Corn a Month Later

I mentioned before, this is the first time I've ever grown corn. I bought an heirloom variety called 'Blue Jade' that is only supposed to get 2-3 feet high. They said you could put it in a container, so I did.

This was it on May 27.

June 27.

Not bad, huh? It appears to be most of the way there. I've been keeping it well watered.

Spring Garden

Finally, FINALLY I have time to write about the garden! I've been so busy trying to get things in the ground, weeded, prepped, covered, mulched, etc etc. So, here is the update:

One of the new things we're trying this year is corn. Corn! I've never grown corn. I picked a variety from Seed Savers Exchanged called Blue Jade. It is a sweet corn that only gets 2-3 feet high, so it is ideal for containers. And I know corn is best grown in clumps (not rows, per say, unless you clump the rows) so I planted it in the half whiskey barrel we have by the porch. We'll see how it goes.
The radishes are giving such a great burst of color here in this patch. Also planted here are peas, beets, parsnips, and carrots. The carrots didn't sprout. Not. A. One. I don't know why. I think I planted 6 different varieties, and nothing. I'll put in a late batch in a different bed in July, probably, and hope for the best. Everything else did ok in this bed. I'm at a loss.
The two head lettuces I grew this year: Tennisball (right) and Dazzle romaine (left). Aren't they gorgeous? Notice the baby in front. I started a few more from seed, then transplanted them today so when I cut the heads of the older plants, the babies will be established and I'll have another batch coming along.
Another pic of the lettuce. I haven't tried the Dazzle yet, but I'm really happy with Tennisball, which I got from Montecello when we were there a year or so ago.
A flat of things waiting to be planted, including but not limited to tomatoes, lettuce, squash, and okra. Some have been planted since I took this picture.

Also, I have seeded beans and cucumbers, and put in some of the pepper plants. The garlic scapes are starting to show, the red shallots are starting to flower (but not the gray shallots yet), peas are on the vines, potatoes are flowering, blueberries and blackberries are in their infancy, parsnips are flowering (I'm collecting seed this year), and some of the tomatoes are flowering, too!

End of Summer Review

Whew! What a year!! I can’t believe it is getting cold already. The leaves are just starting to turn down here, I’m hoping it will be a colorful autumn. I’m hoping someone else finds it helpful and informative, too. Please note that I’m also going through my seed stash and I will be doing a Destash list shortly. Look for it, I’ll be happy to send anything anywhere.

Peppers: Terrible year for peppers. I really only got Hungarian wax peppers to ripen, everything else was a bust.

Cucumbers: Still loving my Boothby’s Blonde. I’m out of cuke seeds now, though, so I may try another variety next year.

Melons: I successfully grew two different types of melons this year but, you know, we just didn’t eat them. Note to Self: dedicate the space next year to something else.

Winter Squash: Pumpkins did well, the Australian Butter did, too, but everything else got got by the vine borers.

Summer Squash: Yanoo, it has gotten to be a joke about how zuchinni takes over the garden and you get swamped by them. I got a grand total of 2 zuch this year. Two. Dos. I did get a nice selection of Reve Scaloppini, though, and some croocknecks.

Beans: Provider is still my go-to bush bean. Really happy with the Triofono Violetto purple pole bean, nice and tasty. The Molly Frazier’s White Cutshort was very prolific and I’m happy with it, too. Not sure what I’m going to do next year, I might try something entirely different. I also want to plant more drying beans and some ‘cowpeas.’

Sweet Potatoes: Oh, dear. I planted about 12 slips, the deer ate them. 2 came back and did very well, vine-wise. Then, the guy we hired to do bobcat work buried them in 8” of dirt. I thought it was a total loss, but the vines started growing again. I’m letting them go for another week or so to mark the spots I need to dig.

Tomatoes: This is the long part, so I’m adding it at the end.

Hanging Tomatoes: total bust. They started out so well, I don’t know what happened? I think we will try again next year, maybe with peppers or something else. I would rather put flower baskets in their place, but I think we should try again with veggies, just one more go.

Keeper varieties: these are varieties I have grown before and know I like, and will grow again: Brandywine, Sungold (cherry), Mortgage Lifter, Cherokee Purple, Aunt Ruby’s German Green.

New varieties and my feelings about them:

Ceylon (cherry): Very prolific. Nice fruit, nice size, but I don’t think I’ll grow it again. Tasty, though. I’d recommend it, but it isn’t what I’m looking for.

Tlacolula: Interesting shape, would be a good stuffer, but probably won’t grow it again.

Kellogg’s Breakfast: Terrific, huge yellow/orange fruit, great taste. I will grow this again.

Fancy Hill: I only got one ripe fruit off this plant so I really can’t comment.

Japanese Triefel: Mine didn’t produce much, but the taste was terrific.

Amish Paste: Nice, basic past tomato. Large fruit, nice taste. I will grow this again.

Purple Russian (paste): I truly think that the only way I would grow this tomato again is if it were the last tomato on earth. It was too sweet for my tastes, the bottom was overripe by the time the top ripened, and it cracked a lot. If you like sweet tomatoes, this one is for you.

I have some fall crops in now. Some are a total failure: peas, beets, the cold weather greens didn’t come up, neither did the turnips. Broccoli, I might not get before the cold really hits. Same with cabbage. The Chinese cabbage I planted is doing OK.

August VA Trip part 2: Here Be Good Food

When I was little, we used to pull the 12+ hour trip to Atlanta in one fell swoop. Several times on the way I remember stopping at a truck stop in Virginia. This is a REAL truck stop. With REAL truckers. Rough looking guys. Lots of trucks.

The cool thing about truck stops is that they serve very good, very hot, very large plates of homestyle food. It is a wonderful thing. If you can ever get to a real truck stop, do. Matt and I stopped at White's Truck Stop on the way down to see Barbara. We'd been stuck in traffic for almost an hour on the highway due to an accident we never did see. We were hungry. It was so funny, I hadn't been there in more than 20 years....and it hadn't changed a bit! Same wooden tables and chairs, same gun collection in glass cases. Same sign. It was a nice bit of nostalgia.

While we were trapped on Rt. 81, the funniest thing happened. We were behind a Toyota Higlander driven by a woman with PA plates. Local to us, actually. She was behind a double FedEx tractor trailor.

The FedEx truck would creep forward and stop.
The Highlander would creep forward and stop.
We would creep forward and stop.
Ad nauseum.

I was driving and I could see the Highlander driver in her side mirror. She was texting on her phone while all this was going on. *texttexttext* *glance at the FedEx truck* *text* and so on. After about half an hour of this the following occured.

The FedEx truck crept forward and stopped.
We crept forward and stopped.
(pause)
The Highlander crept forward...crept....crept....and hit the FedEx truck at about 1mph, but hard enough that the trailor MOVED. She quick put it in reverse and backed up about a foot and a half.....and kept texting. She didn't get out an look for damage. She didn't go tell the driver she'd hit him. We were carrying on about this for the next half hour. We even made up lyrics to Enter Sandman that fit the situation:

Nah nah naah nah na! Hit the FedEx Truck! Nah nah naah nah na!
and
Text with one eye open! Gripping the wheel tight!!
Feeed Eeexxx Truck!! It went THUMP!!!

Anyway, we finally made it to our destination. Barbara always feeds us well. The first evening we had pork barbeque and a fritata. It was divine.

The next day, we made Sage Wine Lemon mustard from the Ball Jar book. The recipe is also available online. She loves the mustard so instead of making it at home I suggested we make it together, and she agreed. She's pouring in the honey above.

Saturday night, she made for us a red curry chicken. Now, I have never liked curry. I had it a few times as a kid and hated it. I didn't tell her this (sorry, Barb).

I LOVED this chicken!! It was to die for. I would happily make this once a week because it is so good. We had a mix of condiments, too, including sliced banana (my favorite with the curry), sliced tomatoes, diced cucumber, shaved cocoanut, a mango chutney I'd made, and some flat bread we'd attempted but didn't turn out quite right.
We also went bean picking in her garden but forgot the basket....so I stuffed the beans in the side pockets of my capri pants. It worked well. See, there is a reason to buy cargo-style pants: picking veggies.

End of July Review and Notes To Self

I had meant to post this at the beginning of August, but I forgot and then I didn’t have time and then…well, you know. So here is my Spring/mid Summer roundup:

Peas: I pulled these SPRING pea vines on 8/2. Really happy with the Little Marvel pea. I have no idea if it is because of weather or the variety, but it was still producing when I pulled the vines! Shocking. Note to self: plant this variety next year, too.

Garlic: I already posted about the garlic harvest. However, as some of you know I’m keeping tabs on $$ when it comes to this garden with the hopes of seeing how much $$ I put in vs. how much I will get out. Here is a tidbit: if I had purchased the 156 heads of garlic at the grocery store through the year, it would have cost me $117.

Leeks: I am happy….but. I overestimated my leek needs and while they were staggering in for a while, they started staggering in really quickly and then I couldn’t keep up. I pulled all the rest today and only 7 were salvageable (they got hit by the onion maggot, and if I had pulled them at the beginning of August they probably would have been fine). Note to self: try to find two varieties next year, an early and a late, and try to find 2-3 people to share them with so I don’t have soooo many leeks all at the same time.

Potatoes: Note to self: if you think you have enough straw/hay on top of the potatoes to keep the sun off them, you don’t. Put another few inches on. About 1/4 of my fingerling potatoes had green spots on them. The red potatoes did well, even though the plants looked like hell. I got 3:1 out for both of these.

Golds did VERY well, I think I got 6:1 out of these. Note to self: plant more golds next year.

Carrots/Lettuce/Radishes: I really think I’m going to grow the Baby Ball/Thumbelina varieties almost exclusively from now on. They’re small, quick, easy to pull, easy to know when to pull, and cute….and I’m guessing easy to can. This year I don’t have too many carrots coming up in the first batch but I was overrun with lettuce and radishes. I usually mix the seeds together, then sew them. Note to self: keep the seeds separate and sew them separately in the same row to make sure I get enough carrot seed sewn.

I did pull and dig some yellow carrots, they looked nice, very carrot-like for our dense soil.

Pole Beans: really happy with both that I put in this year, but the Molly Frazier is going like gangbusters. I emailed the company (Baker Creek) to ask if ‘short vines’ meant 12 feet, and they said no. I emailed them pictures of the beans (not sure if they qualify as ‘cutshort’). It may be the wrong bean, it may be the wrong description.

Bush Beans: I like the Burpee Provider variety again, but something is nibbling on them a lot. Same with the Roma that Barbara gave me. Not slugs, though, these are small fuzzy green worms. The critters don’t get the pole beans as much.

Tomatoes: Happy with: Sun Gold (of course), Ceylon (very nice), and the other varieties I’ve grown before (Brandywine, Cherokee Purple, Mortgage Lifter, Aunt Ruby’s). DO NOT LIKE the Purple Russian paste (sweet, splits easily, the bottom starts to turn to mush before the top is ripe!). Still waiting on most others.

Squash: Really like the Reve Scaloppini, but I have yet to see a zucchini. The yellow crookneck and the Zephyr are doing so-so. Not a good year for summer squash?

Winter squash is doing really well and the vines are rooting along the way, hallelujah. Several vines are 20’ long already, and I have at least 8-10 winter squash on them that I’ve noticed. I have lost a couple to vine borers, and we do have a couple small infestations of squash bugs.

Okra: Nice. Note to self: need more than 4 plants.

Peppers: Really bad year for peppers, and everyone is saying this. Of the 13 plants I have more than half have yet to even show a bloom, much less an actual pepper. Many are dropping leaves every time you look at them funny. But a few plants are doing really well. Go figure.

Cukes: So far, so so. I really like the Boothby’s Blonde.

Melons: I have 3 of the Prescott melons and 5 of the Haogen melons. I watch them and drool a little. I can’t wait.

Onions: did surprisingly well. I think I planted 90 something and I got out 76. Some of them were tiny, but still. And I got some that I had originally started from seed in January, which really shocked me. They weren’t hit by the onion maggot, either, I got them out early enough.

Treats Sweet & Sauer

I'm not a big soda drinker. I got out of the miniscule habit I did have last year, when I was trying to lose weight. However, I sometimes have a hankering for a Sarsaparilla from Kutztown Soda Works and last week it was really bad.
So bad, in fact, that I bought two bottles of Sarsaparilla and a tub of vanilla ice cream and after dinner made a float. And the next day, I made another float. And the day after that....well, you get the picture.

Kutztown makes great sodas. They also do root beer, birch beer, red cream, black cherry, and a few others I can't remember right now. They are not caffinated, and they only use cane sugar as a sweetener. And their descriptions always have some bit of interesting Pennsylvania Dutch lingo, as seen above. Kutztown sodas aren't carried many places, but the grocery store in the town where I work has most of them. Thank god. (You can buy online, too!*)

(*I just noticed something I must have: they have a tshirt that has the logo on the front and on the back says "Got Sass?" That is so going to be mine.)

Continuing on with the Pennsylvania Dutch theme, I recently tried my hand at making good, old fashioned sauerkraut. It seemed easy, right?

This is a picture of the first batch, which looks infinitly better in this picture than it did when I pitched it in the compost bin a week or so later. It had gotten a milky look to it and had started to brown and dry at the top. Not enough water, it was grocery store cabbage and was very dry.
I started a second batch with 2 farmer market cabbages and 2-weeks in it looks and smells much better, and tastes great. I hope to do this with my own cabbage eventually.

Colors of Summer

Israeli Ogen (aka Haogen) melon
'maters.
Carrots!!!!
Beets
Raspberries!

Squash I Have Known

I have several winter squash growing this year. Last year, vine borers killed all my vines. This year, I think I've gotten to most of them WITH A BIG, POINTY KNIFE before they could get to me.

This is a triamble, sometimes called a shamrock, due to the three lobes.
I believe this is on the pumpkin vine I have. The baby on the left didn't make it.
I have no idea what this is. Some of the seed I planted came from a friend, and I haven't looked at the packets again recently to refresh my memory.
This is the one I've really been looking forward to: Guatamalan Blue Banana squash!
I *think* this is an Australian Butter, but it *may* be a variety called Galeaux d'Eysines.

Various pictures

I'm about a week behind, but here are some pictures of the semi-recent garden activities....I hope to post more later....but we'll see. I've got blueberries and blackberries to pick, beans and peas to pick, weeding to do, lettuce to gather, squash bug eggs to destroy, dinner to make....and after all that it seems to be 9:30 already and I'm beat!!

A gallon bag of raspberries, scavenged from up the road:
Reve Scallopini squash baby:


Okra blossom:
Lettuce Christmas trees. I forget what variety this is, but I let it bolt because it is so pretty:

End of June Update and Status

Spring Crops: Peas are starting to peter out, I think we may get 3.5lb of shelled peas out when it's all over. Looseleaf lettuce is just starting to bolt. I'm really happy with the Amish Deertongue, I'll add that to my permanent grow list. Munich Bier radishes are still plugging along.

I'm eating lunch out of the garden almost exclusively now:
Summer crops: I've started harvesting some of the really early garlic, Chinese Pink and Inchelium Red. They both look good, some signs of too much water but that can't be helped. They are hanging in the basement drying.

The red potatoes I planted (that I picked up at the grocery store cheap because they were sprouting) seem very unhappy. I'm not sure why, the leaves have what look like rusty spots on them. When I pulled away the hay, though, there are some plants with gorgeous red potatoes, so maybe it won't hurt the harvest. The Yukon Gold potatoes, however, have beautiful plants:
Most of the tomatoes have fruit, including the ones in the hanging pots. I'll do a post on those soon, I know a few of you are following them. The okra is fruiting, too. Cucumbers are just starting to climb, and the pumpkins and beans are blooming.

The sweet potatoes. *sigh* I planted 13. Of those, 4 sprouted. Of those 4, the deer ate...4. 2 came back, I have since mulched them more and put some deer fencing over them, hopefully it will be enough.

Blueberries are starting very slowly to ripen. Wild raspberries are starting to come in, and the blackberries won't be far behind. Here is a picture of the wintergreen I planted:


And an update on my Adventures with Rooting Hormone: of the 8 baby blueberries I tried to start, it seems this one has made it. I haven't dug it up yet to check for roots, but I can only assume that something is happening because the other 7 were crunchy and this one isn't:

Weekly Update: 8/10/2008

This will be a mini update, I don't have the pictures of the onions, garlic, etc to show you.

I wanted to be sure, though, to tell you all that the compost is done. Well, not really. It went through its 3 months of heating, cooling, and curing. I can still make out some egg shells and lots of twigs. I'm using it as is, I've already put it in the veggie patch as one of my layers. I'm doing Lasagna Gardening, for those of you who didn't know. I'll probably write on that later this fall.

But I've already almost filled up the R2 unit again, so I hope to get another batch done before it gets too cold out.


The snap beans (left) are doing really well and I plan to grow them again next year (variety: Kentucky Wonder). Great flavor raw, haven't steamed any yet. The bush beans are nice, too, but we're having a bug issue and most of them are munched on. Max loves them, we've been using them to keep his mind off his eyedrops. He just crunches away at them. I'm glad he hasn't found the plants yet, he might devour them.

I don't think I mentioned that I purchased a bunch of strawberry plants and put them in the half whiskey barrel we had laying around. The strawberries that made their appearance were picked off by an unnamed creature (not us) before we got to try them, and so far no more fruit has grown. I hope to pile some hay/straw bales around it to try to get them to overwinter, but if not no big loss.

That's it for now, stay tuned for the blueberry, blackberry, squash, garlic and onion report.