October 5, 2008

What a day!  The forecast was dead on, if not a bit warmer than expected.  The day started early with a smoothie for the family.  Then my father showed up and we went to Lowes for the corregated fiberglass panels.  I'm really glad my dad went too because he's better at planning things than I.  We ended up getting three 12-foot panels and three of the corregated 1 by's.  It was a pain standing in line to pay because they were so flimsy that you couldn't stand them on their edge or they'd buckle and crack.  Here's what one looks like next to the kid's playset.



So we started by using scrap wood to build up one end with a 4x4 and a 2x2 in the center.  Then we started screwing it down to the corregatd 1x's.



I like how one panel covers both beds perfectly.  What I don't like is that it is not easily removable.  I also noticed a bit of a dip in the middle that couldn't be helped.  I guess I could shim the middle to make up for it.  But what we can't change is the middle of the bins. It won't handle much weight but hopefully the pitch will keep the rain from pooling.  However if it snows hard we'll have to get out there and clear it fast.  Hehe the covers cost $60 in materials.  But doesn't it look good!?



So check that off the list.  Of course while we were working my neighbor came out and had to comment on how many blackberries were ripe in the back 40.  So even though it wasn't on the list my dad and I geared up and went to do battle with the bramble once again.  The nemisis...



And the prize...



As you can see, the dead canes are thick and numerous.  The rest of the year is scheduling out to make it very unlikely that I'll get back there with a saw-tipped weedwhacker.  And boy would it be hard work to remove all those dead canes to allow for the new canes not to grow on top of a mountain of dead branches like they currently do.  Most of the harvest today came using a rake to pull vines down to something reachable.  The bramble is well over 10 feet high.  In other words, it's a mess.  Cleaning it up may have to wait until spring.  But today we got about another gallon of berries, bringing the total jelly harvest to about 3 gallons.  That should make enough jelly for three families to have homemade jelly for the coming year. Whew!

The next item of the list was the daunting task of fall cleaning of the beds and removal of the trellis.  I got my motivation up by starting with the cucumbers.  First I harvested everything ready to harvest.



And all that's from plants that are almost covered with powdery mildew.  I chickened out and didn't rip out the plants.  Despite the rapidly spreading disease, the cukes keep on growing.  So I took pains to unthread the vines through the trellis, keeping all the vines that had inch-long cukes growing. 



Notice how I just left the vines sprawling all over the place.  And look at what I am still hopeful to harvest.



The scene was chaotic, but the kids had a blast playing in the garden with daddy.



But there was still a ton of work to do... and I had a party to go to in the evening!



Next task was to harvest every tomato that had any chance of ripening this winter wrapped in newspaper. I got a decent harvest, mostly of Early Girls.  I am on the look-out for an early variety slicer that's slightly bigger and NOT owned by Monsanto.  For salads I think I'll grow a couple cherry varieties.  But anyway, here is the harvest I still have to bleach and wrap in newsprint.



The next step was to attack the tomato jungle.  It was much easier to remove than the cukes because I wasn't saving it.



So all the dead vines and the totally green tomatoes went into the yard waste container.  I didn't want to spread the blight to the rest of my plants in my compost.  I don't have the means to kill it off like Cedar Grove likely does, especially since we can now compost meat and bones and pizza boxes etc.  /boggle

After the tomatoes came out the toughest task was next.  The pole beans twirl themselves up the trellis and were all but impossible to remove gently.  So all I could do was rip and rip and rip.  I only broke the trellis in two places.  It took forever, but I was in the zone.  During my demo I found about a pound of beans that were in various states of green/brownishness.  So I pulled them out and will attempt to dry them and harvest bean seed for next year.  I guess I'll have to figure out how to dry the beans now. Ah research!

The next time I stopped to take a picture, this is what I had left!



So the dauntiing task was finally finished.  We folded up the trellis and hung it and the tomato cages in the shed for next year.  A note on my shed.  It's 8x8 and very disorganized.  I've got shelves that I don't even use.  I really need to gut it and organize things better. I bet I could store a ton more stuff in there if I just had the time to do that.  Maybe this fall or winter I'll bundle up and head out there, set up a tarp to keep the stuff dry and organize.  Anyway, here is the shot I took as I was removing the 2x4s.



What a change from yesterday huh?



I didn't have time to set up the trellis, but I moved it over to the bed, and I also have to clean up the SWC for next year.  Unfortunately it's filled with water so it's going to be harder to empty.  Maybe I can handle both items some day this week if the weather holds and I can get home before the sun goes down.

Although based on DoubleD's advice I didn't want to set up the hoop covers, I did want to see how the hoops worked and train the PVC to bend right.  Unfortunately the first pipe I installed was an oopsie.  I didn't think of the fact that the small bed is only 3 feet wide rather than 4 feet.  The 3/4 inch pipe didn't bend well enough and it creased and broke.  Drat.  I didn't think of that before hand.  I should have gotten thinner walled PVC I guess.  Thankfully I bought more than I ended up using so I had extra and I can use the pieces for a top brace for the small bed.  But to try to train the PVC to bend that much, I bent it temporarily between the foreground holder and the second bed over.  The hoops look great together!



Hopefully in a week the PVC will bend enough to make it to two feet more to the bracket.  If not, i've got to re-think the materials for the hoop cover for that bed.  x this is me crossing my fingers, hehe.

Lastly, I am not sure what to do with Judy's marigolds.  They're mamoth.



But I don't want them under my hoop cover, unless they're perennial?  If not, i wonder if they'd hold up to being kept in a vase.  I could get a month or two of fresh flowers working through this 1 SF.  Speaking of flowers, I didn't take a picture, but that wind storm we had the other day destroyed my centerpiece rose bush. It's currently laying down in the rose garden.  /sigh  I hope if my aunt and I can butcher it it will stand back up and grow again.  If not it will be a major loss of a very mature rose bush.  Of course I would replace it with something other than pink, hehe.  Maybe yellow for my son.

So, going through my to-do list, here's what I crossed off.

• Plant garlic in the blueberry bed.  I couldn’t find out if it companions they dislike each other, but they companion with raspberries, so I’ll give it a shot.  I plan on planting six inches apart with I think 4 inch spacing.  My brother will set me straight and provide the seed from his 2008 harvest.  Keep it going in the family.


• Plant more lettuce, successioning it in October for late Winter harvest.  My existing lettuce is doing better such that I may even get some to harvest soon.


• Harvest final cukes and tomates for storage and ripening. 


• Rip out the beans, cukes and tomato plants.  I think the only ones I’ll compost are the beans because the rest have succumed to blight or mildew.  I don’t want to take the chance that it’ll carry on in my compost.


• Remove the trellis and install my old tiny 2×2 trellis with jute twine that I had up when I first started.  It will fit nicely under the hoop cover and be my only trellis this winter. I ran out of time... next week maybe, it'll go up easily but I may need to re-string it with twine.


• Buy the corregated roofs for my compost bins and install them.  The rainy season has started!


• Consider covering the beds. Not sure.  Maybe DoubleD will chime in to help me decide. Per DoubleD, not yet, see above.


• Buy a few bags of beauty bark and mulch the new blueberry bed.  Maybe install landscape fabric under it to keep the weeds and trees from creaping into it. I decided against the landscape fabric partly because I was lazy, partly I forgot and already had started, and partly didn't have that kind of time to sculpt the fabric around everything and get it covered with a limited amount of bark.  I may regret that. hehe


• Help my aunt transplant plants to wherever she wants them, including the one into my front yard. She didn't ask me, and she got my father to help do everything she needed. I'm sure I'll help tons once the new house closes next week.

So all in all, it was a very productive weekend.  And until I was writing about it, I didn't even think about the work week to come.  Perfect!  Just as a garden should do!

Hope you enjoyed your garden this weekend!

September 28, 2008

Ah, what a glorious day here in the Pacific Northwest!  The sun was shining, there were only wispy clouds in the sky, who'd have known it was fall and that we'd missed most of summer?  Unlike yesterday, I had the entire day to myself for work in the garden.  And boy did I make the most of it!

Thankfully my folks came over to help, because I wasn't looking forward to liberating a corner of my yard and planting my two new blueberry bushes all by myself.  After a half hour of planning, we finally settled on where to put them.



Notice the close proximity to the existing blueberry bushes on the other side of the yard.  I think the bees will have no trouble making the rounds, do you?

Notice that the blueberry bush is still in the transplant bin, that's because I had to mix up some planting soil for them.  Since blueberries are acidic, I wanted to make the soil about as acidic as an orange.  Not easy to do, even though we've got a pretty acidic soil here in the PNW.  So to accomplish that, I took the potato bin soil (Mel's mix minus the peat moss) that I'd amended with a healthy dose of coffee grounds last week and added peat moss and a sprinkle of fertilizer for acid loving plants. 



An hour or so later and presto!



Of course the bush on the right couldn't go there without a bit of work first.  I had a rose bush right next to it.  And since these bushes will eventually grow together, that wouldn't do.  So we moved it.  I sure hope it survives.  It didn't look good a few hours after transplanting.  But here is a shot of all three plants we tinkered with today.



I also hope that the downspout is far enough away at 3 feet to not flood the area with water in the fall and winter months.  If I see it's not doing well, I'll buy a rain barrel and install it there with the overflow over the fence into the front yard.  Apparently you can't kill the tree on the other side of the fence (I have forgotten its name).  Otherwise rain barrels are likely a project for next year.

Finally, if you noticed the scalloped concrete blocks in the various pictures above, well we "borrowed" them from my brother's house and my folks house and my house to piece together a border for the blueberries to match the rose garden.  I think it turned out decent enough for piecemeal.



Now all I have to do is buy some beauty bark and spread it over the area.  I think this time I'll put down landscape fabric between the bushes before I cover it with bark to keep weeds from growing up.  Why beauty bark you ask?  Well it's highly acidic which helps treat the soil as it leaches down.  At least that's what I hoped for when I did it to the existing blueberry bed.  Now it's just a symetry thing, hehe.

After that project was done, I cleaned up the yard.  I hosed down the tarp to put it back over the kids outdoor toys when it rains. It had been used to hold the dirt when I broke open the potato pinata, hehe.  Multitaskers.  Then I also dismantled the yukon gold potato bin for storage in the shed for next year.  I saved the douglas fir boards but recycled the pine 2x2s because they just weren't holding up.



After that project I cut the plastic for the hoop covers.  I sure hope I cut them right so I can cover all three beds now.  Anyway, now that the plastic is cut, I can install all three hoop covers in less than an hour if it looks like it's needed.  While I was in the garden I sprayed Spinosad over all the plants that something's munching.  I sure hope my cauliflower survives. I'm not hopeful.  I scrounged a clear tarp to cover the potato bin to let it dry out.  Then I fertilized the cantaloupe bed with bloodmeal for a nitrogen boost.  I've got a half-dozen or more cantaloupe forming.  I'd be happy if one or two make it before the frost.  Maybe I should have cut off all but one bud per plant, but I just don't have the heart to choose which one makes it.  hehe

Lastly, I was energized but exhausted.  Still I bundled up myself and my eldest and we ventured out into the back 40 for what's likely our final blackberry harvest.  This time I armed myself with a machette and went jungle exploring to find hidden blackberry treasures.  It worked like a charm.  I cleared out a fair amount of old inch-thick dead blackberry canes and picked an over-full gallon ziplock bag of berries in the process.  It was slow going because everything low was relegated to my 4 year old.  He was really good about staying away from the big sharp knife though.  I was proud of him.  We had some great father and son time.  What a perfect end to a productive weekend.  I finally finished up with my arm and back giving out on me just in time to pick up the yard and head inside just as it got dark. 

So I didn't get my garden mucked out and trellis taken down, but I think I've got a bit before the hoop covers are needed.  Let's hope so.  I also didn't weed the garlic bed, though it doesn't need it bad and I can weed when I plant garlic.  Speaking of which, my dad thinks I need to research whether garlic will work with acidic soil in a blueberry bed.  Something I should do soon. Maybe after I'm done here.  Lastly I didn't buy the clear corregated fiberglass to cover my compost bins, but I didn't have the truck.  Again that's something I don't HAVE to do but want to do. 

All in all, not a bad weeked, all things considering.  What's more, I think it recharged me enough to tackle the office again.  Whew!

Hope you all were as productive as I and enjoyed your gardens this weekend!

September 21, 2008

What a day, what a day.  The weather cooperated nicely for the perfect outdoor working temperature with no rain.  I just wish I could have been out in it all day, but I'm getting ahead of myself.

My folks came over today and three of us cleared an area here...



to put the blueberry bushes.  Unfortunately earlier this year I took out a bush/tree from right under that pool that needed to be removed.  It turns out the stump was right where one of the bushes needed to go.  I figure I have JUST enough space to put two bushes there without crowding the gate or encroaching too much into the rose garden.  I will need to do something soon about that downspout though.  It will dump way too much water right onto one of my bushes if I don't redirect it.  I may need to get a rain barrel soon and place it there.  It's not where I wanted them, but it's a decent spot for one.  Then I could put the overflow valve over the fence where it wouldn't hurt much.  I hear that where Sandy lives the city sells them... I wish Mountlake Terrace did that.  I may have to make one.  I'm not that handy, but it may be my only option.

Anyway, this is the stump I needed to take out.



It doesn't look like much but all those little twig-like roots were all over the place under that sucker.  Made it challenging at best to get it out.  It took several hours of back breaking work to do so, but in the end, the monster stump was vanquished!  Of course the glove's just for size comparison.



Immediately after removing that stump I jumped over to help my mother pick blackberries.  My dad, mom and I got about 1 gallon of blackberries before we had to call it quits to get ready for dinner over at my house for my inlaws.  We had baked-potato soup using my yukon golds and green onions from the garden.  Oh, and the salad was store bought lettuce (grrr) and home grown tomatoes and cucumbers.  All in all the meal was a big success.  Of course while stiring the rue I thought my arm was going to sease up, hehe.  I'm utterly exhausted.  I think I'm going to call it quits here and go watch the Seahawks game that I TiVo'd.  Go Hawks!

Enjoy your garden!

September 18, 2008

I want to thank everyone who commented on my last post. I was frustrated at being so overwhelmed in my free time when I've been like that for quite a while at work.  I'm so far behind I could work weekends til the end of the year and not catch up, but I won't do that to my family.

Anyway, I wasn't really trying to one-up anyone, just share my frustration.  And thank you DoubleD, I know your work is head and shoulders more hectic, stressful and draining than mine. So when you kicked me in the tail about not being lazy in the evening, it got to me.  Instead of playing with the kids or reading them book after book and making dinner, I got home tonight and had my wife dress the kids for getting dirty outside while I changed.  Then we went outside as the sun was going down (6:30ish) and I sent my wife out to get as many bags of Starbucks grounds for your garden as she could.  While she was on her errand, the kids and I fluffed the compost, using the decomposing kitchen compost, several bags of molding old coffee grounds and shredded paper.  I kept the kids busy garthering up the fallen plums and pears and helping me with the hose to wet down the layers.  After that my wife got back with 10 big bags of grounds.  With the fresh stuff I dumped most of them on top of my dirt pile.  I figured whatever the potatoes took out of the soil (not much since they were only in the bottom six inches), the grounds would put back. 



It was cute, I had my 4 year old hold the well-used vermiculite bag open while I shovelled dirt into it.  He was great and I was so proud of him.  But kids only have so long of an attention span and so after my wife got settled back inside I had her come out and finish up loading 8 bags of Mel's mix to be used for something later.  We didn't finish the job, but we got enough of the dirt off the tarp that we could drag it over the hole where the potato bin was.  The grass was brown so I watered it a bit after sunset and sent the kids inside to eat and get ready for bed.

Then, I was feeling so gung ho about my to-do list that I bundled up and grabbed my steel rake for trying to get the grass and weeds out of the area where the wasps are so I can find the hole where they come out to kill them once and for all.  Unfortunately I'm a wimp and didn't get hardly any of the weeds out before I ran off while being attacked.  I'm a wimp because I was so bundled up that they couldn't get me if they tried.  /sigh

So, I didn't take many pics tonight because it was late and there was no light.  Besides, if you want to see my compost method, check out one of the many posts where I did take pictures.  It's not rocket science, just think lasagna, hehe.

So, two chores down, many more to go.  Tomorrow I hope to get more done, so I can justify the day Saturday for the volunteer work.  And yes, I will have Sunday, but with my grandmother-in-law in town, I'm sure we'll be busy with her so she can see her only great grandchildren.

Lastly, I did take pictures of my dying potatoes.  Guess hoop covers over them won't do any good.  I watered them one last time tonight but that's it.  The clock's starting for three weeks to harvest.



And since I was in the neighborhood, I snapped a pic of my cantaloupe just for Judy.  Seems only the far right plant is producing female flowers, so I hand pollinated several again to make sure it takes.  Not sure I want 5 or so cantaloupe growing off one plant.  I may fertilize again this weekend, probably in the water that I fill the reservoir with.  Give them an organic boost to help them set fruit and mature faster.



Maybe tomorrow I'll enlist my mother and brother to help harvest some plums and maybe even some blackberries.  If I don't do those soon, it'll be too late!  Same goes for harvesting my tomatoes and stuff.  Maybe I can get my brother to swap me some lettuce for tomatoes.  hehe.

Enjoy your garden!

September 16, 2008

Wow, late night at the preschool.  Busy days and busy nights.  Been like that for a while.  I don't have much in the way of happenings to post today, but I can share with you a dilema and maybe even a sneek peak at my weekend to-do list.  I know, it's only Tuesday, but with last weekend being taken up by the inlaws and the Fair, I didn't get anything done at home.

So here's the problem.  My to-do list is getting massive.  I know that's not a problem unless you don't have time to do it.  You see, every year my company participates in an industry-wide volunteer effort to clean up a school or playground, etc.  It is normally a ton of hard work and I typically do yard work, which is fun.  Last year I burned 6,000 calories in 5 hours. I loved it.  I was looking forward to this year as I spent time at this place as a Boy Scout.  It can use the help if I remember it right from 20 years ago.  The event is Saturday. 

Now you're beginning to see the dilema.  But to really drive it home, you need to see my to-do list...

- Harvest the plum tree. I expect I've got 30 pounds of plums and will need to climb the tree and a ladder for hours to accomplish it.  I don't want the plums to turn to prunes or go over-ripe.  Plum jelly is riding on it.

- Harvest blackberries.  We haven't been back after the wasp incident, so I bet the berries are very ready.  It's a huge job even if I don't hack back a third this weekend.  Besides, I've decided I want to pick my neighbor's side for him this year because he's in his mid 80s and just went to the hospital in an ambulance this weekend.  He's ok, but I'd love to surprise him.  He eats berries out of his freezer all year long.

- Speaking of wasps, I still need to do something about them.  I need to get the weeds out of there to see where their nest is to kill it.  Kinda tough to do.  I need a dusk where I can dress for the occasion and rip and run.

- The potato dirt is still sitting on the tarp where I left it.  I need to mix in some coffee grounds and bag it up for use later. I really need to get the tarp off the ground to save the grass.  That'll take an hour or more to bag it all and clean the tarp off so it can be used to cover the kids outdoor toys again.  Double duty. hehe

- My compost is very neglected.  It will take about 45 minutes again to fluff and add.  Plus I really should get a cover built for the bins so the fall/winter rains don't leach the nutrients out.  Besides, my kitchen compost is full and I'm resorting to throwing it away. EEK!

- My blueberry bushes need to be planted.  I need to remove some sod, and a pesky stump before that happens.  Then I need to dig two holes and prep them for my acid loving bushes.  Peat moss and acidic fertilizer should do the trick.  That will take the better part of a morning, even if I don't get the materials to create the border.

- Harvesting my beans, tomatoes, cukes (making pickes if I have time), and cleaning up the corn bed.  See about maybe replenishing the nitrogen in it over winter, maybe with a cover crop since corn's a major hog.  Not sure.  Thoughts on 1 year old compost with corn that was fertilized twice during the season?  It would be good not to have to quite yet.  Not sure, Mel would say no, just add compost next year when I plant.

There, that about does it. The rest of my fall to-do list isn't critical yet.  Now you can really see that I'm not sure I have the time, let alone the energy to give my all from 7 to 1pm Saturday and still get all this stuff done.  It's a bad weekend for it, but folks at work are counting on me.

Grrr.  I feel like those toys when I was a kid. They were foot tall action figures made out of rubber with gel filling inside.  They stretched to double it's length and then slowly went back again.  That's kinda how my time feels right now.  Normally I can handle it, but now I'm feeling a bit overwhelmed.  Maybe as the week progresses it all will become clear!

Enjoy your garden and let me know if you're feeling the time pinch now also...

September 15, 2008

Yesterday was busy from sun up, well beyond sundown, so I'll recap yesterday and then do a bit of a garden tour.

Sunday was supposed to be a full day at the Puyallup Fair with the whole family.  Unfortunately we didn't finish up at my father-in-law's on Saturday, so I started out early to get it done fast.  Thankfully we didn't do as much as we had planned, so by noon we were on the road.  It took us 4 hours to drive a half hour to Puyallup due to the incredible traffic. We would be stopped for 10 minutes without moving. 

When we finally arrived and found the family, the kids went off to play and I tried to find the gardening/farming section. I also wanted to see the chickens to compare them to SandyGoGreen's. Unfortunately, there were none.  The food wasn't even that good.  And the journey home was even worse, sitting in the parking lot for a half hour without moving.  Maybe the Snohomish County Fall Farm Festival will be better.  Not sure.

So anyway, back to my garden.  You've seen the the box-o-corn that I gave away. Well, I didn't have an opportunity to give away a handful of ears, because they were not developed yet.  Their silks were still white as snow. 



I have tried shaking the stalks around it to get some pollen to fall, and blew on the leaves to get some off of them, but I didn't see anything.  I may be too late for these last planted, slowest growing ears.  We shall see.  It would be good to see if they actually grow, if I can time the harvest right.  These ears may very well be the deciding factor as to whether or not I grow corn next year, or buy it from Eastern Washington at harvest time.  It does take up way too much space, even planted as close as I plant it.  It will also determine if cross pollination was the cause of the poor taste.  Either or both are possible.  Time will tell.

I also took the first pictures of my new blueberry bushes.  I described them to you last post, but here they are in a temporary spot waiting for me to dig up a spot for them.



Look good don't they?  And where do you ask, am I going to plant them?  Well, thanks to my Aunt, here is the perfect spot for them.



I figured it out generally that with a tight fit, one plant can go right on the outside edge of the kiddie pool, and the other in front of the downspout.  With luck it won't crowd the kids window, which will eventually be the office again when they move upstairs.  Unfortunately the rose will have to go, but it's damaged and has seen better days.  I may be able to salvage it, not sure, but it will need to move in a few years when those blueberry bushes grow.  By the way, about 10 feet to the left of this picture are the two existing blue berry bushes.  Perfect spot for bees to travel between the four plants.  I'm so happy that I'll have more blueberries!  They freeze up so well once we get tired of fresh ones.

Oh yeah, and speaking of bees going from plant to plant, here is one of the main reasons I had bees to pollinate my blueberries.  Look how HUGE this lavender's gotten!



Can you believe this is ONE plant!?!  My aunt says it is and I believe her.  So we'll hack it back this fall and let it grow again next year.  Of course the garlic is going right next to it between the lavender and blueberries while I've got room for it.  Someone I was talking to questioned the soil acidity for the blueberries vs. the garlic, but it's worth a try.  Besides, I localized pretty well the acidity for the blueberries.  It shouldn't transfer to the garlic too bad.  I plan on giving plenty of room since the blueberry plants have very shallow roots.

Continuing over on this side of the yard, Judy asked about my canteloupe that she gave me the seeds for.  Here is a good pic of the little guys hanging on.



If I thought I had enough season left to get a ton of production out of these puppies (they're growing well enough that I could if I hadn't planted so late), there'd be a trellis here and I'd have trained them to climb it.  Look at those tendrils reaching for anything.  You can't see the the flowers, but they're there. And even a tiny mellon or two that hopefully were hand pollinated sufficiently.  Only time will tell. And if this weather holds. It's been in the mid 70s which is perfect weather for these Minnesota Midgets!

And right next to them is my last potato bin.  The Butte's have the best shot for the 60 pound average production promised by Greg over at Irish Eyes.



Note that the middle is not holding up well.  I've watered but I think they're dying on their own accord.  They may not need the optional plastic hoop cover to extend the season for further fattening to 100 pounds.  Bake potatoes are nice, but my wife always says the huge ones are too big for her anyway.  I can always have two if necssary, hehe.

Lastly on that side of the yard, my aunt tasted the plums and said they're ready.  Too bad last weekend was too busy.  Maybe this weekend we can harvest plums and blackberries.



Ah, in a couple years, I can see my kids climbing this tree to pick plums for fun.  To be young again!

Enjoy your garden!

P.S.  That nifty number 1 on the Top 100 Gardening sites, well as much as I'd like it to be true, I can verify I'm still getting between 100 and 300 hits a day (thanks to my regulars I bore daily), and Judy claims similar numbers at her blog and her Ft2Garden.com site, so how we started getting 35,000 hits a day is beyond both of us.  We'll take the publicity it generates, but I expect they'll figure out the glitch soon and we'll drop back to the 2,000 or so hits a day we share. /shrug

September 7, 2008 Part II

I don't know what I was thinking when I didn't post yesterday.  Sure it was busy, but I've been busy before and still managed to post.  So I decided to post yesterday's today.  In fact, after uploading 33 pictures from my phone, I decided to do three posts, so please go back and read what I just posted.  Enjoy!

Today, Sunday, September 7, 2008 was the day.  I decided to finally harvest my Yukon Golds!  DoubleD told me I could do so any time and gave me great info on how to store them.  I would have done it wrong.  So I laid out a tarp to catch the dirt.



I removed the boards...



And tipped it over with the help of my wife, boy was it heavy!



What's missing from the picture you say?  Well, potatoes for one.  That's right, my experiment was a failure.  I should have had layers and layers of potatoes.  Instead, I had a mountain of dirt.



And at the very bottom I had a cluster of potatoes for each plant I nurtured for an entire growing season.



I guess I should have researched it more and found out that I can't let the plant to grow more than 4 inches or so above the soil before covering it.  It's the only thing I can think of.  Frustrated?   You bet.  But as my buddy at work taught me, it goes shock, anger, denial, acceptance.  Thankfully on most things I cycle through fast and am already at acceptance as I type this.  I'm not sure I will do potatoes next year.  A lot depends on how good these taste and how many Butte's I get.  If I get squat out of all that jungle, I may reconcider doing this again.  All that work for 10.5 pounds of potatoes.  It's probably 5 meals or so, maybe more, but not a year's worth, that's for sure!

Anyway, thanks to DoubleD, I spread out the potatoes in the September sun.  They dried at 75 degrees for several hours.  Perfect weather for long-term storage, if they last that long.



Oh, and I forgot from my garden tour, look at the pretty flowers on the cantaloupe plants!



And look at what I found as I was working.



It's tough to see, but there's a fat bumble bee trying to pollinate my fruit for me.  Too bad there are no female flowers yet.

Anyway, it was about this time that my mother and aunt showed up.  You see, enough of the blackberries were ready to harvest.  Not too sweet but tender.  Perfect.



My first order of business, as usual, is to hack back a couple feet of space between the bramble and my back fence.  Haven't they heard of encroachment? hehe



So, my mother and eldest son started picking as I got out my machette and started carving a path for them.  I actually harvested more than I cut because my son's not quite tall enough to pick much.

While we were doing this, my aunt was doing what she always does, she was weeding the rose garden.  It's a never ending battle.  If it weren't for the mature roses and irises, I would napalm the area and start over with raised beds.  Someday maybe, but not anytime soon.

Anyway, it was early in the picking when a very unfortunate accident happened.  My aunt was pulling out some wild grass and weeds that had grown up between the house and the roses when she grabbed a hold of a wasp nest.  By the time my wife got out there and scrapped the clinging wasps off her, she had been stung between a dozen and twenty times on the arms, chest, throat and face.  My wife thankfully only got one sting on her stomach.  Even more thankfully, after they got safely in the house and the mini-swarm had disapated, I grabbed my son and made a dash for the door.  My mother followed shortly thereafter and nobody else got stung. 

A significant dosage of Benadryl, Advil and hydrocortizone later, we called the nurse line and on their advice, shipped my aunt off to the ER.  She's in good health, but 65 and a smoker.  Best not to take chances.  She's fine, but we blew the day.  Nobody went outside until dusk. 

So the dirt is still on the tarp, waiting to be bagged for use down the road for something other than potatoes.  The blackberries still need to be harvested.  The flower beds still need to be weeded. And my row covers still need to be installed.  Oh, and I've got a wasp nest to take care of.  My mother wants me to call an exterminator for $125 if it's the same as last time.  My dad just wants me to walk up with a spray can and do it myself.  We've taken nests out before.  When it's fall and the night-time temperatures drop considerably, they get slow and docile at night and it's easy.  But now it's still 63 at midnight!  No way. hehe.  I guess I've got a call tomorrow.  /sigh

Hope you had a good weekend.  My football team looked pittiful in their season opener and I wasted a day in the garden, on top of my wimpy potato production.  Mine could have been better.  Work tomorrow. Better hit the sack.

Enjoy your garden!

September 3, 2008

Well, today felt wierd.  The weather's great and I've got the next few days off.  I can't believe I've got a summer!  I don't know what to do with myself?

Tonight was a race to get to preschool orientation.  This is the first year both my boys will be at school, just not in the same class.  Logan is chomping at the bit to get back, and I heard from his friends parents that they're anxious to play with him, which was good to hear.  And Owen is so ready to go to school, he already knows the songs and even knows his way around the school (shh, he's not supposed to have been there), hehe.  Anyway, the new parents are great overall, tons of new folks, which is important to us as my wife's the chair of the board. 

Anyway, my mother reports that the blackberries are ready to start to pick, so I'll get out the machette and help her this weekend.  I can't wait to harvest away and then hack back a third of of the bramble to start the three year pruning cycle!  My main concern is that Mother Nature will give us enough harvest to keep us in my favorite jelly for the next year.

Researching local Freedom Gardeners I found a novice homesteader (Sandygogreen) in Woodinville that's really going all out right off the bat. Brave of them, but increadible results.  Ah to work in the software industry.  I love what they've done with their property.  It's going to be amazing when it's all teaming with life!

I also found the Shibaguyz of Seattle that have nearly 30 containers in their townhome back yard getting local and national attention.  Pretty amazing!  In reading up about them, it seems there is a movement to revive Victory Gardens.  Though I like the PTF folk's Freedom Gardens moniker better, a rose is a rose.  I also found that our state's Senator Maria Cantwell is on the agricultural committee that controls things like gardens nationally.  I may very well drop her a note to make sure she knows the benefits of growing at least a portion of your own food and trying to eat locally (otherwise known as the 100 foot and 100 mile diet).  Apparently if every family in the U.S. ate one meal a week locally, we'd reduce our dependence on foreign oil by 1.1 million barrels for every week that happened!  Very cool.

So, this weekend I've got off, and I hope to harvest blackberries, more cukes, beans, tomatoes, onions and broccoli.  And maybe I'll pull a lower board and check for potatoes.  Not sure.  I will defintely install my hoop cover brackets on my beds and cut my plastic to fit for ease of setup later.  You never know when a frost will hit once October rolls around.

On the pickling front, the pot smells JUST like dill pickles now, which is a very good sign since it's only been a week, not a month. 

As for my bread baking, my mother tried my bread and loved it, so she took home the rest of the loaf to let my dad and aunt try it.  That means I need to bake more.  Great! I was looking forward to perfecting the process to get the best results.  If first you don't succeed, try, try again, and gain weight from all the "failures", hehe.

Well, it's late, so off I go.  Enjoy your garden!

August 31, 2008

Good day, good day.  The weather cooperated, though I didn't get much done in the garden.  I did dig around about a foot down into my yukon gold bed and didn't find anything.  I was afraid to dig too much so I gave up.  Whatever's in there will hold for a while so I'm going to let them cook a bit more.  I may even cover them to keep the rain from providing irrigation. 

But good news, I found flowers on my cantaloupe! Tomorrow they should be big enough to tell if they're male or female.  Of course they should be male first, followed by females a few weeks later.  But you can bet I'll be hand pollinating any female flower I find!



We also were hoping to pick some berries or maybe harvest some plums, but their not ready yet.  DoubleD's right when she says in years past we'd have harvested all there was to harvest by now.  Here's to hoping there will be plums and blackberries to harvest this year. Without it, there will be no PB&J sandwiches for a year, for my kids or I.  Yep, I regularly eat them for lunches or even dinners if I get home way late.  But I can't remember when I've had store-bought jam or jelly, and I'm not going to start now.

Speaking of preserving, we did harvest five more mini-cukes for pickling.  Then, for the larger ones, we cut them into fourths (wedges) and started the pickling process.  To begin with, we mixed up the pickling spices from a recipie found on the net and raiding my mother's and brother's spice racks.



The only things we're misisng here is Mace (whatever that is), and dill seed (we figured we had fresh).  Then we cut up the cucumbers...



The next step was to layer cucumbers, spices and dill.  But wait, I've got to show you my farmer's market dill find (thanks to my brother for calling me to tell me about it). It's so tall it took two pictures to get it all in, hehe.





That's right, they were 3 feet tall and my house smelled like dill even before I started marinading.  So here's one of the layers of pickles to be...



Note that we threw in six cloves of garlic from my brother's garden, then came the thick layer of fresh dill.  I had more than needed so I laid it on heavy. Why not?



So, now that mix is marinading in vinegar and that mess for the next 4 weeks in the garage with a plate weighed down to keep it submerged. It says it will have foaming and scum.  So in anticipation of that, my corn pot (I'm not needing that this season /sigh) is resting in a pastry/cookie sheet.  The mix smells great!  Much better on my wife than the bread and butters did.

We also would love to can some beans since I've got far too many to eat for all three of our families.  But all my mother's canning books say you need to use a pressure cooker to preserve any veggie without acid in it.  We don't have a pressure cooker. Anyone experienced with preserving know of a way to can beans or the like without a pressure cooker?  The last thing I need is MORE kitchen tools.

Anyway, in case you thought I just sat around eating bon bons the rest of the day, I also started making a loaf of no-kneed sourdough bread.  And my mother is pleased that her white flour starter is 90% ready for her to take home.  But since you're probably tired of the progression shots, here is the current finished product. 



It needs to sit under plastic for 18 hours.  Tomorrow morning I'll do the final proof and bake it!  I can't wait.  Tonight I thought of something. We've got that rosemary plant that's taking over our yard. I bet that would be great in sourdough bread.  The possibilities are endless.  Now if only I can bake it without my make-shift cloche breaking on me.

Also, I took a few more pics of my garden.  Enjoy...

Here are some tomatoes that are almost done...



And here is a funny S'shaped broccoli plant that grew leggy behind the cauliflower.  It's twin we harvested tonight and I essentially boiled it in the microwave along with some frozen corn for the rest of the family and it was very tasty!  Yay!  It may not be as healthy as lightly steaming it, but if I'm eating it, it's better than nothing.  Same will go for the beans thanks to the peanut gallery!



And here are Judy's marigolds.  Funny that my brother hadn't heard of marigolds as an amazing companion plant. But they're pretty also.  At least I think so.



However, if they're supposed to draw in bees to pollinate anything, it's not working. hehe\

Lastly, I've been hanging out at Freedomgardens.org with some new local and not-so-local garden buddies, most of whom are either existing or homesteaders in training, so I'm learning a ton.  Anyway, there was talk about clothes lines for drying laundry, and how they're hit and miss in the PNW where it can rain at a moment's notice.  Tough to get your clothes dry if they get wet.  Here's what we've done to dry almost all our shirts, pants and some other laundry.



It was a quick re-build after my father grabbed a hold of it to keep from falling off a ladder, ripping the old one from the ceiling.  It works. Cheap PVC desigend to fit a very small laundry room! 

Yeah, I know, this is a gardening blog, so why am I bothering with making bread, pickles and saving energy.  Tis the season for saving money and preserving what we grow. 

Hope you enjoy it!