoping it warms up faster that way. Right now it is pretty cold. But the peas can handle it. They take longer to germinate in cold soil and occasionally the insects find them before the plant get get established, but usually it works out well.

Yes more dirt. I planted my fava beans too. This year I went with even wider spacing than last year. I planted every 12 inches in a grid. I use a soil innoculant - at least when I remember. And I did remember this year. It really helps the plants grow well. I use it on the peas too. Usually you need different strains for different plants, but I use one that has a wide mix of rhizobial strains so I can just buy one and use it on everything.

I'm so excited. My first seeds are in the ground. The weather looks promising. From now on, everyday that I have time and the weather is decent, I'll be out preparing the soil and getting more seeds in the ground. I still need to plant carrots in front of the peas. And the spinach when that bed defrosts. And radishes and turnips. These can all be put out pretty much as soon as the soil defrosts. For plants I have my onions, first lettuces, and first baby Asian greens almost ready to be planted. I can't wait until I can pick these. Not even H-mart had mizuna for sale around here. Last year it was my favorite plant. I wonder which one will be this years favorite? Every year it seems to change.

Three Sisters

The Leaning Tower of Beans

This week has been all about the three sisters. The above sister, beans, is sadly grown without its other sisters in my garden. I tried a lot to make the three sisters work. But this sister wouldn't play well with her siblings. She would grow up the corn and smoother everything in its path.

Especially this one above. The Trail of Tears beans is an aggressive grower and will trample anything in its path. It is also a great producer and I just love black beans. So I grow it every year. The other dried beans come and go, but this one is always here. I've been picking dried beans for a while now. When I have a bag I shell them in front of the TV. Today I picked a large bag of Trail of Tears and Mexican Pinto.

The next sister, corn, was indeed planted with its sibling, squash. We had raccoons in the garden, but they didn't steal one ear of corn. We got to eat it all. I had heard that raccoons don't like the prickly squash, but I hadn't seen it before. As you see the corn stalks have been chopped down. They are now in the compost. We ate 4 ears of corn every day we were home for dinner. There were lots more, but I could tell the corn was going to start to get old too fast.

So they all got picked, blanched.

And frozen. I have seven one cup bags. I'm thinking a salad of beans, corn, and squash would be good.

The butternut squash is all alone out there right now. I've got eight big squash set on the earliest planted squash. And five in the second bed that was planted later. They have powdery mildew right now. I still hope the later ones can set more. They may or may not be able to ripen at this point, but I can hope.

In other exciting news the snap peas are just starting to ripen. Yum.

And do you see my new garden helper under the bean plants in the path? My daughter is home for a year. She was out helping me pick beans. Kronos the dog was chewing on the dill plants I'd ripped up. I think my daughter was more help. At least Kronos is easy to train. Is is very biddable and smart at the same time. Last year when he visited he learned to stay on the paths the first day I tried training him. He remembered when he came back. Of course it helps that there are plants in the beds now. Last time the empty beds were just so tempting to run through.