Today I cleaned out the sunflower bed and replanted it with wild lettuce mix and cilantro. This is my first attempt at saving seeds, and the cilantro is my first experiment. It's so satisfying to plant seed from plants I grew, and when I cleared the sunflowers I tied them to the fence for the birds, as well as saving a few seeds to plant next year.
A few days ago I went to a friend's house and tried my hand at canning, which was wonderful! I should have snapped pictures, but I didn't think to do so. I pickled sweet banana peppers, canned heirloom tomatoes, and made spaghetti sauce. My friend gave me a hot water bath canner and I'll likely be purchasing a pressure canner sooner than later. It's wonderful to see food that I grew sitting in my pantry, waiting to nourish my family.
If anyone knows of a good canning recipe website I would appreciate it! I'll share anything I discover as well.
Sunday, September 5, 2010
Sunday, August 29, 2010
Saturday's Harvest
We went out to the garden Saturday to trellis the volunteer tomatoes that we'd transplanted and neglected, and we came across this!
It's either a tomato horn worm or a tobacco horn worm, which will decimate tomatoes in no time flat, but the cool part is what's on it... parasitic wasp coccoons! I know it's a bit gross, but knowing that we have beneficial insects in our garden is definitely heartening. I also saw a huge praying mantis with a great big bee in his clutches! I love bees because they're pollinators so I was a little disappointed to see that the mantis had caught one, but our garden has been teeming with both bees and praying mantises, which is wonderful.
Here's the harvest we brought in, once we'd tamed the tomato jungle.
I've never grown corn before so I'm not sure what we did wrong, but as you can see the kernels didn't develop quite as they should. There were black beetles with yellow markings on the corn and the tassles had all dried up, so we picked it, but it wasn't quite the success I'd hoped for. Each plant was about eight feet tall, though!
The surprise for this year is banana peppers. I bought four plants on a whim because we had some empty squares, and I pulled over a dozen of them off the plants over the weekend!
Tuesday I'll be learning to can, so I'm taking my banana peppers, along with a box of tomatoes, both traditional and heirloom yellows and whites, onions, and peppers, so I can make some spaghetti sauce. How weird am I, all excited about learning to can vegetables?
Thursday, August 26, 2010
Fall Planting
I need to get some fresh pictures, but I want to post without waiting for that :) Being a procrastinator doesn't make one good at maintaining a blog!
Our garden did really well this year. We planted some of the tomatoes that volunteered in our garden and they're just starting to produce, as the summer tomatoes are fading and dying off. Today I planted two kinds of peas that I got in a seed exchange, Blue-Podded Peas and Golden Sweet Peas, and this afternoon I'll plant some Sugar Ann Peas. I have Mammoth Melting Sugar Snow Pea seeds, but I'm not sure I'll plant them because the place I've planted previously needs a raised bed put in. They need a big trellis, so I may wait until spring in the hopes of having the bed in by then.
I was really surprised when I planted peas for the greens last year and they produced peas, even though it was supposedly too warm for them to do so. The aphids tormented them, of course, but I still got some peas. My husband loves them so I hope to get a good crop this fall.
Our garden did really well this year. We planted some of the tomatoes that volunteered in our garden and they're just starting to produce, as the summer tomatoes are fading and dying off. Today I planted two kinds of peas that I got in a seed exchange, Blue-Podded Peas and Golden Sweet Peas, and this afternoon I'll plant some Sugar Ann Peas. I have Mammoth Melting Sugar Snow Pea seeds, but I'm not sure I'll plant them because the place I've planted previously needs a raised bed put in. They need a big trellis, so I may wait until spring in the hopes of having the bed in by then.
I was really surprised when I planted peas for the greens last year and they produced peas, even though it was supposedly too warm for them to do so. The aphids tormented them, of course, but I still got some peas. My husband loves them so I hope to get a good crop this fall.
Tuesday, June 1, 2010
Pictures!
Newly harvested, it's been replanted with rampicante squash, two tomatoes, poona kheera cucumber, and five little corn plants that I got from a nice lady on the Square Foot Gardening Forum. She also gave me thyme, sage, and chives!
Of the greens we harvested, my favorite (and least bug-damaged) was Southern Giant Mustard. The Tendergreen Mustard was all but destroyed and I'm not going to plant turnip greens again, since I like the other greens so much more. I left the kale and my son's giant cabbage, as well as the volunteer green that I haven't been able to identify.
You can also see two new frames in the background!
This bed contains bush beans and four cherry tomato plants, which have already set fruit.
The pole beans survived the beetles and are reaching for the sky! I hope to build an overhead trellis for them next year.
This bed is planted with oregano, parsley, basil, tomatillos, and squash.
This bed has a variety of types of sunflowers, as well as three cucumbers, which is why there's a trellis at one end of the bed.
We have 16 different tomatoes planted in this bed, many of which are already producing! I can't wait for the first one to ripen.
The most recent addition, this bed was built for some record-length carrot seeds that were generously shared by a friend on the Square Foot Gardening forum.
Here's an overview of the garden area.
This bed alongside our house was added in May, and contains cilantro, malibar spinach, radishes, bull's blood beets, mustard greens, chervil, and a tall, happy dill plant. Hopefully the shade of the house will keep the mustard safe for a little while longer. I don't know what I'll replace it with.
Of the greens we harvested, my favorite (and least bug-damaged) was Southern Giant Mustard. The Tendergreen Mustard was all but destroyed and I'm not going to plant turnip greens again, since I like the other greens so much more. I left the kale and my son's giant cabbage, as well as the volunteer green that I haven't been able to identify.
You can also see two new frames in the background!
This bed contains bush beans and four cherry tomato plants, which have already set fruit.
The pole beans survived the beetles and are reaching for the sky! I hope to build an overhead trellis for them next year.
This bed is planted with oregano, parsley, basil, tomatillos, and squash.
This bed has a variety of types of sunflowers, as well as three cucumbers, which is why there's a trellis at one end of the bed.
We have 16 different tomatoes planted in this bed, many of which are already producing! I can't wait for the first one to ripen.
The most recent addition, this bed was built for some record-length carrot seeds that were generously shared by a friend on the Square Foot Gardening forum.
Here's an overview of the garden area.
This bed alongside our house was added in May, and contains cilantro, malibar spinach, radishes, bull's blood beets, mustard greens, chervil, and a tall, happy dill plant. Hopefully the shade of the house will keep the mustard safe for a little while longer. I don't know what I'll replace it with.
A Wonderful Holiday Weekend
We had a wonderful weekend! The weather was beautiful and we spent a lot of quality family time working on the garden, harvesting greens and putting in my son's carrot bed. It's 2x2 and almost 18 inches deep, to hold the seeds of a record setting length carrot a nice person from the Square Foot Gardening forum sent to my son. He's so excited about growing them and having his own bed! I planted radishes in the bed as well, since Carrots Love Tomatoes recommended doing so.
I also took a road trip and met another forum member, and she sent me home with lots of plants! I took her some borage to plant with her tomatoes, and she sent me home with english thyme, sage, a Poona Kheera cucumber, a Zucchino Rampicante squash, five Country Gentleman Sweet Corn plants, two mystery peppers (she's not sure if they're the sweet variety or the hot one!) and two more tomatoes! I planted them in the newly harvested greens box and I look forward to enjoying her generous gifts. It was great to meet someone else who has caught the SFG bug!
She also recommended a great little place called DeBaggio's Herb Farm. I could have spent hours exploring that place! I can get a bit OCD about acquiring herb varieties so I came home with banana mint (I'm still searching for ginger mint!), anise hyssop, and a horseradish plant for my husband. We tried to plant a root of horseradish but it didn't grow, unlike his beloved rhubarb, which he mentions whenever we walk by its little green leaves.
My husband recently gifted me with a new book called Your Backyard Herb Garden that's chock full of great information about herbs, including how to grow them, how to propagate them, and how to use them. I love browsing through its beautiful pages, even if I fear that it will lead to my deck becoming overrun with herbs! The herb farm had quite a few of the herbs I'm missing, so a return visit is likely. I'm hoping to put in a wheel herb garden, but that's not a project for this year.
I snapped some pictures of the gardens, the deck, and the tires I use as planters, which I'll post as soon as I find the card reader. I swear I need to put a homing device on that little gadget!
I hope everyone had a lovely holiday weekend.
I also took a road trip and met another forum member, and she sent me home with lots of plants! I took her some borage to plant with her tomatoes, and she sent me home with english thyme, sage, a Poona Kheera cucumber, a Zucchino Rampicante squash, five Country Gentleman Sweet Corn plants, two mystery peppers (she's not sure if they're the sweet variety or the hot one!) and two more tomatoes! I planted them in the newly harvested greens box and I look forward to enjoying her generous gifts. It was great to meet someone else who has caught the SFG bug!
She also recommended a great little place called DeBaggio's Herb Farm. I could have spent hours exploring that place! I can get a bit OCD about acquiring herb varieties so I came home with banana mint (I'm still searching for ginger mint!), anise hyssop, and a horseradish plant for my husband. We tried to plant a root of horseradish but it didn't grow, unlike his beloved rhubarb, which he mentions whenever we walk by its little green leaves.
My husband recently gifted me with a new book called Your Backyard Herb Garden that's chock full of great information about herbs, including how to grow them, how to propagate them, and how to use them. I love browsing through its beautiful pages, even if I fear that it will lead to my deck becoming overrun with herbs! The herb farm had quite a few of the herbs I'm missing, so a return visit is likely. I'm hoping to put in a wheel herb garden, but that's not a project for this year.
I snapped some pictures of the gardens, the deck, and the tires I use as planters, which I'll post as soon as I find the card reader. I swear I need to put a homing device on that little gadget!
I hope everyone had a lovely holiday weekend.
Saturday, May 8, 2010
A beautiful day to be outside
Today was so beautiful, even I couldn't resist being outside! I'm really not an outdoorsy person, but when it's in the mid-70's and there's a strong breeze, I just can't stay inside. It helps that there was some gardening I wanted to do and my husband had promised to build me some salad boxes to grow greens in. I'm going to try to grow salad year 'round, wish me luck!
I took a lot of pictures today, let's start with the garden. A couple of the pictures got cropped in the blogspot view, but if you click on them you can see the full picture.
Here's Bed #1 of our garden, which has a variety of greens, as well as the mammoth cabbage my son got from school and the volunteer brussel sprout with the beautiful yellow flowers. I left it there as a trap plant, but I really like it's flowers.
Here's Bed #2 of our garden, which has cherry tomatoes in front and a couple of types of bush beans and cowpeas behind them. The frost got most of the beans but they're making a comeback!
Here's Bed #3 of our garden, which has three different kinds of pole beans, although they've been ravaged by the same yellow striped beetles that have damaged the tomatillos, as well as little black beetles with red spots.
Here's Bed #4 of our garden, which has oregano in the upper left, tomatillos in the lower left, curled parsley between the oregano and the tomatillos, basil in the center (along with a few random parsley seeds I planted), and four different kinds of squash along the right side.
We tried to grow tomatillos last year and it didn't go well, so this year the man we bought them from gave us two plants to try again. Unfortunately some nasty little yellow striped beetles have ravaged them! I go out every day and drown the ones that I can find in a dish of soapy water.
I caught this picture of my husband checking out my mammoth sunflower.
Last year this bed was all flowers, but this year it's sunflowers and cucumbers, which are on the right end of the bed, so that we can build a trellis for them to climb (which we hope to do tomorrow!).
Our tomatoes are doing great! Some of them are even flowering. The ones on the left were purchased from a different person that the ones on the right, but I'm sure they'll catch up in no time!
This is the side bed my husband built beside our house last weekend. On the left is red and green malabar spinach, and the rest is cilantro.
This is the other end of the side bed, with mustard greens on the right, kale on the upper left, then dill that I planted to deter pests, then chard that I transplanted from Bed #1 because it was too crowded. I started the mustard and kale in pots on the deck.
Like last year, I'm growing some things in pots and planters on my deck. Hopefully they'll go better than last year, but either way I'm happy with my little projects!
These pots contain various things, but most notably the front planter is mustard and the pots on the left are peanuts, which we found at the greenhouse. They love the Mel's Mix soil we use! It'll be interesting to see if we get any peanuts at harvest time.
The big plant with the pretty yellow flowers is a kale plant that I planted last spring! It grew right through the deck and the root is as big around as my thumb. On the left is a daylily that I bought at the farmer's market last year; I can't decide where to put it. On the right in a tray full of winter savory seeds a friend gave me to try to grow. They're a couple of years old but I soaked them in tea, so I'm hoping they'll sprout *fingers crossed*
My husband built the box on the left, which is planted in lettuce mix and loose leaf lettuce. The other are planted with Drunken Wife, Deer Tongue, Red Deer Tongue lettuces, and peas. I'm hoping to grow salad through the year.
The planters in the back have lettuce and peas planted in them and my husband built the two boxes today, so I can grow my own salad. I'll plant them next week. I'm staggering the planting in the hopes of having salad always available!
I have a few herbs growing on the deck and next to the bed beside the house too.
We decided to put the mints and the catnip in pots so they don't overrun the place. The small pot is chocolate mint, which is new to me.
This poor little fennel lives off by itself because I've read that they don't play well with others. I'm mulching with mown grass in the hopes it will hold moisture in the soil during the hot summer.
The planter on the left is dill and the other has summer savory and tarragon. Summer savory has the most beautiful tiny little pink/lavender flowers! When it blooms I'll try to get a picture of it.
This is an assortment that I put in pots. I have high hopes for the salad burnet, which supposedly tastes like cucumber.
And now on to the various flowering things around the farm!
I created these two planters as gifts for two teenage boys to give their mother because they didn't have anything to give her and I was going to the greenhouse. I don't know what all of the flowers are (other than the marigold), I just picked things I thought were pretty.
I put these planters together for two teenage boys to give to their mother for Mother's Day. I really hope she likes them! I put the extra flowers in pots to keep, happy Mother's Day to me! :)
I found this at the greenhouse and I don't remember what the name of it is. The flowers are adorable, though!
I found this pink wishbone flower at the greenhouse. I'd never seen them before, but they're really pretty, and there's a deep purple one as well.
The tiny deep blue blooms of this lobelia are so gorgeous! I don't know the name of the mystery flower, I don't remember what the tag said.
I'm not sure what color this wishbone flower will be. I can't wait to see it!
A couple of clusters of these little pink daisies came up beside the house.
These beautiful columbines grow beside our house.
I relocated some of the deep purple irises from the patch at the end of the driveway to the butterfly garden, with no idea the while butterfly bush would get so big! I may relocate them, although they look beautiful blooming beneath the butterfly bush, which hasn't yet flowered.
This yellow butterfly bush grows so differently from the others. On the others, old growth regrows, but the yellow one is different. Only this one branch regrew, the rest is beginning anew from the base. Last year none of it regrew and it grew into a beautifully shaped bush.
I planted this pink butterfly bush over Jasper, our pot-bellied pig who passed away in March, 2010.
I bought these lantana last weekend and decided to plant them on Fantasy's grave. I hope they flourish!
I planted these last year and they were so tightly packed in their pot I had to cut it to get them out. They're supposed to be while with purple veining throughout, so I really hope they bloom next year.
Sorry for the long post, I had many beautiful pictures to share! I'm hoping to add more in the way of a garden journal as time passes.
I took a lot of pictures today, let's start with the garden. A couple of the pictures got cropped in the blogspot view, but if you click on them you can see the full picture.
Here's Bed #1 of our garden, which has a variety of greens, as well as the mammoth cabbage my son got from school and the volunteer brussel sprout with the beautiful yellow flowers. I left it there as a trap plant, but I really like it's flowers.
Here's Bed #2 of our garden, which has cherry tomatoes in front and a couple of types of bush beans and cowpeas behind them. The frost got most of the beans but they're making a comeback!
Here's Bed #3 of our garden, which has three different kinds of pole beans, although they've been ravaged by the same yellow striped beetles that have damaged the tomatillos, as well as little black beetles with red spots.
Here's Bed #4 of our garden, which has oregano in the upper left, tomatillos in the lower left, curled parsley between the oregano and the tomatillos, basil in the center (along with a few random parsley seeds I planted), and four different kinds of squash along the right side.
We tried to grow tomatillos last year and it didn't go well, so this year the man we bought them from gave us two plants to try again. Unfortunately some nasty little yellow striped beetles have ravaged them! I go out every day and drown the ones that I can find in a dish of soapy water.
I caught this picture of my husband checking out my mammoth sunflower.
Last year this bed was all flowers, but this year it's sunflowers and cucumbers, which are on the right end of the bed, so that we can build a trellis for them to climb (which we hope to do tomorrow!).
Our tomatoes are doing great! Some of them are even flowering. The ones on the left were purchased from a different person that the ones on the right, but I'm sure they'll catch up in no time!
This is the side bed my husband built beside our house last weekend. On the left is red and green malabar spinach, and the rest is cilantro.
This is the other end of the side bed, with mustard greens on the right, kale on the upper left, then dill that I planted to deter pests, then chard that I transplanted from Bed #1 because it was too crowded. I started the mustard and kale in pots on the deck.
Like last year, I'm growing some things in pots and planters on my deck. Hopefully they'll go better than last year, but either way I'm happy with my little projects!
These pots contain various things, but most notably the front planter is mustard and the pots on the left are peanuts, which we found at the greenhouse. They love the Mel's Mix soil we use! It'll be interesting to see if we get any peanuts at harvest time.
The big plant with the pretty yellow flowers is a kale plant that I planted last spring! It grew right through the deck and the root is as big around as my thumb. On the left is a daylily that I bought at the farmer's market last year; I can't decide where to put it. On the right in a tray full of winter savory seeds a friend gave me to try to grow. They're a couple of years old but I soaked them in tea, so I'm hoping they'll sprout *fingers crossed*
My husband built the box on the left, which is planted in lettuce mix and loose leaf lettuce. The other are planted with Drunken Wife, Deer Tongue, Red Deer Tongue lettuces, and peas. I'm hoping to grow salad through the year.
The planters in the back have lettuce and peas planted in them and my husband built the two boxes today, so I can grow my own salad. I'll plant them next week. I'm staggering the planting in the hopes of having salad always available!
I have a few herbs growing on the deck and next to the bed beside the house too.
We decided to put the mints and the catnip in pots so they don't overrun the place. The small pot is chocolate mint, which is new to me.
This poor little fennel lives off by itself because I've read that they don't play well with others. I'm mulching with mown grass in the hopes it will hold moisture in the soil during the hot summer.
The planter on the left is dill and the other has summer savory and tarragon. Summer savory has the most beautiful tiny little pink/lavender flowers! When it blooms I'll try to get a picture of it.
This is an assortment that I put in pots. I have high hopes for the salad burnet, which supposedly tastes like cucumber.
And now on to the various flowering things around the farm!
I created these two planters as gifts for two teenage boys to give their mother because they didn't have anything to give her and I was going to the greenhouse. I don't know what all of the flowers are (other than the marigold), I just picked things I thought were pretty.
I put these planters together for two teenage boys to give to their mother for Mother's Day. I really hope she likes them! I put the extra flowers in pots to keep, happy Mother's Day to me! :)
I found this at the greenhouse and I don't remember what the name of it is. The flowers are adorable, though!
I found this pink wishbone flower at the greenhouse. I'd never seen them before, but they're really pretty, and there's a deep purple one as well.
The tiny deep blue blooms of this lobelia are so gorgeous! I don't know the name of the mystery flower, I don't remember what the tag said.
I'm not sure what color this wishbone flower will be. I can't wait to see it!
A couple of clusters of these little pink daisies came up beside the house.
These beautiful columbines grow beside our house.
I relocated some of the deep purple irises from the patch at the end of the driveway to the butterfly garden, with no idea the while butterfly bush would get so big! I may relocate them, although they look beautiful blooming beneath the butterfly bush, which hasn't yet flowered.
This yellow butterfly bush grows so differently from the others. On the others, old growth regrows, but the yellow one is different. Only this one branch regrew, the rest is beginning anew from the base. Last year none of it regrew and it grew into a beautifully shaped bush.
I planted this pink butterfly bush over Jasper, our pot-bellied pig who passed away in March, 2010.
I bought these lantana last weekend and decided to plant them on Fantasy's grave. I hope they flourish!
I planted these last year and they were so tightly packed in their pot I had to cut it to get them out. They're supposed to be while with purple veining throughout, so I really hope they bloom next year.
Sorry for the long post, I had many beautiful pictures to share! I'm hoping to add more in the way of a garden journal as time passes.
Tuesday, May 4, 2010
Irises and Almost Every Square Filled!
We've been busy! My wonderful husband built me another bed beside the house, so I can grow things that like, or at least tolerate, shade. I transplanted some of the mustard I'd started in pots on the deck and we put our cilantro in there, which will hopefully slow down the bolting process. We also got some herbs which I potted on the deck (dill, fennel, summer savory {which has the pretty tiny purple flowers!}, and tarragon), and I fear that I once again bought more tomatoes than I have space for in the garden, so two of them went into great big pots. We bought four little peanut plants too and put them in big tubs on the deck, and amazingly they're already visibly growing! Sadly I didn't get the pictures on Flickr over the weekend, but I promise to post them soon.
Every spring I find myself smiling at the sighting of daffodils dotted around our little farm and it makes me so happy to see the irises bloom. I went around and took pictures of some of them Sunday, although I didn't get any of the lavender patch that is being overrun by blackberries. I love the deep purple patch at the end of our driveway. We divided them three or four years ago and this is the first year they've really bloomed fully. They were even more dense this morning! Hopefully I'll be able to get a picture of the full blooming patch, but just in case, here are some from Saturday. The last one is my favorite! The sun made the interior of the flower glow, although I'm not sure the picture does it justice.
These two are blooming beneath the butterfly bushes so I need to move them. I don't know if you can see the full range of color in the peach bloom... peach, yellow, vibrant orange, lavender... they're gorgeous!
The last one is a Mother's Day present from my husband. We were at the greenhouse buying compost to put in another raised bed Square Foot Garden and this beauty took my breath away.
I hope everyone is having a lovely spring!
Every spring I find myself smiling at the sighting of daffodils dotted around our little farm and it makes me so happy to see the irises bloom. I went around and took pictures of some of them Sunday, although I didn't get any of the lavender patch that is being overrun by blackberries. I love the deep purple patch at the end of our driveway. We divided them three or four years ago and this is the first year they've really bloomed fully. They were even more dense this morning! Hopefully I'll be able to get a picture of the full blooming patch, but just in case, here are some from Saturday. The last one is my favorite! The sun made the interior of the flower glow, although I'm not sure the picture does it justice.
These two are blooming beneath the butterfly bushes so I need to move them. I don't know if you can see the full range of color in the peach bloom... peach, yellow, vibrant orange, lavender... they're gorgeous!
The last one is a Mother's Day present from my husband. We were at the greenhouse buying compost to put in another raised bed Square Foot Garden and this beauty took my breath away.
I hope everyone is having a lovely spring!
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