Essential Reading

We wish to set up a semi- self- contained household unit, based largely on a use economy, and, as far as possible, independent of the price-profit economy which surrounds us.  
The Good Life- Scott and Helen Nearing

As much as Naomi and I have spent time doing physical work associated with living a more self- sufficient life, we've spent time finding ways to hone our skills as well.  Below is a partial list of some of the books I've read in the past year that have either directly or indirectly aided me with skills, ideas, suggestions, or other information in this ongoing quest.  They're listed in no particular order other than the one in which I happen to recall them Naomi has arranged them.
Five Acres and Independence by M.G. Kains(1935) Dover
Folks, This Ain't Normal: A Farmer's Advice for Happier Hens, Healthier People, and A Better World by Joel Salatin(2011) Center Street Press
Holy Shit: Managing Manure to Save Mankind by Gene Logsdon(2010)
Mini Farming: Self- Sufficiency on 1/4 Acre by Brett L. Markham(2010) Skyhorse Publishing
Mycelium Running: How Mushrooms Can Help Save the World by Paul Stamets(2005) Ten Speed Press
Root Cellaring: Natural Cold Storage of Fruits & Vegetables by Mike and Nancy Bubel(1991) Storey Publishing
Seed to Seed by Suzanne Ashworth(2002) Seed Savers Exchange, Inc.
Sepp Holzer's Permaculture: A Practical Guide to Small-Scale, Integrative Farming and Gardening by Sepp Holzer(2004) Chelsea Green Publishing Company
Small Scale Grain Raising by Gene Logsdon(1977) Rodale Press, Inc
Teaming with Microbes: The Organic Gardener's Guide to the Soil Food Web by Jeff Lowenfels(2010) Timber Press
Weeds: Guardians of the Soil by Joseph A Cocannouer(1950) The Devin-Adair Company

I'm sure there are others, but these are the ones that really stuck out in my mind.  My To-Read list is twice as long, and I hope I can get through more of them in enough time to make a meaningful impact in the coming season!

A Christmas Miracle

     Yesterday morning I let the chickens out, and discovered 2 small brown eggs in the corner of the coop closest to the nest boxes (so close!)  I ecstatically ran into the house shouting for Naomi to bring the camera.  I was suspect that they were both from that morning, so I decided to get the fork and sift through the bedding.  I found a third egg.  That evening when I went to close the coop, I found a fourth.  It was only about 4 PM today that I found a fifth.  I believe it's The Grump that's laying them.  I need to get her to start laying in the nest box, but that's a project for later on in the week.  I'll try making a step/perch to transition into the boxes, and moving eggs when I find them.  I hope the others aren't far behind!  The large egg in the picture was a double-yolker too! 

     I brought some pizza boxes and shredded paper down to the garden today.  We've eaten a lot of pizza in the last week.  I finally got a chance to bring the camera down to the garden as well, although we are getting close to looking for a new camera. 

Pizza boxes featured just right of center.

Some Red Russian Kale seedlings, growing slowly but surely.

 A shot of the inside of the hoophouse.  

The three larger plants are Romanesca Broccoli.

Winter Solstice

Through the entire twelve month cycle, we ate a great variety of fresh food.  It was garden fresh from the first thaw in February-March to the heavy snows of December.  The balance of time it came from an outside vegetable cellar.  By following the seasons, we got a succession of foods- each at its peak.  We enjoyed each in turn.  We tired of none, but always looked forward to its coming in the new growing season.
The Good Life- Scott and Helen Nearing 

Well, here we are.  The day's almost done, and my ass is still intact.  The world may not have ended, but Winter sure came in with a roar.

     I woke up this morning to the sound of raindrops splattering on glass and wind roaring through the attic.  We've gotten almost 3 inches of rain in the last week, too.  But it's all uphill from here.  The days will start getting a little noticeably longer from here on out, albeit a little colder. 

     I think the chickens are getting a little closer to laying.  The Grump has been doing some submissive squatting whenever we approach her, and Naomi said the Grump's been cuddling into a little nest directly in the center of the coop.  She'll figure out what the nest box is for when the time comes.

    I still haven't gotten down to the garden to take pictures of the hoophouse setup, nor the kale slowly creeping along inside it, but I did manage to get some batteries for the camera.  That's at least a step in the right direction.  My beet sprouting project (pictured above) is still working out well.  We've been enjoying fresh beet greens every week or so.  The tops aren't growing at record rates, but it's nice to see a little color.  I've got some basil growing in a pot that's slowly making some progress, too.  This time last year, I was thinking about starting a few flats of onion seeds.  I think this year I'll wait a little longer until I start them, as they seemed to be imprisoned indoors last year for far too long and got overcrowded in their little flats.

     So far, I've managed to keep this blogging project going for almost a full year.  Aside from occasionally keeping up with this blog, I've got copious notes, diagrams, lists, spreadsheets, and other documentation of our garden progress.  Seed catalogs for 2013 have started rolling in.  I eagerly look forward to the arrival of some of my favorites, with anticipation of discovering varieties I've overlooked in past seasons, helpful tidbits of information, and of course, gorgeous pictures that uplift my winter soul. 

    Finally, some things worth sharing today are featured below.  The first is the trailer to a beautiful documentary that we watched earlier this evening entitled Journey of the Universe, and it came out of Yale University.  Its message of the absolute beauty and power of life on Earth is very inspiring to me.

      And finally, as I do every year on this day,  I listened to the song below.  Although I don't willingly seek such a bleak message these days as I once did, it's still fitting as a welcome to a time of the slowing of otherwise prolific life.  The last line seems particularly familiar, as I look to the year's bounty to keep us going through the season. 
The winter tears the earth apart, lets hope we see it through.

New Growth

This post was originally drafted on December 1, 2012 with the intention of adding a few pictures and posting it.  

A few weeks ago, I started a flat of kale seeds, some Red Russian Kale, and I actually forgot what the other one was, maybe Lacinato.  They slowly got to the point where all the seedlings in the tray had their first pair of true leaves, so I planted them in the ground inside the hoophouse today.  I checked the water buckets by the well, and they each had a plate of ice floating in them about an inch thick.  Inside the hoophouse, I have a dark purple rubber container with about 15 gallons of water in it.  I checked that, and it was ice-free- a good sign.

Aside from the 15 gallons of water in a dark container, I've got a row of cinderblocks along the northern side.  The big thermometer on the Ash tree at the bottom of the hill said it was 32 degrees, and the little thermometer inside the hoophouse said it was just above 40- another good sign considering today is overcast.

I'm curious to see what happens, because I don't really know anything about using a hoophouse. I'm hoping to get a lot of experience with it over the winter and into the spring. 

First Snow

Yesterday was our first snow of 2012.  The chickens don't know what to do with themselves.  When Naomi came home yesterday afternoon, they were huddled up in a corner of the run, refusing to walk around in the snow, or even go inside their coop, which is nothing new.  She picked them up and put them inside, where they stayed until this morning.  I shoveled out some of the snow in the run for them. Eventually, they came out.  Other than their apprehension to walk in the snow, they seem fine. 

In the garden, I still have kale, turnips, whatever spinach the rabbits haven't eaten off, swiss chard, and the gourds that are drying.  Oh, and some rutabagas.  I don't think the kohlrabi or broccoli seedlings are going to make it, since they didn't get past their first set of true leaves.  Also, there is an abundance of leeks, which should be fine.  I'm curious to see what happens with all that stuff.  I also guess I missed my chance to plant rye. 

Harvest Record 10/21/12

Leeks: 5 lb. 4 oz.
Parsnips: 2 lb. 3 oz.
Misc. Beans: 14 oz.
Chard: 9 oz.

Blast from the Past

Four years ago, about this time of year, I was living in a shit apartment and gardening was just a tickle on my brain.  I had just met Naomi a few months before, too.  While at the pharmacy, I saw a Chia Garden Herb set.  I remembered growing a Chia pet as a kid once, and was sort of intrigued and bought the thing on a whim.  It had thyme, basil, chives, and something else in it.  The basil lasted the longest, and it was thriving a full year later, at which point Naomi and I were living in our first apartment together.  We didn't have a garden that year either, but my dad, who lived practically across the street, was kind enough to set aside a tiny spot in his garden for us to grow a few things.  That basil just kept on cranking, and it was great!  It lived on various windowsills and the pot was overcrowded, but it didn't mind. 

Time went on, and we moved into our current place, a place where we were finally able to realize our dream of having a garden.  We dug up part of the sod in the yard and buried a fence, and had our first garden (what is now the chicken run).  We worked like crazy in that garden, and it produced a little bit.  We had some tomatoes, a few pounds of finger-sized carrots, 6 softball-sized cabbages, amongst other things.  I forgot about growing herbs on the windowsill. 

Then we progressed into our current large (too big then) garden.  We had basil out our ears last year.  This year, with as crazy as the spring was, I never really got around to establishing a basil bed in the garden, and here we are without any pesto in the freezer.  My mom made a soup for us today, and it calls for adding pesto once served.  So here I am, 4 years later, and for the first time since that cold fall in a shitty apartment, and I've planted basil in a pot on the windowsill.  I hope that it will grow as tall and as strong as it did that winter we've mostly forgotten about, mostly because of the bitter cold in a drafty old building!  On Sunday, Naomi and I will celebrate our 6-month anniversary by going to Miya's Sushi to enjoy their invasive species menu!

Skipped Records

While cleaning up, I found a harvest record from 9/30/12:


Lazy Wife Beans: 1 lb. 12 oz.
Sky Rockets: 6
Purple Pole Beans: 1 lb. 1 oz.
Scarlett Runner: 2 lb. 11 oz.
Bush Beans: 5 lb. 7 oz.
Butternut Squash: 48 lbs. (14)


Additionally, last Friday night into Saturday (10/12-13) we had our first frost of the year.  I found 3 luffa gourds, and promptly peeled them.  I think only one of them was mature enough.  

Cold Weather

It looks like we might get that frost I was hoping for on Friday night!  I should be in bed already, but I'm prepping garlic for planting tomorrow!

Always Improving Something

As of this afternoon, the chickens have double the space to play, scratch, poop, lay around, eat bugs, and whatever else a chicken does.  I finally got around to expanding their run.  I think they like it.  I just need to get some cover crops sown in there so it doesn't turn into a mud pit and so it DOES turn into a salad bar. 

A few nights earlier in the week (maybe Oct. 7-9) the overnight temp dipped into the upper 30s.  It was warmer/wetter today, so we'll see what's coming.  I'm ready for frost.  I'm also ready for eggs!

A Celebration!

Just a few nights ago, I mentioned to Naomi that I wanted to start a new tradition in our family.  For a few years now, we've been talking about making our own harvest celebration that was at a more appropriate time.  Thanksgiving is too late in the fall to be a proper harvest celebration, as most stuff is put up and the big harvest bulk, along with the stuff that's not fit to keep is long gone by then.  One of the best things about the harvest is the surplus, and taking time to be thankful for the bounty.  Careful planning (even a little rationing, eek!) can come later, but we need a time to let loose and enjoy.

While sitting in my treestand a few evenings ago, I was reflecting on this time last year.  It's been just a year since I shot my first deer on October 7, 2011 (I think), plunging Naomi and I into a weird place in the world, one where we became meat-eaters, but not in the way that our culture accepts as normal.  We still don't eat factory-farmed animals, and we eat teeny tiny portions compared to the national average.  The best part is that it's something that doesn't take ANY resources on our part, other than my time afield.  These animals are the definition of free-ranging organic.  Each one of them lives in total freedom.  I see this as a better option to things like genetically-modified soy protein products trucked into town from hundreds, if not thousands, of miles away and farmed unsustainably.  The same path that led us to growing as much of our own vegetables brought us to this decision to eat wild game animals.  So, this led us to choosing the date of October 7th as our harvest celebration.

We had decided that our first year, it'd just be the two of us. We wanted to ease into this new festival of ours.  However, by the time band practice was finished and we were thinking about our preparatins, Sal and Maria were hanging out and we decided to ask them to stay.  We didn't allow them to help us in any of the preparations, either.  As they waited patiently, we prepared the following:

Harvard Beets
Stewed Radish Greens- saved from sometime in early summer
Fried Potatoes with Onions- the onions weren't from our garden, but were purchased from a local farmer in bulk for winter storing
Stewed shell beans with rice- the rice, of course, is from the store, but grown in the US.
Roasted Butternut Squash with nutmeg and cinnamon- spices came from the store too
Mashed Sweet Potatoes with Garlic
Wheat Bread- made by me, but the grains weren't mine either.  Maybe someday I'll figure out this wheat thing

and it looks like this:

We hope that in years to come, this celebration can grow in size as we become more productive.  There will be some challenges, like when the date falls on a weekday and we're both working, but we'll make it happen.  And finally, here is a harvest record for October 7th, 2012. Some of these are the last that their plants have to offer.  It was 38 degrees last night, and I heard the heat come on in our house early this morning.  Here's to a good year!

Jalapeños + Cayenne peppers: 3 lb. 4 oz.
Shell Beans (the last) 2 lb. 1 oz.
Tomatillos: 2 lb. 9 oz. (not the last and not sure how I feel about that)
Fish Peppers: 1 oz (maybe 2 dozen)
Bell Peppers 10 oz. (4)

Happy Fall!

Last Friday we went to a special celebration of the Equinox, which we usually do schedule-permitting.  I finally sorted all of the garlic and selected the heads that I'll plant for next year's crop.  I've yet to haul in any squash, save one.  I spotted maybe 4 luffa gourds the other day, when all along I thought there were none!  The bushel basket gourds are starting to set fruit EVERYWHERE, and some of them are getting big. There are still beans to be picked.

I transplanted seedlings for kale, arugula, and kohlrabi sometime last week, along with tatsoi and pak choi.  I've got a lot more broccoli and kale seedlings to transplant, but it's been raining pretty hard so they'll have to wait.  I'm somewhat impatiently waiting for the first frost, mostly because I want to pick all of the garden huckleberries.  The garden has been somewhat neglected because I've turned most of my focus to filling the freezer now that the root cellar is full. 

Speaking of root cellars, I've been reading about them, and I can't believe how much I didn't even know there was to know about root cellars!  It's fantastic and beautiful.  The idea of saving food without needing any outside power is a really wonderful thing that I think the vast majority of people in our society have no idea about anymore. 

Here is some harvest record information that I found laying under a pile on my desk:

9/8/12
Scarlett Runner beans: 1 lb. 2. oz.
Lazy Wife + Purple Podded Pole Beans: 5 lb. 12 oz.
Cucumbers: 1 lb. 8 oz.
Tomatoes: 2 lb. 12 oz.
Tomatillos: 2 lb. 11 oz.

9/9/12
French Horticulture beans: 4 oz.
Cowpeas: 5 oz.
Sky Rocket Tomatoes: 3 oz.
White Onion: 1 oz.
Tomatillos: 3 lb. 4 oz.
Jalapeño: 7 oz.
Mixed straggler beans: 6 oz.
Bottle Gourds: 2.  (they later rotted because they were too immature)
Swiss Chard: 2 lb. 1 oz.
Malabar Spinach 1 lb. 12 oz. (later fed to chickens)
Leeks: 6 large ones (weight unknown)
Sunberries: some.
Long Beans: 2 for seed collection

9/12/12
Sky Rockets: 7 lb. 14 oz.

9/16/12
Beans, mixed: 4 lb. 10 oz.
Daikon Radish: 1 small one
Herbs for drying
- Oregano
- Basil
- Spearmint
- Peppermint
- Raspberry leaf
- Sage

Pole Beans: 7 lb. 3 oz.
Bell Peppers: 4 oz.(2)
 Tomatoes: 14 oz.
Peppers: 4 oz.
Tomatillos: 2 lb. 7 oz.

9/ 21/12
Bell Peppers: 2 small ones
Tomatillos: a few
Skyrockets: a few

9/22/12
Georgia Jet Sweet Potatoes: 17 lbs.
Ping Tung Eggplant: 6 small ones
Red Onions: 3 small ones found while digging sweets.

9/??/12- sometime in the last week
Tomatillos: 17 lbs.

Busy Busy Busy

It seems like most of the rush of the Summer's end harvest has passed us at this point.  The high point of that harvest always seems busy, because we're in a rush to process and save as much as we can for the coming winter, but now that it's done, it seems there's so much more to do now. 

I need to start prepping the garden for winter.  That means pulling the last of the weeds, mulching bare soil where things were taken out, setting up the hoophouse, and starting fall crops on time.  Yesterday, I spotted a SIXTH woodchuck; probably the biggest one I've ever seen in my life.  Seeing a woodchuck always gives me a sense of urgency, so that's not helping. 

I also need to expand the chicken run before the ground hardens.  I also need to make sure I eliminate any drafts in the coop.  We're about a month away from the time when the chickens should start laying.  The anticipation is starting to get to me!!  Last week I started 3 trays of seeds; stuff like cabbage, broccoli, spinach and kale. 

We've yet to harvest any butternut squashes.  I need to pull up the sweet potatoes really soon.  After the frost comes, I can worry about the garden huckleberries.  The beans are still going strong because I planted them late.  I think the last day that I planted them was July 15, but might have been a few days later.  Hopefully the hoophouse greens will work out well!

Harvest Records and Updates

I dug the last of our potatoes today.  Many of them were over 1 lb. each!  In all, I harvested 46 lb. 8 oz. of Butte potatoes today, giving us a grand total of just over 100 lbs. for this growing season.  This is great!  If only our tomatoes did as well this year, but I really can't complain.  Naomi put up 11 pints of corn, last year she only put up 3, so that's good.  We also didn't have beans last year, or potatoes, or any onions at all.  If only we had harvest records from last year to compare to. 

I started seeds this past week, but can't recall the day.  I think it was Monday, September 3rd, but I'm not sure.  I've got two trays going now that were started on different days.  I also bought more seeds this week, along with some more multiplier onion bulbs.  I'm looking forward to growing some hardy greens this winter, especially in the hoop houses.  I know there will be much to learn about growing under plastic in low temperatures, but I'm ready to learn! 

We've still got one woodchuck that's been visiting daily.  He'll get his soon enough I hope.  I'd like to go into winter with no resident woodchucks, so I can have a jump start on the spring. 

I've been slacking off on general garden chores as I've been getting back into work for the fall.  A lot of weeding needs to be done still, and I'm planning to rebuild all of the garden beds before mulching them over deeply before winter's chill sets in.  The good thing is that I haven't needed to water; mother nature's been providing plenty. 

OK, onto the harvest records!

8/31
Daikon Radish: 4 oz (cut off about half to rot)
Corn: 8 oz (2)
Jersey Giant Tomatoes: 1 lb. 2 oz. (4)
Tomatoes, mixed: 3 lb. 7 oz.
Tomatillos: 5 oz. (6)
Onions: 4 lb. 8 oz.
Cowpeas: 8 oz.
Sky Rocket Tomatoes: 1 lb. 6 oz.
Jalapeño: 3 oz.
Ground Cherries: 5 oz.
Basil: 2 oz.
French Horticulture Beans: 1 lb. 1 oz.
Green, Purple, and Wax beans, mixed: 8 oz.

9/3
Corn: 2 Lb. 5 oz. (4 ears)
Tomatoes: 7 Lb. 2 oz.
Sky Rocket: 1 lb. 4 oz.
Beans (green, wax, purple): 3 lb. 5 oz.
Yard Long Beans: 2 oz. (2)
French Horticulture beans: 7 oz.
Cowpeas: 1 lb. 2 oz.
Tomatillos: 10 oz.
Eggplant: 3 oz. (1)
Fish Peppers: 5 peppers
Ground Cherries: some

9/6
Cowpeas 8 oz.
Ground Cherry: 4 oz.
Tomatillos: 13 oz.
Tomatoes, mixed: 3 lb. 12 oz.
French Horticulture beans: 1 lb.
Wax, Purple, and Green Beans, mixed: 1 lb. 2 oz.

9/7
Butte potatoes: 46 lb. 8 oz. 


Sometime in the last week, I picked 5 lbs of green beans, purple beans, and wax beans, but I can't find the paper with that day's harvest record on it, so some data is missing.

August Harvest Records

We've been accumulating these records, and of course the accompanying produce, but haven't been logging them here.  So, here they are.

August 2, 2012
Boston Pickling Cucumbers  1 lb. 12 oz.  (7)
Basil- one handful
Lemon Cucumbers 3 oz. (2)

August 3, 2012
Boston Pickling Cucumbers 10 oz. (2)
Lemon Cucumbers 8 oz. (2)
Tomatillos 13.5 oz. (6)
Crookneck Squash 13 oz. (3)
Jalapeño pepper 1 oz (1)
misc. beans 4 oz
yellow onion 1 oz (1)
Red Wethersfield Onion  5 oz. (6)
Sunberries 1 oz.

August 7, 2012
Lemon Cucumber 1 lb. 14 oz. (6)
Boston Pickling Cucumber 4 lb. 10 oz. (16)
Sikkim Cucumber 1 lb. 11 oz (4)- largest is 1 lb!
Lazy Wife Beans 1 lb.
Purple Podded Pole Beans 1 oz. (1 pod)
Soybeans 1 oz. (one dry pod)
Tomatillo 2 lb. 7 oz.  (28)
Tomato (oxheart) 7 oz. (1)
Sky Rocket Tomato  4 oz. (3)

August 9, 2012
Australian Brown Onions 2 lb. 5 oz.

August 10, 2012
Australian Brown Onions 3 lb. 5 oz.
Volunteer Potatoes 1 lb. 3 oz.
Scarlett Runner Beans 2 oz (2)
Ground Cherry 2 oz. (7)
French Horticulture Beans 8 oz.
Corn 1 lb. 4 oz.  (2 ears)
Chinese Turnip 1 lb. 3 oz. (2)
Tomatillos 10 oz. (7)
Boston Pickling Cucumber 1 lb. 6 oz.  (4)
Sikkim Cucumber 7 oz (1)
Bell Pepper 4 oz. (1)
Oxheart Tomato 7 oz. (1)
Sky Rocket Tomato 5 oz. (3)
Lazy Wife Beans 1 lb. 8 oz.

August 12, 2012
Corn 10 lb. 3 oz. (15 ears)
Purple Podded Pole Beans 4 oz.
Lazy Wife Beans 8 oz.
Sikkim Cucumber 1 lb. 1 oz. (2)
Boston Pickling Cucumber 1 lb. 11 oz. (5)
Lemon Cucumber 6 lb. 8 oz. (18)
Tomatillo 12 oz (9)
Ground Cherry < 1 oz.
Sky Rocket Tomato 11 oz. (9)
Oxheart Tomato 1 lb. (3)
Jersey Giant Tomato 10 oz. (1)
Sparks Tomato 14 oz. (3)
Southport White Globe Onions 15 oz. (6)

August 13, 2012
Southport White Globe Onions 12 oz. (5)
Corn 5 lb. (8 ears)
Boston Pickling Cucumbers 3 lb. 12 oz. (9)
Tomatillo 8 oz. (5)
?? tomatoes 12 oz. (5)
Sky Rocket Tomatoes 5 oz (4)
Jersey Giant Tomatoes 7 oz. (1)

August 15, 2012
Corn 3 lb. 2 oz. (4)
Oxheart Tomatoes 3 lb. 13 oz. (11)
Jersey Giant Tomatoes 2 lb. 2 oz. (6)
Sky Rocket Tomatoes 1 lb. (12)
?? Tomatoes 2 lb. 8 oz. (6)
Lemon Cucumbers 2 lb. 4 oz. (8)
Boston Pickling Cucumbers 1 lb. 15 oz. (9)
Tomatillo (green) 5 lb. 4 oz.
Swiss Chard 4 oz.
Malabar Spinach 1 oz.  ( We decided that we didn't like it, so we didn't harvest any more)
Basil < 1 oz.
Lazy Wife Beans 3 oz.
Purple Podded Pole Beans < 1 oz.
Red Wethersfield Onions 5 oz. (6)
Ground Cherry 2 oz.

August 16, 2012
All Blue Potatoes 26 lb. 10 oz.

August 19, 2012
Purple Podded Pole Beans 7 oz.
Lazy Wife Beans 2 oz.
Lemon Cucumbers 15 oz. (4)
Sikkim Cucumbers 5 oz. (1)
Tomatillo 10 oz. (6)
Jersey Giant Tomato 3 lb. 10 oz. (14)
Golden Queen Tomato 1 oz. (1)
Sky Rocket Tomato 9 oz. (9)
Oxheart Tomato 15 oz. (3)
??? "globe?" 3 lb. 8 oz. (9)

August 21, 2012
Yard Long Beans 2 oz. (2)
Ground Cherries 4 oz.
Cor Di Bieu Tomato 13 oz. (1)
Sauce n' Slice Tomato 5 oz. (1)
Sky Rocket Tomato 5 oz. (5)
Soy Beans < 1 oz.

August 23, 2012
Yard Long Beans 2 oz.
Lazy Wife Beans 6 oz.
Purple Podded Pole Beans 10 oz.
Green Beans 11 oz.
Wax Beans 14 oz.
Corn 2 lb. 14 oz. (4)
Tomatillo 2 lb. 11 oz.
 ??? tomato 1 lb. 5 oz. (4)
Golden Queen 4 oz. (1)
Oxheart Tomato 13 oz. (3)
Jersey Giant Tomato 4 lb. 7 oz. (14)
Sky Rocket Tomato 14 oz. (13)

August 24, 2012
beans, mixed 11 oz.
Ground Cherries 5 oz.
Pepperoncini 2 oz.
Corn 2 lb. 8 oz. (11 ears)
Red Wethersfield Onion 1 lb. 9 oz.
Tomatillo 1 lb. 7 oz. (17)
Golden Queen Tomato 4 oz. (1)
Jersey Giant Tomato 1 lb. 11 oz. (5)
Oxheart Tomato 1 lb. (2)
Sky Rocket 8 oz. (5)

August 25, 2012
Ruby Queen Beets 17 lb. 11 oz
Early Blood Turnip Beets 4 lb. 2 oz.
Onions, mixed 5 lb.
Chinese Radish 1 lb. 12 oz. (2)
Kohlrabi 11 oz. (7)
Sikkim Cucumber 12 oz. (1)
Jalapeño pepper 1 lb.
Pepperoncini 2 oz. (4)
Boston Pickling Cucumber 4 oz. (1)
Bell Pepper 4 oz. (1)
unripe tomatoes 2 lb. 10 oz. (7)
Ground Cherries 3 oz.
Lemon Cucumber 3 oz. (1)

August 26, 2012
Cowpeas < 1 oz. (1 pod)
Kale < 1 oz.
Yard Long Beans 1 oz.
misc. beans 2 oz.
Tomatillo 11 oz (10)
Butte Potatoes 9 oz. (2)
Tomatoes 6 oz. (2)
Swiss Chard 3 oz.
Red Wethersfield Onion 13 oz.
Yellow Onions < 1 oz.
Sunberries 1 oz.
Ground Cherries < 1 oz.

This is Pay Day

Here we are in mid- August; the time when all that hard work really starts to pay off.  We're entering the tomato glut for the year.  This year, however, we've got to add tomatillos to the count.  I can't believe how productive tomatillos are.  We've got some good-sized bell peppers this year, unlike last year where they never got bigger than a quarter.  Last Thursday, I dug 27 pounds of blue potatoes.  I couldn't be happier with the production of our beans this year, either.  We even grew some yard-long beans, and they lived up to the name for sure:

This past weekend, we went to visit my grandparents in Pennsylvania.  We thought we were hardworking over-achievers until we spent the weekend with grandma and grandpa.  They actually wore us out!  Grandma's gardens were beautiful, and she sent me home with some plants.  I got some more multiplier onions, some kind of herb that smells like bubblegum, lemon balm, and fennel.  Plus my mom gave me some daisies and something else I can't recall the name of.  Here's a picture of Grandma's garden:

Cucumbers are winding down, and we have about 20 more ears of corn that we're waiting on.  I planted turnips yesterday, and I've been meaning to start some flats of broccoli, cabbage, and other greens but haven't done it yet. 

Pickles & Cheese

You can pickle just about anything. Yes, we all have an idea of what "a pickle" is... but for each of us it could be something different. It usually conjures up some version of a pickled cucumber- for me, its a garlicy dill pickled cucumber. So far this summer, I have pickled black radishes(on 7/8/12) and dill pickles (today). I jarred 9 pints of pickled black radishes and 4 quarts and 4 pints of dill pickles. I adapted a pickled beet recipe with black radish inspired spices to create the recipe for those bad boys. They came out well, but in the future, I would recommend peeling the skins off. I left them on, because I like the skins when they are cooked, but it turns out that the skins get chewy when pickled. Edible, but not ideal. I'll have to wait at least 2 weeks to try my jarred dill pickles, but I always make sure to make extra for refrigerator pickles to tide me over.
Pickling is essentially fermenting foods in a certain way- the way that you like, and doesn't kill you. In that way, it is very similar to cheese. I would never be able to keep all these cucumbers for more than a month or so without pickling, just like there's no way to keep milk around without cheese. So far I have made Mozzarella, Ziegerkase, Farmhouse Cheddar, Whey Ricotta, Milk Yogurt and Soy Yogurt. However, I haven't tried all of these yet! Cheese is about patience. Aging makes one cheese one way and another another, so we'll have to wait and see if my cheddar and ziegerkase are successful! Mozzarella is quickly becoming a household norm, and the soy yogurt is vastly more popular and easier than the milk yogurt.

Read more about pickling here!

The Second Half of July

Oh boy. Looks like I haven't updated in a while... The garden looks like a jungle again, but at least I know in which areas things are, even if they are under the weeds. There are no no-mans-land areas like we had last year. I at least have access to all the rows, even if you wouldn't be able to tell where the row ended and the walkway began without having been in there everyday for the last several months.
Here's the Harvest report:

• 7/16:
• boston pickling cucumbers: 3 lb (11, 2 were munched :/ )
• beans (type unknown): 1 oz (3 pods) - these fell off in the storm and were recovered, not really harvested
• nest egg gourd: 1 WAY too large gourd. picked and given to chickens. 
• 7/17:
• garlic. 
• bp cukes: 10 oz (4)
• 7/20:
• kale: 4.5 oz
• red beet: 1 lb (5)
• kohlrabi: 6.5 oz (1)
• bp cuke: 2 lb 2 oz (8)
• chard: 13 oz
• rat tail radish seed pods: 3 oz (40)
• 7/21: 
• bp cuke: 12 oz (4)
• 7/22:
• green tomatillo: 11 oz (7)
• pickling onion: 2 lb 11 oz (48)
• crookneck summer squash: 1.5 oz (1)
• kale: 3 oz
• kohlrabi: 10 oz (1)
• beans: 5 oz (6) 
• rtr seed pods: 1 oz
• lemon cuke: 1 lb 8.5 oz (7)
• bp cuke: 1 lb 13 oz (9)
• 7/24
• lemon cuke: 6 oz (2)
• bp cuke: 1 lb 13 oz (11)
• tomatillo: 3 oz (1)
• 7/25
• cn squash: 10.4 oz (3)
• bp cuke: 1.4 (1)
• 7/29
• lemon cuke: 1 lb 11 oz (10)
• bp cuke: 6 lb 3 oz (20)
• kale: 4 oz
• cn squash: 1 lb 1 oz (3)
• lazy wife beans: 1 lb 12 oz
• scarlett runner beans: 9 oz
• chard: 10 oz
• beet: 3 lb 10 oz
• kohlrabi: 15 oz (3)
• tomatillo: 1 lb (11)
• strawberries(everbearing?): 2 oz (12)
• 7/30:
• cn squash: 1 oz (1)
• rtr seed pods: 1.75 oz
• lw beans: 7 oz
• tomatillo: 11.5 oz (11)
• beet: 1.75 oz (1)
• red wethersfield onion: 4.5 oz (5)
• yellow onion: 2 ob 1 oz
• 7/31: 
• yellow onion: 1 oz (1)
• beet: 4.5 oz (1)
• 2 strawberries... didn't make it inside. CHOMP
• ground cherry: >1 oz (3)
• bp cuke: 2 lb 9 oz (3) (bigger is not better)
• cn squash: 5 oz (1)
• lemon cuke: 1 lb 4 oz (8)

I love lists. :)
Happy growing! <3

Got New Seeds

I got some new seeds in the mail today.  They are as follows:

Purple Dark Opal Basil
Lacinato Kale (the other seeds I had didn't germinate for some unknown reason)
Lamb's Ears
Sylvetta Arugula
Lovage
Hyssop
Amado Coneflower
Prize Choy
Tatsoi
Purple Vienna Kohlrabi
Chives
Tall Russell Lupine
Mrs. Burns Lemon Basil

I'm trying to establish a perennial border to keep down on weeds, so that's why I got all the strange herbs that I don't cook with.  The greens will be grown in the coming months.

A Drip Before the Deluge

So here we find ourselves in the middle of July, with more work to do that there are hours to do it, and I'm not talking about weeding.  We started harvesting garlic on Tuesday, pulling out some 139 heads, equaling just under 16 pounds of garlic.  Lacking a shed or barn, we were hard-pressed to find a place to cure it.  We ended up stringing it up in an unused as of yet portion of the chicken run, and putting a tarp over it with a support pole in the center sort of like a mini circus tent. 

After not receiving and rain for weeks, we got almost an inch on Wednesday along with some hail.  Most of the corn is now lodged, the runner bean poles fell over, amongst other more minor things.  We learned last year to leave the corn alone, and it may straighten itself back up using its powerful brace roots. 

The Rose Gold potatoes that we planted in mid-April are ready to come up.  The leaves were starting to get pretty crunchy looking about a week ago, and after the storm hit us on Wednesday, I went to survey the damage.  The potato plants looked fine, it's just that the Rose Golds looked like yellow sticks coming out of the hay mulch.  Hopefully tomorrow it'll be dry enough to do some digging. 

Some tomatoes have blossom end rot, but I'm hoping it'll rectify itself.  BER happens due to a lack of calcium.  One possibility is that a large fluctuation in moisture disrupts the previous amount of uptake of calcium to the soil, temporarily causing a lack of calcium available to the fruits.  This is the case with us in the last week as we went from .05 inches of rain in July to over 2 inches in a matter of hours.

Our chickens finally learned to stay inside the coop when it's raining instead of miserably standing around in it.  A very large tom has been gobbling in the pasture every morning this week, and I got my first glimpse of this year's fawns. 

Rain

It's raining! I'm so happy!!!

Harvest Record 7/6-7/14

I'm sitting here, munching on a cucumber and listening to the rain fall. We've been needing it bad, and I'm so grateful for it! I hope our garden perks up from all this great H2O! One downfall from the rain is that one of the chickens seems to be unhappy about it. From what I gather, she's not sick or injured, just grumpy about the rain. Will and I gave her a look-over, and she seems fine, but we'll keep an eye out tomorrow when it's not raining to make sure she perks up after the rain, too.

• 7/6:
• boston pickling cucumbers: 15.1 oz (4 cukes)
• 7/7:
• bp cucumbers: 5.1 oz (1 cuke)
• chinese turnip (?): 3.4 oz 
• Will's dad was given seeds from one of his Chinese co-workers, who has limited English. We grew them, and they looked like a cross between a red globe radish and a purple top turnip. It also turned out that it was rotten on the inside, so we didn't get to taste it. Bummer.
• romaine lettuce: 8.9 oz (1 head) 
• Despite the heat, the lettuce is still doing fine, since it is well shaded under the cucumber plants. Some of its garden leaves are bitter, but that's to be expected. The chickens don't seem to mind these outer leaves.
• black radishes: 24 lbs.
• This group + the other already harvested black radishes got pickled and jarred up, making 9 pints of pickled radishes! Yum!
• 7/8:
• blue potato: 2.2 oz (1 potato) - test potato! 
• red potato: 1 oz (1 potato) - test potato!
• bp cucumbers: 1 lb 4.6 oz (6 cukes)
• fava bean: .7 oz (2 pods)
• Our fava beans were kind of pathetic this year, but we asked the farm-stand lady to ask her farmer his secret to big beautiful pods, so maybe we'll have better fava beans next year!
• rhubarb swiss chard: 1.4 oz
• 7/9: 
• beets: 5.4 oz (3 beets) - test beets!
• bp cucumbers: 14.3 oz (4 cukes)
• 7/10:
• bp cucumbers: 6.9 oz (3)
• 7/11:
• kale: 2.7 oz
• rhubarb swiss chard: 2.1 oz
• killarney red garlic: 3 oz (1 head) - test garlic! 
• Ready to come up! Just need a dry day where we're home!)
• 7/12:
• sad cucumbers: 6.8 oz (1 lemon & 2 bp)
• These cucumbers were the victim of a 'friend' with a tiny mouth. I suppose I will never know for sure who the culprit was, but it was most likely either the juvenile woodchuck or the baby bunny. I cried in the garden when I found these unfortunate veggies.
• 7/14:
• creole red garlic: 2.9 oz (2 heads) 
• The stalks on these heads were totally dead, but they made little heads anyway! I think we'll be the garlic king and queen from now on...
• romaine lettuce: 8.7 oz (1 head)
• One head of lettuce a week is perfect for our 2 person family! 
• rat-tail radish pods: .1 oz (3 pods)
• The pods are the edible part of the variety of radish, not the root. They are very prolific, but we wanted to test them out to make sure we didn't die or throw up upon consuming them. We had them in spring rolls, and I'm not dead yet!
• bp cucumbers: 13 oz (4)

Happy growing! <3

Rain and Rabbits

On the 4th of this month, I planted approximately 200 beans.  Two days ago, there were 58 remaining seedlings as the rest had been munched.  Today, there are 17.  We're one less woodchuck, but still host to an ever-growing rabbit.

I planted 4 more packets of beans today, and I'm about to go out to the store for 4 more.  It's getting iffy on planting these beans.  Depending on the variety, they take about 45-60 days to mature.  It's the 15th, and based on first frost dates I've seen, the frost will come as early as September 15th, but we might get lucky til the end of the ninth month.  Only time will tell of course. 

Yesterday, I spotted the first corn tassles.  There are an increasing amount of green tomatoes on the vine, and the beans I planted in spring (a little late though) are producing pods that are starting to plump up.  The garlic can be pulled up any day, but I want to wait a few more days.

There's rain in the forecast for today.  I really hope it comes.  Thursday or Friday, there was some water on the driveway when I woke up, but it burned off fast.  We got less than a half an inch.  Otherwise, it hasn't rained in weeks.  I'm really keeping my fingers crossed. 

The Weeds Are Growing Like... Well, Weeds

It's July, and it's hot.  I'm thinking about water and weeds.  I've observed in previous seasons that immediately after weeding an area, the plants suffer some wilting and shock, and the soil surface dries out and looks like beach sand.  I interplant various species intensively, use mulch, and sow cover crops as religiously as possible. 

Weeds are just doing their jobs, as I am mine, protecting the soil's fertility and host to a multitude of bacteria, fungi, and other microorganisms that support life, photosynthesizing life or otherwise.  Weeds are the pioneers, reclaiming disturbed land, covering it over as quickly as possible, over time leading to a progressing to edge habitat, and eventually woodlands.  I don't hate the weeds.  I don't want to poison them off, or torch them with a flame thrower.  All plant matter that we don't intend to eat is not removed from the garden.  It is pulled out of the ground, left in the sun, and later returned to the soil either on the surface, or spaded under.  I want total biomass retention.  by removing fertility from the garden in the form of edible vegetables, I need to replace what I've taken out.  I do this with kitchen compost, manures, growing green manures like buckwheat, clover, and ryegrass, and keeping all of my weeds. 

In the spring, I brought in a good deal of wood chips, and inoculated them with cultures of Garden Giant mushrooms.  I needed to keep them in full shade and moist, so I built a really simple structure.  It's essentially a low table with the tabletop made out of chicken wire.  We pull weeds and pile them onto this table to dry in the sun, while also shading the mushroom patch.  After the weeds are sufficiently dried (eliminating the possibility of them re-rooting themselves, they're used as mulch.  It looks something like this:

Currently, some of our biggest garden invaders are Purslane, Lady's Thumb, Ragweed, and Mugwort.  Of course we've got the normal crabgrass and other various grasses, too.  I mostly leave the purslane alone, as I don't see it as a big threat.  All Lady's Thumb and Mugwort are pulled out immediately on sight.  The mugwort is never left directly on the soil surface after being pulled, because it's so tenacious at re-rooting itselt.  Once it dies back, though, it's great.  On the property there are some big expanses of mugwort that are left standing for the entirety of their life cycle, and the soil underneath is GREAT because of the amount of decomposing plant matter from previous years' stalks. 

I like to share my successes, but it's also important to note some of my failures.  For the second year, I've tried to grow a small patch of wheat, since I love to bake bread (provided it's winter!).   On account of a dry spring, and a pinch of neglect on my part, I got terrible germination this year probably from lack of moisture.  In no time, my precious wheat patch was overrun with grass stalks going to seed that were well over my head.  I decided it was time to give up on it and mow it down.  This week sometime when it's less hot, I'm going to turn the whole thing under and probably plant radishes.  Better luck next year.  RIP wheat patch 2012:

6/26-7/5 Harvest

Hey folks,
It's that time of year where the weeds are growing like mad, and every ounce of time is spent making our garden still look like a garden. Here's the harvest of this week:

• June 26
• peas: 1 lb 6.1 oz
• June 29
• romaine lettuce: handful
• June 30
• black radishes: 4 lb 10.9 oz & 2 gallons of processed greens (minus what we've been eating for dinner before I weighed it, including one night where we had 4 cups of radishes)
• July 2
• rhubarb swiss chard: 2.7 oz
• romaine lettuce: 2 oz (~one small head)
• fava beans: 1.1 oz (4 bean pods)
• peas: .8 oz
• July 5 (stuff for dinner)
• kale: 1.4 oz
• swiss chard(fordhook giant & rhubarb): 2.3 oz
• purslane: 6.6 oz (when you eat weeds, it feels less defeating) 
• wheat: 6.3 oz (nuked the wheat patch...)

Happy growing! <3

June 21st Harvest

Just a quick list of what I got today--

• garlic scapes: 4.3 oz 
• Zut alors! I have missed one!... or ten.
• black raspberries: 5.2 oz
• Unlike blackberries, black raspberries are non-native to North America, but are growing like mad in various parts of the property around the garden. Black raspberries are a similar color to blackberries, but are smaller- much like raspberries. We double-checked with our landlord that we could harvest these berries and he told us "Good luck getting to them before the squirrels."
• (mostly) admiral peas: 2 lbs 4 oz
• It has been super hot for a couple days and the pea plants are trying their hardest to send their pods out before they wither and die. We are trying to harvest these pods before the slugs eat them all. All in all, the admiral peas did (and are doing) vastly better than our other pea varieties. Not bad for a cover crop!

Happy growing! <3

CT Farm Fresh

Here in Connecticut, we have this great thing called CT Farm Fresh.  It's an organization that partners with local farms around the state to deliver fresh and local food directly to your door from farms around the state.  Every week, CT Farm Fresh calls up the farms that it partners with and asks them what they've got for that week.  After tallying it all up, all of the listings are put on a webstore (CT Farm Fresh Store) which goes up every Thursday afternoon sometime I believe.  Whatever you order is then delivered the following Thursday, and you're given a timeframe that's far more reliable than any home repairman or UPS delivery I've ever experienced.

You get to choose what you want and when you want it.  We've only ordered once, but it was great.  You pay a small delivery fee, which makes it worthwhile to stock up, instead of ordering just a few things every week.  The store runs the gamut of veggies, fruits, cheese and other dairy products, baked goods, meats, and other farm products.  Instead of spending a whole week driving across the state in search of fresh food from local farms, consider getting it delivered to your door!

Mid June Harvest

It's that time of year already-- where I work at my job all day (wearing high heels, ugh), come home and tornado-change into garden clothes and with a burrito in hand, stop by the chickens, to hang out, on my way to weed the garden, seemingly in vain. Keep in mind, this is not a complaint. This is exactly how I want to live my life (except maybe replace chickens with a less annoying creature). 

I suppose the end of summer is the real boom of harvesting, with the heaps and heaps of fruits that HAVE to get taken care of before the hard frosts kill everything off, but the rest of the year provides, too. The tomatoes aren't flowering yet, but some crops are already on their way out- like our early variety of spinach. I am astonished at the people who set up their gardens with only tomato season in mind- set plants in the ground around memorial day, and take them out at labor day. Think of all the wonderful foods they're missing out on!
June 16, 2012 Harvest:

• garlic scapes: 2 lbs 7.1 oz
• admiral peas (w/ shells): 2 lbs 15.9 oz
• fava beans: 3 bean pods

Now I get to figure out clever ways to incorporate garlic scapes into everything! This evening I made garlic scape ketchup- uh, yum! Here's a recipe for Garlic Scape Dip I'm going to try for a party I'm throwing this weekend.


When I was shelling 3 lbs of peas, to get ready for freezing, I was astonished at how spoiled we all are. It took me hours to shell roughly half a package of frozen peas. I'm sure there is some far more efficient way that it is done commercially, but in the good ol' fashioned way with my fingers, it took forever. But, if I was interested in the easy way out, I wouldn't be doing what I'm doing. Growing my own food gives me an appreciation for the food so readily available, too.

Happy growing! <3

This is why we can't have nice things

I'd love to have broccoli, kale, lettuce, cabbage, sunflowers, and beans in my garden but this is why I can't:

Never Quite Caught Up

This weekend was a busy one.  We got two inches of rain, but it was either fast-moving, or happened overnight, so I was able to work quite a bit still.  The biggest thing that I got done this weekend was to mulch my potatoes.  I hilled them with composted manure last week, and just now got around to mulching them.  I use waste hay, because it's available in large quantity, and it's dumped to compost in extreme proximity to the garden. 

In previous years, we've tried growing potatoes in a trench and filling in dirt as the plants grew, but we've had limited success with this method.   The benefit of that is that extra material is not needed to hill around the plants.  You simply use what was dug out of the trench to backfill.  Two years ago, my father tried this method and got a great yield.  For the last two years, however, we have not had nearly the experience that my father has.  I suspect that the flaws with this method are that we have rather heavy soil, and compaction is further encouraged by the digging and backfilling, and that by continually covering up the growing stems and foliage, the plant is weakened.  Then it takes longer to recuperate before growing nice tubers.  Instead, I chose to use a hilling method.  I buried my seed potatoes rather shallow; maybe 2 inches deep.  Once the first stems broke the surface, the plants grew vigorously!  Once they had reached their full height, I began hilling around their bases.  By the time I finished with the hay mulch yesterday, I noticed that many of the plants were blooming quite robustly, as I've never had potato plants do before.  I'll have to keep my eye of the hay level over the plants because I suspect that it will compact and break down rapidly throughout the summer, potentially leaving my tubers exposed to sunlight. 

Yesterday evening, I picked spinach, as it's starting to bolt.  I will replace it with New Zealand Spinach in the coming days.  This is a big event for me, because successfully growing spinach was #2 of my 2 garden goals this year.  The first goal has yet to be accomplished, but it's a long way off anyway. 

Washed and ready to eat!

I've always had trouble germinating spinach, and it's because I didn't understand the plant.  Usually I attempted to start it with my other brassicas, under moist, light, and relatively warm conditions.  This was a mistake.  This year, I did a little research.  I soaked the spinach seeds in water for 24 hours, and then put the seeds into plastic baggies with a wet paper towel, and then put that in the refrigerator until I saw their little white shoots coming out.  At that point, I probably could have set them in the garden to do their thing, but I wanted to keep a closer eye on them, so I arranged them in a flat tray and put it under lights in my living room until they had real leaves.  Then I set them out in the garden.  All of this happened late in the season of course, but I'm happy to have had a success!

Chickens

About a week and a half ago, we got chickens.  Well, not chickens exactly, but 6 Silver-Laced Wyandotte chicks.  For the past week and a half, they've been in a box in the kitchen peeping away every second of the day and night.  I worked like a madman to construct a coop (which happens to be the best carpentry project I've ever successfully completed).

We've talked about getting chickens for a bit now, probably ever since we started to stray from veganism.  We were trying to figure out what to do with the small garden by the house that we neglected last summer, when I came up with the idea to turn it into a chicken run.  The biggest step was getting permission from the landlord, which was a piece of cake.  Then I began with the coop.  I had an idea of how I wanted to coop construction, but needed some real plans so I didn't waste a lot of materials and time making it work.  I found some good free plans through Purina Mills.  I set out to building it, and finished in 3 days.  I'm really proud of that thing!  I kept thinking that I was going to modify the plans to suit our setup, and after much deliberation, I realized that everything in the plans was just fine. 

The coop is now done, except for the nest box, and a close-able door for the chickens to use.  Luckily, they're still too small to be outside, so I have time to finish it.  I also need to finish closing off the run on the top, but that should be easy to do as well.  The only thing that has been stopping me from finishing is trying to catch up on planting in the garden. 


Below are two photos for comparison.  The first is the little garden, taken on 5/28/10.  The second was taken today, 5/29/12 of the same garden, looking through the chicken run.  What a different place! 

I started off small with the part of the run that will be enclosed.  I designed it so that I can extend it easily and cheaply.  I will do so as the summer goes on, especially if we get more chickens (which I'd love to do!).  Finally, here's a video of the little peepies playing with a piece of lettuce:

Mrs. Dirty Fingernails

So, we had a wedding. And as much as I enjoyed it, it took entirely too much time and effort just for a party. I'm still rifling through piles of stuff to get my life back together. Thus, I haven't updated this blog in a bajillian years. Oh well, I'm back in the garden and back here.

But Will never stopped working in the garden. I could go on a feminist rant about how, as the woman, I was forced to be in charge of our wedding, but the fact was, I was busy and he was marginally less busy so he took it upon himself to keep the boat afloat. I kept myself pretending that I was still farming by reading farming books and spending my few free moments sitting outside with my laptop and cell phone, as opposed to sitting inside with my laptop and cell phone, just to get some of that sweet vitamin D that I crave. I really didn't have time for much else in the last 6 or 7 months.

There are many reasons why we got married, but not the least of which is the reason that we're in this together. Having a garden is hard (and enjoyable), but trying to do it on your own is even harder (and perhaps less enjoyable?). If I didn't have a partner in this thing, I would just be starting my garden now, instead of being able to jump in and help weed the peas. For the rest of the year, I would be resentful of my wedding, and how it stood in the way of me eating the foods that I enjoy eating. I would be SO behind. But, luckily I have an awesome husband (!) and we just keep plugging along. One piece at a time, we'll feed ourselves.

(I am really going to try hard to make this the ONLY wedding post, I promise.)

Sprung

The first photo above is of our garden on May 22, 2011, and the second picture is from today, May 20, 2012.  It's quite a different place.  For a further comparison, see the header of this blog page.  We're doing some things differently this year.


First of all, we're implementing a more effective wide-row system this year.  I actually dug out paths between the beds and used that soil to create raised beds.  This garden plot has a tendency to flood or hold water in heavy rains because it's so close to the river, and the soil is very silty.  So far, these beds and low paths in between have helped irrigate water on their own.  Last year I tried to make wide beds, but didn't implement it well enough.

In the second picture- this year's picture, dead ahead you can see a strip of green.  This is annual rye grass and clover.  I planted it between a few of the rows to suppress weeds, hold moisture, create biomass for mulching, habitat for insects and animals, and beautify the garden so it would look like one lush green mat.  There is much more planted in the garden than it looks from the picture.  Off to the far left is where most of the action is.  There's a ton of garlic over there, as well as some peas.  The potatoes have really shot up in the last 2 weeks too.  I need to find time to hill some soil on them, as it's about that time.  Previously, I've tried starting the potatoes in a trench, and filling in the trench as the plants grow.  The problem that I found with this is that our soil is much too dense for that, and leads to further compaction, which of course the growing tubers don't like.  So, this year we're going to hill them.

Radishes are coming up, as well as corn and beets.  The jerusalem artichokes are coming up very very fast.  I hope that I like them, because I think we're going to have them for years to come.  Our spinach is coming along, despite the warm weather we've been enjoying.  The weeds are starting to overgrow the onions, but I started to remedy that today, and should finish in the next day or two after work rain or shine.  I still have quite a bit to plant, but it will happen as I can get around to it.  Sunflowers are coming up, and the wheat is starting to get going finally, too.  Hopefully in the next week or so, I'll get around to describing in more detail about the specifics of starting some of these plants.

As Naomi and I were weeding this morning, I was moving around some wooden boards that I haven't made into tripods yet, and I dropped a whole stack of them making a loud CRACK sound.  Instantly, I heard a turkey gobble in response, so I pushed over another stack of boards with the same result.  I had the camera with me, so I crouched down and headed in the direction of the sound- the river bank.  I looked across the river, and there he was...

Real Life

I've been severely neglecting this blog lately, and not keeping my promise to myself.  Naomi and I got married, and I've been hustling ever since to get stuff done for spring, and catch up on lost time from the previous 6-10 months. 

In the next few days/weeks, I'm hoping to catch this blog up with all the great stuff that's been going on in and around our garden.  I've been opting to spend what limited free time I have outside working on stuff, rather than inside posting about it online.  More news, updates, info, and pictures to come!

Pictures and Things

Naomi and I just got back from a walk along the river to get more fiddleheads, and came back with a basketful. We picked some more daffodils for my mom, along with a branch with apple blossoms on it, and some unfurled ferns for a bouquet for her.

Down the river a ways, we found a seemingly endless stand of ostrich ferns in their prime. We picked until we didn't want to pick anymore, without even making a dent. I made a comment about it looking like Jurassic Park.



Sometime in the late summer or fall, I don't remember which, I had been exploring along the river, and I had seen what seemed like endless ramp seed stalks sticking out of the ground on the river bank, and I've wanted to go back out and see if they were growing. Sure enough, we encountered RAMP LAND- where ramps are king! I'm getting really impatient waiting for the bulbs to swell.


Below are some pictures of the garden, including the rows of onions, the garlic doing its thing, a pea shoot amongst the weeds, the open hoophouse (that's 100 degrees inside), Naomi with the basket of goodies, and the calf.

Spring is Delicious

It's been a busy few days here. I was off from work on Thursday and Friday, so my brother and I finished spreading the manure and tilled it in. I'm working toward not tilling anymore, but I need to add a lot of amendments and rid myself of more mugwort, but it's coming.

Back in the last week of December, I started 15 packages of onion and leek seeds. They've been growing in flat trays under lights in my living room since then. We've got 2 of the trays planted, but have a lot more to go, and I've already exhausted the space I allocated for onions and then some. It's one of my goals to grow onions this year, since I've never had any success with them. That's why I went overboard with them. My other major garden goal this year is to grow spinach, which I've never even gotten to germinate. I've learned that it needs to be pretty cold, all things considered, and I was always trying to germinate it too warm. We're fixing that right now.

The hoophouses I built have been great. Yesterday when the air temp was a little under 60 degrees, it was 110 inside one of them. A few mornings ago, I went to check the temp inside, and there was frost on my car windows. It was 50 degrees inside the hoophouse. I'm going to start some tomato seeds, and put them in there to see if they can make it. That would be great!

Since you can't work all the time, my brother and I went across the river yesterday mid-morning to shoot a few rounds, and while we were out there, I wandered off a bit and picked some fiddleheads, which are perfect right now! The ramps are still a few weeks out I think, but they're coming along. I also walked up on a hen turkey and froze and watched her until she flew off. As I meandered deeper into the swampy area by the river bend, I found a stand of daffodils blooming in the swamp. Naturally, I picked one stalk from each clump, and brought them back for Naomi. She was thrilled!

With two weeks to go before our wedding, I've still got a LOT of work to get done in the garden. We saw the woodchuck for the first time on Friday, so they're going to be coming to munch. That's high on the list of priorities to get done. I'll probably want to plant the wheat and corn, as well as greens. The latter I might hold off on just so they don't get cleared out by that woodchuck until that problem is taken care of. I'll probably end up putting most stuff in later than I want to, just on account of the wedding so I can keep an eye on it better.

Now's a great time to go outside and walk around. Buds are popping out everywhere, things are greening up, and there's lots of wild plants to be munched! We're planning to go for a little walk this morning and look for more fiddleheads! Hopefully, I'll get a glimpse of some of those monstrous toms with the 10" beards out across the river.

Happy Spring!

I really wanted to post last week on the first day of spring, but I spent all last week hustling to get my hoophouses finished, which they now are. The picture above was taken before I really fixed up the plastic to a more permanent state. I tucked the plastic under on all sides and then buried the frame because yesterday after work, I came home to find the plastic flapping in the 20mph wind gusts like a flag. Now it's all secure. Today after work, I put down black weedblock fabric inside both houses. It was 80 degrees inside around 4:00PM, when the outside temperature was about 50.

Later this week, I'm going to move some seedlings inside. I should also fill it with manure or compost, but I may just do that later, since everything inside will most likely be in trays for now. Once the plastic isn't needed for the summer, I'm going to put construction fence over the hoops and use it as a trellis.

Saturday saw a significant drop in temperatures to the nearly-80 degree highs we had last week. Last night it was in the low 20s, and tonight should be about the same, accompanied by the 20+mph winds again. The rest of the week will be cool, but not as low as yesterday and today.

It's probably a bit too early, but I'm getting anxious about putting out these onion seedlings that I started before the year even began. I may move the trays to the hoophouses, and put some in the ground to see how it goes.

This week, I started trays of spinach, broccoli, cabbage, collards, arugula, chard, basil, marigold, kohlrabi, and spearmint. Some are experiments, like the basil that I didn't even thresh out of the seed pods. I want to see what will happen. The marigolds are really early, but I want to see if I can get them a head start to an earlier bloom with the heat inside the hoophouse. The spearmint will go straight in the ground and I'll worry about it spreading later. I'd rather have something I like spreading than the mugwort and knotweed. I guess we'll have to see what happens. I'm going to start a few more trays of seeds tonight and put them into the hoophouse tomorrow. I still need to do a few things for the hoophouses, like get something to clip the plastic back when I go inside, and some boards to hold down the ends of the plastic so I don't have to cover/uncover out of the dirt every time.

There's also a mountain of manure to spread, and some tilling to do. I'm finally starting to get the no-till message, but the soil needs a lot of work. I'm going to work my way up with cover crops, green manures, and composted manure until I can start to see some progress past the compacted red mess that I have now. I should have planted a cover crop before winter, but it didn't work out. Now that the ground is workable, I've got LOTS to do. Hopefully I can get it all done in the next few weeks, and take a breather to get married.

Keep on Scratchin'

I've been working at building my hoophouses, slowly but surely. I got a ton of help from my brother last Saturday with hauling lumber out of the old barn, dragging it all over the place, and doing some crazed cutting. I got all the wood painted while it was still bone dry, before subjecting it to a life out in the elements. I'm gonna reuse the plastic from the old collapsed greenhouse, at least until that falls apart. I wish I got this done a few weeks ago, but better late than never I guess.

On to the more exciting news, I bought MORE SEEDS today! As I said a while back, I'm going to grow some new stuff I've never grown before, and I'm really excited about it. Here's a list, to the best of my knowledge:

Luffa gourd (too cool!)
Calabash gourd (like a little bottle)
Tomatillo (yummmmmmm)
Nasturtium (I went overboard and bought about 7 different varieties)
Poppy (love poppyseeds in breads!)
Bushel basket gourd (they can get bigger than 20"! unique containers!)
Jerusalem Artichokes (I've passed over buying them a few times in the last month. I'll just have to wait until I have my own! I've never tasted them!)
Amaranth- (I just "discovered" amaranth the other day. I'm interested in its "grains")

As warm as it's been, I wish I had some stuff already started. Tomorrow, I'm going to try to plant some peas, fava beans, and runner beans. It's still been pretty cool at night, despite being near or over 70 practically all week now. I really need to get some manure into the garden, and get it turned in, but I can't wait any longer for some of this stuff, so it's gotta happen, and I can put manure later!

I'm especially looking forward to having so many more flowers in the garden this year. It will surely brighten things up and look even more inviting. I'm keeping my eyes peeled for those pesky woodchucks, too. They ought to be popping out any time now. If only they weren't so selfish, but they didn't leave any beans for me at all last year, and just chomped the vines right down to the ground. Perhaps my vigilance will pay off, and I can enjoy more sunflowers, beans, and radishes this year.

I've got to say that I'm happy about daylight savings time. I can spend a little more time outside in the evening in the garden. Soon indoor tasks, like this blog, will be saved for after dark.

By the next post, I hope to have my hoophouses up, so keep an eye out for that!

Fungus update

A week ago, something started to appear in the old Hood Ice Cream bucket next to the coffee pot. The mushrooms were starting to grow! I was really excited. I moved the bucket over near the kitchen window the other day, closer to the light. Here's what I saw on March 1:


And here we are today, only a few short days later!:


I might cut a few of the big ones loose later and cook them for sampling. I'm definitely hooked on this, and will look into cultivating some other varieties in the future.

Next on my reading list is Teaming with Microbes: A Gardener's Guide to the Soil Food Web by Jeff Lowenfels and Wayne Lewis. I've been interested in learning about micorrhizal fungi for quite some time. My father uses it in his pumpkin patch. I'm really "innoculated" with fungi!

In other news, a baby was born last week! One of the neighbor's cows had her baby, and she's such a cutie! The calf is currently running in circles outside.

I'm really hoping to get my hoop house(es) built this weekend; perhaps on Saturday with the help of my brother, who will be visiting. Then I need to worry about getting some manure tilled in. Spring is getting really close, and I have so much to do!!!

Last but not least, listen to Archagathus.