The Modern Victory Garden

HARVEST MONDAY

Each Monday, Daphne’s Dandelions hosts “Harvest Monday” where everyone submits links to their blog posts summarizing their harvest for the week.   It’s fun to see what people are producing from gardens from so many different regions, and how they are using it.   Check it out and join in too!                               

Root crops that are held in the ground for fresh harvests over the winter  that are left too long in the ground once the days start warming up and the day length starts increasing will generally begin sprouting in an attempt to go into a second year of growth.   For biennials like carrots and parsnips the second year is all about seed production rather than root development.   In fact, the roots of biennial crops will actually become less edible as the second year of growth progresses.   As I mentioned earlier in the week, I am seeing some signs of increasing growth throughout the property and on Sunday I noticed that the last of the parsnips were putting out new top growth too.   This is my cue to harvest the remaining roots as they will only decrease in quality from here on out.    There really was not that many of them left in the bed, but I harvested all that remained.         

Harvest totals for the week of January 23rd through January 29th (rounded to the nearest ¼ pound).

• Parsnips 0.75 lbs

Total For Week 0.75 lbs

Total Year to Date 3.50 lbs                                                  

Eggs collected this week – 8                                                                 

SEED STARTING

I am officially into my peak seed starting season.   The onions, celery, and celeriac are all emerged and growing.    My ultra-early start tomatoes that I seeded last weekend are starting to emerge.   The plants I started for the Giving Garden have their first true leaves and will soon need regular drinks of very dilute kelp emulsion tea.   All in all, things are progressing right along and as usual, I am constantly juggling to make more room under the lights for the newest items to be seeded.   This weekend, I started cabbages (Famosa, and Parel), kale (Dwarf Siberian Improved and Beira), Tatsoi, pac choi (Ching Chiang - dwarf), and kohlrabi (Koliribi).   I started all of these items in micro soil blocks as they are fast germinators and so keeping them adequately hydrated should be easier than slower starting items.   I used an old cookie sheet lined with aluminum foil and then I marked which group of 20 was what by placing masking tape on the edges of the pan with the crop and variety name indicated.   The micro block maker does 20 small blocks which are sized to plant up later into the medium sized soil blocks.   The blocks are easier to transplant if they are cleanly separated from the other blocks in the group.   I used my dough scraper/cutting tool to help separate the blocks more after they were formed.   It is the perfect tool for the job as it has a thin sharp edge, is not overly long (6 inchs), and has a handle to hold on to at the top.                                                           

These were covered by a plastic humidity dome and placed under the grow lights along with all the other seedlings.                    

GARDEN BED TIDY UP

The weather was windy and overcast all weekend, but for the most part it did not rain and the daytime temps were in the mid 40’s.   I took advantage of the mild conditions on Saturday to do some garden bed tidy up under the long grow tunnel cover.   I removed the items that were played out, eaten too badly by slugs to be useful, or had been freeze damaged by the period of days we had two weeks ago that were in the mid 20’s.   This resulted in several large sections that are now empty under the bed.   I cultivated and weeded the entire bed, and used my sharp hoe to scrape the weeds away adjacent to the edge of the bed.        

As you can probably tell from this picture, the soil was actually pretty dry under the cover so I gave everything a good watering while I was at it.          

The kale and the swiss chard have all been previously harvested pretty hard, such that they currently do not have much usable leaves on them.    However, they are showing signs of good new growth at the central growing point and I expect they will be producing harvests again very soon.                                   

There are two small sections of this bed that have baby radish and swiss chard seedlings growing that were seeded earlier this winter.   The swiss chard starts are very small yet but appear to be holding up despite the slug attacks.   Here's a golden swiss chard plant.                                

Further on down the bed is the last of the late summer planted crop of golden beets (a rogue red beet plant appears to be in among them), and the young pac choi plants I put out several weeks ago.                          

Once the bed was weeded, cultivated, and watered, I let it sit exposed to the ventilating effects of the mild breeze that was blowing Saturday before I recovered it with the tunnel cover.                                                 

There is just over two months left before I will need to plant this bed with the current year’s potato crop – assuming reasonable weather conditions, I should be able to continue getting good harvests from these overwintered crops during that time frame.                                                     

How are things going with your season extending efforts?   Have you begun any seed starting yet?                                

Laura

kitsapfreedomgardener

HARVEST MONDAY

Each Monday, Daphne’s Dandelions hosts “Harvest Monday” where everyone submits links to their blog posts summarizing their harvest for the week.   It’s fun to see what people are producing from gardens from so many different regions, and how they are using it.   Check it out and join in too!                      

Winter finally arrived this past week.   We had a heavy snow storm on Wednesday followed by more snow mixed with freezing rain on Thursday.   The temperature never got above 25 degrees during these two days of winter storms.   However, by mid-day Friday the temps moderated back to our normal range for this time of year (night time lows of mid to low 30’s and day time highs of low to mid 40’s) and the moisture laden storm systems steadily pumping through our area turned to rain - lots of rain.   As you can imagine, we are a big soggy mess at the moment as the rain and snow melt has nowhere to go since the ground is so saturated already.                                                       

Despite the steady and rather heavy rain, I ventured outside for about an hour on Sunday to watch over my hens while they enjoyed some free range time.   They did not want to stay out in it long as it really was a soaker of a day, but they were happy to get some fresh greens and a few worms and grubs before they declared defeat and retreated to the relative dryness of their covered yard.   While the hens were busy foraging, I made use of the time to harvest the last of the leeks and some kale leaves.                                                

Several days of below freezing temperatures had made the leeks outer leaves a bit slimy, so it was time to just harvest all that remained.   I peeled away the outer leaves, trimmed up the roots and gave them a good rinse – and ended up with some nice leeks for my efforts.   The kale leaves harvested was a mixture of the Siberian Dwarf Improved kale that is growing under the protection of the grow tunnel and tree kale leaves.   I have to tell you that I am more and more impressed with the tree kale plants.   They were looking very stressed during the multiple days of mid 20 temps, but as soon as it warmed up the plants just perked right up and now look like the winter weather never occurred.   Apparently tree kale is just as hardy as regular kale plants.   They produce abundantly too.         

Harvest totals for the week of January 16th through January 22nd (rounded to the nearest ¼ pound).

• Kale 0.25 lbs
• Leeks 0.50 lbs

Total For Week 0.75 lbs

Total Year to Date 2.75 lbs                                          

Eggs collected this week – 8                                               

WINTER DOINGS

Saturday morning, I took the time to create my annual Seed Starting Schedule.   I also set up the 2012 Harvest Tally page, although for now it is blank, as I only post the totals on a monthly basis and January is still a work in progress.   As you can see from the schedule, the seed starting process for 2012 is now underway in full force.   There will be a steady stream of seed starting from now until late spring.   Last week, I started the celery and celeriac and the main crop of onions.   Saturday I got the ultra-early start tomatoes seeded.   Unfortunately, I am already struggling for room under the grow lights and things are just getting going!   Part of the issue is that I am also starting seeds for the Giving Garden so I have more than my usual number of flats vying for space under the lights.   I am just going to have to move the more cold hardy items out to the unheated greenhouse a lot faster this year in order to free up space for items yet to be seeded.   First items moved out to the greenhouse were the Ailsa Craig Exhibition onions I started late last year.   Hopefully these plants will continue to grow in the greenhouse with less warmth and light then they had indoors, but it’s a chance I had to take as they needed to be moved to make room for the tray of soil blocks seeded with tomatoes.                

The greenhouse at the moment has several items growing in it.   I have some containers that I seeded with some spinach last week.   It may yet be too cold for them to germinate but if that proves to be the case, I will just reseed them again later.   In the other large containers I have some baby napa cabbages, baby carrots, dwarf pac choi, and some young lettuces.   The lettuces are looking pretty tough after the string of below freezing days last week.   They may (or may not) bounce back from that set back.   The dwarf pac choi plants are looking good though.              

That’s the way it goes with mid-winter growing efforts, some efforts fail and some thrive.   The trick is to keep a steady stream of new items coming online to increase your odds of success.                              

Laura

kitsapfreedomgardener

HARVEST MONDAY

Each Monday, Daphne’s Dandelions hosts “Harvest Monday” where everyone submits links to their blog posts summarizing their harvest for the week.    It’s fun to see what people are producing from gardens from so many different regions, and how they are using it.   Check it out and join in too!                                                      

This past week was very busy.   Lots happening at work that kept me hopping and then in the evenings I was working on wrapping up (literally) the holiday gifts and Christmas cards so that I could do mailings on Friday afternoon, and do UPS shipping on Saturday morning.    In addition, I was making an all-out effort to finish the last continuing professional education (CPE) course required to complete my CPE hours for the 3 year reporting period ending 12/31/11 for my CPA license.    The good news is… I indeed got all of this done!    The bad news is… I was taking short cuts on meal prep all week and it was not until this weekend that I did any harvesting or cooking of any real significance.           

On Saturday I pulled some nice green onions but there was not enough of them to make my harvest tally weight minimum and I failed to take any pictures of them.    I used them to make a large potato salad to go with some grilled chicken and Portobello mushroom sausages for Saturday's dinner.   The potato salad used potatoes from storage, the fresh harvest green onions, eggs from our hens, and lots of my home canned dill pickle relish.                                   

On Sunday I harvested some mache and a few young spinach leaves.    

This was used to make a nice green salad to go with a pot roast and the leftover potato salad (from Saturday) for the Sunday evening meal.        

Harvest totals for the week of December 5th through 11th (rounded to the nearest ¼ pound).

• Lettuce & Greens 0.25 lbs
• Onions (green) 0.00 lbs (not enough to make harvest tally weight)

Total For Week 0.25 lbs

Total Year to Date 365.75 lbs                                 

Eggs collected this week – 10                                       

WINTER SEEDLINGS

On November 27th, I started some dwarf pac choi, onions, and some lettuces in micro soil blocks.   A week later (December 4th), some of the dwarf pac choi plants were already big enough that they needed to be potted up to the medium sized soil blocks.     About half were ready and the other half were still just emerging and needed to wait another week.    Here’s a picture of the first group of dwarf pac choi a week after being potted up.        They are growing along nicely.                         

This Sunday (two weeks after initial seeding) the remaining dwarf pac choi plants and the lettuces all needed to be potted up too.   The onions are emerging but will stay where they are for a while longer.                    

In addition to planting up the pac choi and lettuces, I also wanted to start some more micro soil blocks in red onions (Cabernet).   I got all the supplies out and ready to go in the kitchen.                                

I made myself a micro soil block grabber out of two large wooden plant markers and a rubber band.                                                

It is not too great to look at but it makes handling the mini blocks much easier.   I then proceeded to make up a tray of medium sized soil blocks in just the amount needed to plant up the waiting micro block plantings.              

I then placed the micro blocks into the waiting preformed medium sized blocks.                                                         

And then I tamped it in to ensure the soil was in contact on the bottom and four sides.                                                         

I got all the plants taken care of and put back under the grow lights.   I also planted up 80 micro blocks of Cabernet red onions as well, which went under the lights and on a heat mat.                       

The onions will eventually be planted out in the regular garden beds in early spring.    The lettuces and the dwarf pac choi are replacement plants that will be transplanted into the large containers in the greenhouse as other items are harvested and come out, or alternatively will be planted under the grow tunnel cover in areas that are opened up.                   

I am still trying to get the knack of making the soil blocks.   This was my third effort at making soil blocks and both the medium and the micro blocks turned out pretty good – definitely better than my first efforts.   I still have room for improvement though.   Hopefully by the end of the big spring seed starting process I will be an old pro at it.                       

Laura

kitsapfreedomgardener

My blog posts of late seem to be largely confined to the weekly harvest and cooking recaps, which could lead one to believe that there is nothing going on in my garden at the moment.   While it is true that things are largely quiet right now, there is still a certain level of activity that is happening.   It is hard to give garden photo updates to show you though, because the winter crop beds are largely under the cover of grow tunnels and unless I am getting into them to do some harvesting they are not readily visible.   Easier to see are the containers in the greenhouse that have some greens and carrots I direct seeded late this fall.   They are growing slowly and should provide some early spring harvest items.   The plants are all quite small at this time (and a little hard to see) but they seem to be doing quite well.   Here are some of the carrot seedlings.      

This year I am making the switch from using plastic cell packs to start my transplant seedlings in – to using soil blocks.   I bought the block makers earlier this summer and have been just waiting to start using them until this winter when I had more time to learn and practice.   Today I did my first effort at using soil blocks.   I started with some flats of mini blocks and planted the following:

• 20 Arctic King – lettuce
• 20 Autumn Blend – lettuce
• 36 Ching Chiang – dwarf pac choi
• 80 Ailsa Craig Exhibition – onion

I am not that great yet at releasing them smoothly into the trays but practice will eventually make me better at this.   I used clean empty chicken stock boxes cut in half (length wise) to create trays for the mini blocks.                

These were then placed on a heat mat under the grow lights in the house.                                   

When the seeds are germinated and grown a bit, I will plant these into the medium sized soil blocks and grow them on from there.   The lettuces and the pac choi will eventually be planted under the grow tunnels or in the greenhouse.                       

I had another garden task to do today as well.   The tree kale/collard plants have been growing beautifully.   The original plant is now over 8 feet tall and the young plants I have rooted from cuttings are several feet tall as well.    Unfortunately, the bamboo pole I used as the main support for the original plant was both not tall enough and not sturdy enough to properly support this really tall plant.                                              

With my husband’s help, we used a 10 foot stick of 3/4 inch metal conduit and just slipped it over the original bamboo pole and then drove it deeply into the ground to anchor it well.   Added a few additional tie wraps (loose) on the top most portion of the plant to provide better support and the whole thing was in much better shape afterwards with virtually no disruption to the plant itself.   

I have some pole bean vines that are dead and need to be removed from the grow support structures and I have leaves to rake up and compost from the front yard.   Both tasks are things I will do when the weather gives me a bit of a break.   What garden tasks have you been doing lately?          

Laura

kitsapfreedomgardener

Fall has definitely arrived this past week.   The days are overcast and damp; the sun sits much lower on the horizon now; and the temperatures have returned to a much cooler range.   As a result, the garden is looking a bit shaggy and ready for some fall attention.                      

I was home on Monday and made use of the time to get caught up on things after being away the entire prior week.   Some of the things I attended to were in the garden.   There is quite a bit of work to be done in the garden this time of year to get the beds cleaned up and prepped for winter.   I intend to spread the fall garden work out over the next several weeks, but I got a good start on it on Monday.   One of the chores is to get crops that are spent removed and the beds not holding winter crops amended.   I have several items that need to be cleared out but the most immediate need was the bush bean patch (Royal Burgundy) which has virtually quit producing.   In addition, in an adjacent bed I have the sugar snap peas (Cascadia) growing on a slanted trellis that have been allowed to die back and mature the pea pods for the purposes of producing seed stock for the 2012 growing season.   The return of the fall rains required that I get the peas removed and inside to dry down or risk having them mildew and rot on the vine.            

I pulled the bush beans out and composted them and also pulled and composted the sugar snap pea vines after first removing the best of the matured pods.   Here’s that same area of the garden as in the prior picture but with the beans and the peas now removed.                        

The peas were hulled and the largest and best were kept to be dried down and used for next year's seed stock.   The smaller ones were given to the hens as a treat.   The seed peas were then placed on a large plate with several layers of absorbent paper towel under them and set in a warm and dry room in the house to begin drying down.   They will be "swished" around occasionally to ensure they properly dry for storage.                   

In addition to pulling the bush beans and pea vines, I also pulled three of the zucchini plants that were badly infected with powdery mildew.   You can see the powdery mildew on this large zucchini plant.                 

The cucumbers next to it also have powdery mildew but not nearly as badly and are still producing some cucumbers (at least for the moment).   Here’s that same bed after I removed that particular plant.              

I left one of the healthier zucchini plants in another garden bed and will keep harvesting from it until it either quits producing or gives in to powdery mildew too.   I also pulled up the pepper plants growing in large containers in the greenhouse.   There was only a few remaining peppers and I wanted to make room for some direct seeded greenhouse crops.   After I pulled the pepper plants, I loosened up and amended the soil in the containers and then planted them - three containers with carrots (2 containers of Mokum and 1 container of Bolero); one container with napa cabbages (Tenderheart); and one container with lettuce (Bon Vivant). The carrots will not have sufficient time to get much growth on before winter hits, but they should get a good start before going dormant and should launch quickly back into growth mode in early spring - providing fresh fare during the lean season of March/April.      

Since the fall rains have arrived and appear to have settled in for the duration, I went ahead and harvested the larger of the tomatoes off of the plants and brought them indoors to begin slowly ripening off the vine.            

I will not include these in the harvest totals until after they have ripened.   There are still more fruits on the vine and lots of cherry tomatoes but the odds are high that the plants will soon start moldering and dieing from the effects of the cooler temps and heavy rains.                     

There are still lots more tasks to be done:

• There are more crops to be removed as they wrap up their production.
• The emptied beds need to be spread with compost.
• Soaker hoses and other garden equipment needs to be properly stored for the winter.
• The overwintered crops need to have their protective covers put in place to keep the hens out of them after I open the garden up to them for winter foraging.
• In just a few weeks it will be time to plant the garlic.
• The greenhouse panes need to be cleaned to ensure as much light availability as is possible during the dark days of winter.

While there is much yet to be taken care of, I got a good start on it Monday and if I pace myself over the coming month it will all get done before the weather potentially turns more severe.   What fall preparations are you working on?                    

Laura

kitsapfreedomgardener

The blog went quiet for a week because I was traveling in Pennsylvania on a visit to my daughter.   I had a lovely time and if you would like to see a photo slide show of some of the places we visited (particularly Longwood Gardens!) then just click HERE.    While I was in Pennsylvania, I was able to work a visit and garden tour in with Robin from The Gardener of Eden.   Robin is as delightful in person as she is on her blog, and her new garden at the community plots is really impressive.   Through her blog I have watched as she transformed a field of weeds (at the start of the year) to the lush and productive garden it is today.   She is truly an inspiring gardener.                 

Back home, the garden did fine in my absence.   Before leaving, I watered everything very well and picked everything that needed to be harvested.       

In addition to the raspberries I picked from our patch,  Scott from Opt Out En Masse stopped by the day before I headed out of town and brought me a pie plate full of raspberries from his garden.   They were absolutely delicious!   The raspberries were a barter trade for a few tree collard/kale starts I had for him.    I gave him a quick tour of our garden and we had a nice visit that afternoon.   It really is fun to meet up in person with bloggers I regularly follow and I had the pleasure of meeting two of them this week alone!   

I returned six days later to find lots of sugar snap peas ready for harvest and the start of a nice wave of ripening Sun Gold tomatoes.         

While it has not been hot here at home, the temps have been staying in the mid to upper 70’s which is helping the tomatoes to get serious about producing some ripe fruits.   The forecast for the next several weeks is for more of the same – nothing terribly hot but warmish and dry.   I am hopeful that I may yet get some ripe tomatoes, cukes, and zucchinis this summer.   The peppers in the greenhouse are coming along well and I have several large peppers that are ripening to red.   The extra warmth and protection from rain that the greenhouse provides really helps the peppers.    The warmer weather has helped the green bean patch as well.   I have small young beans developing and I will likely need to do the first picking by this coming weekend.   The corn also appreciates the sunshine and warmer conditions. 

The summer garden crops are moving on to center stage, but in the wings the fall and winter crops are getting ready for their turn to shine.   I have been busy transitioning several garden beds to fall crops.   Some of the fall and winter crops have been in the ground for some time now (such as the parsnips, leeks and carrots), but others are planted mid-summer (either as transplants or direct seeded) in order to grow to maturity before the day length and sun strength significantly decreases with the approach of fall.   I recently planted out a large quantity of broccoli transplants and some cabbages.   They seem to be coming along nicely.          

Growing under lights in the house are some more lettuces, kale, swiss chard, napa cabbages, and pac choi.   These will be planted out in the weeks ahead once they are big enough and hardened off properly.   In addition, prior to leaving for my trip to Pennsylvania, I direct seeded some more carrots, golden beets, spinach, and some onions to be overwintered.   The beds don’t look like much right now, but they hold the promise of fresh produce for fall and early winter.   All of these areas planted up have been recently opened up by harvests of other earlier crops – such as the pea patch and the garlic.  

4X4 foot section of spinach planted next to the young strawberry patch.       

Another 4X4 foot section of garden bed planted up with storage onions (Top Keeper).   These are intended to be overwintered and if I am successful with that - will provide better sized storage onions next year.   I have not had good success with overwintering onions in the past, but my previous efforts were with transplants not direct seeding.     I am hoping this will prove more effective.    Later in the fall, I will plant part of this bed up with next year's garlic as well.                 

This last growing area is planted up with some more carrots (two kinds - Bolero and Mokum) and some golden beets.    You cannot see them in this photo but the beets have already germinated.             

We are heading into the busy harvest months of August and September.   It will be harder to be away from the garden for any real length of time in the coming weeks because the harvest items will require more frequent attention.   I am glad I was able to work this trip into my schedule in advance of the coming harvest peak.

Laura

kitsapfreedomgardener

Things are progressing in the garden even if the weather has continued to be rather cool and gloomy.   The raspberries and strawberries are starting to spin off a few ripe berries, which we have (of course!) promptly gobbled up without any picture taking or weighing.   That’s how it usually goes with the berries.   When it comes to these sweet sun ripened beauties - you just have to live in the moment and savor them right then.   We also enjoyed the first harvest of a few young carrots and sugar snap peas this week.   Here’s a picture of them with an onion and some broccoli side shoots harvested on Tuesday night for the purposes of making a stir-fry for dinner.                

The carrots are still quite slender and small yet, but they are beautifully formed and should continue to fatten up into nice specimens.   The sugar snap peas are the first small harvest of what will be many more plentiful harvests to come.   The shelling peas are also fattening up and it will not be long now before it is time to do the big annual harvest, shelling, and processing for the freezer of the big pea patch.   In fact, if we got a few days of abundant sunshine, it could be as soon as this Sunday but the weather forecast is not giving me a lot of hope on that score.   I just have to keep checking them and adjust my schedule to their timeline (whatever that ends up being).   

The tree kale/collard plant is getting really tall now and filling out nicely.   I have several cuttings of it that I have been rooting out and I noticed this evening they are sending out new leaf growth.   It appears I was successful!   I intend to do another round of cuttings soon and propagate as many of these as I am able before winter arrives.       

The corn patch is stunted this year due to the prolonged cool and cloudy conditions this year.   All this means is that the plants are not as tall as they typically could get, but they are otherwise quite healthy and are producing tassels and the first silks.     We should be harvesting the first ears of sweet corn in early August.   

There are several grow bed areas that are now opening up (or will be soon) from the removal of early season crops.    Once the rest of the garlic is harvested, I plan to plant that whole section in kale, chinese cabbages, pac choi, and lettuces for late fall harvest.   I already have most of these seeds started indoors under my grow lights.   Once the pea patch is harvested and the vines removed, I will be planting the fall broccoli starts there.   I have the broccoli seedlings outside hardening off this week.   They really need to go in the ground but the pea patch is being extra slow to mature with this cool and gloomy weather.   Hopefully I can keep them hydrated and healthy despite this delay getting them transplanted.     

 The bush bean patch has lots of flower buds and should start blooming and setting beans shortly.   This is my second year growing Royal Burgundy bush beans and I must say I am very impressed.   They germinate and grow so well even in cool and damp conditions – a very favorable trait for maritime Pacific Northwest gardeners!

The cucumbers are showing some real life the last few days.   They are latching on to the vertical support and have flower buds formed.   I have one melon plant that looks like it might give me something this year, and a whole bunch of other tiny melon plants that are likely going to end up as compost fodder.   The zucchini and the pumpkins are finally getting with the program too.     

 The exciting news to share is how well the artichoke plants are doing.   I have central buds on all three plants and now there are also lots of side bud stalks too.    One bud in particular is getting close to being ready for harvest.   I don’t want to pick it too early but at the same time I don’t want it to open up because I waited too long.   Going to watch this one carefully over the next few days and err on the side of caution and harvest it if I think it might be ready to open.    

The summer garden is starting to take center stage and the fall crops are backstage warming up.   Have you got succession crops worked into your garden this year?                                     

Laura

kitsapfreedomgardener

Harvest Monday                            

Each Monday, Daphne’s Dandelions hosts “Harvest Monday” where everyone submits links to their blog posts summarizing their harvest for the week.   It’s fun to see what everyone else is harvesting from gardens in so many different regions.   Check it out and join in!                             

The harvests are picking up as the weather has finally moderated and the day length continues to increase.   The harvest is mostly various types of greens but I did have two parsnips that I pulled on Saturday.   They were in the prior year bed and apparently had been missed when I removed all of the overwintered parsnips.   The lettuces, kale, pac choi, swiss chard, and chinese cabbages are all producing nicely, but the spring planted spinach is unfortunately absolutely dawdling.   I am getting concerned that by the time they finally get some decent growth on, the longer days and increasing warmth will just rush them straight to bolting.   I hope I am wrong, but the probability is increasing with each passing day.   At least I have a good stand of swiss chard to stand in for the spinach.   Here’s the harvest pictures for the week.                                           

Harvest totals for the week of April 25th through May 1st (rounded to the nearest ¼ pound).

• Chinese Cabbage 0.50 lbs
• Kale 0.25 lbs
• Lettuce & Greens 0.25 lbs
• Pac Choi 0.50 lbs
• Parsnips 0.25 lbs

Total For Week 1.75 lbs 

Total Year To Date 14.50 lbs                                     

Eggs harvested this week – 32                                    

Finishing Up The Spring Planting          

I have a commitment next weekend that will keep me out of the garden, so I took advantage of the lovely weather we had this past weekend to just finish up the spring planting process.   On Saturday after taking care of some errands, I planted up the Precocious and Bodacious corn starts.   I have better luck starting corn and planting them out as transplants because it gives the plants a jump on the season.   I could not direct seed them that early due to cold soil but indoors they germinate and grow quickly.   Corn grows so fast under the ideal conditions of the indoor grow lights, that it is not very long before they simply must be put into the ground due to lack of room for the roots in the cell packs.                         

On Sunday morning, I planted up the rest of that bed (next to the corn) with bush beans (Royal Burgundy) using my 6-inch planting jig.    I then planted up the cucumbers and the melon plants in the vertical grow bed located in this back section of the garden.   I may be pushing it with the cucurbit family planting them on Sunday but they desperately needed more root room and I think they were adequately hardened off to make the move.   The weather forecast for the coming week is for mild with some rain and then a warming trend on Wednesday and Thursday.   Hopefully these plants will settle in and not be unduly stressed by nighttime low temps.   Similarly, I planted up the zucchini (Partenon), pumpkins (Small Sugar), and winter squash (Early Butternut) in the retaining wall bed.   I also had some dill starts that I planted up in that bed as well.   I also planted up the long vertical grow bed in the side garden with pole beans (Blue Lake) and dried beans (Pinto) and then seeded the front sections of that bed with parsnips (Cobham Improved) and carrots (Mokum).                              

The last thing I took care of on Sunday was to plant out the basil (Mammoth) and peppers (Lady Bell) in the containers in the greenhouse.   These plants were definitely ready for more root room.                    

The greenhouse is unheated but stays quite warm from passive solar.   I shut it up in the evening to retain and hold heat and then open it up in the morning to allow cross ventilation.   The automatic vent windows always open up when it gets warm, but when it really warms up the side windows and doors are opened to provide greater cooling.   Hopefully the peppers and basil will settle right in and not be set back for too long from the move.                    

At this point, the entire garden has been planted with the first spring/summer crops of the year.   The workload lightens up considerably from here on out - at least until the mid summer harvest peak kicks in!   Routine things like weeding, watering, pest management, and daily harvesting are now on deck, but the heavy lifting work of the spring bed prep and planting is now behind me for yet another year.                

I hope you had a great weekend in your garden too.                  

Laura

kitsapfreedomgardener

Harvest Monday

Each Monday, Daphne’s Dandelions hosts “Harvest Monday” where everyone submits links to their blog posts summarizing their harvest for the week.   It’s fun to see what everyone else is harvesting from gardens in so many different regions.   Check it out and join in!                    

Greens are still the only real items available for harvest in the early spring garden.   The variety available though is starting to pick up.   I picked a couple of fresh salads (mix of swiss chard, kale, spinach, and napa cabbage leaves) this week and also harvested some chives as well.   The greens were enough to weigh in at a ½ pound but the chives did not weigh enough to round to a ¼ pound and so they are (once again) not in the tally for this week.                    

Harvest totals for the week of April 11th through April 17th (rounded to the nearest ¼ pound).

• Lettuce & Greens 0.50 lbs

Total For Week 0.50 lbs

Total Year To Date 12.50 lbs                  

Eggs harvested this week – 34                         

Hardening Off The Tomatoes           

The weather continues to be much cooler than normal, but Sunday was a halfway nice day with periods of sunshine through the morning and early afternoon.   I took advantage of it and did some more bed prep and planting.   The back garden area has three 4’X24’ foot beds.   The beds are on a sloped area and are terraced to adjust for that.   The top two beds on the slope had a heavy layer of compost put on them last fall, but the bottommost bed has had overwintered crops in it and has not had any compost added to it as a result.   I am fresh out of finished compost so I purchased two 3 cubic foot bales of compost on Saturday and stacked them near the lowest bed so they will be handy when I finally get to prepping that bed.   On Sunday, I used the broadfork and aerated the top and middle beds.   I wanted to plant up half of the middle bed right then, so I went on and used the hoe to cultivate the top several inches and then raked the bed smooth.   Here is the middle bed all prepared and ready to be planted.         

On the left in the picture above, you can see the other bed that has been aerated but not cultivated or raked.   I will wait to do those tasks until right before I am ready to actually plant it.   On the right in the picture above, is the lowest bed that has the overwintered spinach and green onions.   This is destined to be the main tomato bed for 2011 and will need to be planted up in about week.   Until then I am leaving it alone so I can squeeze out as much spinach harvests as I can from the overwintered spinach before I have to pull them all out.   You might notice in the top right portion of the picture that I have all the tomato starts out enjoying some morning sunshine.            

These plants are in the final phase of the hardening off process and are starting to spend a few hours each day outside before being put back into the unheated greenhouse.   The amount of time they spend outside will be gradually increased until they are spending the entirety of the day exposed to the elements.   I cart them back and forth from the greenhouse, which is a bit of a pain but necessary.   Luckily the duration that I have to do that for is not that long.   Behind the tomato plants in three large black containers are my artichoke starts.   I have not grown artichokes before so this is something new for me.   These starts have been outside in the cold for many weeks now; hopefully they have gotten their required “cold period’ that induces the first year plants to produce buds.             

The slanted trellis system was set up in the first 8 feet of the middle bed and in the strip in front of it I planted the sugar snap peas (Cascadia).   Underneath the trellis support, I planted turnips (Purple Top White Globe).   Next to this, I then planted a 4’X4’ section with (mostly) carrots (Mokum) but also included in that spot are some onion sets that I wanted to use up.   I am planting them too late to properly bulb up but they should provide some good green onions for fresh eating.   Here’s the bed after I got it set up and half planted.               

Notice in the picture above that the tomatoes have magically disappeared from the top right portion of the picture!   It was mid to late afternoon and some clouds were coming in and giving threat of wind and rain.   I did not want to take a chance with the tomatoes as they are just starting to harden off so I stopped long enough in my planting work to cart them all back to the greenhouse for the day.   It never did rain or get all that windy but I would rather be safe than sorry.                     

Were you doing bed prep or planting this weekend as well?                 

Laura

kitsapfreedomgardener

Harvest Monday                

Each Monday, Daphne’s Dandelions hosts “Harvest Monday” where everyone submits links to their blog posts summarizing their harvest for the week.   It’s fun to see what everyone else is harvesting from gardens in so many different regions.   Check it out and join in!                

Just a couple of fresh harvests this week, one on Tuesday and another on Sunday.   They look identical to each other as the only thing really producing right now are the kale and swiss chard plants.             

Harvest totals for the week of March 21st through March 27th (rounded to the nearest ¼ pound).

• Lettuce & Greens 0.25 lbs

Total For Week 0.25 lbs

Total Year To Date 11.50 lbs                 

Eggs harvested this week – 33                    

Plant and Seed Starting Progress                   

The garden activities have been somewhat minimal this week for two reasons – 1) I was in Los Angeles Thursday through Saturday on business, and 2) the weather has been quite wet.   Before I headed out of town for a few days, I did get all the remaining tomato seedlings potted up to bigger containers.   Sunday I thinned out several trays of greens started about two weeks ago and they should really take off now without the competition.   The pepper starts were ready for potting up as well.             

So I got that done on Sunday too.                 

The celery and first group of swiss chard starts are ready to begin hardening off.   They are moving out to the greenhouse where they will spend nights inside and days outside for about week to get hardened off sufficiently before being transplanted into the garden the weekend of April 2nd and 3rd.                         

I did the last big round of spring seed starting on Sunday with all the cucurbit family plants and some dill. I got the following underway:

• Two 6-packs Dill - Long Island Mammoth
• Two 6- packs Cucumbers - Little Leaf
• Two 6-packs Cucumbers - Alibi
• One 6-pack Zucchini - Partenon
• One 6-pack Winter Squash - Early Butternut
• One 6-pack Pumpkins - Small Sugar
• One 6-pack Melons - Tigger
• Two 6-packs Melons - Haogen

How is your seed starting going?                 

Laura

kitsapfreedomgardener