Garden Log

[George the original one]

Heavily watered young trees yesterday. I'm not about to let them go dry! My availability for watering them is one reason I waited until retirement to order them.

[George the original one]

60 row feet of gold yukons are in the ground. Still... there's a couple dozen of both varieties of potatoes awaiting the rest of the bed, but the pressure is off. Time for a small celebration: fried razor clams collected this morning, radishes, and blueberry crisp baked by loving wife!

[CECTPA]

It was quite a cold night (not frost but close) and under the best Northern Lights ever my first pea shoots came out! It took them 15 days!
Also radish is peeking out (just 5 days after sowing).
Transplanted rhubarb is doing great.
Onions and kale are growing, but slowly. Or maybe it is normal growth process, I don't know yet

[CECTPA]

Went to the greenhouse to buy Saskatoon berry bushes, but they were of poor quality, so I was only able to pick 2 decent ones. Hopefully they'll make it.
I also bought a hardy kiwi bush, planted it, but it didn't make it through the frost $21 lost unless it'll try to revive itself next spring.
Also for the purpose of generating shade on our house I bought 2 small spruce trees and planted on the front yard.

Transplanted 2 raspberries from containers into the ground.

Sowed the seeds on May 10: lettuce, Brussel sprouts, some more beets and rainbow chard.

Previously planted onions, kale, peas, radish, beets are growing well. Except for snow peas that didn't germinate. Or maybe they are yet to come, I don't know. The seeds were mailed to me by a friend from Vancouver from her own garden.

[George the original one]

Fruits of my labor!

With all the warm dry weather we've had, the strawberries are ripening a month early, even here on the coast. Ate my first one yesterday.

In the greenhouse, 3 peppers are growing and 1 tomato has set (early girl). The watermelon seedlings are large enough to transplant into the ground.

[George the original one]

Grr, not sure what critter is attacking the strawberries. They've eaten a ripe one before I got to it and plucked some green ones that they left on the ground. I've set up chicken wire as a discouragement. Possibly bluejays, as feathers of one consumed by feline were found nearby. Feline may be the grey domestic that wanders around or it may be the bobcat that left tracks...

There are 6 peppers and 4 tomatoes now set in the greenhouse. Tomato plants are large enough to trellis now and I've staked them this morning. Half the watermelon seedlings have been transplanted. Cucumber plants are getting larger and I hate waiting, LOL.

Red potatoes are tall enough that I did their first mounding today. Gold yukons are visibly sending up shoots.

Mammoth peas are, well, mammoth. Still haven't seen blossoms on them. Earlier plantings of snow peas and some other variety are still producing.

Radishes gone. Earliest spinach has bolted. Thinned carrots where there was a need. Onions doing well. Kale & lettuce regularly harvested. Fresh squash sprouted to augment the one survivor. Broccoli looks spindly, but, then, I'm not really sure how it should look at this stage.

Potential garden expansion space was uncovered when we had trees on property line cut down (hired tree service due to liability if trees fell wrong way). Still trying to figure out a plan for the area because none of us want to dig out the stumps and roots. Considering plopping dwarf fruit trees in there...

Nights are still in the 38F-42F range, so I'm holding off planting green beans and corn.

[7Wannabe5]

I am now the proud possessor of 5 12x4 raised sheet mulch beds of black gold. I have 8 Sweetie Pie, 8 Golden Jubilee, 12 Striped German and 4 Cherokee tomato, 8 basil, 8 eggplant, 4 Habanero, 11 Antohi pepper transplants to set out. So, that will account for most of the space and, hopefully, get me close to achieving 25% of my eventual goal of 2000 lbs. of produce grown by Year 7 of my permaculture project. Unfortunately, the quick rush from winter to summer weather with no spring in between, has limited the production of my cold crops, but my little sour cherry tree is covered with fruit just one year after planting, and my black currants are looking to yield in year one.

Next my giant hugel-bed will be constructed, my mini-swale system will be completed, few more fruit trees planted and all will be underplanted with legumes, and my third lot will be covered with tarp and sheet mulch and squash, pumpkin, melon planting, my used tire collection will be spray painted hot pink and planted with sweet potatoes. Then my dome greenhouse will be re-positioned and secured with sunk posts and a circular seating area with center fire pit will be constructed next to it. Then a landing pad for my non-profit-tutor-camper will be poured. Etc. etc. etc.

[enigmaT120]

Do you have animals of some sort, too? I thought they were part of permaculture projects. Chickens, rabbits, fish, I don't know.

[7Wannabe5]

enigmaT120 said: Do you have animals of some sort, too?

Given that I am somewhat limited by urban zoning, I am thinking along the lines of quail and snails. Lots of squirrels and wandering cats already on site. If/when I actually attempt to live on my property rather than in my rental space, I will likely borrow my sister's newest dog. She is a Rott/Lab mix.

[George the original one]

@7W5 - How are you going to use your currants? I've thought about growing some, but have no experience other than pouring some out of a box for an occasional recipe.

[7Wannabe5]

@Gtoo: I am going to particularly try cooking the currants with some kind of gamey meat. I already have some mulberries, strawberries, blackberries, raspberries, goji-berries and goose-berries planted, and I plan on adding blueberries, so I am eventually going to be the queen of mixed jam. One woman I work with is from Bangladesh by way of Britain, and she told me to try not-quite-ripe goose-berries with fish in curry. Black currants are also supposed to be one of the highest anti-oxidant foods, so could be tossed in the juicer with broccoli stalks and flax seed.

[George the original one]

Greenhouse: 6 peppers & 9 tomatoes set on; only german queen has not set tomatoes yet. Cucumber has first flower. Watermelons have so far survived their transplant, including the three exiled outdoors. Greenhouse temps continue to be 70-75F during daytime while it's 55F & overcast/mist; still down to 40-45F outdoors at night and greenhouse only somewhat warmer.

Outdoors: it continues to be coastal mist damp and strawberries have mold issues (no surprise), second planting of spinach is bolting, earliest batch of red potatoes are now getting their second mounding, mammoth sugar snap peas are too big for their trellis and threaten to blow over. Plucked 4 green worms off apple trees and blueberry bushes a few days ago. Planted first trial of green beans because the soil was noticeably warm on Wednesday.

[CECTPA]

Hardiness zone 2 update. It is still chilly at night, but no frost is expected and everybody has got beans and corn planted.

Yesterday I removed the cardboard from the patch of the lawn where we wanted to kill grass. It did not look completely dead, I think, but I made some holes and sowed pole beans and corn. Just a little bit, to experiment. Without digging. We'll see. Some "laidback gardener techniques" lol.

Same seeds of beans and corn I sowed into the dug plot I got ready for them earlier.

Also sowed Edamame beans, and some unknown bean seeds my friend sent me from British Columbia (they are humongous!).
Planted 2 types of corn in different spots far away from each other. One is Orchard Baby, other one is Mandan Bride. Very excited about them, however my soil not that great. Next year I'll make sure my soil has a lot of nitrogen by cover planting with legumes.

Watched lots of videos on youtube on No Till Cover Crops gardening, does anyone have experience? Looks pretty neat, but need to figure out ways to use that method in the small scale.

This week I'll try to organize a lasagna garden plot, which is a very new concept for me. I have a 3rd type of corn to plant into it, a quick 60 day variety.Also pretty excited about it – Tom Thumb popcorn.

My hardy kiwi bush has perked up despite me thinking it would not make it. New buds and vines are out! Basically, everything I got from the nursery survived so far (but some are still in shock), except for the basil that froze.

The only harvest we had so far is the chives.

[7Wannabe5]

@CECTPA: The grass is not dead enough. You will need a significant barrier to prevent it from taking your corn and beans down and out. If you don't want to mulch, you might try trenching around the periphery of the bed. I have also been engaging in experiments with burning small areas of grass and weeds before planting, and this has been rather successful.

[CECTPA]

If you don't want to mulch

I want to mulch, but not sure when. I thought I should wait until the seeds germinate and then mulch around, right?

[7Wannabe5]

@CECTPA: Depends on what you are using for mulch. For instance, you might have just left the cardboard in place and cut holes to plant the corn and beans in. Ugly, but reasonably effective. I am mostly using cardboard covered with wood chips, but I have run out of free wood chips, so the paths in my new giant veggie patch are temporarily made out of strips of inflatable mattresses that my sister's dogs destroyed. My hatred of mowing is becoming so intense, there may soon be a motley patchwork of whatever carpet scraps, cotton sheets, plastic tarps, variety pots, wood scraps I can scavenge covering and smothering the weed-strewn lawn of my estate, with the exception of one 25' X 50' ft very well-maintained surface adequate for the occasional game of croquet, badminton or somersault practice.

[CECTPA]

Depends on what you are using for mulch.

Probably straw, dry leaves or peat moss. That's all I've got.
Next time I can try with the holes in the cardboard
Too funny about the motley patchwork lol

[jennypenny]

I guess the peas are ready

[7Wannabe5]

Woodchuck Patties in Tomato Sauce


1 woodchuck
1 cup bread crumbs
1/4 cup ground onion
1 tsp. salt
1/8 tsp. pepper
2 eggs
3 tbsp. fat
1 cup catsup
1/4 tsp. Worcestershire sauce

Clean woodchuck; remove meat from bones and grind. Add 1/2 cup crumbs, onion, salt, pepper, 1 beaten egg, and 1 tbsp. melted fat. Mix thoroughly. Shape into patties and dip into 1 beaten egg, then into 1/2 cup crumbs. Fry until brown in 2 tbsp hot fat. Add catsup and Worcestershire sauce and bake in a slow oven (325 degrees F.) for 1 hour. Makes 8-9 patties.

[enigmaT120]

7WB5 beat me to it, but I was going to say my favorite line about almost anything: "Tastes mighty good fried up with a little bacon."

I can't remember who said that, I think it was Rancid Crabtree.