New Fencing and Canning the Garden Harvest

 

 

My fence is finally up!  I took this picture from the deck this morning.  We ended up building the fence board by board rather than panels because the ground is uneven, which made for more work, but I'm loving it.  It makes a great backdrop for the garden and for future flower beds.

My garden thrived this season for the most part.  Didn't produce as many cukes as I wanted, but all and all it was a good year. 

This is my second batch of pickled peppers.  My daughter called yesterday, and asked for a quart size jar.  She said she knocked out the jelly jar in one setting.  I was able to make 2 quarts, 2 pints and 3 jelly jars from the batch I picked yesterday.  I gave away 2 gallon baggies full to the guys who helped build my garden fence. 

I'm drying chili peppers in this bowl.  Initially, I put them in the oven at 170 degrees for the day to get them started.  The oven drying technique calls for a temperature of 150 degrees or less, but my oven doesn't go that low.  I'll let them sit for a few more days and than I'll throw them in the chopper to make dry pepper flakes.  I put them on everything!

I plucked this batch of tomatoes from the garden for fresh salsa.  I love that I have a variety of colors.  There's nothing better than colorful and flavorful foods.  I'll be canning the salsa for Christmas gifts again this year.  I made baskets last year with salsa, chips and homemade cookies for family and friends.  It was a big hit, homemade and cheap.  Can't get any better than that.   

This was my attempt at making Spicy Dill refrigerator pickles from my cukes.  I have a few yellow cukes in there, but they were yummy!  Unfortunately, my vines didn't produce many.  I called numerous farmer's markets in the area, and they didn't have much luck with the cuke crop either.  Walmart has a pretty good deal on their pickling cukes, so I may resort to store brought cucumbers to make more. 

Well I'm off to blanch tomatoes for the salsa.  Need to go to the garden and pick a few jalapenos for the salsa.  We like it hot in my household.  I wonder if this heat is a contributor to my hot flashes!  How did your garden do this season?  Have you brought out the canner yet?  Leave me a comment and I'll stop and visit your garden endeavors. 

Vegetable Garden Fencing

I decided to expand my garden this year.  Last year it was 10 x 20, and was somewhat crowed with what I planted.  This year I'm going to till a 25 x 25  or 30 x 30 area and fence it in similar to the picture shown.  We're putting up 250 feet of privacy fencing, so I thought I would fence the garden as well.  This was suppose to be one of the projects last year; but there are several trees that need to be taken out so we postponed the job.  I need to call in a tree company to remove them.  Hopefully, the ground will be hard enough to bring in a bucket truck soon and we can start the project.   

I still need to figure out how to keep the groundhogs out.  You remember my battles with them last season.  I'm thinking of building a trench around the wood fencing and burying chicken wire a foot into the ground and than bending it under the fence and stapling it to the wood.  

I'm going to set traps again this year.  I have a college student who is willing to set-up traps for me while he's home for summer break.  I'm hoping this will help with the problem.  I trapped 6 last year.  You have to continuously set the traps during the growing season.  They were a royal pain in my __________ last year.   They spread the word about my buffett, and had a major feast with my pole beans.  I replanted at least 4 times and couldn't up with enough beans for a meal, lol. 

Last year I used the row method for my garden.  I'm actually contemplating raised beds this year.  I love this layout behind the wood fencing.  (Thanks to waldeneffect.org for the photo and idea). 

It has been suggested that I use cedar for the boxes, apparently cedar will last a life time.  I have a few months to make a decision.  My soil is great, I was able to produce a high yield of veggies last year with very little amendment to the soil, so I'm wondering if the raised boxes will really be worth it.  Since I've never used a raised bed, I really have no Pros to weigh against the Cons.  Do you have raised beds?  I would love to hear what you think about one method over the other. 

I will definitely incorporate the arbor, stepping stones and the marigolds around the border, but replace the raised bed in the middle with a bench.  I want to be able to sit and admire the fruits of my labor, lol.   What do you think about my garden layout plans? 

     

Visitors

I have a black walnut tree in the back of my yard.  I've been finding walnut shells around my deck and was wondering how they got there.  I walked into my kitchen to fix a cup of coffee, and when I looked out the window I found this little fellow sitting on the deck rails.  I think I solved the mystery!   

As you know, I've been fighting groundhogs in the garden.  We trapped 6; however, 2 more have found themselves a home under my storage building.  I placed chicken wire loosely around the rabbit fencing leaving about 8 inches at an angle in hopes that they wouldn't dig under it.  These 2 are smart, they never appear when I'm home and they only dig on one side of the garden.  I've placed a few large stones along that fence line, so far I've blocked that side pretty good.  Hope I don't jinx myself, lol. I placed bricks along the backside of the fencing, so I would know if they were out.  This is what I found last week.  They've moved the bricks and bent the fencing pretty much to the ground.  Because it's loose, it's bending under their weight.  They did make it to a few tomatoes that were growing over the fence, but no major damage.   

Since I'm unable to relocate these little pests, I'm debating an electric fence for next year's garden.  I'm a little nervous about the idea, since I have a soon to be 4 year old grandson who loves to run around the yard.  Do any of you have an electric fence?  If not, how do you manage to keep the pests out your garden?  .