This and That

I haven't been posting a lot recently. Not much was going on in the garden. This last week I did get a few things done though. My zucchinis have gotten a bad case of powdery mildew and quit producing. All of their female blossoms started to get very very small. So I cut them back severely. I'm not expecting to get much from now on more due to low light levels than the mildew. Probably just tiny zucchini. But something is better than nothing.

I harvested the last of the melons. There were a few small melons left on, but they rarely taste that good when harvested in late September, so I pulled the vines and planted with bok choy. It is too late to plant in the main part of the garden, but in the circle garden it gets less shade in the fall. The light levels though have gotten much less and they may or may not size up well. It is worth the chance. Usually I'd plant overwintered spinach. But I decided this year to forego that and try something new.

I didn't take a before photo, but the landscape of the garden has changed now. I picked the last of the corn and then took down all of the stalks. So now it is much shorter. And I have seas of squash growing all alone.

I braided the last of the onions, which you will see on Monday. And tore down the drying rack. I also cleaned up around the compost piles as they were getting kind of ratty. I need to get a new broom. My old one barely has any bristles on it. It makes my brick path really hard to clean.

This year I tried to keep the morning glories from climbing up the compost pile. Obviously I wasn't totally successful. They sure are pretty, but they are hard to clean off and get in the way of the drying rack. And they make it hard to access the piles themselves. So I ripped them down again. It is sad to see them go, but now I can get to the leaf pile again.

Two Sisters

As many of you know, I grow my corn and squash together. The main reason for doing it this way is that squash takes up a lot of space. My yard is small at only 9000 sqft with two townhouses and shared by two families. As you can see from my raised bed set up, I don't leave much room for the walkway as large paths take up space too. But it means that I have to control that squash.

In addition to Waltham butternut, this year I'm trialing Upper Ground Sweet Potato squash and Thai Rai Kaw Tok. There won't be a really fair comparison between the two as I plant the corn in succession and I plant the squash when I plant the corn. If I wait longer to plant the squash it won't have as much time to produce and our growing season isn't the longest. If I plant earlier than the corn, the corn won't survive as it gets smothered. So The UGSPS is bigger as it was planted a bit over two weeks earlier than the Thai squash.

UGSPS already halfway up the corn stalk

I have noticed that the UGSPS is aggressive. Waltham butternut will try to climb the corn, but only sometimes. Often it will clamber up a little and then stop. It is a fast grower, but it can't compete with UGSPS. The UGSPS will climb straight up and send out multiple branches that grow very fast. And all the squash will try to escape their beds. So every day I tuck the ends back into the bed and break off tendrils of the squash that have wrapped around the corn, and push the plants back to the ground. This method of growing a Two Sisters bed is time consuming, but so worth it if you have little space. We love our corn. It is such a treat in the summer. And squash is a winter storage staple.

And can you see what the two stalks of corn have in common? Each of them are producing three ears of corn. Not that I expect to actually get those. Last year my corn mostly produced two each, and the second ear was pretty sad. Maybe with three, two will be good. I can hope.

So why the difference this year? In addition to trialing different varieties of squash I'm trialing mycorrhizal fungi. In the spring for the peas and lettuce I saw no difference in the plants at all probably because the soil was too cold. But here it seems to be helping. Most of the beds all got the fungi, but one bed I only put it on one side of the bed. The northwest side. Usually the corn gets taller and produces better on the southeast side. This is the side on which I'm getting the three ears. However in that one bed where only some got the fungi, the corn is a little taller on the northwest side. So it seems to be helping. BTW I'm also doing a trial of it in my sweet potatoes. I haven't noticed a difference in growth there, but now the bed is so over grown I can't tell which plants are which.

For both beds the real story will be in the harvests. Putting out seemingly extra ears of corn is only useful if they all grow and fill out and produce more. OK it would be just as useful to make the corn more nutritious, but I have no way of determining that, so production and taste will be the deciders.

This and That

Cappuccino Rudbeckia

Most of what I do in the garden is never recorded. Deadheading some flowers here. Pulling some weeds there. Trellising, tying up, harvesting, pruning. So many little chores that don't take very long. But I'm out in the early morning to get them all done before the heat hits.

Prairie Splendor Echinacea

Since my perennial bed around the peach trees is new this year, I've been enjoying seeing what the new flowers look like as they bloom. I have the above two right next to each other. I think I'll have to fix that in future years. Both are beautiful, but they really don't go well together. The Rudbeckia would be much better off by another pale yellow echinacea that I have with some coreopsis in the front. Right now I have the red Rudbeckia by that one. A switch is in order. But not now. Maybe in the fall, or maybe next spring.

The cukes got tied up. They love to go sideways across the trellis instead of climbing it. I have to encourage them. While I do this I check the plants for cucumber beetles. I knock them into a jar of soapy water whenever I see them. I do this check every morning and also if I'm out later in the day. I've only gotten a few so far, but they always multiply.

Behind them are the zucchini. I check them every day. When I see both a female and male flower at the same time I ought to uncover them. They really want to get out. I figured the squash vine borer ought to be gone soon, but I read the Extension Service Newsletter. "In years with mild temperatures such as we are having this summer, SVB adults tend to remain active throughout the summer rather than dropping off in summer. . . " Damn. They aren't going to go away. I'll have to uncover and just cross my fingers. I haven't seen a ton of them around, but if I see a few, you can bet there are more out there that I can't see. And it only takes one borer to severely set back the zucchini if not kill it.

The squash that grows under the corn needs constant work. I have to keep it UNDER the corn but of course it goes to the light and tries to escape. My garden isn't big enough to let it run free. So every couple of days I check them and tuck the tips back where they belong and make sure it isn't actually climbing up the corn. While I do this I pull any weeds I see.

Yesterday I needed a bit more. The shorter ones had some bamboo poles under them to keep the cats from digging. But I didn't think I needed them anymore. The corn was large enough to keep them out. So I pulled out the poles. At the ends I put in some smaller sideways stick to keep the cats off the bare soil around the squash. Those won't last long as the squash is growing fast.

In addition since I'd removed that big row cover next to the corn, the wind could now knock it down. One of the problems with growing corn in a raised bed is that it lodges easily. The soil is very soft and you can't hill the stalks up. So I stake the outer most rows, which protect the inner rows from the wind enough that they are usually safe.

Next up was the cilantro. I let it go to seed every year so I can collect both green coriander and ripe coriander (the former for the kitchen and the latter for sowing). Once the seed starts to set the plants can get top heavy and fall over. So I tied them to the fence. Hopefully it is good enough to keep them from trailing on the ground.

The last chore was to pick and prune the currants. I pick the gooseberries while I prune to make picking easier. The currants are younger and I haven't had them very long. It didn't hit me until afterwards that I should do the same thing. It would make the picking so much easier. Live and learn. I like how the Pink Champagne currants grow. They send out new strong shoots from the base instead of lots of side shoots. So I could cut all the old wood out. The Jonkheer van Tets likes to have some of its stronger shoots as side branches which makes it harder to prune. That last one I have to really keep under control as otherwise it blocks the path. But I can't let either get too large, so pruning every year is a must.

I do have one more currant, Rovada, but it isn't quite ripe yet. Soon though. That one I'm trying to train as one leader across my fence, but it is resisting. Hopefully if I'm persistent it will work. If not I'll just let it bush out as that space can take it. But if you have ever seen a photo of Lee Reich's espaliered currant bush you will know why I want one. The red fruit hanging down from my white fence would be very striking. But only if I can get it to grow correctly.

Today was pretty similar, though I didn't get outside as quickly. I deadheaded the daisies and dianthus. I weeded the front perennial bed and near the garden shed. I uncovered the zucchini as it indeed had both a male and female in bloom. I tied up the cucumbers. I extended the trellis for the beans a tiny bit. I staked the last succession of corn. I tucked in the squash, melon, and sweet potato vines that were trying to escape their beds. I swept part of the walk that had sand all over it (the ants have moved in). I noticed some signs of aphids on the Brussels sprouts - ack! I'll have to bring out the sprayer tomorrow and deal with that. Sigh. I watched the hoverflies dance around the cilantro flowers. Then it was time to go in for breakfast. I love my mornings in the garden.

Successions

I have several succession crops going in my garden. Corn and squash for a two sisters garden was planted for the third time yesterday. I have two more to go. Also I put in another succession of turnips. That one isn't doing as well. The second sowing never really came up. The soil was too dry. So I resowed what was bare and sowed another row too.

I can squeeze through - barely

My garden is small and some of my paths are tight to keep the area cropping larger. But keeping each bed in production is the most important thing. My carrot bed will be come a brassica bed for the fall, and the brassica beds will become carrot beds. Some of my broccoli will get ripped out to plant more broccoli, but some in that bed will stay to produce side shoots. When my onions come out I'll plant kale. And I do another sowing of lettuce every couple of weeks. I really don't need 20 heads of lettuce all at once, but six every couple of weeks is perfect.

Today I got my soil blocker out and made the block I'll be using until about August. None of these needs a lot of blocks, so I put them in smaller containers for each kind of plant I need. In the spring I get flats. In the summer I get small old take out containers with holes in the bottom. Most of these will sit and dry until I need them. Then they will be rehydrated for use. My calendar has the date that I'm supposed to sow each one. Though I still haven't figured out what I want to grow for my cabbage/kohlrabi bed in the fall. European cabbage rarely does well here in the fall. I'm not sure why. It might be that my garden doesn't have enough sun in the fall as the neighbors' houses and trees are pretty close. I love European cabbages, but I tend to do better with the Chinese cabbages. I'll have to think about it.

This is my last succession of lettuce planted on May 20th with the new one seeded today. Six plants of a summer mix. I segregate the mixed lettuce seed into white and black to try to not have too many duplicates. And when they come up I keep some of the reds and some of the greens. It is kind of fun not knowing what will pop up. I hope I like them.

This and That

View on the other side of the fence from my garden. I love phlox.

I know I've done things in the garden as I really really need to weed, but somehow I ended up doing other things instead. I get distracted when I go out into the garden. I know I planted my chitted squash seed on Sunday since I wrote that down. I know I watered the front beds. And then watered the strawberries yesterday as some of them were wilting.

And I fixed my bird netting over the strawberry plants. I had simple hoops that were too small as the flowers were poking out of the top. And if the flowers poke out, the strawberries will be out of the netting so the squirrels will eat them. I should call it squirrel netting not bird netting as the birds aren't all that bad. In addition I pretty much let the strawberries run last year. Where they liked to be was right next to the edge of the wall. So If I put a hoop in the soil those strawberries right at the edge would be halfway through the netting. So I made some bigger hoops and bent them so they would hang over the edge to keep all those wonderful blossoms inside the net. At least mostly. Next year I've got to keep them from rooting right next to the wall. If nothing else they wilt too quickly there as the soil dries out fast at the edge. The ones farther back do better.

I've been fixing up the places for my herbs. I took the old Mojito mint pot and got all the old roots out. I added compost and mixed it in. Now when the plant come I can just pop it into the pot. I also took down one of my two rhubarb plants (the left one). I figure I really only need one. I'll use the spot for some rosemary. Though I still have to dig out those roots. It will be better to have something smaller so I don't have to worry about it blocking the air conditioner as much.

Bed 2W

I don't know if I was avoiding weeding or not. I usually don't mind weeding. But I had to go out after dinner to finally get some of it done. I weeded all of Bed 1 and the western side of Bed 2. You can barely see the spinach in the above bed. And some of those weeds are starting to bud. The last thing I need are more weed seeds in my garden. I've got to get to the rest of the beds. I think my priority are the carrot bed and the other two spinach beds. Then I can do the other beds that are less problematic.

There is the same bed all weeded out. I had a lot of damping off in this and the other spinach beds. So there are huge gaps. In Bed 1E I found four cut worms that were taking down my turnips. I hope there aren't more. I'll go out this morning as soon as I finish watering the beds and see if any more have been taken down and if so dispatch the culprits. Luckily the cabbages and kales in this bed are probably too big for the cutworms to hurt.

Harvest Monday, 2 March 2015

This was the week that I used up the greens in my freezer. I do have one lone spinach packet, but I've been eating two per meal for a while now. So it won't even make one meal for me. I now have fresh broccoli and asparagus from the store. And some bought frozen spinach and kale. I was wondering what to do with the spring fava bean bed. Obviously I need to grow greens to eat during the winter. Kale or broccoli as I've already figured out a way to add in another spring spinach bed. I like broccoli better fresh. But I think I like kale better frozen.

The above meal is pretty typical of my dinners in a way. Lots of greens. But I always also have some kind of non green vegetable too - squash, carrots, or sweet potatoes (which are still holding out well). And as many of you noticed and asked about. . .

When I make squash, most of the time it is a squash casserole. I put my original recipe in the blog ages ago. But it has changed over the years to be healthier (no sugar or butter anymore). I still make close to that recipe when I bring it for parties as it is fine to have such things on occasion, but for every day I'd prefer it to be mostly squash, not mostly other ingredients which my old recipe was. Also I got rid of the soy milk and gluten. The last two substitutions were a godsend really. I substituted the flour for cornmeal and the soy milk for coconut milk. The mixture of coconut milk, cornmeal, squash, and when I add it maple syrup go very well together. My everyday version won't have maple syrup though. Bummer as it goes so well.

Daphne's Squash Casserole Take 2

• 1 egg
• 1 c to 1 1/2 c pumpkin puree
• 1/2 c coconut milk
• 1/2 t vanilla
• 1/4 t cinnamon
• 1/8 c corn meal
• 1/2 t baking powder
• 1/4 t salt
• (2 T butter or coconut oil melted, optional)
• (1/8-1/4c maple syrup, + 1/8 c corn meal optional)

Mix the wet ingredients together. Mix the dry ingredients together. Mix them both together. It can barely fit into two 1c ramakins if you don't add the extra ingredients. Or as in the picture above you can use 2 x 1 1/2c pyrex dishes. Or cook it all at once in a larger dish. Cook it at 350F until it doesn't jiggle anymore. That is usually 45 minutes for me, but it varies. My squash measurements aren't perfect. I have some containers in which I freeze pureed squash. They can hold anywhere from a cup to a cup and a half depending on how full they get.

So in a way it is much like pumpkin pie if you add the sugar. I'd call it a pumpkin custard if I didn't add flour to it. But I love it. I often eat it after dinner and think of it as dessert even without the sugar. Squash is sweet. I found after a while of almost no sugar, my taste for sugars in food have changed.

Harvest Monday is a day to show off your harvests, how you are saving your harvest, or how you are using your harvest. If you have a harvest you want to show off, add your name and link to Mr Linky below.

92 Pounds! A New Record

I can't believe I got thirty squash this year. The last time I got a good haul of squash was in 2012, the year I got a lot of everything. It was the year that had no winter and I planted seed in February (totally unheard of here, where I usually start at the end of March). I'm wondering if I will beat my production record this year over all even without the early start. 92 pounds of squash really kicks the total up a lot. Last year I got only 50. Though to be fair I have 25% more space in squash this year. Even taking that into account it was the best squash year ever. And I have six little squash trying to ripen still in the garden. I don't think they will make it, but I'm rooting them on.

Squash is a hard one in my raised bed garden. Squash likes to ramble. Containing it is hard. I give the plants 3' at both ends of my 16' long raised beds and grow corn in the middle 10'. I train it under the corn. It is a constant struggle to keep it where it belongs. Even in a good corn and squash year like this year, I can't get a pound per square foot out of the space with just them. One of the beds had crops in them in early spring though. That added to the poundage in the beds. So these beds probably came out pretty even to one pound per square foot. Most people without a lot of space don't grow corn or squash. But corn is my husband's favorite. And squash is one of my major storage crops for the winter.

And speaking of winter. Can you imagine me eating 90 pounds of squash in six months? That is about half a pound a day. There is no way I can eat that much. I'm sure I'll be sharing it with my townhouse mates. And bringing squashed based items to every party I go to during the holidays.

For now the squash is joining the sweet potatoes in front of the sliding glass door so they can cure. If only we would get some sun that is. Recently it has gotten cold and dreary so nothing is really curing they are just sitting there shivering.

Well at least the ones by the far windows have a nice view of the garden while they shiver.

And in future possible records, the carrot harvest is looking big too. My fresh eating carrots are getting just huge. I'll show you the photo on Monday. If the storage carrots get that large I'll certainly break my 2011 record of 42 pounds. But sadly I'll have to wait until November for that one. I like to let the carrots see a bit of frost before I dig them up as they get very sweet and delicious that way.

Repairing the Damage

Staked Fennel

We had a storm come through on Wednesday. It dropped about 1.5" of rain which we sorely needed. But with the wind and rain a few things got knocked over. Nothing was all that bad except the fennel. It is blooming and setting seed right now and it has a lot of heavy blooms. In fact I can't believe all the blooms on it. But I had no stakes to prop them up with. So I first had to recover some from the corn patch.

Most of the corn in this patch has been harvested, but I hadn't cut down the finished stalks. Or removed the bamboo stakes that I put in after another storm knocked all the corn down. So I went about doing that.

Now that a lot of the plants have been removed, the squash will be happier. It was really trying to invade the paths. In fact it got away from me as it always does.

One branch went up and over my poor current bush and over the fence. After propping up the zinnias on the one side with some string and taking out the corn plants on the other. I found a lot of fruit in there. So my poor current will have to live in the shade for the rest of the year. I haven't seen a lot of the squash set, so any that have will stay.

If you remember from before I said this corn was setting two ears per stalk. That is true. But the second ear usually look like the one above or even less developed. A few have been edible but not many. The first ears are all perfect, but not these ones. So the stalks left have second ears that might do something. I'm hoping.

The wasps on the fennel were swarming around the flowers as I staked them up. There was even a white faced hornet (never fear they are very gentle hornets). I really wanted to take a photo of them, but couldn't get the silly camera to focus on them. Then a downy woodpecker landed on one of the stakes in the cleared out corn bed. He happily sat there for a while. I sort of got him in focus. I really need my husband's good camera for this. A point and shoot doesn't do focus on small things well. But this bird has been visiting every day now since the sunflower has ripened some seed. Sometimes I'll walk by the plant and not notice him (since the flowers are 8' high), but then I hear him fly off.

Two Sisters Beds

Yesterday was a red letter day for my husband. He has been asking for the last several weeks about the corn. Is it ready yet? I'm terrible at telling when to pick it. I always rip the biggest ear open a bit so I know when to start. And oh was it good. My husband said it must have been time consuming for me to inject sugar into every kernel. Some people like the old fashioned corn that isn't as sweet. My husband loves the newer varieties.

For the first time this year I'm growing growing a yellow corn. In the past I've always tried bicolors. I've found that in New England bicolor corn is the traditional. Where I grew up in Colorado my parents won't eat anything but white corn. I'm only growing one variety Honey Select. I've been trying new varieties every year as many of the newer hybrids have trouble sprouting in cold spring soil. This seemed to do pretty well, but I didn't push the season much. What surprised me about this variety is that they produce two ears for every stalk. Though I haven't checked them all, I even have one stalk that has three ears on it. They seem to be forming pretty well too. Amazing.

Bed 1

The other of the two sisters plants is the squash. You can see it growing all around the foot of the corn. I give it three feet at the ends of beds. This space contains two squash plants spaced two feet apart. Then I train it to grow into the middle of the corn. I plant the corn and the squash on the same day. The corn is spaced a foot apart. The corn grows a bit faster and it seems to work. My only issue is when the corn doesn't sprout and I have to replant. Then the squash can overtake the corn on the edges. This is why I need a really good sprouting corn. It can't fail or I'd have to rip out my squash too and restart.

The only squash I'm growing is Waltham butternut. It is productive for me and resists those nasty vine borers. Every year I worry about it setting in time to ripen. This year the first little one set on August 1st. It is now a bit over 4" long. I see a few others starting to set too. Squash is a big winter crop for me, so I need them set soon.

Bed 5

I have two full 4'x16' beds planted up as two sisters.

Bed 7W

And one 4'x 8' section planted up near the beans. This is 25% more space than I had last year for these crops. So I'm really hoping they do well this year. The corn certainly seems very happy. I expect I'll get a lot of frozen corn for winter. Usually I just get a few packets, but not many. Also this year I didn't space the corn plantings out very much like I usually do. I was originally planning to go to London later in August, but that trip was canceled. I tried to time it so it would all be ripe before we left. So when the corn starts to really come in this week we will be inundated for a couple of weeks then we will have nothing. Last year I had better timing and we ate sweet corn for a month or so almost every day. I think when I plan summer vacations mid July is best as I can time things better to leave a gap in production. August is a terrible time to leave.

Garden Chores

Black Swallowtail laying eggs. It's top wings wouldn't stop moving so they are blurred while the rest of butterfly was still.

Every morning I go out into the garden to do the chores. The first things I see are the melons and sweet potatoes. They are always trying to escape their beds, so I turn the ends of the plants inwards to keep them under control. Or at least relatively under control. Then it is on to the covered zucchini plants. I lift the covers and fertilize any female blossoms I find. Usually there is one. I haven't been very successful in getting them to set though. Maybe one in three. One more week and the cover comes off. Then the bees can do their work.

The cucumbers are just coming on strong now. I tie them up and make sure they stay on the trellis. They really want to escape. Today I saw the first signs of wilt in the patch. No! I cut that branch off way down. I'm hoping it doesn't spread. I'm very surprised to see it. I've only see one cucumber beetle so far this year. Usually wilt hits a bit later. I've gotten a few cukes in dribs and drabs over the last week, but yesterday the inundation started.

So I cut up the cukes and tossed them into the brine I made the other day. I picked yet more today so I'll make up a large cucumber salad for a BBQ that I'm going to tomorrow. I'll probably bring coleslaw too and a jar of the pickles.

The beans are right next to the cucumbers so I check those over and pick any that are big enough. I make sure the asparagus beans aren't being taken over by their more vigorous neighbors. They don't seem to want to branch very much. I do pinch all the beans out when they reach the top of the trellis to get them to branch. But those beans are such slow growers that they have just gotten there. I've also had some rust and some kind of spotting disease. So I ignore the beans when they are wet. And I've been cutting off any affected leaves to try to keep it from spreading. Last year I didn't do this and the rust spread very quickly.

Then it is on to the corn. I've been hand pollinating these every other day since I started to see silks. This just involves shaking each stalk early in the morning. With my last variety I would see the pollen fall down, but this variety doesn't seem to put out very much pollen. I hope they all get fertilized.

And there are a lot of ears to fertilize. In past years I would occasionally get more than one ear. But this variety (Honey Select) seems to put out two ears most of the time and I've even seen three. In other varieties the second ear really doesn't mean much. I would be tiny and not well filled out. It would often be tossed as useless. Will this one put out useful second ears? I hope so. In addition the tillers have male blooms. That is the first time I've seen that happen. This corn likes to flower.

My other patches of corn are getting huge too. And they weren't really protected from the wind. I find that corn falls over easily in my raised beds. So the windward sides of one patch was staked. I don't have enough stakes for all my corn, but if those stay upright, they will protect the other corn from falling. I have one other patch but it is partially protected from a nearby tall row cover so I'm hoping it will stay upright.

The squash runs below the corn. Not voluntarily though. So I have to keep it turned so it will cover that area. I need the squash to really take over under the corn as its prickly branches will keep the raccoons out of the corn. The first male flowers have bloomed. I've got a week or two before I'll see any females, but it won't be long. I hope I get a lot of squash this year. The only variety I'm growing is Waltham Butternut. I'm hoping to save seed. All the other years I've had germination problems and had to plant Early Butternut close by so I couldn't save seed.

I noticed that one of my fall bean plants was starting to run, so I got the trellis up finally. I always put the poles in when I plant, but the cross bars and the string went up today. I put up one string per plant.

And as always I weed when I see them. But occasionally things get out of control - especially under those row covers. Yesterday I decided I HAD to weed the onions. The crab grass was about to bloom and there was a nightshade plant that was huge. I got out the gloves for that one. Some of the crabgrass was close to the onions and was huge. Mostly I could pull it with only minimal disturbance, but one red onion was accidentally pulled. Like the Ailsa Craig onions, the red onions are a bit smaller this year I think. Maybe not though. I'll find out when they are all harvested and weighed as I grew the same amount of each variety this year and last.

Planted

Isn't there such potential in an empty bed? It could be anything. But today it became the cucumber and zucchini bed. I prepped and planted a row of cucumbers along the back. I'll trellis them once they get big. And there will be three zucchini plants along the front. Costata Romanesca is a very hard one to control as they will try to run all over and escape the bed. I'm not a fan of its habit but I like the taste better than most zucchinis.

The next bed that I prepared was my sweet potato bed. As you can see it has a nice brick path that goes along two of its sides and the edges of the bed are also brick. This bed gets nice and hot in the summer. I'm never sure how many plants to put in. In the north it is better to space them closely as they don't have time to expand and root and set more potatoes. Typically I get sweet potatoes only from where the original plants were put. So they are a bit over a foot apart in all directions. I have three rows (and an extra plant at each of the points where the bed sticks out).

One row is Purple, an apt name for the potato that is purple inside and out. I put it near the path. The roots of Purple will spread all over everywhere. The tubers tend to be thin but very very long. And I didn't want to deconstruct the whole bed to try to find them when their roots break out and go into the path. But I think the brick path will contain them. That path has a pretty solid foundation.

In the middle of the bed is Beauregard. It attracts whatever pest I have. I don't know what it is - maybe the sow bugs - but whatever it is, it eats holes in the tubers. It seems to like this potato the best. So maybe the other two wills stay nice and I can bake them. The Beauregards will all be peeled to get rid of the damage. The last variety is Garnet. Whatever the pest is, it usually leaves this alone for the most part. I get some holes but not many. Because of that it is the best baker of the bunch.

I wanted to get them in today because their roots were getting long. As it is they got a bit too long for my tastes. But they will be fine.

There they are all planted out. You may wonder what the bamboo is for. Well the cats here have contests about who can leave me more presents in the soil and there are a lot of cats in the neighborhood. I'm not a fan of their behavior. The poles discourage them. I can't leave my soil uncovered even for a day. I've learned. I have bird netting cut to the size of the beds. But once the plants are in the netting really doesn't work. So I resort to other measures. The poles won't have to be there long as the sweet potatoes will be big enough in a month to remove. Then the foliage will discourage those cats.

Though I had prepped the bed and planted the corn of the first two sisters bed, I hadn't yet planted the squash. So today I did. I like two vines from each end to trail in between the corn. Hopefully the soil is warm enough for them to germinate.