Fri 2 Sep 2011

News from Hunter’s Garden…

Posted by admin under Grow With Us
No Comments

What an interesting growing season this has been.  It’s hard to believe that we live in a desert with it raining like 3 times a week and all.  Being a water conservationist it’s hard for me to complain about the rain, but the long cool spring has definitely affected the growth of my plants. While the tomatoes came on late, some of mine are now 8′ tall and producing pounds every other day.  Bring on the tomato glut!

                                              "Tomato Matrix," Hunter Merritt, 2011

What hasn’t bounced back so well are my peppers.  They are just dinky and sad this year with small fruit and very low yields.  I have one pepper plant that never grew over 4″.  One problem I have every year is my peppers ripening unevenly.  To compound this problem, it seems half the peppers get sun-scorched ta boot, rendering half the pepper inedible.  Anyone have any pepper growing suggestions?

                                                     Hunter's Garden, 2011

For some reason my okra JUST sprouted a week ago.  I thought I had bunk seeds.  It grows crazy fast and is already producing pods.  Eggplants are doing reasonably well with the hybrids putting my heirlooms to shame in terms of production.  The pinto beans have been producing steadily and I’m drying the beans for storage.  My edamame plants look large and healthy but have only recently started putting out pods.  A star performer for me this year has been spaghetti squash, yay!

As far as fertilization goes…

I’m pretty good about using liquid fertilizer every 2-3 weeks.  I started off with straight fish emulsion, then began adding Morbloom when the plants started flowering, and now I’m giving them straight Morbloom.  Let me clarify that I only use half the recommended dilution when using Morbloom.  I’ve gotten grief form my friends that Morbloom isn’t organically derived, but it’s what I had left from last season and it works.  The  12+ tomatoes on each plant verify this.   One of the arguments I heard against it was that non-organic fertilizers destroy the healthy soil bacteria and fungi.  My engineer brain can’t resist a good research project, so I tried to verify this claim on the interwebs.  While there is much anecdotal ballyhoo on Organic gardening websites about this, I could not find any scientific research to back up this claim.  In fact, I found a few legitimate studies that effectively demonstrated no change in the concentrations of soil organisms when using chemical fertilizers.  If anyone has some more information about this, please share…


 “Cuc’s and Eggplant,” Hunter Merritt 2011

Speaking of soil biome and fertilization, I mounded mulch around all of my plants a few weeks ago and the results have been dramatic. My rows are spaced closer than I’d like and I had been noticing that the soil around the plants was getting compacted because of walking on the clay-ey soil.  I was kind of chintzy when I top dressed my garden with compost before planting; only putting down a 2” layer or so.   If you can pick out the eggplants in the picture with the cucumber trellising, the one on the right is at least twice as big as the one of the left. As you can guess, the one on the right got a mound of compost mid-season, and the one of the left inadvertently didn’t. I never really thought much about adding compost midseason but I’m here to say it works!

Hunter

Tags: , , , , , , , ,

 

Fri 19 Aug 2011

What to do with all my produce?!

Posted by admin under Carrots, Cooking, Grow With Us, Pepper, Tomatoes, Uncategorized, Zucchini
No Comments

So is anyone else having trouble keeping up with the produce in their garden? I’m so excited for harvest season- you finally get to see the fruits (literally) of all your labors!  My tomatoes are finally changing color, the basil is getting bushier, I’ve been harvesting beans and cucumbers the last month or so, my peppers are going crazy and now I’ve got zucchini to deal with….  Along with the steady supply of kale, chard, beets, micro greens and carrots supplied in my CSA from BUG Farms, I’ve started falling behind in actually eating and preserving all of this nutritiousness.

And it’s just the beginning of harvest season!

So what to do?  Tell me.   How do I keep all this stuff from going to waste?  Eat more veggies right?  And maybe do some canning or something?  Right.  But it’s not that easy, as I’m sure you all know.   Don’t get me wrong, I do my fair share of veggie crunching, but you can only eat so many raw veggies before needing a change in texture.   Let’s face it, a lot of veggies taste better when they’re cooked or prepared in interesting and delicious ways.   That’s why humans invented the art of cooking- and it is an art!  As much time as we’ve all spent on our garden, now we’ve got to put just as much effort into cooking, preserving, freezing, drying and eating our yummy fruits and veggies.

So let’s make a deal and help each other.  I’ll share some recipes if you share yours!

Together we will become culinary artists of the masterful kind.

Here are some ideas I’ve come up with so far:

Fresh Bruschetta- one of my all time favorites!

Baguette, olive oil, fresh mozzarella, garden fresh tomatoes and basil leaves, salt, pepper.

Slice fresh baguette, brush or rub with olive oil, add a slice of fresh mozzerella, tomato, salt and pepper.  Put basil leaves on top.  Enjoy!

 

 


Shredded Beet and Carrot Salad

I haven’t tried this one yet, but I have a lot of beets and carrots to eat.  Doesn’t it look beautiful?  Check out the link.  I think adding apples to this would be delicious.

Kale Chips

Put parchment paper or aluminum foil on baking pan.  Chop stems off kale, chop in smaller pieces if you’d like.  Drizzle and toss with olive oil.  Add salt and pepper to taste or Cajun seasoning.  Bake at 400 F until crispy or desired texture.  About 15-20 min.

 

 

 

Sauteed beans and greens

Chop and string beans, chop off stems and chop up kale, chard, pok choi and/or spinach greens.  Saute garlic first in butter or oil, then add beans.  After 5 min add greens.  Saute for about 5-10 more min, just until wilted and bright green- don’t over cook.

Veggie Lasagna with Zucchini and Chard

I made this last week and it was amazing!  The recipe is in “Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone” by Deborah Madison I substituted the eggplant for zucchini.

Pickles, “Dilly Beans” and Pickled Peppers

I use this recipe for all three except I add a spicy pepper per jar, grape leaves (1-2 per jar) and sometimes powdered alum (these two help keep them crunchy).   I like to cut the cucumbers into spears and cut off the ends.  The beans I cut off the ends.  The peppers I put in the jar whole.

Here’s a great resource I found about  freezing, drying, canning and storing produce from Wasatch Community Gardens…

Also some good canning and preserving info from Utah State University Extension.

I need to do more freezing.  And get a bigger freezer.  Freezer salsa is next on the list!

Ok, now it’s your turn.  What do you do with all of your produce?


Tags: , , , , , , , , , ,

 

Fri 12 Aug 2011

News from the Giant pumpkin

Posted by admin under Giant Pumpkins, Grow With Us, Planting
No Comments

So let me start off by saying….I feel a little embarrassed.  Maybe that’s why I haven’t written for a while.

Here’s what my “giant” pumpkin looks like right now:

And here’s what an experienced giant pumpkin grower’s giant pumpkin looks like right now:

The bees are doing there job, so that’s not the problem.


I’m just a little behind…What can I say, I’m a beginner at growing gigantic pumpkins.  And I got a late start this spring….Hey, we all learn from our mistakes.  Before you throw me a pity party, let’s remind ourselves that my goal was to grow a pumpkin boat, which if I’m not being too idealistic, I think I might be able to pull off with maybe 200-300 lb pumpkin.  Maybe.   The experienced pumpkin growers, like the one growing the beautiful pumpkin above, on the other hand, are looking to grow a record breaking pumpkin- upwards of 1000 lbs!  So hey, let’s not give up hope for my little pumpkin quite yet.   I’ve still got some time right?  Even if it frosts in September as it sometimes does, I’ve got a whole month of growth left.. If mine grows as fast as most giant pumpkins do, I think I should be able to pull off at least a tiny version of a giant pumpkin in comparison….If the frost stays away till October, which it sometimes does, I might even still have a chance at growing that pumpkin boat I’ve been dreaming about.  Who knows?

Keep your fingers crosses and let’s wait and see!

Lessons from the giant pumpkin:

-Get a head start. Build a hoop house; start the pumpkin in the hoop house in April.

-Be diligent about training the vines (let the main vine grow straight down the middle, and carefully but diligently bury the secondary vines to help grow more roots and bring up more nutrients from the soil).  I started doing this, but haven’t kept up with it…giant pumpkin growing can be a full time job.  Already have one of those:)!

-Don’t grow anything else in your pumpkin patch
(you can see in my picture that I let some volunteer tomatoes and other squash grow in the same space [remember all of that fresh compost I added to my new garden? looks like it was full of seeds!] – they’re doing well but taking nutrients away from the pumpkin plant).

-Don’t give up hope! Keep fertilizing and maintaining your pumpkin patch even if you get behind:)

-Krystal

Tags: , ,

 

Fri 5 Aug 2011

What seeds you can plant today!

Posted by admin under Uncategorized
No Comments

It may be hard to imagine cooler weather right now in the midst of the hot August sun, but believe it or not, NOW is the time to plant all of your cool-weather-loving crops for fall harvests.  In fact, this weekend may be even the perfect time.
Average planting dates for fall crops range from July 1st-August 10th depending on the crop, so you’ll still make it into this  planting window if you plant within the next 5 days.

Check out what we planted yesterday in our new demonstration grow boxes at our warehouse!

Beets:



Early Wonder                                Chioggia                                                      Bull's blood
48-60 days                                      55 days                                                            55 days

Beans:

Top Notch Wax                Blue Lake Lake Bush 274
50-55 days                                     58 days

Lettuce:

Red Sails                                      Black Seeded Simpson                    Oakleaf
45 days                                                   45 days                                       40 days

Kale:

Vates Blue Scotch Curled
55 days

Turnip:


Purple Top White Globe
55 days

Spinach:

Tyee
37-45 days

Other crops you can try:

Carrots  55-70 days to maturity.

Chard 50-60 days to maturity

Radish  23-30 days to maturity

Mustard Greens 45-60 days to maturity

The average First Fall freeze dates for Salt Lake City are between Oct 11th-31st, and if your lucky, sometimes even later than that.
Today is August 5th, so that means that it is possible to have 67-87 frost-free growing days left.   Cross your fingers!

Since most of these crops are frost tolerant (with the exception of the beans) that gives you a nice chunk of time to grow, even if some frost creeps up on us in September.  One thing to keep in mind as we get into the fall months is that there will less sunlight than in the summer, so growing times may take a little longer than usual for some crops.  Another great reason to plant now!

If you've already got enough produce to harvest this fall, start thinking about planting some cover crops!  Cover crops are crops that you grow for a few weeks, then till into the soil before they reach maturity to add nutrients and organic matter to your soil.  That way your soil will be ready for another great season starting in the spring.  Some nice crops to try are Austrian field peas, buckwheat (warm weather), or clover.

Have fun planting this weekend!

Resources:

Wasatach Community Gardens

USU Extension

Utah Freeze Dates

Tags:

 

Tue 19 Jul 2011

Jenni’s peas!

Posted by admin under Lettuce, Peas, Planting
No Comments


I planted the Lincoln peas on April 1st; the package notes they are generally ready to harvest in 55-60 days.  Here it is July 4th and I just picked my first batch yesterday; 90+ days after sowing.  I assume their late maturity was due to the long cool spring (although peas like cool weather so ??). The plants have stopped flowering, but there are still quite a few pea pods maturing.  Another couple days and I will pick the remaining peas and then pull the plants.  Last night we shelled 7 cups of peas.  We had some for dinner (they are sweet and delicious!) and froze the other 6 cups for later use.  Peas are a labor-intensive crop (picking and shelling) but definitely worth the effort.

The Romaine Cimmaron lettuce was planted on April 6th.  It’s maturity date is listed as 75-85 days, so it is right on target.  Looking forward to many great salads!

Tags: , , , , ,

 

Mon 13 Jun 2011

Critter Proof Your Raised Beds

Posted by admin under Grow With Us, Starting Seeds
No Comments


I have cats, chickens, raccoons (not by choice), and wild birds running around my yard.   In the past I have had trouble with my chickens, as well as quail, getting into my raised beds and either scattering newly planted seed or eating seedlings.  I have found a way to keep them out.  I purchased rolled wire fencing from the hardware store (Lowes, Home Depot etc.) and put that around my raised bed.  Then I took bird netting and put that over the top of the fence.  Wire fencing has small end wires about 6 inches from the top which I looped the net around.  It keeps the net snug on top of the fence.  I then tuck the remaining overlap of net into the edge of the raised bed (see photo).  This successfully keeps the critters out!  This works great to keep robins out of my strawberry bed too.

 

Tags:

 

Wed 8 Jun 2011

It’s Alive!

Posted by admin under Giant Pumpkins, Grow With Us, Starting Seeds
No Comments

Ok folks, I think we’re getting somewhere…
Look!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

My giant pumpkin seed has sprouted!
Now if this sun would keep on stickin’ around, I’ll have a giant pumpkin that I can turn into a boat in no time.
Stay tuned for future progress!

Tags:

 

Tue 7 Jun 2011

Sprout Saftey

Posted by admin under Sprouting, Starting Seeds
No Comments

In light of the recent E. coli outbreak in Germany, we thought we would take this opportunity to remind you of the basics of sprouting! Sprouts are tasty and extremely wholesome but, like any raw food, safety precautions should be taken. Below are some helpful and specific instructions so you can sprout safely!

Basic Safety Steps:

  1. The first step is to ensure that your supplies are clean; water, sprouting vessel and seeds. The quality of water you use should be just as sanitary as the quality of water you drink. As far as your sprouting vessel is concerned, you’ll want to wash it after each use, just like washing dishes after a meal. It is possible that the seeds could also be contaminated and there are a few basic steps to ensure that even your seeds are free from bacteria (for more detailed information, please click on the pdf below).
  2. As you sprout the seeds, straightforward procedures such as washing your hands, washing the sprouts and properly drying the sprouts before storage can greatly mitigate any bacterial risks. Most of all, use common sense. If something doesn’t smell right or look right don’t eat it!
  3. For more specific safety information, please click on the Mountain Valley Seed Co Sprout Safety pdf!

Thanks and happy sprouting!

Tags:

 

Tue 24 May 2011

Tender

Posted by admin under Books, Cooking, Grow With Us
No Comments

Weather like we’ve been having does not inspire gardening but rather sitting inside and reading a good book. Which is exactly what I’ve been doing. I’ve been reading Tender: A Cook and His Vegetable Patch by Nigel Slater. That’s right, I’ve been reading a cookbook, that’s how terrible the weather has been. The book is 918 beautiful pages of gardening and cooking inspiration and instruction (I’ve made it to page 59). I’m a freak for organization which explains why I think the best feature about Tender is the way the book is organized.  Alphabetically the book digs in with a chapter for each vegetable starting at Asparagus, Beets, and Broccoli, runs through 25 other vegetables ending at Tomatoes, Turnips and Zucchini.

Each vegetable chapter gets its own introductory description of what you can expect from said vegetable, a bit of history and a few interesting facts. After the introduction, there is a short section about properly growing the vegetable in the garden.  Tender stands out from general gardening books in the next section by explaining the very best ways to use the vegetable in the kitchen after harvest. This includes the best ways to cook a vegetable in order bring out its most desirable flavors, taste distinctions between varieties, seasonings (beyond spices) for cooking the vegetable, tips to avoid overcooking or other common mistakes, and a handful of creative and encouraging recipes. Like The New York Times’ Mark Bittman, Nigel Slater leaves the recipes flexible, suggesting substitutions or alternations which ultimately give the home chef more knowledge to creatively pull together their own dish.

Last summer I received a weekly CSA (community supported agriculture) from Sharon of B.U.G. Farms…which seasonally included beets. I love roasting beets with other root vegetables, but there are only so many roasted beets a girl can cook and eat. When I didn’t plan to roast my CSA beets, I usually put them aside optimistically thinking I would come back and use the bunch later in the week.  Optimism aside, I hardly ever used the beets except when adding them into my compost pile. It just killed me to know how much work Sharon put into the beets and I was just wasting them! What it came down to is that I didn’t know how to utilize all the beautiful red beets I was reciving week after week. Thankfully Tender has a section just for beets and now I have at least seven totally different recipes for my CSA beets including chocolate beet cake, goat cheese and beet salad, beet meatballs, and chickpea patties with beet tzatsiki. No more wasting.

While I read through Tender on an unseasonably cold and rainy day like today, I know I wont get through all 918 pages once the sun comes out. That’s all right though. Unlike the Thai cookbooks I use once a month, Tender is more than a recipe book, it is my new and favorite vegetable resource.

Tags:

 

Fri 13 May 2011

My Ginormous Pumpkin- Episode 2

Posted by admin under Garden planning, Giant Pumpkins, Grow With Us, Soil, Starting Seeds
No Comments

Day….13  Ok, so here’s the update on my giant pumpkin: no germination.  What?!  This is why I write the blog- and you read it.  So you can NOT do what I did.  Right? Right.

So as you may have read, I tried germinating one of my two gigantic pumpkin seeds in some potting soil on top of the fridge.  After a couple of pretty gloomy days last week, I decided to move the pot near our south facing window when we were expecting some sunny days (finally!).  Another couple days go by and…nothing.  I knew the soil temperature probably wasn’t the ideal warmth that pumpkin seeds prefer, but I figured a week and it would get there.  Day 7, still nothing.  This is when I decided I needed to get a little more serious about this.  I decided to give in and do what the President of the Utah Pumpkin Growers Association (Andrew Israelsen) does with his seeds- put the pot inside a cooler with 2 quart jars of warm water to get the soil temperature up and encourage faster germination.  I even added a home made heating pad for extra warmth (one of those bean filled bags you put in the microwave).  This would surely work!

The 4 ” pot is the pumpkin seed, the other two are some herbs I started germinating the same day.

I used this method for two days and still….nothing.  How could this be possible?  I couldn’t take it any more, so decided to dump the pot completely and try the elementary school method: wet a paper towel place it in an unsealed zip lock bag (unsealed for air flow) and put the seed inside.  When I checked the seed…again… it had not sprouted at all!  I decided to add my second pumpkin seed in the same damp paper towel, about 3 inches apart from the first.

It’s been 3 days since the I’ve tried the Ziploc bag and paper towel method. Andrew’s take 4 days to germinate…so maybe tomorrow is my lucky day?  My plan, once the seeds germinate, is to transplant both pumpkin seeds outside.  I will warm the soil around them with milk jugs filled with water to create a mini greenhouse effect.  Maybe I’ll even cover them with some clear plastic for extra warmth and protection.

In the meantime, I still have the new garden space to deal with…So this is what I did on Sunday:

I dug up the other half of my “garden space” (the other side of the wheelbarrow in the picture).  The weather was actually perfect for the pick axing, shoveling, hauling and raking – ominous rain clouds in the distance, overcast skies, and a cool, gentle breeze.  Ahh, nothing like pick axing rocks for three hours on a Sunday morning. The soil, if you can even call it that,  is mostly sand with a lot of rocks.

To be honest, pick axing made me feel like one of the dwarves in Disney’s ” Snow White”. The difference between me and the dwarfs were they were digging in rock to find sparkly gems, and I was just trying to make soil out of rocks.  Most of the time I felt like grumpy- blisters on my hands, back breaking swings, dirt down my back, rock dust in my eye. This pick axing business is not for the weak.  A tiller may have been easier- but I think the rocks in the soil would have broken a tiller in  in about 5 sec.  Maybe if I had a tractor…

The chickens decided they wanted to help, so while I was swinging my pick axe with all of my strength, I had to dodge chicken heads that were racing each other to eat the worms in the earth I had just loosened.  Brave chickens (or maybe just stupid which is more likely). They do scratch around a little and add some fertilizer here and there, so I suppose I’ll give them some credit for helping.  I’m just glad I didn’t gouge one with the axe.

Once I did all the loosening I could do (which ended up being about six inches deep, ), I sifting out fist sized rocks, some left over asphalt crumbles, big roots, and misc. trash like strips of plastic bag, candy wrappers and pieces of rotting boards (if you ever see our house, you will accept that it has an unusual history and pieced together landscaping design at best).  Once I raked out a the “soil” into a long rectangle shape and  leveled it out, I measure it.  About 8′ x 25′.   The next question is: does this soil have enough nutrients and root space to grow a gigantic pumpkin?  Guess we’ll find out (if the seeds germinate).  I added 6 bags of top soil (1.5 cubic feet) and 1 bag of eco compost that I got from Home Depot.  This is a constant balancing act – how much am I willing to spend to grow a giant pumpkin?   So far I’ve spent about $20 on soil and compost.  The soil could use a lot more love and organic matter, but I’m hoping that once I add the compost from last year’s compost pile (rich with year old chicken manure, egg shells and veggie scraps) that should be enough to grow something.

I still have a lot of work to do to get the garden ready. Fist on the list is to fix the flax tire on the wheelbarrow. Then empty the rocks.  Then shovel compost.

After that I can:

-Add on new irrigation tubes
-Fix the timer wire that I pick axed through
-Build a hoophouse, buy some wall-o-waters or drink a lot more milk for the cartons to make mini greenhouses
-Plant the seeds (which hopefully will have germinated)

Watch for next week’s update!

Krystal

Tags:

 

Next Page »