Pictures June, 28, 2011

Finally decided to retake the pictures i lost in the computer fiasco.  Please excuse the weeds... between rain and my limited time its been hard to keep up again this year- even with my scuffle hoe.

 Remove the bug and it will look delicious!

 Potatoes--  i think i should take pics of the garden from this side more often.  Our patio might be littered with toddler toys but its a better backdrop than our neighbors' melted siding and bare clapboard! lol

 Tomato, cucumber and 49r summer squash.  I'm really disappointed by the cucumbers.  They are going very slowly. I've learned for next year to not direct sow anything! lol

 One tricky thing about raised beds is how quickly weeds grow up the slopes. 


49r summer squash....  Not sure if that silvery color along the veins is normal for this variety.  I had wanted to plant Golden Zebra, but 49r came as the substitute.

Tomatoes are starting to bloom!

Front end of the tomatoes

 Potatoes again

 Kossack kohlrabi and then cabbages.  There are some volunteer tomatoes in that row where the kohlrabi are. I'm planning on leaving them there so when i harvest the kohlrabi, i can have some extra tomatoes growing. I'm guessing they are from the yellow pear tomatoes i had last year.

 Onions. They always look so bare and forsaken.  The herbs are at the far end with the marigolds.  I have parsley, oregano, dill, basil, rosemary, cilantro and sage.

 Mostly full shot.  The empty spot near the clump of marigolds is where i planted the second round of green beans.

 Some houseplants vacationing outside. Mostly hoyas,  some citrus, cloves and a jade plant.   I need to bring my cardamom plant and bay laurel outside too.

My potted fig

My Nova elderberry might be thinking about setting a bloom. It would be a nice treat to see that in its first year. 

My unnamed elderberry from last year died to the ground, so its no closer to blooming right now than it was in fall of last year.


Stanley simply looks awesome.

Blueberries, starting to get blue

Comfrey, Bocking 14

It needed water, but the big leaves are almost the length of my arm from wrist to elbow.  This is the infertile type, propagation is by crowns i guess--- not sure if cuttings can be taken from this plant with its growth habit.  I'm hoping to be able to share these out because they are not cheap or easy to find.

So i got to take a little stroll around the house with no purpose but to enjoy it. I just let myself look at things for how they are right now, not how they will look once i can get this or that done- or how they will look if they survive the winter or how i have to prune in a year...  It was nice to be able to let go of some of my self-inflicted anxiety for once.
The air was fresh and warm, little breeze making the leaves float a little on the branches...  birds were chirping. The sun was getting ready to set.  It was really nice to just be in my little yard with all the things growing.

Productive day, productive week.

Got the garden tilled again, and getting the rows carved out.  Hubby did it for me really,  i started smoothing out the top of the beds

I'm taking the rows in the opposite direction this year,  i'll see what works best.

It was getting dark so we halted work for the night.

I was getting worried a bit later that my measurements were off, i just doesn't look like i can fit 6 rows in there,  but i remeasured and i have 35' as planned. 

Oh, this morning we moved hubby's antenna- the one that features prominently in most of my pics of the garden from the side door of he house

It used to be at the corner of the driveway but now it is to the left and in front of the shed. We also got the tarp-covered fence panels up and out of the way,  so the backyard is less of an eyesore! Yay!

I'll also post pics of my previous week's efforts on the flower beds:

Elderberry sticks

Mini Vineyard

Stanley plum

What a difference two years makes!

Apple tree waking up

Blueberries getting buds

Grape leaves developing

Side of the house,  ready for berry plants!  They'll be assorted things from seed (i need to get going on them)

A Junebug in May???

So, the beds are all ready for berries, the garden is ready to have the rows all dug.  I may try planting radishes this week.  Maybe kale next week?

I planted the lingonberries last night.

Oh and my comfrey crowns...well hubby thought they were weeds growing out of the bag of potting soil...so he weeded them!  I got really mad.  To make amends he bought me a giant bag of soil and i replanted what was left of the roots in my giant pretends-to-be-terracotta flower box.  Out of 6 of them, 4 should pull through i think. They were already trying to send up new leaves.  He does this sort of thing so often i can't laugh it off anymore. I try, but i can't. 
This was last night, so i'm calm now. :o)
But...he's not allowed to weed anything ever again.  No unauthorized "helping". lol

The weather was gorgeous today, it was great to work outside!  Its supposed to be nice for the rest of the week.

This and that

I got the email that my  canner has been sent out, ETA is tomorrow, which is sooner than expected.  But who's complaining?
I showed it to my hubby (the item listing) and he said it looked a lot like his grandmother's, only hers had a gasket.

Its going to be fun to see if i can get enough out of my garden at one time to use it to capacity and if i will have enough time to pick and prep enough to use it.

If not this year, there's next year.

I learned a lot so far this year. The most important things were regarding the sun direction and where shade is coming from.

I think i might run my rows in the opposite direction next year. My dad suggested this becuse the way the slope goes, having raised my raised beds against the flow of water will trap the water for the plants.
If we have a wet year, this might work against me though.

I could put the tall things all the way to the back  and the shorter things will come forward.

The way i have things now, nothing in the garden really shades anything else in the garden, but that is not always such a good thing.  I think my kales and collards should need shade.
Good thing is that hubby likes the garden well enough this year that he thinks we might add another row to it,

Corn is starting to tassel, i think Golden Bantam  was the first (closest to the tomatoes) and next is Incredible, Stowell's Evergreen was the one that didn't germinate so well or as quickly- but that was seed from 2008 anyway.  It is catching up though.

I picked a few carrots yesterday to have a sample. They were small, maybe a nickel size diameter, but they were longer than i expected them to be.  You read about soft, sandy soil and how carrots need it, but i  wasn't quite sure if my soil fit that definition having little to compare it to.

I have only gardened in my family's soil for the most part, and even now most of my soil came from the same 10-15 acres i grew up on, how many people get to say that?  I get to stick my toes in the same dirt i grew up running around on as a kid.

Anyhow, the carrots were a little less tender than i hoped, but i wouldn't call them tough, they were a bit bland, i was hoping for a sweeter taste, but maybe that comes later.  I'm sure my test sample of 4 were picked a bit early.  But i at least saw enough to know that the soil is a good texture for them and they showed no sign of insect damage.

I'm sure i have some more cukes to pick, one of the slicers was getting about grocery store size and it rained last night.  Cukes stop producing if their fruits mature too far and i didn't plant enough to make us happy as it is, so i can't let them stop producing too early!

One of the Carnival squashes are getting huge.  When i grew them in my tiny garden they didn't get much bigger than normal acorn squash. They were about the size for one serving for two people when cut in half.

I did find out that Jerusalem Artichokes can be canned, its in the Ball "Complete Book of Home Preserving". Its a relish recipe that sounds nice.  I should be able to get enough to try making some.
I do plan to grow less of them next year and give the extra space to the asparagus, but i had to start out with so many to be sure i'd have enough to try myself if something tried to eat them on me.  I planted a few pounds in my parent's garden many years ago and chipmunks ate them all.  So i overplanted my sample plot in case they attract chipmunks.  Right now it looks as if they don't.

I thought it was interesting that USDA and Ball don't even recommend canning summer squash anymore.  I guess its no big loss, even freezing it 'ruins' it.  Its great to add to sauces like that, but after any type of processing its definitely best as a secondary ingredient. Its not "butter ready"  from a can or freezer bag.

There is a bird that keeps spearing my unripe apples. I found one last week that had peck marks in it, so i pulled it off and tossed it.  The other day i found another one with the same marks.... this time i left it. Maybe the bird will remember that he's already sampled from this tree...  Where i missed a couple sprayings i have misshapen apples, but its not a big deal, i wasn't counting on much from this tree this year.  I mainly wanted to see if it would survive to produce after being neglected so long and to get apples big enough to try and have the type ID'd.  We are still going to go to the orchard this fall where we will end up picking three times as many apples as we need.   But maybe this year i could can some pie filling and make sauce.

I need to get back in and catch up with weeding again. I have let it go a bit since the plants are big enough to not get smothered easily, but i can't let the weeds go to seed or it will be another uphill battle next year.

I also ordered some bare root Bocking Comfrey from a place called Horizon Herbs. They ship Priority Mail with about a $14 minimum so i  looked around and they also have Clove plants for a decent price. This is guess is the first time they have had any to sell. Its a different name, but according to Wikipedia they are synonomous-  Syzygium aromaticum and Eugenia aromatica-   why they are different names i have no clue.  But anyway i figured buying one was a better way to justify the price of shipping the Comfrey roots.  If they do well for me i can share any future comfrey plants out.

My current clove tree is doing fine, it isn't really doing anything, but it does not appear to be dying at least! :o)

I also put in an order with Bountiful Gardens, some berry plant seeds and they have SeaKale which i think i can wintersow.  I can wintersow all the seeds i just ordered, which is why i figure i should get them sooner than later.  Either they sit in my fridge or theirs.