The Modern Victory Garden

I did some minor chores in the garden this morning before heading out to get my hair cut and run some errands.  However, once I got home again most of my day was devoted to getting ready for the delivery of the chicken coop and covered run kit.   It was scheduled to be shipped out on Monday or Tuesday and should be making it’s way to us by truck.   It is traveling from Pennsylvania so it will take a while for it to reach us.   In the meantime, we had some site prep work to take care of and we needed to provide a larger run area for the birds.              

Just as a reminder, here is a picture of the coop kit and covered run that we ordered.                            

We will be installing the gate on the run on the other side from what is shown in this picture. The reason is that we will have it open up into the larger covered run that we assembled today.                          

This is a very economical (cost less than $350) and easy to assemble covered chicken run. The prefabricated panels are connected using simple clamps and a socket wrench.   It has a door with a latching mechanism on one end, and on the opposite side a square panel designed to be easily removed to connect it to either a small hutch or (as in our case) to another covered run area and coop.

The other task we took care of today was to level the area that the coop and other run are to be located.   Our backyard area is quite sloped, which is why our back garden beds are all terraced.   Using a good garden spade, I carved a flat area into the side of the slope wide enough and long enough to accommodate both the coop and the covered run.   This next picture shows you the prepped site area.   The square area on the new run we assembled today (closest to the site prep area) is the panel that easily unscrews and pops out.   The entire run will be moved closer to the other run once assembled and the connecting panel will then be removed allowing the gate on the wood covered run to be opened up into the larger run.                                   

Just to give you an idea of how much I had to cut into the slope.

Notice in the last picture there is a pet carrier sitting up next to the house.    That is how we have been transporting the chickens from their pen set up in the shop to the out of doors.   Once the coop is here and assembled we can stop messing around with that, but it has actually worked quite well in the interim and the girls are pretty relaxed about the whole process.   This final picture just shows you how the run and coop/run combo will be situated in relation to the raspberry patch and the back section of the garden.            

With a little work his afternoon we are now all set for the coop kit to arrive.    In the meantime, we can use the larger run area for the birds to spend daily time in without having to move their portable dog pen set up in and out of the shop.   Tomorrow, I am planning to plant the rest of the beans, as well as some dill.   Overall, the garden is growing and doing well. With the exception of some weeding and some watering to take care, the garden is not too demanding of my time at the moment because most everything is planted up and (other than some daily fresh harvests) there is not much else that needs to be done.

The first freeze arrived this week.   It didn’t just arrive in a gentle way either.   It seems with the weather in the past few years that everything occurs in an abrupt and significant manner.   The month of November is always our rainiest month in these parts, but this year it was setting records.   We had rain virtually every day through the month of November and plenty of them were deluge type soakers.   While it was soggy all through November the temperature was relatively moderate and warm for the time of year.   Then December arrived and it is like the spigot was just turned off by someone.   A stretch of dry and (mostly) sunny days has since ensued and is forecasted to continue through mid month and with the change came a sudden drop in temperatures – almost down to record lows for our area.   We have an arctic blast hitting us, which brought our nighttime temperatures into the mid 20’s .   The significant and hard freezes have taken down the vegetation on the semi hardy crops.   The tops of the parsnips are done but the roots will continue to reside safely in the ground.   The lettuce is also quite done in and I need to brave the cold today and remove them.   So far the brussel sprouts are holding up, but I should harvest the rest of the sprouts over the coming week just to be safe. Yesterday, I stepped out into the cold just long enough to dig up a nice mix of parsnips and carrots to slice and sauté in butter for dinner.   

I’ve got a few lists going at the moment.   Some are in my head and some are actually on paper.   And despite what you are probably thinking, the lists I am referring to are not related to the impending Christmas holiday!   Instead, they are about getting myself organized for the annual seed and supply ordering process.   I generally place orders for the bulk of seeds, nursery stock, and garden supplies right after Christmas.   I find it works better if I spend most of December taking an inventory of supplies, and developing / refining my garden plan for the coming year.   In addition to thinking about what to plant in the garden and what supplies might be needed, I also give some consideration to what projects should be completed prior to the growing season getting underway.   So far, here are the things I am thinking about:

• I need to replace the 4 Heritage raspberry plants that did not make it last year.   We also need to construct a proper support structure for the raspberry bed this year. 
• The broad-spectrum light tubes in the grow light fixture need to be replaced before the big seed-starting season gets underway.  The current tubes are quite a few years old and appear to be losing some intensity. I have some spares on hand but will order another set of spares to replace the ones I will use.   
• I am totally out of seed starting soil mix and need to stock up. 
• I want to add 4 more half-whiskey barrel containers to the greenhouse (have three in there now) – need to watch for a good sale on these, as they are kind of pricey.  As an alternative, I may give some serious consideration to constructing deep raised beds in the greenhouse using up the remaining timbers from last year's garden expansion project.
• After blogging this week about intercropping, I am inspired to give the 3 Sisters planting combination another try – using a half runner dried bean variety (probably pinto beans) and just a few squash plants in an attempt to keep it more manageable and produtive.
• This winter’s shop project is going to be the creation of some planting jigs to make it easier to do precise planting without excessive fussing around on my part.   I have an idea in mind and just need to go purchase a few materials and make a prototype of it.   I will blog about the shop project when it get's underway.   Last year’s idea and project was the horizontal pea trellis, which turned out to be a great success.

What’s on your lists?

In order to thrive, plants need to be in soil that is within a certain range of PH levels.   If it is too high (alkaline) or too low (acidic) for that plant then it will not be able to avail itself of required nutrients from the soil.   Most vegetables and fruits prefer a range from 6.0 to 7.0 with some of the more notable exceptions being potatoes (which prefer a slightly more acidic soil of 5.5 to 6.0) and blueberries / cranberries (which prefer a much more acidic condition of 4.0 to 5.0).                   

Each year in the fall, I do a check of the garden PH levels to determine if adjustments are needed.   Last year when I did this, most of the regular garden beds indicated a need to have some dolomitic lime added to raise the PH level and the blueberry / cranberry areas indicated a strong need for sulfur to be added to lower the PH level.   The adjustment indicated for the blueberries and cranberries was pretty significant so a complete correction was not attempted but rather a step down in the PH level with a plan to continue adjustments in the future.   Adjusting more than 1 point in a given time period can cause undue stress on plants and it is generally advisable to try and improve the PH level over a period of time rather than to attempt extreme adjustments all at once.       

There are two small (relatively inexpensive) tools that I would recommend every gardener have on hand.   One is a good soil thermometer.   The other is a soil PH meter.                                 

They are both readily available at most garden centers.   There are also chemical PH test kits available as well.   Not all meters are of the same quality and reliability.   I have had a few “duds” in my time that read the same no matter which bed it was placed in!   The one in the picture above is the meter I currently use and have found it to be reasonably accurate.   However, if I get readings that indicate an adjustment is needed, I always go back and do a second check to verify the results before proceeding to do an amendment process adjusting PH levels.   In addition to the meters and test kits, you can also take soil samples and submit them to your local cooperative extension service office.  For a small processing fee they will test your soil for PH and nutrient levels etc.,   If you contact them they will provide instructions on how to do this and where to submit the soil for testing.   Here is a link that will help you find a local office near you if you are interested in this.

http://www.csrees.usda.gov/Extension/                                       

To test soil PH using a meter with probe:

• Always thoroughly clean the probe before and after each insertion in soil.   My meter comes with a scrubber pad to initially clean and prep it - I then use a dry paper towel between tests and afterwards to dry it off before putting it away.
• If the soil is soaked from rain then insert the probe several inches (more than 4 inches) into the soil and wait one minute to take the  reading.   If you get a very strange reading, the probe is likely touching a bit of debris.  Pull it out, clean it, and try again somewhere close to the original insertion point. 
• If the soil is somewhat dry, dig a small hole and remove any debris such as rocks or twigs, pour distilled water (preferable) or rain water (second best) into the hole until the soil is thoroughly wet.   Then insert probe and allow one minute before reading.
• For garden beds, take several readings at various places in the bed area and determine the range of readings indicated.   Soil will be different throughout a bed due to a variety of factors and can vary significantly from one part of a bed to another.

This afternoon I took the time to test all of my garden beds and more permanent container plantings.    Including the potted blueberries…                

…. and every one of the other garden beds too.                        

The readings were placed in a spreadsheet that compared those results to the desired PH range for the bed and it’s current or expected future use.     

It appears that all of my adjustments to increase  PH last year worked very well and there are no indications that I should add lime to any of the garden beds at all this year.   However, the beds that will hold the potato patches next year and the cranberry and blueberry planting areas all need additions of garden sulfur to reduce the PH level.   The blueberry and cranberry areas in particular need rather significant reductions still.   I will wait to do the potato beds next spring, as they currently have crops in those beds that prefer the current PH range.   I went ahead and applied garden sulfur to the blueberry and cranberries today though.        

Follow the instructions carefully on the bag regarding how much to apply for a given plant or garden area to adjust the PH level.   If I am adjusting PH upwards, I like to use dolomitic lime  - as it adds calcium and magnesium while also increasing PH.   Again whatever product you need to use, follow the directions carefully on how much to apply.

Have you tested the PH levels in your garden?

Today was another warm and sunny day.   This morning I finished watering the last of the garden beds.   Everything was quite dry so I took extra time this weekend to do a deep soaking - particularly in the potato patches.   By the end of the three-day weekend, I had managed to get through all the beds with a thorough soaking.    

In addition to finishing up the watering tasks, I also pulled the last broccoli plants and harvested the remaining side shoots.   They were pretty well gone by and there is so much more coming on in the garden right now that eeking out a few more side shoots just is not worth the effort or bed space.   I lightly cultivated the soil in that section and then broadcast seeded some buckwheat for a green manure cover crop.   Buckwheat is one of my favorite green manure crops but I rarely get to use it because it is a tender plant that can only be grown in the warm summer months.   Typically, I have very few open sections in the garden during the summer - since I regularly plant succession crops.   However, this bed is in an area that does not get good fall/winter sun exposure so it will not be used again until next spring.   I will follow the buckwheat green manure crop with a fall cover crop planting of crimson clover, which should get the soil in prime condition by next spring.   I keep a 1 lb bag of buckwheat seed and about 3 lbs of crimson clover seed on hand because I like to use green manure/cover crops on a regular basis - particularly in the fall with crimson clover.                                   

None of these tasks took too much time, and my husband and I took advantage of the beautiful weather and headed to Point No Point beach during the mid-day low tide and had a lovely beach walk.   Played in some tide pools, day dreamed about what it would be like to live in the lighthouse, sat on the driftwood and soaked up sun, and generally just spent a few hours watching the world go by and enjoying the sea air and grand Puget Sound views.   This County Park is just a short distance from our home and is one of our favorite beach destinations.           

On the way back from the beach walk, we stopped at Port Gamble, which is an old timber town and Washington's oldest surviving company town.   Port Gamble is just 4 miles from our house and this charming location is a fun place to spend a Sunday afternoon.   We had some lunch at the General Store cafe, which is located right next to the beautiful Walker-Ames House (reputed to be haunted).                           

After a yummy lunch of cucumber salad and blue cheese/grilled onion burgers, we made one last stop at the old livery stable.   This old carriage barn and stables has been converted into an antique barn - where I found a great old compost sifter!         

I have been meaning to make myself a compost sifter using Dan's (Urban Veggie Garden Blog) directions/example, but this old farm implement will do nicely instead.   It will get many more years of use in my Modern Victory Garden.     

I hope you were able to enjoy a relaxing summer Sunday too.

It's that time of year again; the slugs are out in force and hungry for the tender young plants that are emerging in the garden beds. Living as we do in the maritime Pacific Northwest and in a house that is in a small clearing surrounded by dense forest - means that slugs are my number one garden pests. Through years of experience I have found several tried and true methods for slug management - and proven several other often-recommended solutions as essentially worthless. I thought it might be worth while to share with you some of what I have learned on this subject.          

First off, let me just say that without a doubt the most effective method of slug management is to do an early morning garden inspection and just pluck them off and either drop them into a small bucket of soapy water OR fling them far into the dark woods.   If this is done about twice a week spring through fall - the populations are kept more manageable.  It does require getting up quite early a couple of days each week. In addition, it requires that you invest enough time to give a careful inspection of your plants - making sure you find the ones hidden inside the folds of leaves etc.    

The second most effective method is the use of copper collars. I have found they work really well overall but unfortunately they are not a complete solution. First, they are only practical to use on larger items like cucumbers, broccoli, etc.  Second, if a leaf is drooping down over the edge of the copper collar to the ground, slugs will use the leaf as a bridge and climb aboard the plant. Despite these limitations, I have had stellar success with copper collars and have accumulated quite a few of them.   What is particularly nice about this slug management tool is that they are permanent and completely reusable. They only require a clean up with either some metal polish or some steel wool to remove the build up of tarnish that a season of use puts on them. Here's a picture of my 2009 broccoli planting with the collars in place

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Of course, those are not possible to use on smaller items or large block plantings like my pea patch or bean patch - so here are some other methods I employ along with the hand picking:

• Copper tape wrapped around the perimeter of an entire raised boxed bed - sold with adhesive backing on them this works well but the tape is so thin that this only lasts for a few years before peeling away. I have this on one of my long vertical grow beds and it has made a HUGE difference. That bed has very little slug activity in it.   
• Diamateceous Earth ("DE") sprinkled around the outer perimeter of a growing bed area. If you remove the slugs carefully prior to putting the outer band down of DE - you don't have to dust the plants themselves. I use this stuff with great caution because if you accidentally inhale some of the dust you can really damage your lungs. Works fairly well if you don't get lots of rain for a spell and if you apply it with great care.
• I no longer use any natural mulch around plants. A thin layer of compost is okay, but I have found it is best just to wait until fall to lay down a heavy carpet of compost on the beds or just work it into planting holes when transplanting. But the reality of gardening in the rainy Pacific Northwest is that you are much better off to never layer on mulch around plants because it is a home for slugs. Deep mulching (ala lasagna gardening) is a disaster if you live in slug territory.
• Keep walkways mowed down and weeds whacked near beds - they are a home for slugs.
• Place a wood plank or board in the bed where it will not interfere with your plantings. In the afternoon, turn it over and remove all the slugs that have retreated to the cool damp underside for the day. Dispatch them in the same manner as you do for the hand picking "walk about".
• I keep an old pair of salad tongs near the garden area because they are the perfect tool for grabbing and flinging slugs with! Don't worry the salad tongs stay in the garden and are not the ones we use for meal serving!  It really does work though because the longer handles give greater throwing distance when flinging them AND I don't have to touch the larger slimy ones with my bare hands. Sadly, this does not work with the baby-sized slugs and there is nothing for it but to grab them with your fingers. Ewww... not fun but necessary.

These are all methods I regularly employ and I have found them to be effective in varying degrees.  However, what I have found to be a complete waste of time was the often-recommended beer trap solution.   My experience was that it was a lot of fussing around - cleaning them out to remove the rotten slug bodies bloated in moldering old beer and buying cheap beer or mixing yeast and sugar solutions to refill the containers sunk partially into the soil - all just to capture a scant few of the varmints. I would not recommend it at all.                     

That's my experience in the land of the slug - maritime Pacific Northwest.

The big “to do” for this weekend was to get the remainder of the stumps and roots removed from the garden expansion site area.   We have been working on this project since late last fall – removing trees, bushes, large ferns, and clearing the debris away.    I was down to one large tree stump, 2 large fern roots, and 3 smaller rhodie tree stumps that were standing between me and the next phase of this project – building the boxed beds and double digging them.     

I am able to tackle the fern roots and some of the smaller rhodie tree stumps by myself.   But there were two stumps remaining that required some additional horsepower to get out.   My husband was kind enough to help me today and brought out the chainsaw to do the heaviest of removal work remaining.   However, before he joined me in the garden this morning, I tackled the removal of a large stump next to one of my existing garden beds.   I wanted to remove it because this bed should be 4 feet longer to maximize the available space.   I had kept it shorter to avoid dealing with the stump originally - but now I want to correct the situation.    Here are some pics showing the stump, the removal process, and the area once raked back smooth and completed.   It’s now ready for the bed to be lengthened!

Once that first stump was removed, my husband joined me and we tackled the large blue spruce tree stump.   This one was quite large and had large radiating roots that snaked their way through most of the new garden site area.  

We  dug out the area to make room for the chainsaw blade and then set to work cutting it up and prying the pieces and long roots out. 

Once the big stump and roots were out, I tackled the remaining stumps and fern roots.   I have whined about the fern roots several times before – they are an absolute bear to remove.   Because they are so difficult, I have  been procrastinating on removing these last two.   But today I got them done.   Just to show you how monstrous these are… here’s a picture of the first one I pulled out today.   It is turned over so that the roots are on top.  

Whew!  That was a lot of work!   I was out there working from 10 am until about 3 pm – taking a half hour break for lunch mid way.  But look at the site now.   It is basically ready now for the construction of beds.   

In addition to the garden expansion site work, I also reseeded a few cells of broccoli this morning because I did not have 100% germination on the seeds I planted last weekend.   I also gave the spinach bed and corn salad a drench of fish emulsion tea.   After I was through with the heavy work for the day, I picked a large colander full of mixed spring greens to fix a nice salad for dinner.   Young lettuce, baby swiss chard leaves, baby spinach leaves, and some corn salad made up the mix.   The only thing on my “to do” list that I did not get to – was getting the seed potatoes out of storage to begin encouraging them to grow eyes.   This is something I can do any time over the next two weeks – so it can wait for another day when I have a little more energy left.   

Hope you were able to also get out into the garden and do some spring prep work.