Garden Tour - Now and Than

 

 



The Blue Lake pole beans are filling in nicely around the teepee trellis.  They've made it to the first rung on the teepee and continue to climb.   

 

The Boston Pickling and Straight Eight cumbers have progressed and starting to climb the netting.  I'm hoping for a good crop this season for salads and pickles.  Wished I had planted a few salt and pepper, but there's always next season. 



 

 

 



Tomato Row is looking good.  I see lots of canning and BLTs in my future.  I have two volunteers, below.  It will be interesting to see what emerges.  The two volunteers will make 16 tomato plants for the season.  I had several volunteers in the perennial garden, but I pulled those.   



Check out my neighbor's tomato patch.  I love the circle idea.  I'm assuming they're hybrids since he uses the small cages.  I wonder if it would work with heirlooms?  I also wonder how I would get to the center to harvest, lol.  Okay, scratch that idea.  My arms aren't that long. 

                                                  My neighbor's tomato patch.

 

 

 

 



 

 

My yellow and white onions are doing great.  Wish I could say the same for my garlic, it didn't come up.  Anyone have any ideas as to why?  I'm wondering if it was the soil.  I wished I had planted red onions.  I'll add them next season, but I do have one lone volunteer.  I'll allowing it to go to seed, and will hopefully start my own red onions bunches for planting next spring. 

 

 

I purchased the yellow flowers from my favorite nursery, but didn't keep the tag.  I have no idea what they are, but I love them in the garden.  They look like a variation of the marigold.  

 

  

 

 

It's amazing how a few weeks can make a difference with the plants.  My peppers are doing pretty good.  I have chilies and banana peppers and few white belle.  My first year for the white belle.  I'm anxious to see how they do.   I planted a mixture of chilies, yellow, purple and red.  I also have a Purple Beauty and jalapeno and Hungarian Wax.  What's happening in your garden?

 

A Wagon Wheel Garden?

I dream about you every night and every day.  These words are lyrics to a song, but it's also how I feel about home grown veggies.  I love them, and I can't wait to dig in dirt this spring and summer.  I have the garden mulched with leaves from my neighbor's yard.  I acquired at least 20 bags of leaves and 3 bales of straw at the end of the season.  The straw will be used as mulch and weed control in the garden.  The leaves will be used in the compost bin and as an amendment in the garden.  

I've done some winter sowing and started a few seeds inside.  I've read that you should buy good seed, but what does that really mean?  I've purchased my seed from the local hardware when they're on clearance, the Dollar Store, Ebay to on-line growers.  So far, I've had success from all.   This year I'm going to try saving seed, at least from my heirloom tomatoes. 

I like a little creativity in my garden.  Last year I added an antique orchard ladder.  This season, I would love to add a wagon wheel.  I saw this picture at Two Men and A Little Farm blog,  and thought it was a creative way to add the wheel to my garden.  I found 2 wheels on Craig's List.  If I'm able to purchase one for a reasonable price, I'll be building this wagon wheel herb garden.  I've also thought about alternating yellow and orange marigolds in it.  Should I do the herbs or marigolds?  If this doesn't work, I have my eye on an antique plow. 

While I'm waiting to make a deal on the wheel, I've checked my seeds and this is what will hopefully be planted in my 2013 Garden if all germinate:

Tomatoes: 

• Tiffen Mennonite
• Cherokee Purple
• Hillbilly
• German Johnson
• Delicious
• Early Girl
• Pink Brandywine
• Homestead

Cukes:

• Salt & Pepper
• National Pickling
• Straight Eight

Greenbeans:

• Bush Blue Lake 
• Bush Jade 
• Pole Blue Lake 

Peppers:

• Hungarian - Yellow Wax   
• Jalapeno
• Cayenne - Mix of colors
• Belle - Grand Bell Mix 

• Spinach  - Giant Noble 
• Zucchini
• Squash

Herbs:

• Lavender
• Basil
• Dill - Long Island Mammoth (Purchased from Big Lots last year. Germinated and did great)
• Chives
• Oregano

I'm going to try growing Zinnia, Snapdragon, Petunias and Marigolds this year too.  We'll see how that goes.  What are you planning to grow this year. 













 

Last of the Garden

I'm trying to clean up the garden and close it for the season.  I have plenty of green tomatoes, dill which came back from the dead, peppers and maybe a handful of green beans left after this harvest.  I love having fresh dill in the freezer and dried.  I use the dried dill in a potato chip dip recipe, which I'm addicted to and eat by the gallon.  Why do all the bad foods taste so good?  Here's my Creamy Dill potato chip recipe:

Ingredients:   2 cups of Mayo 2 cups of Sour Cream 1 tbsp Parsley 3 tbsp Dill Weed 3 tbsp onion  (I use yellow) Seasoning salt to taste Mix well, chill before serving.

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I was able to do 8 pints of pickled peppers from this bunch and blanch and freeze a quart of green beans from this batch.  Next season, I need to double the amount of green bean plants to ensure I have enough to share and for soups and casseroles.  I'm already planning my garden for next season.

I'm freezing this batch of dill.  I'll dry what's left in the garden for my dip. 

I snapped these pictures of a groundhog and cat out my bedroom window this morning.  The cat is curious and wants to be friends, but the groundhog is only interested in eating. 

From the looks of him, he hasn't missed any meals.  I trapped 7 this season and my neighbor trapped 7.  This one is in neighbor's yard, I hope he stays there.  Looks like he's been eating well.  He is huge.  I had a few that managed to dig under the garden fence, but not much damage was done.  They love the green bean leaves and tomatoes.  Havahart live traps are great! 

Well I need to have another cup of coffee, take a nap and than go down to the garden and harvest the remaining tomatoes.  I have a 3 day week-end, so I'll be scrap booking, clearing out the garden and just enjoying this beautiful fall weather that we're having.  What's happening in your garden?  What's your plans for the Columbus Day week-end?  Leave me a comment, I love them!


                                                                                              

Bugs Be Gone Please

My zucchini and cucumber recovered from the cucumber bug attack, and now the leaves on my green beans are being eaten by these unwelcome visitors.  Does anyone know what they are?  I sprayed them with Sevin, and they are now history.  Last year I didn't have a bug problem, but I guess I'm being welcomed to the world of gardening this year. 

On a good note, my tomatoes are doing well.  This is a Brandy Wine.  So far they show no signs of cracking!   I'm working hard to water regularly and fertilize at least by-weekly.  I want big Brandy Wine slices for my BLTs.  How often do you fertilize your tomatoes and what do use?

My peppers are gdoing great.  These are Hugarian Wax peppers, which I have never tried.  I'll be harvesting a few within the next week or so.  I have one that is turning orange, which is suppose to be at its hottest stage.  I'm going to try it in salsa. 

My cukes have recovered from the cucumber bug attack.  It has lots of blooms, so I'm hoping for lots of cukes for pickles.

My Wando peas are growing, and I have a few flowers.  Not sure how they are going to turn out in the summer heat, but this particular brand is suppose to be heat tolerant.  Have any of you grown Wando peas?

This Beefsteak is producing very well too.    I'll be planting another batch of bush beans this week.  The pole beans are doing great, but I want to make sure I have enough to can. 

That's what's happening in my garden.  What's happening in yours?

Garden Tour II and First Harvest

I was worried about my garden while on vacation, but it did great.  It's amazing what can happen in 7 days.  I gave it a good soaking before we left and I'm in awe of my plants when I visited today.  The squash and zucchini are just about at the top of the trellis and both are producing.  I wonder how long it will take before my neighbors ask me not to leave them anymore squash or zucchini. 

These were babies when I left.  They were huge when I returned.  I harvested 6 squash and 2 zucchini.  Guess who will be making a batch of zucchini bread this week.  I have a new recipe that I'm going to try with the squash thanks to my neighbor.  The others I will share with my mother. 

This is the pepper patch.  Several of the peppers were on the ground, so I had to tie them up today.  They are all producing.  Can't wait to make pepper flakes out of the chilies, and freeze the others for some of my other favorites dishes this winter.  I love hot pepper flakes on everything! 

Miss Tilly is wearing her new hat thanks to my neighbor.  Doesn't she look great.  It was a little large, so I stuck in a few hat pins to hold it up. 

The tomatoes are doing great.  At the top are a beefsteak and Paul Robeson. Both are flowering.  The beefsteak has a few tomatoes.  I'm working diligently to remove the suckers this year in hopes of bigger tomatoes.  I'm also giving them doses of calcium and fish emulsion, which I didn't do last season. We'll see if it helps.   I'm going to put a few scoops of compost around them if time allows this week. 

The cukes have taken off.  They are now climbing the netting.  The dill is doing great.  I'm going to use it for refrigerated pickles.  I have red onions planted in this area too.  They will be used in my salsa. 

These are Pink Brandywine.  They are flowering and doing great too.  Can't wait to slice these babies. 

This is a Hillbilly.  I named it Hatfield, lol.  Watched the movie Hatfield and McCoy on the History Channel last month with Kevin Costner.  Oh, how I love him.  Now he's planted in my garden. A girl can dream can't she. 

The watermelons are sprawling and they have lots of flowers.  A vine had actually grown through the fence.  I was able to bring it back into the garden and head it in the other direction.  I'm letting them grow over the ground along the back fence.  I'm hoping there's enough room.  My bamboo trellis didn't hold up, so the ground was the alternative. 

The Roma patch is under the ladder.  They doubled in size while I was gone.  I also have Blue Lake and Wax beans in the patch as well.  I'm hoping for a good harvest of green beans.  My family loves my green beans and corn, so I'm hoping to can a few quarts to use for family gatherings this year. 

The french Blue Lake pole beans are wrapping around the teepee trellis.  So far so good this year.  The groundhogs ate them down 5 times last season.  I finally gave up.  My battle with them this season will be another post.  I also have Blue Lake bush beans in this patch. 

Here's my first harvest for 2012.  So proud, I grew these from seed.  I may try it again next year.  The spring onions are a courtesy from my neighbor. 

More Sprouts

I have more sprouts, but not as many as I would like.  Next year, I will start the germination process earlier.  To date, I have 2 jalapeno, 2 Cherokee Purple, 1 Beefsteak, 2 Boxcar Willie, 1 German Johnson and 1 Kaki Coing that have germinated.  None of the sweet or hot peppers have germinated or the Hillbilly or Paul Robeson tomatoes. 

Tomorrow, I'm going to start a few more Cherokee Purple and Beefsteak pots since they germinated quickly so I can have a few extra heirlooms on hand just in case the other tomato seeds don't germinate.

I'm loving the grow lights.  I need to pull out a banquet table to set it on this week-end.  It's setting on the floor in one of the guest bedrooms now.  I can say that purchasing the light was money well spent.  The seedlings seem happy at this point.  I set a few pots of dill under it a few days ago.  It seems that dill needs light to germinate, so I'm hoping that it will warm the soil enough to germinate the seeds.  I found the perfect stand in my attic last week-end that I plan to turn into a germination station next year.  It has 4 tiers, and is wide enough to hold several flats per tier.  Sure wish I had spotted it earlier.  (I really need to clean my attic out, lol).   

Any experienced dill growers out there?  I need dill for my pickles this year.  I had a few dill plants in the garden last year as companion plants and they did well.  I'm hoping to germinate a few seeds.  Research has shown that dill doesn't transplant well, so I don't know if I will be successful with transplanting it in the garden if the seeds do germinate. 

The thing that I tried and was successful in producing last year was sunflowers.  I'm going to try to germinate my seeds inside this year.  I love sunflowers in the garden, and hoping to share the experience with my grandchildren.   How's your seed germination going?