It's That Time Again

It has been quiet the past few months. I have been planning the garden out on graph paper and today I ordered all my seeds. Yup, this year the garden is growing from seed! This will be my first year attempting to start everything from seed. Well, except the eggplant, I cheated and ordered plants. I have never grown eggplant before so I thought I would start safe. As for seeds I went with the standards - tomatoes, cucumbers, zucchini, lettuce, spinach, peas and beans. I am also going to attempt swiss chard, garden purslane and cantaloupe. Hopefully I have enough space to put all the flats! I am also trying out the new cow pots. They are made from cow manure and are supposed to be better than regular peat pots - both for the environment and the plants. I have been itching to get into the garden and cannot wait. This year everything is coming from Territorial Seed. I have had great success with them in the past, so fingers crossed it will be a stellar year!

Record breaking weather (again)

So it hit 67 today - December 3rd! Can you even believe it? It has been way too long since I updated this - bad blogger I am. The gardens have all been cleared out and cleaned up and I planted my green manure in my garden and Tom and I covered the Victory Garden with newspapers and cardboard in the hopes of keeping down some of the obnoxious weeds that grew feet in seconds all summer long. Although it was 67 today we have had a few frosts overnight so I thought I would dig up some of the parsnips.

and as you can see I still suck at growing root crops. The seeds were put down in mid July and should have been ready by mid October clearly these are not edible. Hairy, forked and REALLY pliable. I guess there is always next year.
Oh and because of this unseasonably warm weather we have been having my giant hyacinths and daffodils are now sprouting. I am hoping that they come back again in the spring when they are supposed to! They are a good 2 inches up already. I don't think mulching will help at this point. I also found some more asparagus spears growing yesterday. Those suckers grew from Spring till now. Fingers crossed that I get such a big harvest next year too!

A Disappointing Harvest

So the weather this Spring and Summer left a lot to be desired. It was AWFUL! Rainy Spring and cool Summer doesn't leave a lot of wiggle room for the crops I was attempting to grow. Let's see...in a nutshell:
Corn: was eaten by city critters. I'm placing my bets on raccoons. Not that the ears were bigger than 4: anyway. With all the rain in we had it drowned out the seedlings.
Delicata Squash - 1 squash per plant does not a harvest make.
Spaghetti Squash - none bigger than the size of a small bowling ball. And here I thought they were supposed to be oblong!
Onions - lost some to I have no idea what and the ones I did harvest were small, small small. But useful for a single size serving w/o having to store it.
Carrots - lets just say root crops aren't my thing!
Potatoes - they got so darn big they fell over and died prematurely so the harvest was small as well.
Lettuce - the seeds were devoured by the birds
Asparagus Bean - not nearly as plentiful as last year. But maybe it was because the seeds were a year old.
Zucchini - usually I can't get my neighbors to take anymore from me because I have such a huge crop. This year maybe 3-4 per plant - and I planted 6 plants!
The success stories are few:
Kentucky Blue Wonder Pole Beans - 12 seeds must have produced at least 5-6 pounds, if not more of beans. My neighbors are officially sick of beans! And I still have new flowers coming every day.
Sweet 100 and Bonnie Grape Tomatoes: WOW!!! That's all I have to say about those.
2009 wasn't the best of years but there is always 2010!!!!!

And on to the winter crops

Hard to believe in 90 degree weather that I am planning my winter crops, but apparently this is the time of year to do so. A few weeks ago I planted parsnips in my yard in an area that will need to be dug up in spring anyway, so I figured 'why not?'. I also planted some over in the V-yard (victory garden) - 4 or 5 rows, I can't really remember now. I have them protected w/ the oh so famous chicken wire in the hopes that the birds and squirrels don't harvest the seeds.
Today I transplanted the ripbor kale into both my yard and the V-yard. I am hoping that I placed mine high enough up on the hill that the dogs won't trample it - you never can tell with the three amigos! I direct seeded some more kale along with some spinach over in the V-yard. The spinach only takes 40 days (give or take) and I have plenty more seeds, I just ran out of room. I am hoping to find some more space somewhere to plant more.
I added a bit more of the salad bowl here and valamaine lettuce over in the V-yard. Both are hardy in the summer heat. And with the weather we have been getting lately it is hard to tell if it will be hot and dry like a typical August or rainy and cool like it has been the majority of this growing season.
I think that this is the first and last growing season for the V-yard. The bank came by earlier this week and they are putting the house up for auction (again). I am not worried about any of the winter crops that have been planted. The inside of the house needs so much work that if the house is bought the outside will be the least of their worries.
Although the place is an eye sore. I am hoping it goes unsold. With all the trial and error that Tom and I have gone through this year with that garden, I think that next years will be stellar. Let's just hope no one buys it!

Sorry State of Affairs

I love gardening and I love the taste of fresh, homegrown cucumbers. It is pure summer! But not this year. Just look at my sad, sorry, cucumber plants.
I planted 8 plants and have pulled out three because of all this disease. I check every single leaf and can't find the dreaded cucumber beetle, or any other pesky pest either. I didn't have enough space to plant all of the seedlings so I gave some to Tom and his plants look great, so I know it isn't the plant itself. Here's an up close and personal look at the damage:
And even more sorry pics - these two are of my black-eyed susans.


So much for disease free native plants, huh?

Me and Root Crops Don't Mix

Yeah, I obviously have been doing something dreadfully wrong when it comes to root crops! I dug up my carrots a few weeks ago – they should have been done mid-June. There were only 2-3 that actually looked like carrots. The others were so forked it was ridiculous. They looked like something out of a bad science experiment. Now the radishes in the Victory Garden are all misshaped too! I dug and dug and dug some more to make sure the ground was good and ready to plant the radishes and carrots, but still nothing. I do believe my soil is just too darn heavy. Next year I am making a root crop section and adding tons o’ sand.
As far as the potatoes they are growing like wild fire and toppling over they are so big. I have hilled them about 1 -1 ½ feet and still they topple. I know have them caged like friggin’ tomatoes! Who would have thunk it?
My asparagus continues to grow. What is that all about? It is almost August and I have 6 new spears coming up and that is not including the 5-6 that have already gotten o be about 8-9” high along with the original spears that are now all going to the ‘ferny’ stage.
The weather continues to be a challenge. If it isn’t raining buckets it is so damn humid and sticky. All this moisture is killing my zucchinis. They are starting to get moldy. My beans are being attacked by God only knows what and my cucumbers are the saddest looking things I have seen in a while. I have only picked about 10 cherry tomatoes and ONE yellow pear tomato. That is so not right. The only thing that is growing well right now is the parsley, which I planted to make gremolata for the beans that are not growing. S –I-G-H.

And the rain continues

Well this little guy is getting quite the workout lately. June's weather was awful and July is continuing on the same way. The 4th of July weekend was nice but the past two days consisted of rain, thunder, lightening and more rain.
Because of all this rain my corn, at least I think, has washed away. I can't tell if I am growing corn or crab grass. If it is crab grass it is growing in a very uniform row, just like where the corn should be.
I read in my bible (aka Trowel and Error) that you can hang red Christmas ornaments on your tomatoes when the first green ones appear. Allegedly the critters will peck at the ornaments and realize that they don't like them so when the tomatoes actually turn they will have been deterred from the whole plant. So here is my Christmas in July. Here's hoping it works.