Problems and Failures

You have to be a pretty optimistic person to garden. Taking a tiny seed and expecting it to become a four pound cabbage takes a lot of faith in mother nature. Every time I plant, I believe in that miracle. I never lose the wonder when it does grow, but sometimes we have failures. They aren't uncommon. Either our own mistakes get us or nature deals the blow. This week I had a some of both. Nothing devastating like the year the earwigs ate all the silks off my corn (only once, and never before or since thank goodness). Or the year the groundhog ate all my winter squash. Ouch. But this week had quite a list of little problems.

Turnips under a good row cover

Turnips seem to be getting the brunt of it right now. You know how I was doing such a good job with my succession sowing? Well this week I totally forgot until Sunday. I'm supposed to plant every Monday. Whoops! Well one week missed is not the end of the world. But for the poor turnips that wasn't all.

Turnips elsewhere struggling

At my last house I had a lot of issues with flea beetles, but they have been pretty mild here. They exist but don't do a lot of damage. Until now. They are doing enough damage to kill some of my newly sprouted turnips.

I don't spray here (except soap when the aphids get bad on the kale and broccoli), so my only recourse is to try to catch them. I won't catch them all, but the hope is to get enough that the damage won't hurt the plants too much. I brush the plants trying to get them to hop in the soapy water. I'll leave some of these bowls near the damaged plants. Over time some will die. Every day I'll chase more in. Hopefully it will be good enough.

In the other half of the bed with the turnips are my parsnips. Not many parsnips. Half the bed barely germinated and the half that was better is by no means full. I no longer have time to resow parsnips. They just take too long. If I had seed I'd use half that section to sow in amaranth. I've never grown that before. I think next year I'll try it. I could do mizuna but those flea beetles would probably take them down too. Maybe I should inter sow carrots. They have plenty of time. I will have two other carrot beds in the fall though. Will that be too many carrots? Is there such a thing as too many carrots? The issue with carrots is their germination is just as problematic as parsnips. I usually use a doubled over row cover on the soil to keep it moist. I can't do that with the parsnips growing. I could use one layer, or maybe just try without and hope. I'd have to water a lot.

Basil was one of the worst failures. I planted in three spots to try to avoid the basil downy mildew. That worked last year. One section went down fast, but the other was mildew free for most of the year. All three spots got hit already. So they all got taken out. Sigh. I did get a small harvest from the last one out. It was enough to dry so I can make Italian seasonings for this coming year, but not enough for much else. I do still have time to start again. Do I want to?

Chard bed

I love chard. It is such a good grower. I'm always amazed at the harvests I get from a small patch every year. One plant got pulled as it looked like it was starting to get diseased. I grow Argentata and it seems to handle the diseases we have around here. But safer to pull the bad one that isn't resisting so it won't spread. Also one end was getting holes in the leaves. I have this trouble every year. The earwigs take up residence in the centers and eat holes out of the youngest leaves. They can take a plant down if they get too numerous, though they usually don't.

Earwigs freak me out a little, but in the garden they can be a help and an hindrance depending on the crop. They are omnivores so eat other insects but if they like the crop they also eat that. I just don't grow Napa cabbage anymore because of the damage they do to that. Michihili cabbage works better. Sometimes they get in, but not as much. For chard I go on a search and destroy mission with my knife. They hide where the leaf meets the stem. I poke the tip of the knife down in there to get them. I won't get them all the first time. I'll go out for the next few days to get the rest. Then keep vigilant for the rest of the season. I used to mulch the chard to keep the leaves clean, but I found the earwigs had too many places to hide then.

The last one is in the Michihili/kohlrabi bed. Luckily it wasn't earwigs this time. Nope they started to bolt on me. I picked one earlier in the week that had started to bolt. Well I didn't check them for a couple of days and the next one did. So I picked them all. I was kind of hoping I wouldn't have to until next week. I'd probably be able to tell if my sauerkraut was working for me by then.

Chinese cabbage ready for the fridge

I stored most of them in the fridge. I wrap them in a damp flour cloth towel and just leave them in the main part. They are way too big to fit into anything. They are 20" long and have to go sideways in the fridge. They store pretty well. I can keep them fresh for about a month and a half to two months, but the problem is they take up so much space. And the other side of the bed is the kohlrabi. I think I have 15 or 16 of them in there. Some of them have sized up already and need to be picked soon. Winner doesn't get woody fast, but they are hard to cut when they get really large just because of their size.

And remember at the beginning of the month when I had the groundhog incursion? Well I shored up the defenses and it seems to be working. He hasn't come back. Most of the beans that he lopped off died, but four of them might make it. They have some tiny little green growth were the cotyledon leaves used to be. And the four seeds that I had left and replanted have come up and are growing pretty well. So I put up the strings to the trellis. The two plants that he didn't touch are growing strong and climbing the trellis supports. I think it was the trellis itself that saved them as they were behind the metal and harder to get to. So at least there is some good news there. My beans are recovering to an extent.

Kale to Parsnips and Turnips

Spring planted Red Russian kale

For the first time this year I'm growing spring planted kale. It is going very well so far. I've had the first harvest from one side of the bed. I'll harvest the other side this week.

Overwintered kale

Usually I just have overwintered kale that bolts really quickly. I don't mind that as kale blossoms are so good. But the hard winter is leaving the plants pretty weak. The blossom shoots are getting really spindly, so it was time to take them out.

Oh and did you notice the little white flowers in front of the kale? Those are mache. This is the last year I'm growing them. I just don't get much of a crop for the amount of work I put in with them. Most of what is overwintered is too ragged to eat in the spring and the new growth doesn't last long enough before they bloom. And what is there is so tiny it drives me crazy to pick it.

Molly the cat keeping the compost area free of mice

So I pulled the whole bed. I forked up the bed to aerate it. I fertilized and raked it smooth. And sifted a wheelbarrow of compost to cover it in. While I was at it I finished sifting the rest of the compost to empty the bin. All the finished compost is in one of my black composters awaiting the next time I need it. And I now have an empty pallet bin which is good as all my others are full.

I planted the bed up half with parsnips under a row cover to keep the soil moist as they sprout, and half with the start of some turnips. I made ten rows for the turnips and will seed two rows every Monday. Well that is the plan. You all know that it doesn't always happen. So far my successions have gone well though. I'm hoping the when the sixth Monday comes up the first rows I seeded will be ready to come out. Turnips are not like radishes though. Radishes come right on schedule for me. Turnips ripen here and there. So I'm guessing I'll be picking some, but not others and I'll have a gap in the sowing. But that is fine. As soon as it empties I'll start the rotation again.

I'm a bit worried about the turnips. I had uncovered kale in this bed. I could see a horde of root maggot flies hovering around. They must be able to smell all the kale roots. I tried to shoo as many away as I could, but I'm sure I missed some. I might have maggoty turnips. I'll go out again before they sprout and do some more shooing. Maybe it will work. Just parsnips would be a much better rotation, but parsnips are still experimental and I don't want to use a full bed on them. And I really want more turnips.

Emptying the Beds

These last few days were busy in the garden. We are expected to get a good freeze on Friday and Saturday nights. The ground may or may not thaw out again this year, so I needed to get all those root crops out of the ground.

Tuesday was beautiful so I wanted to get a good chunk of the carrots done. I got half of them picked and stored. I did the rest today. I'm not going to talk about that much as I'll do a carrot post soon.

Wednesday I cleaned up the broccoli bed and picked the last broccoli. I didn't put compost on that bed because if I can get a chance this year before it all freezes up, I want to double dig the bed. Afterwards it will get its share of compost. I also cleaned up the celery and celeriac section of one bed (the rest had already been cleaned out). Of the four celeriac plants I put in during the spring, only two survived. And one had a rotten root. So I harvested just one rather small bulb. I hope it was worth it. I'm fairly sure the seed was contaminated with celery mosaic virus. And then it spread to my celery plants. I'm not too happy about that as mosaic virus never goes away. If I try it again I'll get it from a different seed source.

Also on Wednesday I did a lot of cleaning up. The bamboo poles got put in their silver tarp to protect them from the wet over the winter. The freeze thaw would pretty much destroy them, and I don't want to put them in the basement, so every year they get wrapped in a tarp and put on top of the early corn bed. I like that bed because I won't need it until May, so the poles can stay there a long time if necessary. I removed the hose and reel from the front yard and did the garden area hose late today once all the roots were harvested and cleaned. In addition to the hoses all the filters, flow controllers, and sprinklers were put in the basement. All the little things like knives, scissors, and trowels (which I keep all over the garden) where put away in the shed. Except where it is still protecting the soil (from the cats) all the rebar was put in the shed too along with the short bamboo poles. The shed isn't tall enough for my big poles.

Today in addition to the second half of the carrot bed, I picked the parsnip bed.

It had parsnips, turnips, and beets. The parsnips did just OK. I had a few really good ones. Most were small. I have some rot in the ground that turns the outside orange. Usually it is just skin deep which is good, but I'm guessing they won't last long in storage.

The turnips were also small. They probably had enough time, but the parsnips were right next to them and were so big they blocked the sun. I'm a little surprised they grew as well as they did. I didn't get a lot, but I'll appreciate what I have. Next year I'll grow the parsnips in a square block and leave the other half of the bed for turnips. This year the parsnips were down the middle of the bed. This was a problem for two reasons. During the early season, the early turnips shaded a lot of the parsnips out. And during the later season the parsnips shaded the next seeding of turnips out. I think 4' x 4' blocks of each will work much better.

So I think I'm all set for the cold spell to hit. I have just three beds in production now. The spinach bed, the kale bed, and the bok choy/chard bed. And my refrigerator is full of root vegetables, mainly carrots. Hopefully later this week I'll get a post up about those carrots. But for now I'll just say they did really well. They are my favorite of the root crops. So I'm happy even if the others weren't all that stellar.

Make Hay While the Sun Shines

OK no hay and it wasn't sunny today, but for the last three days we have had progressively warmer weather. Today we had a high of 65F. After today it is getting colder again. So I figured I needed to get my butt in gear and do some chores while it was warm. Sunday really inspired me when I had to go out and pick carrots in the snow. I decided then to find the warmest days to get things done. I made myself a list and kept adding to it.

First off where those pesky carrots. I'd been picking a handful whenever I needed them. But I decided they weren't getting any better and they store really well in the fridge. So on Monday I picked half of them. I was going to pick more, but it really wasn't warm yet. I did get to the rest today.

While I was at it I checked out the parsnips and turnips from my experimental bed. I say experimental because I'd never grown parsnips before and I planted them late. I wasn't sure if they would produce at all. They did, not fabulously, but not too bad either. I will be eating parsnips this winter just not a lot of them.

Yesterday I got around to picking all the parsley and cilantro. Though I pulled the parsley plants, I left the cilantro. That bed won't get cleaned up anyway since they are in the middle of the kale. And they might survive the winter. Not likely but they did one year. Once they were inside I washed, chopped, and froze them. When they are thawed they don't have a good texture anymore, but the taste is still there. So they get added to sauces and meatballs and such.

I removed the last of the row covers and got the bad ones tossed out and the good ones put away. And do you see that compost pile. It is much taller than the photo. It is getting out of control, but I don't have another bin right now to put the excess into, so it just keeps getting taller as I clean up.

I only have six and a half beds still with things in them. Whatever got cleaned up, was covered with a layer of compost, except that one bed right next to the broccoli. I'm thinking of double digging that bed and its neighbor with the broccoli next week. Double digging is a good chore when it is colder since I'll be working up a sweat.

Chores Completed

• Replace battery on the weather station
• Tie kale up to stakes
• Tie rose to arbor (my husband said it was having a bad hair day)
• Remove last of row covers and store
• Clean up fennel and lettuce bed
• Put seed heads of fennel on Bed 7 (next year's fennel bed)
• Compost decorative corn stalk by door
• Harvest fresh eating carrots and store, clean up bed
• Pick parsley and cilantro and freeze
• Clean up two patches of zinnias
• Make front garden map (for the new perennial bed so I can do some planning)
• Make applesauce

Chores Todo before the ground freezes

• Harvest everything except bok choy
• Blanch and freeze kale
• Taste test storage carrots
• Blanch and freeze some of carrots, store others in various ways
• Freeze celery
• Double dig Bed 6
• Collect leaves

And I did one other thing today, but I'll write about it in a separate post as this one is long enough.

Clearing Out and Planting Up

Yesterday I showed you the bed I had my lettuce in. If you were looking, you would have noticed that I also had a lot of dill in the bed. I never plant dill anymore. It volunteers everywhere and is quite a weed. I didn't weed it out of the bed as I wanted to pick and dehydrate it. As I was picking I noticed one black swallowtail caterpillar munching on the dill. They are really common here and I often have to move them to another plant when I need to clear a bed. This one though was on some dill in the path, so I just let it be. It won't be long before this bed is all planted up with melons but for now it gets to wait. We have a two day cold spell and I'll wait to start melons once it is over.

I did want to plant up one bed though, the old kale bed. But first I had to harvest the last of the kale blossoms and rip the old plants out.

Between the plants I had some cilantro growing. I debated with myself over whether to pull it or try to plant around it. Since I was planting parsnips in that location I decided I'd better just pull it to eat small. I really wanted to loosen the soil up for the long rooted parsnips. I've never grown parsnips before and don't know if I've given them enough time, but I'd love to have more things for winter storage or maybe early spring picking. I didn't have any beds available for them earlier.

In the middle of the bed I planted parsnips. On one side I planted a mix of mizuna, salad turnips (will they grow in the summer?) and beets. The other side I'm leaving empty for a succession crop. I put a doubled over old row cover on top of the soil to help keep it moist and to keep the soil in place the next couple of days. We have wet weather predicted, though I don't think any really heavy rains are in the forecast. From what I hear parsnips take a long time to come up so I'll probably leave the cover on until they do. The cover helps keep the soil moist and makes watering easier.

While I was out seeding I seeded some Red Sails lettuce in the lettuce bed and some fennel next to the older fennel. I've never grown fennel before either. The earlier planted fennel are doing very well, but again I don't know how well it will do in the summer, but it never hurts to try.

And last but not least of the chores was to put up a cover for the cucumber and zucchini. It won't stay on all season. But the cucumber side will stay on until they start to run well and need their trellis. I do it to keep the number of cucumber beetles down. The zucchini side will stay on until the borers are gone. In my eternal quest to have zucchini survive the borers I've tried covering them in the past unsuccessfully. They always seem to find a way in. But maybe, just maybe this year my zucchinis won't die so quickly. Maybe. Or maybe the zucchini will outgrow the cover long before the borers are gone, and then I'll have to pull it off. I've never had a year that I've had way too much zucchini. I know I'm supposed to, but it just never happens. My townhouse mates get some every year, but no one else does. I keep crossing my fingers for that zucchini glut. Not because I love it so much, but I hear about it all the time and somehow I think I'm missing something. Probably not. My yearly chard glut just makes me work to get rid of it all.