Potting Up Soil Blocks

Friday morning I was busy in the laundry room where I keep my seedlings. My lettuce seedlings had their first true leaves. The roots were coming out of the bottom of their little tiny soil blocks. It was time to pot them up. I've had questions about what soil blocks are and how I use them. So I'll use my lettuce as an example.

Small, Medium, and Large

I have three soil blockers. The smallest one makes 20 blocks all 3/4"x3/4x3/4"". They are so tiny. When I use these blocks I put just one seed inside each. If they don't germinate (like you can see for some of the lettuce above), they just get tossed. They don't take up much soil so it isn't much of a waste. They are great for using every little seed you have, but they dry out very quickly. I have to water them very often compared to the bigger blocks. These little blocks pair with my largest blocker. These larger blockers make soil blocks 2"x2"x2". Mine have inserts (which you buy separately) that punch out holes for the 3/4" blocks. So once they have a true leaf, I just put the little blocks inside the bigger ones. Potting up is so easy.

The medium ones are 1 1/2"x 1 1/2"x2". These are my favorite size. The 2" size takes up a lot of room. They can be crammed five across, but it doesn't leave any space between them (I need one that is just 1/8" short of 2"), so the roots will grow together into each others blocks. This is not ideal. For some plants I'll have to place them only four across which takes up a lot of space. The 1 1/2" blocks fit six across with a lot of space between them. Perfect. The issue with these is that I always put in at least two seeds so I have to thin. Not really much of an issue. I will still use the other ones for things that need a bigger pot, like tomatoes and peppers. I'll also use them for things that I don't know the germination on or things that I don't have much seed for.

Soil blocks have a great advantage of not having transplant shock (just like newspaper pots but faster to make). I don't have to wash out pots every year. No plastic, which is always good. Nothing thrown away. Their disadvantage is that they have a learning curve and if you are too rough with the blocks they can fall apart on you. I use tongs to move mine and bottom water so the soil doesn't get washed away.

Here are my lettuce seedlings all potted up. I have a whole box of Popsicle sticks from when my kids were young. I use them to label all my blocks. In a couple of weeks they will go into the garden. I think lettuce from now on will stay in the 1 1/2" blocks and I'll save the bigger ones for things that need it. They take up way too much space. But these will be outside quickly so it isn't too much of a problem this time.

Flashlight Gardening

Yesterday was pretty busy for me, but I really did have time to plant my spinach in time. I just let time get away from me. So at 5pm with spinach seeds in my hand I was ready to go out to plant finally. It was getting cold, but there was still plenty of light.

Then the phone rings. It is my daughter. She is at Brandeis checking out the professors for grad school. She had had enough of it all, even though they were putting her up for the night. It was just too noisy and too chaotic. She loved the small group interviews though and loved the high energy physics department and thought the school was good. Anyway I put my seeds down and went to get her, because that's what a mother does.

I thought about those seeds all the way there. I started chitting them on Wednesday. They needed to get in today. There were already little roots coming out of the seeds. Two days is really the longest you can chit spinach seeds before they grow into the paper towels. I figured my daughter owed me one, so I had her hold up a flashlight while I planted the seed. It wasn't ideal. My fingers were numb before I finished. I forgot to fertilize the bed before planting - no worries since I'll side dress after they are up. And since the light was dim I think the spinach seeds were not perfectly at 3" spacings. Some had two or more seeds instead of one in a spot. But at least they got in. I hastily covered them with some remay, but without hoops since I was freezing. I just wanted a covering for this weekend since we were getting pouring rain. This will keep the soil in place if the rain get too heavy.

Next time I'll do it in the morning, instead of putting it off for later in the day. Yeah like that will happen.

Is It Spring Yet?

New England is currently experiencing strange spring like weather. It feels like early April more than early March. I think of March as a temperamental month. It might have a good day, but it will punish you for it by snowing on you the day after. Since Saturday our temps have risen into the 50Fs, even the high 50Fs. Our nights have been touching freezing but not dipping below. The days have been sunny and glorious. The weather will stay like this through tomorrow then it will stay warm but it will rain.

Thomas said his beds were already unfrozen by Sunday. Mine were still frozen solid. I went out and covered them with plastic and row covers. They are starting to thaw. I thought they were unfrozen yesterday, but it was just the middle bed. The upper and lower still had ice below the surface. Today I again went out.

Nope there is still ice under there. And the soil temps say it isn't quite yet time to plant peas in this bed. Too bad. I already had the peas in hand when I went outside. I guess I was overly optimistic.

Spinach bed is the one on the left this year

Spinach however can handle the cool temps and I'm sure its plastic covered bed will be totally defrosted by Friday.

So I started to chit some seeds. Two days is about the maximum that they can stay in their paper towel condo. I'll plant them out Friday morning, hopefully before the rain starts. That ought to get them started well. But the peas will have to wait until after the weekend rain storms are over.

Lights

My light that I used last year, now has this year's seedlings under it

Last year I only had one 4' fluorescent light. It really isn't enough for me. I had to squish the seedlings. I had to ferry some from window to window throughout the day. I had to put some outside before the best time for it. I decided this year I really needed one or two more lights. So I got one more to see if it is enough. I was hoping to buy the same kind as last time. My old one is a T8 shoplight that has a nice 8" wide reflector, 10" would have been better, but 8" was good.

I couldn't find one. I found one that was gray. That wouldn't reflect much light. I found one without a reflector at all. And they had one that had a 12" reflector. That seemed a bit big but was better than too small. Sadly it as also more costly. I got it anyway. I'm going to have to add it to the tally next Monday.

New light next to the dryer

I hung the light from one of the shelves I stole from my garage. I moved it into the laundry room with the other seedlings. The laundry room seems like a good spot for it. The space is pretty big and get lots of light from all the windows.

While I was in a shopping mood, I also got another timer. This way I can grow my onions that can't see long days (my onions are long day onions and will start to bulb if they see daylight of a certain length - usually 14-16 hours) and I can grow my other crops that will benefit from long days of light - like my tomatoes. I'll probably have to put some cardboard over it so that it will not see the light from the other side of the laundry room.

Harvest Monday - 8 March 2010

black bean, leek and potato, and minestrone soup

I ate quite a bit of preserved food this last week. My husband was out on more business trips. While he was gone I decided I needed to eat some of my soups that I'd frozen. They had piled up. I didn't even know that I still had leek and potato soup made from my own potatoes and leeks. I thought I had eaten the last one long ago.

In addition I opened up another of my pickle jars. It wasn't as good as the first one. I season each jar separately and this one had a touch too much clove. It was good mind you, but not great like the last one.

Hopefully soon I'll get a real harvest. This is my overwintered spinach patch. Most of the plants made it through the winter, but not all. This weekend was glorious. We had sun and temperatures in the 50Fs (10C). I had to get out in the garden to work. Since the ground was still frozen solid I elected to clean up the spinach. I think this bed will defrost in not too long, maybe a week or so if the weather stays like this. Then the spinach can really start to grow.

If you would like to join Harvest Monday with a harvest or how you are using it, put your name and URL into Mr. Linky below.

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.

Get Growing in March

This is the fourth in a twelve part series for new gardeners. If you have never planted vegetables before but always wanted to, this is the series for you. Robin, who writes the blog Vegetable Matter, and I will post on the first of every month. Robin lives in Houston and I live in Boston. We will be posting about what to do in the garden that month and giving advice. So if you have always wanted that vegetable garden, but didn’t know where to start, you have no excuse. Get growing!

March finally gets us out in the garden even in the North. The beginning of March often has snow and frozen ground, but by the end of March things are usually defrosted. Snow is still possible in April and in northern New England in May, but our temperatures are moderating. Only the hardiest of plants can survive without protection in March. Two of these plants are peas and spinach. Neither can be grown as a summer crop, but they both thrive in the early spring.

Peas

Here in Southern New England, St. Patrick'S Day is often considered the time to plant peas at least if the ground has defrosted. Some years it does, and some years it doesn't. I keep checking the soil to see. Once it is defrosted you still may need to wait. Some soils get waterlogged at this time of year. A raised bed will prevent this, but if your soil is too wet, it will hurt the soil to be worked at this time of year. In addition the pea seed will be too wet and may rot in the ground. You can tell if your soil is dry enough by getting a handful of your soil and forming it into a ball. If the ball starts to fall apart when poked with your finger, you are fine, if not it is too wet. Wait until it drys out a bit more. After a while you will just get a feel for how wet the soil is but until you do test it.

Peas need a soil of at least 40°F or 4°C to germinate. If the soil is colder, this will cause the seed to take a long time to germinate and it could rot before it does. This does not mean that the soil needs to be 40°F the whole day. If the soil freezes at night you should be fine. Peas are very hardy. Just make sure the soil reaches that temperature in the daylight hours before you plant.

For more pea growing information you can see Robin's Get Growing post on peas.

Spinach

Spinach only needs a temperature of 35°F or 2°C to germinate and won't germinate at all in soil that is too warm. So as soon as the soil is defrosted and dry enough you can plant.

Spinach needs a fairly fertile soil. It does well if it follows peas or beans as they increase the fertility of the soil. If your compost is very high quality (is made with the fast method and has a lot of nitrogen in it), you can get away with just that, but if you are like me and have a more carbon rich compost, you will need to fertilize before planting in addition to your inch of compost. I use an organic 5-3-3 fertilizer. But whatever you use, follow the direction for the amount on the package. Sprinkle it on the surface of the soil and either rake in (if you don't till) or turn it under.

Spinach bed about to be planted in rows

Spinach does best when planted 6" or 15cm apart in all direction. I make rows 6" apart and plant one seed every 1-3" (2.5-7cm). When the plants get big enough I thin every other one and eat the thinnings. Some people don't like this method. They like to broadcast the seed over the soil. They just throw the seed down over the surface and thin after it comes up. Either way you sow your seed, the seed needs to be covered by 1/2" or 1cm of soil and patted down.

Once you have your spinach 1/2" under ground, water the seed in well even if the ground is wet. The watering will help the seed make contact with the soil. Don't just spray it with a garden hose however, as the blast will knock the seed out of the soil. Invest in a rose for your hose that gently waters the soil, or use a watering can with a rose.

Spinach will often have germination issues. If I am planting regular seed, I put them 1" apart in the rows. However I often presoak the seed and then I plant 3" apart. This insures that almost all the seed will germinate. To presoak I put the seed between two pieces of very damp paper towels and put in a plastic bag. I leave the bag just slightly open. Enough for air to get in, but not enough to dry out the paper towel much. Then after 36 to 48 hours I plant the seed. If you wait as long as 48 hours, you will begin to see little roots starting to come out of them. Plant them right away if yo see any roots, or they could break off when they get planted. If they do break, the spinach will die.

Some people like to start the seed indoors so the germination is better. Be very careful with this method. If there is any root disturbance it will slow the plant down drastically and make the plant bolt more quickly. Spinach does not like to have its roots disturbed. If you insist on this method (which frankly I don't think is worth the effort since spinach is so fast), use something like newspaper pots or soil blocks.

Your spinach seed pack will probably tell you that spinach takes 30 days to mature. If you have very cold temps it will take longer. Don't fret. Give it time. When you harvest, pick off the outer leaves and let the inner ones regrow. The plant will bolt fairly quickly, but sometimes you can get multiple harvests. Spinach bolts when they either experience very warm weather or when the day length gets longer. In my area (about the 40th parallel), spinach will start to bolt around May 15th if only the sun were a factor. If you get hot weather it could be faster. Spinach is considered a very finicky crop.

Leaf miner damage on chard

I've never had disease issues with my spinach but in my area I get one insect pest and it isn't usually until late in its growth. Leaf miners lay small little white eggs in groups of about 3-6 on the underside of the leaves. When they hatch the larvae mine through the inside of the leaf. It makes the leaf unusable. There are four solutions. 1) Pick all the spinach before the miners come out for the year. 2) Do a search and destroy on the eggs. Just scrape the eggs off the back. This can be very time consuming if you have a lot of spinach. 3) Ignore the problem and just eat the leaves that are still good. 4) Use a row cover.

Row Cover

I use the last option for my spinach. I have some Agribon row covers that I use as soon as I plant my spinach. It does two things for me. First it keeps off those leaf miners. And second it warms up the soil and air around the spinach in the early spring. I've found the spinach is ready about a week faster with a row cover than without one.

Other post in the series

Determining your growing zone and planting peas (Vegetable Matter - December)
Planning a Garden (Daphne's Dandelions - December)
Growing Lettuce (Vegetable Matter - January)
Starting transplants indoors (Daphne's Dandelions - January)
Growing tomatoes (Vegetable Matter - February)
Compost (Daphne's Dandelions - February)
Snap Beans (Vegetable Matter - March)
Peas and Spinach (Daphne's Dandelions - March)
Eggplant (Vegetable Matter - April)
Brassicas (Broccoli, Cabbage, Asian vegetables) (Daphne's Dandelions - April)
Edamame (Vegetable Matter - May)
Tomatoes (Daphne's Dandelions - May)

Harvest Monday - 1 March2010

Now that it has been a few months into eating from my saved harvest, I think I'll do an overview of what was good and what wasn't. It seems like a pretty boring thing to read, but will be good to have in my records. I'll start with the frozen things:

• Spinach and chard: good, 5 cups of frozen each is probably enough
• Komatsuna: toughened up in the freezer, don't freeze again
• Tomato Sauce: worked great, I've already used half, so need more next year
• Salsa: better canned, I've been using store bought for fresh eating
• Applesauce: only froze because I ran out of jars, not yet used
• Zucchini: as usual great for bread and soup, probably don't need more next year
• Green Beans: good, but don't need more next year as I only use in soup
• Corn: I totally forgot I froze some and it isn't touched
• Serranos and Jalapenos: better pickled than frozen, have just a bit too much
• Raspberries and sorbet: I don't use the frozen berries at all, make it into sorbet instead, as it gets eaten over the summer
• Carrots: almost out, need more next year

Then onto the canned items:

• Applesauce:I've eaten half of what I've made since September, so I probably didn't make quite enough, but we will see
• Raspberry jam: I'm not much of a jam eater, so probably made a bit too much
• Rasberry jalapeno jam: not spicy enough, loses its potency over time, made about the right amount
• Apple pie filling: we haven't been eating it much, only used one, but good, I'll get to the rest before apple season I'm sure
• Applebutter: made way too much, half the amount next year.
• Pickled snap peas: ick, gets mushy in canning, don't make next year
• Pickles: fabulous, need lots more, at least 12 pints, but 18 would be good then I can give away some

And onto the pantry and refrigerator:

• Dried Beans: way, way too little, I need to grow about 15lbs maybe and need to learn how to make a good baked bean dish. My husband love baked beans and so do I, but we both like the kind from the can. Anyone have a recipe that tastes more like canned (I know weird huh?)
• Garlic: I seem to have planted about the right amount maybe a bit too much
• Onions: need lots more, I ran out early
• Carrots: need lots more
• Cabbage: I only need two large heads, I eat it all the time, but I'm the only one and it is a lot of cabbage

So there you have it. The bottom line is that I'm doing OK except for onions, carrots and pickles. Truth be told is that I prefer to buy broccoli and have it over the winter than to constantly eat from my stores. I haven't been doing it except when my daughter comes home to visit, but when she does we have a lot of broccoli, fresh red peppers, and Tasty Tom tomatoes (which are the only tomatoes in the winter I've found worth eating).

If you would like to join Harvest Monday with a harvest or how you are using it, put your name and URL into Mr. Linky below.

State of the Garden

Over the last two days we have had pouring rain. Last night was particularly bad as the winds were gusting to about 60mph. I kept hearing branches hit my roof. The oak trees in the back yard stretch their branches out over the house which is great for shade in the summer, but not so good in a wind storm. Anyway the rain washed most of our snow away. It seemed a good time to go out and see how things are growing.

The first thing I noticed was the first little shoots of garlic poking up. This variety, an unknown from the store, is always the first to come up. As you can see by the acorn the shoot is still short but it is very thick.

The mache has a couple of clumps that look the same as they did in the fall. So far it seems quite hardy here without protection. I didn't get much germination last fall. Maybe more will come up this spring. You can tell how small they are by the little seeds that lie next to them. Those are dill seeds that scatter themselves around the garden.

Then I saw something Thomas is familiar with. I have a little vole or mouse hole in my garden. I often get these and occasionally see them during the summer. Usually they are voles. Unlike Thomas I've never noticed any damage in the garden. So I wondered. How was my spinach under the row cover faring?

It seems untouched by voles and has over wintered well. Now I wouldn't eat that spinach, but it will be putting on new growth soon. In about three weeks I'll be sowing my spring spinach which will be eaten in May, but I'm hoping this patch will give me an early crop.

I also left in a couple of bunching onions to see if they would overwinter this year. Some years they do fine. They still seem to be alive. Their outer leaves are mush, but the inner ones look alive. The kale seems ragged, but not dead. Maybe it will put on new growth in the spring too. I can always hope.

Harvest Monday - 22 February 2010

This week was very special for the use of my harvest. As I've said before I pickled snap peas and was sorely disappointed. I'm a real pickle lover and they make great refrigerator pickles, but once they see heat they sort of dissolve. Ick. This week I opened the first of my cucumber pickles.

They really don't look like much, but oh my goodness they were so delicious. They weren't quite as crunchy as the refrigerator version, but not bad at all. They were better than any pickle I've bought before. YUM! Sadly last year was a bad cucumber year. I only made three pints. I've got just one pickle left in the first one. I can't eat one at a time. I eat four at a time. I really hope we get some sun this year so I can grow more cucumbers.

The recipe is the same as my refrigerator pickles, but you have to salt the pickles for hours first and can them. Is the growing season here yet?

If you would like to join Harvest Monday with a harvest or how you are using it, put your name and URL into Mr. Linky below.

We Have Liftoff

Though we had another snow storm this week giving us 7" of more snow, the gardening season has officially started for me. I have seedlings.

So they aren't all that big yet.

It took them a week to get here and right now they are sad little things. Still it means that spring must be right around the corner.

Harvest Monday - 14 February 2010

I know you expect the hostess of Harvest Monday to actually show you something. But I've got nothing. I didn't make anything special from my garden saved produce. I used spices and a bit of pickled peppers on my hamburger. Do I get points for it being grass fed from the farmers market last fall? But I didn't make any soup. Just the typical coleslaw and squash casserole. I didn't even eat any of my applesauce. All in all it was just the same old, same old.

I did have excitement though. I finally gave in and planted some onions. I was waiting for my Varsity seed from Fedco, but it still hasn't materialized. The planting target date was Feb 6th. I planted February 12th.

I multiplanted my soil blocks. Each have four seed and will be thinned out to the best two. Last year I found the doubles grew well if planted on 6" centers but the triples planted on 8.5" centers did not. I planted 18 blocks of Redwing and 36 blocks of Ringmaster. If Varsity comes soon, I'll get rid of half the Ringmaster and plant 36 new blocks (for a total of 72). If it comes late I'll probably plant up just 18 blocks and let Ringmaster be my major onion. 72 is a great number for me since a flat fits 72 perfectly (1 1/2" blocks).

I'm still trying to find the best container to keep the blocks in. I don't like the wood ones that a lot of people make. Flats are nice since they are a good size to go under the lights and large. I have three layers to my flats. The first is the solid bottom flat. The second is a wide plastic mesh which is strong enough to hold the plants without the first. The third is screening (from some old window screens) cut to fit so the soil won't fall out and the bottom is flat. I think this will work. I can put water in the bottom one and then lift up the middle one when the blocks are finished with getting watered. I'm hoping it works at least. Last year I just put them in the solid flat and didn't like it much.

If you are doing better with your harvests than I am, put your name and URL into Mr. Linky below.

The Return of the Sun

I've noticed a real increase in the angle of the sun recently. Remember on January 22nd it looked like this.

The neighbor's house shaded the garden almost all the way to the fence. Now just three weeks later:

The lower bed is totally in the sun and the middle bed is even partially in sun. Whoohoo! It must be almost spring. Notice also that the garlic area is out of the snow already! We were supposed to get 8" of snow on Wednesday night, but it never materialized. We got about an inch and it was melted off by the afternoon on Thursday.

Wasn't the Superbowl Four Days Ago?

I've been slacking on my blog. I've been meaning to talk about Superbowl food, but here it is Thursday. I'd better get with it, shouldn't I?

As our most parties that my friends throw, the Superbowl party was a potluck. Sue, who is the traditional hostess of the Superbowl among my friends, suggested that we theme what we bring to coincide with the teams playing. New Orleans was so easy, but what should I bring for Indiana? I suppose middle America food - potato salad, coleslaw, jello molds - would have been appropriate, but I wimped out and just supported New Orleans with my food choice. I made Seafood Creole. Yum. I don't make it often, though it is quite a well loved dish. It takes at least an hour of active food prep and about an hour after to let it simmer.

This post is all about how much of a slacker I've been because I really wanted to take photos of it after it was done. But did I? Nope. So to make up for it I'll give you all my recipe.

Daphne's Seafood Creole

• 2lbs uncooked shrimp with shells on
• 2T flour
• 3-4 T butter
• 2 onions minced
  
• 1/4c minced jalapenos
• 1/2c minced celery
• 2 cloves garlic minced
  
• 4c Sungold tomato sauce
• 2 cans crabmeat (or use fresh if you have it)
• 1/4 lb scallops
  
• 2 bay leaves
• T dried parsley (or more fresh if it is summer)
• Tony Chachere's Creole Seasoning to taste (which has salt, so I don't add any more)

While other things are getting sauteed, I work on the shrimp. Peel. Rinse the shells. Put the shells in water to cover and boil for 10 minutes to make a shrimp stock. Strain and use 1 cup in the recipe. If I have really large shrimp I chop them up a bit for this dish.

Make a light roux with flour and 3T butter. Add onions to roux and sautee for 10 minutes over low to med heat. I often add another tablespoon of butter at this point because it likes to stick. Add jalapenos and celery. Saute 15 minutes. Add tomato sauce. BTW you don't really need Sungold tomato sauce like I used but if you don't have a really sweet sauce, add some sugar to taste. You can also use fresh tomatoes, but add about 5 cups finely minced. Add bay leaves. Simmer 20 minutes stirring constantly. Add the rest of the ingredients. Simmer for an hour. Serve with rice and a nice Louisiana hot sauce on the side.

From my garden I used, jalapenos, parsley, and the Sungold tomato sauce. I've had trouble using up my Sungold tomato sauce. It is really too sweet for most things, but it went very well with this. It gave a really sweet and sour taste to it.

And this ugly thing I remember to take a photo of?

After I was done making my stock, I kept looking at the shrimp shells. It would have been such a waste to throw them away. People buy things like crab meal to use as fertilizer. I keep my eggshells. So I dried them out and I'll crush them and put them on the garden. Maybe they will be good for nematodes like crab meal is. I can only hope.

Harvest Monday - 8 February 2010

I hadn't put my accounting up before, but I think it is time. I've spent a lot of money on the garden already. It is typically how I spend. I think of what I need for the year and get it all at once. I like to buy from one company if I can because it saves on shipping. Or it does if you can remember everything you were going to buy and put it in. I failed miserably at that task this year.

My first order I talked about already. Seeds from Fedco at: $33.90. Then a couple of weeks later I ordered from Fedco Organic Growers Supply. If Fedco were a normal garden company I could have bought them together, but they aren't. They have several different branches of the co-op and you have to order from each one separately. From them I got:

• Buff Oats OG (hulless oats)
• Peas/Vetch/Oats mix for a cover crop
• Legume innoculant (works on beans, peas and vetch)
• Micro soil blocker
• 2" soil blocker
• Orchard netting
• 2 1/2 gallon sprayer (my old one broke last year after about 20 years)

This gave me a total of $170.80. $100 of that was a birthday present from my MIL and $50 was from a gift certificate I won from another gardening blog. Which gives me a total of $20.80 out of my pocket.

Now if you will notice I ordered two soil blockers and forgot to add in the part that lets you use them together (putting the micro block into the 2" block when potting up). Whoops! So much for buying things all at once. But GrafixMuse came to my rescue and told me about a 20% off coupon from Johnny's so I ordered it from them along with the two other things I forgot about.

• Soil blocker insert set
• Sluggo (trying it for the first time this year)
• Bt dust (for my winter moths in the spring that eat my blueberry flowers)

That added up to $26.03. Now if someone could just tell me how to put those inserts into my soil blocker I'd be all set. There were no instructions.

At my local hardware store they had a beautiful display of Blotanical Interest seeds. I still haven't gotten my onion seeds on backorder. So I picked up Ringmaster, which the seed packet claims is a storage onion but not nearly as long keeping as Varsity the one on backorder. Now my eye did get drawn to the tomatoes since they had a huge selection of great ones, but I resisted. I already have more tomato varieties than I can grow.

And speaking of seed I'd like to thank Miss M for the leek seed that showed up on my doorstep the other day. Yes I've been sent yet more seed. Where oh where will it all go. Resisting seed at the store is so much easier when you know you have too much at home. It is hard not too look though.

Now I still have to buy new tomato cages. I want some good ones that fold, so that is going to be a pretty penny. I've seen two types. Round ones that you can get 6' high or square ones at 32" which you can stack two high. Two square ones are more expensive than one round one so I'll probably go with round. To get twelve I'd need to spend $200. Ouch! I could always buy a roll or two of concrete reinforcing wire, like I've done in the past. It does get rusty fast. It doesn't fold at all so storage has always been in issue. If anyone has used either of the above, please let me know how you liked them.

So now onto the tally. Spent:

• Amortized Fence $60
• Fedco Seed $33.90
• Fedco Supply $20.80
• Johnny's $26.03
• Hardware store $1.89
  

Harvest in pounds: 2.2 oz
Harvest total: $0.21 (hey don't laugh!)
Yearly spent: $140.73
Yearly earned: $-140.52

Until things start coming in this time of the year is really pretty sad. I spend a lot and I won't harvest a thing until April (if I'm lucky, otherwise May).

If you would like to help me believe that harvests still exist, put your name and URL into Mr. Linky below.

And Yet More Seeds

Hmm seems to me I've used that post title before. I must have too many seeds in the house now. I had a package from Canada arrive last week. I knew what that meant. Seeds from Dan.

He sent me some Little Gem Romaine. Now I have 12 varieties of lettuce. Where, oh where will I put them all? At least this one has "little" in its name. That must mean it is a dwarf variety and won't need as much space. Maybe I should plant it with my Tom Thumb lettuce from Stefaneener. Two cute little heading lettuces together would be nice.

He also sent me some Tiger's Eye Beans. These will be part of my dried bean growing effort this year. I want more things to eat over the winter from the garden. And as you have all probably figured out, I love dried beans and eat them all the time. It would be great if more of them were my own.

The other two are Cherokee Purple and Big Chili II. I've been wanting to grow Cherokee Purple all summer long as people rave about the taste. It takes a bit longer than the other tomatoes I grow, but I'm going to try it anyway.

I know there are a couple of folks that said they would send me seed and haven't yet. Well I really, really don't need anymore. I have too many varieties of too many things.

The one thing I need and I haven't gotten yet is my onion seed from Fedco. My charts say my target date for planting is Feb 6th, just two days away. I only have my red variety right now. Varsity, my white storage type is nowhere to be seen. I might just have to pick up some from the garden center soon. I really wanted to try Varsity. Fedco's description was that it kept better than Copra and can get as big as Ailsa Craig. That is saying a lot. But if it doesn't get here, I'm sure I can find something locally to plant easily enough.

I placed an order from the Fedco Organic Supply too. I ordered a lot of things, one of which was more seed. I always find it amusing that cover crops and grains are put in the garden supply section and not in the seed section. I ordered their soil building seed mix. I'm a fan of an oat and vetch combination, but to buy them separately costs too much for me. The mixes are cheaper. Their mix is an oat/pea/vetch mix. It ought to work well at any time of the year as vetch overwinters. Around here most do a rye/vetch mix for the fall into winter as rye is also winter hardy, but I like oats much better. All the research I've seen shows that oats, even though they winter kill, is better than rye because it isn't allelopathic like rye. So crops after oats grow better than crops after rye.

I also ordered some hulless oats on the outside chance that I'll get a community garden plot to put it in. The thought of growing a little grain seems really quite intriguing. I haven't a clue how I would harvest it yet as I don't own a scythe, but I'll cross that bridge if I get a plot and actually plant the oats. For now you can laugh at the image of me cutting a patch of oats with scissors as that is the best tool I have right now.

Get Growing in February

This is the third in a twelve part series for new gardeners. If you have never planted vegetables before but always wanted to, this is the series for you. Robin, who writes the blog Vegetable Matter, and I will post on the first of every month. Robin lives in Houston and I live in Boston. We will be posting about what to do in the garden that month and giving advice. So if you have always wanted that vegetable garden, but didn’t know where to start, you have no excuse. Get growing!

Compost

Here up north we are still locked in winter. If you are growing onions from seed, this is the month to to start them under lights, but other than that we are still reading gardening books and dreaming of spring. So this month I'm going to talk about composting which is a useful topic any month of the year.

Compost isn't rocket science. It is just broken down organic matter. Nature does it every day. If you scrape away the top layer of leaves in the forest you will see nature's compost.

Why Compost?

When people start gardening, they don't think of their soil as being alive, but it is. It is home to many organisms, both the good and the bad. My philosophy to gardening is to work with nature not against her. When you don't replenish the soil with organic matter (compost or turning under crops), you are effectively killing off all the good organisms that help your plants grow and some can even help protect your plants from disease.

When there is plenty of organic matter in the soil the good bacteria and fungi can thrive. Many of the good bacteria can hold onto excess nutrients in the soil and when they die they release them to the plants. Interestingly enough the good bacteria and fungi thrive in a compost pile. So when you add the organic matter, you aren't just making a good living environment for these organisms, but you are adding more of them to the garden.

You can get compost in several ways. You can buy it bagged up at the garden center, which can be expensive and isn't very sustainable. Many towns in my area now compost their leaves and grass clippings and it is often free for town residents for the taking. Some will even haul it to you in large quantities for a low price (fabulous for starting a new large garden). But you can't beat your own homemade compost. It costs exactly nothing and keeps a lot of kitchen waste out of the trash. When kitchen waste ends up at the dump it produces methane, one of the worst of the greenhouse gasses. So you are doing both your garden and the earth a favor by composting.

Where to put a compost pile

You want to put your compost pile on flat ground over dirt or grass. It needs to be within reach of your hose. It should be convenient to your kitchen and to your garden. You can put it directly in your garden and rotate it from year to year. The soil under the pile will be very fertile. Or you can put it in the shade which will help retain moisture in the pile.

How to contain the compost

Commercial compost bin

There are many commercial compost makers, from the really expensive, like a tumbler, or the more inexpensive like a wire bin composter. Many people make their own. You can get wooden pallets and connect them to make a free composter.

Compost bins made from wooden pallets, photo copyright and courtesy of Our Engineered Garden

My solution is to buy wire fencing material. I measure out about 10' of it and cut it off. I connect the two ends and have a bin about three feet in diameter. Then there is the cheapest and easiest of all methods. You can just pile up the materials into a heap. Most people don't elect for this one since it takes up more space and looks messier.

To keep the compost hot you need a compost pile that is at least three feet in all directions. The mass of the pile will be able to insulate it well enough. If you want a smaller compost pile you need to go for one of the enclosed black plastic varieties (either a tumbler or the on ground ones) and keep it in the sun. There is an advantage to those types of composters. They keep animals from getting into them. I usually throw my kitchen scraps into one to keep the raccoons out of it. It has no bottom, but the top locks shut. If I lived in an area with rats, I might choose the tumbler kind that is totally encased for my kitchen scraps.

But what type of containment you use is totally up to how much you want to spend, the quantity you are making, and how you want it to look.

How to make a pile

I pile needs three things to compost well. It needs moisture, air, and orgainic matter to compost. Typically you can add any organic matter to your pile with certain exceptions. DON'T ADD:

meat and bones	atrracts pests like rats to your yard (it can be done, but it is expert composting)
milk or oils	smell up the compost pile
dog and cat waste	contains parasites that can infect you
diseased plants	if the temps don't get high enough the disease can spread
toxic materials	dyed hair, treated wood, plants treated with herbicides or pesticides
black walnut tree	produces juglone which is toxic to certain plants

The organisms that break down the organic matter in your pile like a 25:1 to a 30:1 ratio of carbon to nitrogen in the organic matter you put in. If you are really into getting the perfect ratio you can do a lot of calculations, but a good rule of thumb is to mix half green material (higher nitrogen material) and half brown material (higher carbon material). It might be called green material and brown material, but the color has nothing to do with it. And even the green material which is higher in nitrogen, still has more carbon than nitrogen.

Greens	Browns
grass clippings	leaves
kitchen waste/eggshells	wood
manure	paper
coffee grounds/tea bags	cardboard
alfalfa/clover	straw
hair/feathers/wool	sawdust
green plants from the garden	dried plants from the garden

It is best to cut up or shred the larger items. If you put a log into your compost it could take years to break down, but if the wood is chipped it will compost much faster since it has a larger surface area. Leaves, especially oak leaves, can mat down and take a while to compost, so shred them by running over them with your lawn mower. I've found that newspaper mats down very easily into a glue like substance. It is best to shred them and mix them with something else. Grass clippings also can mat down if left in large clumps.

Many people will tell you to make a compost pile by adding four inches of green material and then four inches of brown material. The reality is that they do better by being mixed up at the start. The pile heats better and things don't tend to clump as much when mixed. So add eight inches of mixed material together. To get the organisms you need into the pile to start it off faster add a shovelful of soil (I've done piles without any soil and it still works). Soil, especially good garden soil, will not only add organisms, but will add some minerals that might be lacking. You can buy compost activators from a store, but in reality all the organisms you need are in your soil.

If you add too much carbon to your mix, your compost will decompose more slowly. If your nitrogen is too high then you will get a smelly pile as the ammonia goes off. Your neighbors will not appreciate this. If you find you have done this, just turn the pile and add more carbon.

Without being moist the pile won't heat up properly. You want your pile to be moist but not wet. Think about the moisture content of a wrung out sponge. So as you layer your pile, water it so everything is just damp. If the pile gets too wet it will become anaerobic and the organisms that like to live in an airless environment will take over. These are not good organisms for your garden and they smell. If your compost is too wet, turn it to air it out a bit. I keep plastic over the top of my open bins to keep out the rain, since I live in a very rainy environment. This also keeps the rain from leeching out the nutrients in the pile. If I had sides to the pile this would probably be a bad idea since the pile needs to breath, but I don't. I just have wire mesh on the sides, which give it plenty of air.

My wire bins with plastic on top to keep out the rain

So you just keep adding to your pile until it reaches the top of your enclosure. In a normal household this can take a while and the bin is mostly populated with leaves and grass clippings and a few buckets of kitchen scraps. Some people collect things and make a big pile all at once which makes for better hotter compost, but doesn't fit the lifestyle of most people. If you want to collect things for you piles an easy source for carbon material is leaves in the fall, or newspaper from your friends all year long. Often tree companies will dump their chipped wood on you for a low cost or free (they have to pay to get rid of it). For nitrogen materials, coffee houses will often save buckets of them for you. I get pails of this from my husband's work. Grass clippings left by the curb are great if you know they don't use herbicides on them. You could probably even convince a nearby restaurant to save the kitchen scraps for you. I occasionally get these from my husband's work too, but there is someone with rabbits that works there that gets first dibs.

Maintaining a pile

Once you have your pile, you have two options. You can keep it turned every few days to a week to keep an active compost pile, or you can just let it sit like mother nature does.

For the active compost pile. The organisms in compost will heat up the pile if they get just what they want to survive. They need the right amounts of nutrients, water and air. Turning the pile adds air to the mix and will keep a pile hot if everything else is just right. After a few days to a week the temperature will start to come back down again. Now it is time to turn the pile. You keep doing this until the pile no longer heats up when you turn it. The better shredded your starting materials are the faster it will decompose. Also the closer to your 25:1 carbon to nitrogen ratio you have the better it will work. If things go well you can have compost in six weeks. The best compost for the garden is this kind of compost. When you add all your ingredients for your pile, you will notice that it heats up all on its own. It creates a whole lot of disease preventing fungi and in addition the nutrients haven't had time to leech out so it is more nutritious for your plants.

For the inactive compost pile you can just let it sit until it is ready. This can take up to a year. This method doesn't even require the right amount of nitrogen for the pile. If there is too much carbon it just takes longer to make. One type of compost is leaf mold, which is just made with a pile of leaves that have been moistened and allowed to sit. They have to sit for a year if very well shredded or two if not, but it is very low effort. This type of compost won't have the nitrogen content of a quicker compost. So on its ownit isn't a perfect fertilizer. It needs to be supplemented. It also won't supply the large quantities of beneficial organisms for compost tea (use actively made compost for that), but it will provide a lot of low work organic matter and your garden will love it.

If you just have compost pile that you constantly add little bits and never turn, the pile will never officially be done, but it will produce good compost at the bottom of the pile. Once a year you should dig off the top parts that aren't yet decomposed. At the bottom will be your finished compost. I do this with my black bin composter (shown above). The bin has little side slots from which they assume you will dig out your finished compost. They are way too small to do that. I just lift off the whole bin and move it over to a new spot. Then dig the unfinished bits back into the bin.

Using the compost

Compost is finished when it is dark and crumbly and smells like soil and not your original ingredients. Many people screen their compost before use. Sometime there will be parts that haven't decomposed, like a stem from a plant or a stick. Maybe some oak leaves have been resistant. These are usually screened out before adding to the garden. Screens can be bought or made from 1/2" hardware cloth. I don't usually screen mine. I go through it and pick out the larger bits and toss them into the next pile to form.

Once it is screened or sorted through you can dig it into the top six inches of the soil or use it as a mulch if you follow the no-dig philosopy. I tend to think of 1/2" as a minimum to add to the garden on a yearly basis to replace the organic matter that has disappeared over the year. I tend to add a lot more because I make a lot of compost and often use it as a mulch to keep down weeds. Most garden writers will tell you to add at least 1". With organic matter more is not a problem. It isn't like fertilizers. It won't burn your plants.

There is one other common way to use compost - in tea. Actively made compost and worm compost (which I'm not discussing here since I don't keep a worm bin and have no experience, but you can buy worm compost), are the best for compost tea. They both have a lot of beneficial organisms. The usual tea recipe requires a bubbler, molasses, rock dust and sometimes a host of other ingredients. The idea is that you give your good organisms a really good environment to grow and boost their population. I do not do this. I simply put the compost into a container and fill the container up with water. I let it sit a day; filter it; then spray it on my garden. The reason to do this is the organisms contained in the compost can out compete the disease causing ones on the plants. In addition it supplies some foliar feeding. The actively brewed tea works much better than my version, but requires equipment that I don't have. If you want to know how to do it, you can read about it in Fine Gardening.

Other post in the series

Determining your growing zone and planting peas (Vegetable Matter - December)
Planning a Garden (Daphne's Dandelions - December)
Growing Lettuce (Vegetable Matter - January)
Starting transplants indoors (Daphne's Dandelions - January)
Growing tomatoes (Vegetable Matter - February)
Compost (Daphne's Dandelions - February)
Snap Beans (Vegetable Matter - March)
Peas and Spinach (Daphne's Dandelions - March)
Eggplant (Vegetable Matter - April)
Brassicas (Broccoli, Cabbage, Asian vegetables) (Daphne's Dandelions - April)
Edamame (Vegetable Matter - May)
Tomatoes (Daphne's Dandelions - May)

Harvest Monday - 1 February 2010

The first harvest of the year! Kale: 2.2oz. OK so it isn't much, but it is a harvest. The kale survived under all the snow. We had a good melt out. Not enough to get rid of all the snow cover, but enough to get to the kale. Whoohoo!

The stores continue to be eaten up slowly. Above is lunch. I would call it leftovers, which the meat is since it is leftover from a restaurant meal, but my son insists that what I make to just leave in the fridge can't be called a left over. I often have coleslaw made in the fridge for no particular meal. The coleslaw is from cabbage from the farmers market from ages ago. It is amazing how long cabbage will keep. The squash casserole I also make to keep in the fridge for whenever. It is made from frozen squash from the garden and farmers market. I mix the squashes when I puree them.

This meal of a sweet potato and bean burrito is probably more typical of my use of garden produce.

The only things in it from the garden are coriander and garlic.

And a pepper from the ristra. Sadly the black beans weren't mine. I do still have a small bit of mine left and I'll have to cook them up soon.

Next week I hope to have my new tally up. I have been spending money and keeping track. Now that I had a harvest I don't feel so bad about it. My next real harvest probably won't be until spring, but at least I've had something.

If you would like to join me in Harvest Monday, put your name and URL into Mr. Linky below. It doesn't matter how big or small your harvest is. If you have had a harvest this last week, show us and join in!

Food Crisis

Thomas asked on his blog today "Are we really at risk for a sudden and widespread food catastrophe" or is it just paranoia. He pointed out the paranoia of things like the cold war that didn't come to pass. I grew up with two kinds of paranoia, the cold war (I'm 48 to give you a timetable). The other was my dad.

My dad was quite the pessimist when I was growing up. He always thought our government or economy could collapse and we would have to take care of ourselves for a couple of years before things normalized again. I still remember his target date was 1982. I grew up in a household where food for a year was the norm -buckets of wheat, powdered milk, honey and salt (which he no longer has, but I'm talking aout my youth). We all learned how to use guns. My dad hunted. My job was to learn all the edible plants that grew around us in our backwoods house. Oh so much paranoia in my youth. So I understand the paranoia and have seen it not come to pass.

However just a couple of years ago we did have a world wide food catastrophe. Weather wipe out a chunk of the worlds rice crops driving up prices. Some farmers held onto their crops because they believed the prices would go even higher causing an even greater shortage. Oil prices hit a record high (required for how we make food today). Ethanol programs made the price of corn skyrocket. Stem rust in wheat was spreading. We had record high population (as we do every year) and a 60 year low in grain stockpiles. All of this came together at once. The world saw food riots. Remember this was all just a couple of years ago. I know we were largely insulated in the US. Even our poor were fairly insulated compared to places like Africa, but we have had a food crisis recently.

Will it get bad enough for the rich countries to be affected? Thomas talked about the potato famine and Monsanto's GMO crops. It is possible for GMOs to bring in genes that are susceptible to some disease and cause a crop failure of catastrophic proportions? Yes it is possible, but the likely scenario is that if something like that happens it will be a more minor crop failure like the corn gene issue of the 1970s. Most of the corn that was being grown had one little gene in it that caused it to be susceptible to smut (a corn disease not porn ;>). Over a couple of years smut started spreading. The seed companies figured this out and started growing out seed that wasn't susceptible. The whole world's crop probably won't be affected at once. The disease will spread. Monsanto isn't stupid (heavy headed and cruel to farmers at times yes, stupid no). They will notice and switch genes as fast as they can. This doesn't mean that whoever is growing the crop won't have issues. This doesn't mean it won't last a couple of years as they scramble to grow out another seed in large enough quantities. It could cause regional issues, but probably won't affect us.

If we have a food crisis for the richer countries, it will grow slowly over time. Population will increase. Petroleum will slowly run out and its price will rise. We will see more confluence of events like a couple of years ago causing temporary shortages. It will grow over time. Eventually we won't need a confluence of events. One bad weather year will create a shortage. This will happen unless we get the population under control. There is no stopping it. The time scale of this I have no clue, but as long as our worldwide population keeps growing it is inevitable. But look on the bright side. It is self regulating. When food becomes too much of an issue then massive war will break out worldwide and our population will go down. If it gets bad enough we might even bomb ourselves back into the dark ages or worse out of existence. How's that for paranoia?

Communal Insanity

I'm officially declaring myself insane. As some of you know we have been looking for a house to move to in East Arlington for the last year and a half. We like the location. It is within walking distance to the subway system, near the buses, near the bike path, and near a group of my friends. It seems like a perfect location. The problem is that East Arlington has tiny little houses and multi family houses and tiny lots. None of which we want. I wouldn't mind a smaller house and a smaller lot, but not tiny. And unless we know the people, I really don't want to live in a multi family house. We might not get along. I hear stories of not getting along and having to move. Don't worry I'm getting to the gardening part. I swear.

There are houses in the area that are fine for us, but they just haven't come on the market. I figure eventually we will get a house. Which of course got me to thinking. Most of the houses come on the market in the spring and summer. The typical time to move is summer after the garden is all up and running. I would hate moving out of my garden in its prime. I wouldn't be able to save any of my seed and wouldn't be able to can any tomatoes. So you see my problem. If we get lucky with a house, I get unlucky with my garden.

So I finally did it. I signed up for a community garden. If we haven't signed any papers by the end of May it will get planted in dried beans and hullless oats. If I have signed papers I can plant it with my tomatoes, squash, peppers and yes my beloved dried beans.

Finding a community garden was problematic. The one in Winchester is a postage stamp. For the longest time I was sure it was just someones garden from the fire department since it is on the same land. Even if I got in, the plots are way too small. Arlington only lets Arlington residents in, which I'm not yet and it has no water. Lexington (which abuts both Winchester where I live and Arlington) has two gardens and does let nonresidents in, but again they have no water. You might not think water is important with all the wet weather we have (we average 4" a month), but August tends to be spotty in rain. The last two years we have had 2-3 week stretches without a drop.

So I had to look farther afield. I thought being convenient to Arlington was more important than Winchester since a stand of dried beans and oats don't require a lot of attention. Belmont is right next to Arlington and their victory gardens are only 15 minutes from my house. They have water and they allow nonresidents to apply, though residents get the first option. So it seems to be my only reasonable choice. I applied. I wonder how far down the waiting list I am. And whether I have any shot at it at all. I know they had a large waiting list last year.

So I'm insane to try for yet another garden, but I did. I'm guessing the odds of actually getting a spot are slim, but you can't do it if you don't try.

Harvest Monday - 25 January 2010

I haven't been great about eating from my stores this week. It was the last week my son was home before going to collage and he was sick. So I let him pick what he wanted to eat: chicken soup, chicken pot pie, and chicken enchiladas. The only garden food used in these were my frozen carrots and my garlic. I had to buy my onions and potatoes as they are all gone.

I did open up some pickled peas. They are mediocre. I cooked them too long. Occasionally I get really paranoid with canned food and overdo it. If I make them again I'll follow the cooking times exactly. My refrigerator pickled peas that I ate over the summer were prefect, but they never saw heat. I might just stick with them and freeze the rest of the extra peas this year.

Another disappointment is my salsa. It tastes fine, but frozen salsa coagulates a bit. Canned salsa has a better texture. It is great for adding to things. My black bean soup recipe has three ingredients: black beans, salsa, and vegetable broth. It is so easy to throw together and tastes great. Adding salsa to chili works great too. Oh and bean dip (refried beans, salsa and cheese - again really easy). There are lots of ways to use it up, but I'm not putting it on chips anytime soon. Next year I'll can it. Weirdly the tomato sauce that I froze is just fine. As soon as it cooks up again it seems to get smooth. I'm using it up fast though. I'm almost down to my Sungold sauce. The sungolds make a really sweet sauce that isn't good for everything. It works great in chili which can use some sweet to counteract the spice, but it isn't good for pasta.

We are in a really warm spell today. It is going to get into the 50Fs and pour. It ought to free up my kale. I'll see if there is anything edible. I'll let you know on next Harvest Monday.

If you would like to help me believe that harvests still exist, put your name and URL into Mr. Linky below. It doesn't matter how big or small your harvest is. If you have had a harvest this last week, show us and join in! Just a note. Last time quite a few people put links to all sorts of weird posts, but not the harvest post they wrote. Make sure you are putting the correct link into Mr. Linky. I can fix them if necessary, but would rather not.

January Thaw

Last winter was very weird. We usually get a winter thaw, but last year it was snow. Then more snow. Then more snow. We never got the cold rains in the winter which I think as typical here after it snows. The snow didn't melt out until March. I was wondering if this year would follow suit, but the forecast is for three days above 40F and we might even hit 50F on Monday. That is pretty warm for January.

My beautiful white garden will probably melt out. I'm still not ready for the end of winter yet, but I'm sure by next month I'll be getting antsy. Right now I'm enjoying the beautiful scenery. I should have taken some photos for you all after the last snow storm. The flakes were large and beautiful and the trees just glittered.

BTW the photo of the garden was taken at 1pm, right in the middle of the day. You can see the nice shadow line of my neighbor's house. In a couple of months the sun will be high enough to get over the house and my garden will have sun again. I keep thinking I ought to do some winter gardening, then I see that shadow and know that my location isn't all that good for winter sun. And I'm happy again to be lazy in the winter. I think I'll go get a cup of tea while I dream about spring and enjoy the views.