Sad but true

Sadly I've let my garden go.  I still have pumpkins growing and some tomatoes, chili peppers, bell peppers, onions, cucumbers and onions that are hanging on but it is supposed to freeze this weekend and garden season is over for me.  My life has overwhelmed me recently and the easiest thing to let slide was garden and lawn.  soooooooo Here's to next year!

Auto-pilot

My garden is on auto pilot.  I pull a few weeds every day and turn on the soaked hoses for a few hours.  I've made 10 1/2 pints of zucchini relish so far.

July 4, 2012

I haven't kept up with any of my blogs this summer, but I've been watching the garden grow.  I lost my potato plants so we dug them up today and got some good out of it.  They were starting to get eaten, so it is good that my hubby and I dug them up.

I also have gotten 3 zucchini now.  My entire replant of green beans is growing.  I replanted tomatoes and I have success with the plants themselves and there are 3 cherry tomatoes on the vine as well.
Carrots are coming up between tomatoes and in their own little row.  Chili pepper is doing well and I have 3 green pepper plants.  My 2 pumpkin plants are doing well.  I still have life in my black-eyed peas but no blooms.  I put dill in the garden and see nothing yet.  My onions are between the size of golf balls and baseballs.  My sweet potato is thriving above ground, so I'm excited to see them this fall.
So far no parsnips have come up, my replant of lettuce is looking good.  I just planted about 10 brussels sprout plants and 2 eggplants.  All of my first lettuce is done.  3 of my zucchini plants are HUGE and one is small and I have 3 watermelon plants that look healthy and my 4 cucumber plants are blooming.  It was too hot for my spinach replant so that's a bummer, I might try again in a few weeks.  Last of all I planted about 50 new onion sets for green onions.  They looked poor at the store, and I have about a 50% success rate on them.  We have had just over a half inch of rain in the last month and the temps have been over 100 degrees F most days for a few weeks.
My watering system has switched and I am doing soaker hoses only and it seems to bee keeping the rest of my crops alive for now.
I had a beautiful crop of parsley until a few days ago and caterpillars ate almost all of the leaves.  UGH!!!!!  I  hand picked them off and they never returned for the basil which is beautiful.
I will post again with more harvest pics.

Vacations and storms

Well, I went out of town for 8 days.  My husband watered my garden faithfully and I am pleased with that.  While I was gone there was a very big storm with winds that destroyed grain bins and buildings.  It took some shingles of my roof and branches from my trees and ripped doors off my garden shed and knocked over my grill and broke it.  So, that is the property damage.
Garden assessment.  My tomatoes are a loss, but it is early enough this season to replant.  Most of my black-eyed  peas are gone and all of my peas are gone.  The spinach was almost at its end and has gone to seed, but the remaining spinach is ok.  The lettuce looks surprisingly good.  My seedlings must have been small enough to avoid damage because my pumpkins, cucumbers, zucchini, and watermelon are all broken through their mounds minus 2 mounds that haven't sprouted.  They all look as they should.  In the front flower bed, my mums are stripped to stalks and a lot of twigs are in my flower beds.  Roses look good and my herb pots survived.
So far I see no green beans or carrots or green peppers or parsnips.  I may need to replant green beans and peas, but it is a bit early for the peppers, carrots and parsnips.  My spinach replants are sprouting too.
I don't have much planned this coming week except baseball practice for my son and 1 game, so I have plenty of time to do a recovery for the garden.  As for today and tomorrow, I have birthday celebrations and church and rest, rest, rest!

Day 57

Well, It's been 2 more days and the stems of my tomatoes are still firm and fully green.  Some of the leaves are still droopy, but I think it's a good sign that they are no worse for the wear.   We went shopping and found some new sprinklers, so I'm going to set us up with the sprinklers for watering instead of hand watering now that the whole garden plot is planted.  I was going to put out soaker hoses, but I would have to buy more and I think if I change my watering to evenings, the sprinklers will do just fine.  I can put them in each corner and water the whole garden at once.
We also put up a fence of chicken wire to keep the nibbling bunnies out and tonight I came home and found a very small rabbit near my fence.  I scared it half to death I think and it ran into my fence and bounced off 2 times and finally broke through, but ran completely through the garden and I'm pretty sure it got out between the pickets of the front fence.  There's only so much I can do.  Since the chicken wire has larger holes than I planned on, a baby bunny can get through them if it bounces a few times first.  I just hope not to hurt one.

This picture was taken just after my planting on May 14, but before watering.

Tomatoes, Come back!

Well 4 days ago, I transplanted tomatoes and they look pretty pathetic at this point.  I've been told that they go into shock, but I've never had this trouble before.  I've had tomato plants since I started gardening about 5 years ago and they've always transplanted well.  This time they are all droopy.  The stems are firm, so I haven't lost hope.  I've done a little research and found they have transplant shock.  OK, now what?
According to the bloggers, you are to pinch off some of the leaves so that the roots concentrate on growing.  That goes along with what I heard from some Master Gardeners last night.  I did that Tuesday.  Still today they're droopy.  According to these Master Gardeners, roots also need oxygen so they recommend spading the ground about 12 inches before transplanting.   Well, its too late for that for me, but I poked holes in the ground around the plants about 12 inches with an iron fence rod that is about 1/2 inch diameter.  I watered away from the plants and pretty much filled these holes so the water will saturate deeply.  I'm hoping that once the water soaks through the deeper soil that these holes will become air pockets.  One of my plants was a little perkier this morning, but I did the same for all.  We'll see how they all come out.
I'm also traveling for a week next week.  Last time I did this and left my dearly beloved husband in charge of my garden.  My seedlings were dead and my garden was wimpy when I returned.  I'm giving him instructions now to hopefully prevent that while I'm gone this time.  I might just put out a soaker hose and turn it on to a trickle for the duration of my absence.  That way the only thing left is my herb pots.  Surely if I move them inside, they'll be seen and taken care of... Maybe.

Day 51 of 2012 garden

Finally every crop is in the ground that I want to grow ... okay, I really want some carrots, but can't find the seeds.  Yesterday, I weeded the current crops in detail and wrote about what I learned in my Reflections blog. My husband and son tilled the soil in the rest of the garden to make it ready for the final planting.  I got that done and I'm one tired Mamma.
I planted green beans along the fence and pumpkins behind that.  I planted most of these others in mounds as the package instructs.  I was going to do a row of cucumbers, but changed my mind.  I have 7 hills of zucchini and 4 hills of watermelon.  I planted 2 hills of pumpkin and 6 hills of cucumbers.  Since I was running out of space, I may have made a mistake by putting these rows of hills too close together, but I staggered the hills.
The last thing I was going to do was tomatoes, but I had to go to the store anyhow so I bought 6 tomato plants.  I bought 1 German Queen Heirloom, 2 Cherokee Purple Heirlooms, 1 Black Krim Heirloom, 1 Pink Brandy-wine Heirloom and a Sweet N Neat cherry tomato plant.  I miscounted my tomato cages, so in the extra cage, I planted some cherry tomato seeds.  If it doesn't come up, I will just grab another plant and put it in later.  At the end of the tomato row, I planted about 6 green pepper plants.
If I find some carrot seeds I will sprinkle them between my tomato plants per recommendation of my husbands grandma.  She had great gardens!  She doesn't garden any more because she's too busy and the property owners don't allow it.  I trust her, though, and hope to share some veggies with her.
Pictures to come, but I need to finish out my garden chart.  I include instructions from the package, germination date and harvest expectations.

Salad, Please!

I can tell I'm going to need to weed again already, but it's okay because I enjoy being outside.  I haven't planted anything else because we haven't gotten a rototiller.  We put the ashes from the fireplace in the area that is not yet planted.  I'm told it is good for the soil.  I don't know, but I did it.
I've pulled a few spinach leafs here and there to nibble on, but tonight my son and I harvested enough spinach and lettuce to make a small side salad for 3 of us at dinner.  We added a little feta cheese and a little Parmesan and our favorite dressings and had our first "garden" salad of the year!

Day 35

My largest spinach plant

Everything is looking great so far.  I might add to my garden tomorrow, but I'm not sure we can retill the rest of it so soon.  We need to borrow a rototiller. 
I've been watering every day that it doesn't rain.  I hoed between rows and finally wedded near the plants today.  I accidentally pulled off a few spinach leaves and lettuce leaves while I worked but they tasted good.  My potatoes got fill dirt in the trenches today.  I also thinned out about a dozen green onions.  I brought some to my neighbor but she wasn't home so I'll probably bring them to church to share in the morning.  I checked my chart and everything is right on time including my patio herbs.
My losses are chili peppers and asparagus. 

The garden so far

Insect update

I opted not to treat my garden for insects at this time.  The plants are growing stronger as they are.  The formulas for homemade insecticide all require a waiting period for the spray to become more potent I assume.  Garlic and onion blended up and put into water. Some times hot pepper.  I'm really not excited about putting that on my young plants yet, and there is a warning to test a few leaves first.
I've used a mixture of flour and cayenne before, but I was treating the wrong insect with that combination.  I had squash bugs then and I was able to get rid of them with a solution of original formula liquid dish soap and water squirted directly on those bugs.  It was amazing to see how quickly they keeled over and then it rained and I had soap bubbles in my garden and in my downspouts from the house gutter.  It was funny.  I'm going to prepare a onion garlic solution to have ready for when problems arise again.
Getting ready to put in the green beans, cucumbers and zucchini this weekend.  I might drop some tomatoes in next week too.
Happy gardening!

First Fruits

Well, today I picked some veggies from my garden!  I was going to hear about a local mission and needed to bring a snack item.  I looked about the kitchen and found a bar of cream cheese and some dried beef and crackers.  Needed some green onions.  I went outside and I have several greenies that are ready to be picked. This also will thin them out enough for some of the others to grow bigger.  The first couple I tried had such a good root system that I couldn't get them up and broke them at the stem.  The great thing is that they may just come back up.  I got about 6 green onions to make my dip and it turned out to be wonderful!  I'm so excited to be able run to the patch of soil beside my house rather than the grocery store sometimes!  .... and it's not even May yet!

Potatoes and Insects

Well as I toured my garden today I found that all of my potatoes are successfully growing!!!  So much for my unconventional ways.  We got 0.2 inches of rain last night. The weather channel website said that today was a high need to water plants/grass day. NO!  I was okay with the moisture that came last night and today while at the grocery store, it started pouring and it lasted a while.  I haven't checked the rain guage later today, but I'm pretty sure we got another 0.5 in that downpour.  My cereal boxes got pretty wet from car to house.  I'm still grateful for the rain regardless of the inconvenience with groceries.
Someone at the grocery store told me to be careful because there was "black ice" under the rain.  Naturally with my garden success so far, I was concerned, but only a little. People hydroplane when oil from the road floats on top of water at the beginning of a rainstorm and I think that was her problem.  It was 45 degrees F at the time.  We actually got a bit of thunder with our rain this time too!  I like that!
The bad news is that I found the reason for my gaps in the black-eyed peas.  I've got insects of some sort eating the leaves.  I need to find some way to stop that.  I'm not opposed to chemical pesticides, but I would like to try a natural remedy first if possible. I've pinned some stuff on Pinterest so I'll do some work with that tomorrow.  I also subscribe to Mother Earth News magazine.  It is published in Kansas and I am all about supporting this great state if I can.  I saw some natural pesticides in there too, so tomorrow, the bugs will flee from my garden area.  They can live somewhere else.  If I find something that works, I will post about it and credit the source of information.

Day 23

It has been a little rainy here and we didn't get the tornado weather as was in the forecast for most of our state.  It is supposed to be pretty chilly tonight and there is a frost advisory with a low of 33 tonight.  I'm just going to stick it out.  So far we see no chili peppers so I think I might call that a wash.  We have most of our peas and I'm almost ready for the first harvest of green onions.  I have 10 of 13 potatoes growing.  I'm waiting until they're 6 inches or so before I cover them again.  Black-eyed peas are about 2 inches high now and I thinned them a little.  They are growing at regular intervals and then a 6 inch to 1 foot gap and then good growth and then another gap.  Not too bad, though.  the lettuce is coming up in bunches.  I'm supposed to wait until its a bit bigger to thin it, and eat what I thin.  That's exciting too!  Spinach is interesting because there are some with just the sprout leaves out and others with the first round spinach leaves which are about an inch diameter already.
My hubby keeps asking when I will put the rest of the garden in and it will be the end of April for much of it and then the end of May for the rest.  So for now it is water when necessary and weed control.
Some of my flower pot herbs are sprouting, so I'm hoping for a good harvest there this year too!

Day 17

There's not a lot new to post yet.  I did hoe between rows today.  There were a bunch of little weeds so they had to go.  I still don't trust my seedlings' root system enough to weed to close to them.  When I go back to do the thinning of plants, I will weed the rows themselves.  I want a healthy garden.
The low weekend temp of 34 degrees F might have got a few of my black-eyed peas because a few are yellow. We did the hoeing and watering this morning and we continue to wait!

Peas and Potatoes Anyone?

This was my post from April 7.  Apparently I forgot to publish it.

My peas are breaking ground.  The seeds were a few years old and given to me from family so I put them in to see what I could get.  I got 4 sprouts as of this morning out of 8 or 10 seeds, but they've barely broken ground.  It will be neat to see what comes of them.
I also wondered about my potatoes.  The boots and websites I found to learn how to plant them warn against supermarket potatoes and say only to use certified seed potatoes.  They also tell you to refrigerated and then pull them out and then cut and let eyes form.  Well I didn't do any of that.  I had some potatoes red and yellow and 1 sweet that had sat around too long and got a little soft.  The eyes were growing and it was close to planting time so I kept them in the bin.  I pulled them out and cut chunks with eyes and planted the day I cut them.  Later I realized I planted most upside down.  I was doubting I would get growth, but I found cracked ground at several sites and actual leaves coming up this morning.  I broke almost all of the potato rules and it looks like I at least have plants growing!
All I have yet to see is chili peppers, asparagus and herbs.  Not bad!

Love the Rain!

My garden has been loving the sun, but it also loves the rain!

It rained just over 1/2 inch last night and we checked our rain guage this morning.  Very pleased to say that it is supposed to rain on and off for the rest of the week.  I don't mind watering, but this kind of water is the best for the plants.

Here is a spinach plant surfacing.  They look different than I had imagined them, but I remember from last years plants this grass-like seedling.





My onions all in a row look pretty good.  The pics are kind of bad, but I'm happy with the true results.




Celery was our experiment.  When I chopped up my celery for eating, I saved the stump of it and cut the tops of it evenly.  I let it soak on the counter while I awaited my garden area to be made ready.  We had to borrow a rototiller.  Ours is a tiny one that we used for little garden boxes and we have a garden space this year.  As soon as the soil was tilled, I put this in at the end of the onion/potato row.  I just covered the bottom of the stump with dirt and left the top and the growth above ground.  The stump part is now withering and the new growth is looking pretty good!






Here are my black-eyed peas.  Coming up nicely in a row.  I think I will be thinning them as early as next week.  I will remove the string that guided my row in the next day or so.  I left the string there so that I could get a feel for where to look for sprouts.




This is my first year for lettuce and this is the Bibb variety.  I didn't know what to look for as they sprouted and my string was a great tool for me.  I now see many similar sprouts along my string.  We were a little careless with these seeds as they were so tiny!  It said to plant the seeds every 2 inches to start, but I had a hard time getting just 1 seed in each hole, so my sprouts are in clusters like this.  I can thin them later.  On the bottom of the picture you can see a weed with a different shade of green.  I will pull these when I thin the lettuce plants out.  I'm afraid to do it too soon and grab seeds and sprouts with the roots.

I plan to hoe between rows to keep the weeds down.  My husband thinks we should use the little rototiller between the rows, but I don't trust myself to go in a straight line.  We'll see!

Day 9

WooHoo! I have black-eyed peas (cowpeas) sprouting! I didn't get to watering this morning because of church, but my daughter and I watered the garden after lunch today. I don't think it hurt anything to wait, but I like the morning watering routine. I've also been hitting it in the evening as well if it has been over 75 degrees. 89 degrees F on April 1? That's just crazy. It is supposed to be pretty windy here tomorrow and the temp is supposed to drop to the low 60's. Kansas. What else can I say?
I will grab a pic tomorrow of my lovely sprouts. Almost all of my onion sets are growing. I haven't seen anything of the Asparagus, peas, chili peppers, lettuce, potatoes or spinach yet. In time, I know. Herbs aren't supposed to germinate for another week or so either. Water, water, water. Patience, patience, patience. I'm starting to see weeds, but I won't pull any too near my seeds or seedlings yet because I don't want to uproot the wrong thing.

Even with the temps, it was a lovely day!

Day 7

I'm still doing my morning watering routine and I so far have 6 green onions from the sets and 5 from the kitchen transplants up as well. One of my shallow onions has the green peeking out too. I'm hoping to have some more results this weekend from my lettuce, cowpeas, spinach and peas.
I transplanted our asparagus from our old home at the corner of my house on Day 1 as well. I've seen no action from it yet. There was a chute that I completely burried. I was hoping to see life from them by now too. I hope they take because I LOVE asparagus.
Today I planted forget-me-nots in a large planter and also basil in 2 little flower pots. I have another 2 pots that each hold about 2 gallons and I planted dill in one of them and parsley in another. I may get a few more pots for rosemary and thyme. I just read that garlic is easy to grow, so I may grab some of that too. My hubby wants strawberries and I thought of putting them out front in my flower beds, but as this is our first spring at this home, I want to wait and see what comes up. I know that there are mums and roses which are some of my favorite flowers, so I'll look into the flower bed revamping next fall. We have tulips behind our privacy fence in the back yard that I can't see unless I'm in the alley. They are coming to the front too.
Happy Weekending!

First Sprout

I was a bit surprised to see a little onion spout this morning when I watered.  When I planted, I did a pattern of 1 shallow then 3 deep so that I can use the deep for green onions.  I always plant yellow onions because I like their sweeter taste.
It was a happy morning.  You can see my shallow planting in the pic as well.

Day 4

No new planting yet. I've been watering every morning. It has been beautiful outside and I love hearing the birds sing while I spend time in the sun. My seeds are likely transforming inside right now and I can't wait to see results. I think my earliest sprouts should come around Saturday. So far all of the sprouts from my kitchen window of celery and onion are still standing and green, too.
The more exciting posts are still to come, but good things come to those who wait. Patience is key in the sport of gardening.
I guess I should clarify exciting... not that I will have an intriguing novel, but to those who love to see the results of their labor(me), the reports will be exciting.
My son was getting wild with the patting of the soil after putting seeds in and I told him to calm down. I said that we were not doing an exciting game. He asked, "So is gardening supposed to be boring?" Well, I suppose it is boring to some, but rather than describing it as boring or exciting work, I told him it was a relaxing type of work for me and he was just keeping me from being relaxed. :)

Day 2

This afternoon I had 2 helpers with the planting but my 6 year old didn't last long.  I planted 2 more rows according to seed pack directions.
In row 2, the East 1/3 is spinach and the same is true for row 3.  Then I planted black-eyed peas or purple cowpeas for the next 2/3 except I put 2 Chile peppers at the west end of that row.  The west end of row 3 is the same.  And between the peppers and spinach is lettuce in the 3rd row. 
Against our white picket fence, I planted peas for about 2 feet.  I'm saving the rest of the fence for climbing green beans.  I may regret the decision to let plants climb my fence.  We'll see.I'm saving space between the row ends and the fence for pumpkins, but they won't go in until the end of May, first of June.
I still plan to plant green beans, cucumbers, tomatoes, and zucchini as well.

I am anxious to see it grow.

This picture is taken from the opposite end as day 1. The potatoes are to the far right and the next two rows start with spinach. Lettuce was hard to plant because the seeds are so tiny it was hard to just drop in one at a time.

2012 first planting day

I'm thrilled to get started on my garden.  I may be late according to some or early compared to others.  I guess that makes us just right.
We (I) wanted to keep the back yard for playing so I chose to put my garden in our North side yard.  After the tilling, I realize that space is much larger than I expected.  Our previous home only had a couple of small raised box garden beds due to lack of space. 
Today's task was to prepare the ground and plant potatoes and onions.  Since we had to let the first turning of the soil dry out a bit, the rotatilling didn't get done until after 5pm.  I planted 1 sweet potato plant and about a dozen potato plants.  I planted in a trench so there will be room to bury the stems as they get taller. 
In the same row I planted onions and green onions.  I put sticks on either end of where I wanted to plant and stretched a string between them to keep my row fairly straight.  I adapted my method from last year's research.  I used onion sets and planted them crowded together in a row.  1 shallow then 3 deep the 1 shallow and 3 deep and so on for my pattern.  The thought behind that is to have 3 green onions for every 1 large onion.  As I thin out the green onions, it will make room for the onions to grow.  The shallow that will grow are spaced about 5 inches apart.

The pic shows my first row just before watering.  At the near end is the celery that I have been growing on my counter from the base of a store-bought stalk.  Also I have a few green onions that I was growing from roots of a bunch that I had bought from the grocery store and eaten.  They were our kitchen window experiments.
That's all for today.