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 in so many different regions.   Check it out and join in!                              

On Wednesday I harvested a very large colander full of lettuce, a head of Gonzales cabbage, some garlic scapes, broccoli side shoots, and the first turnips to be harvested for 2011.                    

The lettuce was washed, spun dried, torn into bite size pieces, and then placed in a large bowl in the fridge for use throughout the next several days for dinner salads and lunches.    The rest of the vegetables were used in a stir fry of thinly sliced pork strips, garlic, broccoli, turnip, and cabbage with a spicy shanghai orange sauce (purchased item) and served with cooked rice.   

On Saturday another couple heads of the Gonzales cabbage and several more turnips were harvested.             

These were used to make a delicious coleslaw by peeling/coring and then dicing up an apple and adding it to the turnips (peeled and diced) and the cabbage (chopped up) and then dressing it with my favorite creamy coleslaw dressing:                   

My Favorite Creamy Coleslaw Dressing

• 3/4 cup mayonnaise
• 1/8 cup maple syrup
• 1/8 cup lemon juice
• sprinkle of ground nutmeg

The last harvest this week was some more broccoli side shoots, romaine lettuce, and two savoy cabbages.                       

The romaine lettuce was washed, spun dried, cut into chunks, and then made into a large Caesar salad.   The broccoli and cabbage was cut into small pieces and then steamed until just tender – then sautéed with lots of garlic until really tender.   To this, some cooked and drained orzo pasta was added along with some raisins and vegetable broth and allowed to simmer until the vegetable broth was largely evaporated – salted to taste and grated Parmesan cheese was stirred in just before being placed on the table.    Dinner on Sunday was small steaks – seared and seasoned with a white wine sauce, Caesar salad, and the parmesan/vegetable orzo pasta dish.        

Harvest totals for the week of June 20th through June 26th (rounded to the nearest ¼ pound).

• Broccoli 0.50 lbs
• Cabbage 2.50 lbs
• Garlic 0.25 lbs
• Lettuce 1.50 lbs
• Turnips 1.75 lbs

Total For Week 6.50 lbs

Total Year To Date 74.75 lbs                        

Eggs collected this week – 25                                       

Garden Overview

It has been a while since I have done a garden overview so I thought it might be a good time to do one.   Our garden is in an “L” shape that runs along one side of and then behind the house.   It is impossible to get a single picture that captures the entire garden – even if I were brave enough to climb up on the roof and try and do an aerial photo (which I am not!).   Instead I decided to just take a series of photos from our deck that (like the garden) wraps around the back and side of the house. Hopefully this will give you a sense of how the garden is laid out.        

Starting at back of the house and to the far left is the chicken coop and covered runs.                                    

The hens free range in the entire back area during the day but we bring them in to the secure yard and close the gate on them about an hour before it starts getting dark.   This gives them time to eat some layer crumbles and scratch before retiring ultimately into the coop for the night.   We always shut the hen door on the coop after they are in for the night, to keep them secure from predators.   We reverse that process in the morning, opening the hen door to the coop first and giving them about an hour to eat the purchased feed while the day light increases, and then ultimately the run gate is opened up around 7:30 am and they are allowed free access to the entire fenced back portion of the property.   They come back into the coop and run periodically during the of their own accord to eat, drink, and to lay eggs in the coop nest boxes.  The run has a clear plastic cover over it to keep the area dry for the hens, which is important in our climate since it is prone to heavy rains in the fall and winter.   Behind the hen house and protected with some chicken netting, is the raspberry patch.   The rest of the bushes you see behind the hen house are rhododendrens and other landscape plantings.   

A fence separates the garden from the back area that the hens run in regularly.   Immediately on the other side of the cross fencing is the next section of garden.                    

I think you can tell from this picture that the whole back section of the garden slopes down from the house.   The beds are terraced to make use of the space despite this.   In the front bed, you can see the bush beans. They are lying down a bit when I took this photo as I had just watered them and they had not popped back up quite yet from their soaking.   Behind the beans are the determinate and semi-determinate tomatoes.   Next to them are some onions and carrots.    Further back is part of the larger tomato bed that has the taller varieties growing in it.   Behind the tomatoes and hard to see in this photo, there are three large pots against the fence in the corner – which has the large artichoke plants in them.   In that same back area is the long and narrow vertical grow bed.   The portion of that bed visible in this picture has cucumbers growing in it and a recently planted carrot patch.                

Moving still further to the right is the rest of the back section of the garden.        

In the front bed is the corn patch.   I weeded; side dressed with organic balanced fertilizer; and lightly cultivated them Sunday before giving them a good watering.   Considering how cool our spring was this year, the corn plants are actually good sized and growing very well.   Here’s a closer look at the corn.                     

Behind the corn is the onions and carrots that were visible in the previous photo and the slanted grow support structure which has sugar snap peas in the front growing up the trellis support, and underneath the support is a large patch of turnips.   The third lower bed is the rest of the main tomato bed.   Behind the tomatoes is the narrow vertical support bed that has cucumbers and melons intended to run up the supports and in front are some recently planted carrots, young lettuces, and some radishes.   Here’s a closer look at the cucumbers and the newly planted carrot patch.                

As you can tell from this picture, the cucumbers had quite a few failures that I had to reseed and many are quite small as a consequence.   The closest plants visible under the trellis are two of the melons.   Many of those also failed and had to be reseeded, and it is a question mark as to whether they will have enough time to grow and produce given their late start.                

The backside of the greenhouse and the bed located behind it are next up.       

The greenhouse has large containers in it with the bell peppers plants growing in them.   During the summer, the greenhouse windows and doors are all kept wide open because it gets very hot and humid in there and the cross ventilation is necessary.   The bed behind it has the two ultra dwarf apple trees I planted this spring.   They broke dormancy well and are now sporting lots of new leaf growth.   I initially planted this bed with lettuces and various greens this spring.   Most of those have since been used and removed, leaving a section of lettuces that are still going strong.   Sunday, I planted the middle portion of this bed with some salad/bunching onion seeds (two varieties) to provide me with more onion options this fall and early winter since I am expecting my main onion harvest to be rather light this year.   Here’s a closer look at this bed.                          

Notice I have the newly planted area covered with some wire fencing and wire panels.   This is to keep my cat from using the freshly worked up bed to take a tinkle in.   He just cannot seem to resist a freshly worked up bed.   Later once the plants are up and growing well, I will remove the protective covers.               

The bend of the “L” shaped garden is the next view.                    

The first bed is the pea patch growing on the second-generation horizontal pea trellis support.   The peas have been flowering profusely and have the first big pod set on the lower portion of the plants.   In a few weeks it will be time to do the annual big pea harvest.   I have a large flat of broccoli and cabbage seedlings going in the house under lights, which will be planted into this bed after the peas are harvested and removed.   The middle bed has leeks, onions, and garlic in it.   The garlic has been really beautiful this year and is starting to dry out on the outer leaves, which means it will not be long now before it will be ready to be pulled and cured.   The leeks also are growing well and are starting to size up.   The onions on the other hand are not much to get excited about.   The last bed that is visible is the large retaining wall bed.   As you can see the ground slopes away quite steeply in this section and in order to use that area we had to create a retaining wall that levels the growing area.   In that bed is some dill (tall plants in front), zucchini in the front and in the back is some pumpkins and some butternut squash.   All of these plants are very small for this time of year – a function of our very cool spring.   Hopefully they will catch up.   At the very back of this section running cross wise to these beds is another bed that has the bush pie cherries and the rhubarb growing in it.   That bed is just not visible in the photo due to it's lower elevation.                          

This next picture is moving into the side garden area.                 

The bed in front of the railing is the big potato patch.   The second bed behind it has the broccoli patch, the green and red cabbages, and the dwarf kale.   The third bed behind that has the strawberry patch and some dill.   The adjacent bed is the first of the blueberry bush beds.   At the back of all of this is the narrow vertical grow bed.   Pole beans and half runner pinto beans are planted under the grow supports and in front of those are some carrots and parsnips.                                 

Moving still further right.                             

More of the potato patch is in the front bed.   Behind that is the red cabbages, dwarf kale, swiss chard, Tronchuda cabbage, dinosaur kale (looking a bit skeleton like since I harvested them hard last week!), savoy cabbages, and some more swiss chard.   In the bed behind that is the four large blueberry bushes with some cranberry plants growing underneath them as a ground cover.   Again, you can see the vertical grow bed behind it all and in the shadows so not very visible – is the compost piles.                   

Finally, here’s the view at the top end of the side garden.                  

In the first bed in front of the deck railing is the last portion of the potato patch, some carrots that did not germinate well, and the beet patch.   Behind that is a stub out on the second bed that is only 2 feet wide by 8 feet long – that has the cranberries growing in it.   Behind that is a bed that has the tree kale growing in it and the celery.    That bed is in partial shade when this photo was taken but was in full sun about a half hour later.   That bed is the most shaded part of the garden and works well for crops like celery and leafy greens that can tolerate lower sun availability.   Not visible in this picture but immediately to the right is the side of our shop.   Behind it is the rain barrels which catch run off from the roof of the shop building and our stack of wood for the wood stove.   I will leave you with these closer views of the beet patch and the potato patch, which were largely hidden in the prior photos by the railing of the deck.                                   

There you have it – the overview of our Modern Victory Garden – summer 2011.                           

Laura

kitsapfreedomgardener