The Big Dig

As promised, here are the pictures from the second day of the garden expansion.

Step 1: Start digging.

That's me, starting out the second day. 

Step 2: Keep digging.  

Step 3: Sift the dirt and backfill.

I angled the sieve so that the larger rocks rolled themselves
down and into the wheelbarrows waiting below. 

Step 4: Till and level the new bed.

I think it looks nice. Planted peas along the back edge, and
brussels sprout, cauliflower, spaghetti squash, and pumpkins
down the center line and front edge of the planter box.

Beefsteak Tomatoes

Other Garden Pictures 

Our Lone Pepper

Roma Tomatoes

Cobbles, Gravel, and Bentonite...Oh My!

I apologize for starting out this post with a big yawn, but I am wiped out.  I spent most of my afternoon "renovating" our new garden real estate.  It's gonna be a crazy day when you have to bust out the ol' pick axe from the side of the house. I kind of felt like one of Snow Whites long lost dwarf (Oh, what I wouldn't have given to have the whole gang with me). Anyway, the plan was (actually still is, since I have more to do tomorrow) to break the new area up into thirds, break up and dig out the soil down about two and a half feet, sift it (separating the volcanic rock from the soil), returning it back to the garden, and layer in a bag of organic compost and a quarter of a bag of blood meal (per section). So, the score at the end of the day, me-2, native prehistoric pain-in-the-butt volcanic/bentonite mess - 1.  Yah, I'm tired and punchy, but feels great to get dirty. Promise to have pictures tomorrow.  Time to sleep...yeah!

The Lone Pepper

Here I am again, working to put our daughter to bed, and I just wanted to post a quick note. Earlier this evening, while watering the garden, I noticed that we have the coolest little jalapeno pepper growing. It being the first pepper of the season... for that matter, the first pepper I've actually grown, I'm pretty jazzed. Next time I am out in the garden, I will remember to snap a pic to share.

Up, Up, and Away!

Tonight, sitting on the floor in the upstairs hallway, across from our daughters bedroom (working on getting her to sleep), remembering that so much has happened with regards to the garden since my last post. It's kind of blowing my mind here.

The first Zucchini of the season. Yum!

Let's see...it was about Tuesday of last week, I finally decided it was time to bust out my new soil nutrient testing kit, I purchased during my

Budding Bell Peppers

outing to the local nursery with our daughter (Ah, what a great day that was!). Following the directions, I collected 1 part soil (from the center of our garden), and in a glass mason jar added 5 parts water, then shook the ever-love'n-bajeezus out of it. 24-hours later - ding - the liquid was clear enough to extract and test. The test results indicated the soil had a pH of about 6.5, and contained adequate amounts of phosphorous and potassium. Nitrogen levels, however were depleted. Luckily, I had picked up a box of organic fertilizer,

Roma Tomatoes Waiting to Turn

sprinkled that around the garden, and watered it into the soil. All I had to do left was wait, and oh yeah, continue day-dreaming about my plans for my fall/winter garden.

New Real-Estate

My day-dreaming about a fall/winter garden led me to visit a couple of seed supply company websites. I finally ended up at Burpee Seed and Plan Company, and ordered sugar peas, organics sugar pumpkins, Long Island heirloom brussels sprouts, multicolored cauliflower mix, organic goldetti spaghetti squash, and yellow dutch shallots.  Adding to my excitement of growing a fall/winter garden, I've been offered a new area to expand the garden into. This new real estate will at least double the current size of our garden. The only thing holding us up is the necessity of getting paid. So come next month, we will plan a trip to the nursery. COME ON AUGUST!

Finally, over the past week, I added a trellis to the garden in an attempt to grow our cucumber plants vertically. I thought about doing this last year, but never got around to it. The reality of it was that we had plenty of space to just let our cucumber plants grown along the ground. This years garden is thriving in a much small area, which I think it makes perfect sense to trying an grow any many of our plants vertically as possible. I'm an already thinking of employing the same design in the fall garden for the peas. 

Intervention

"I can stop! Really, at any time." -- "Beefy" Tomato

What does one do when it becomes apparent that your plants have a drinking problem...ya head on down to your new favorite local nursery and treat yourself to some new toys, and a bit of garden bling! Okay, so calling it an intervention may have been slightly dramatic, but really it made for  a great excuse to spend some awesome father-daughter time together in the garden.

Designer Tomato Scaffolding

I'd say it all started Friday afternoon, when we stopped off at the local Home Depot to pick up a couple of trellises. During the proceeding week, we had experienced a significant warming trend, resulting in a growth spirt for most of our plants. At the Depot, I found and bought four wrap around cages. Called the "Ultamato Plus", these cage kits came with three 5-foot long stakes, and nine adjustable (10 to 14 inches) horizontal supports. What really attracted me to these cages is the ability modify the configuration of each cage (teepee, cone or straight column shape), and that when were done, the cages can be broken down for reuse later.

Back home and in the garden, I choose the straight configuration, or at least that's what I attempted to create. Let's just say, at times the rocks in the soil posed a few minor challenges. The cages were a breeze to set up, so much so that our daughter even helped to clip the supports onto the stakes.

With the cages constructed, I decided to spend some time pruning our plants, and weeding. That's when I noticed several problems with out plants. First, I noticed that the zucchini sprouts - mentioned and pictured during my last post - had yellowed and all but died; second, the pepper plants appeared to have started to develop blossoms, but they too faded; and finally, the leaves of our tomato plants appears to be wilting (as pictured above). I suspect that the problem might be associated with either amount of water the plants are getting, or nutrient level of the soil. So, Saturday morning, after a very very fun father-daughter pancake breakfast, we drove over to a nearby nursery.

Wow! I felt like we were both two kids in a candy store. Hand in hand, excitedly we explored the nursery, looking at all the beautiful colors, stopping to smell all of the sweet flower blossoms. My daughter would spy something new, look up at me, and say "look at this", or "what's that".  Fun, fun, fun!

At Armstrong Nursery, we picked up an at home soil pH an nutrient test kit, a soil moisture probe, a box of organic vegetable garden fertilizer, a pair of garden shears, and...a humming bird. "Agh, it's so cute" my daughter said as she played with it's spring hinged wings, and that sealed the deal for me. Into the cart it went, and shortly thereafter our daughter proudly placed it into the garden. Total Visa card moment, right! "Metallic humming bird...price, six bucks, the price of seeing such pure joy on your daughters face...priceless".

Soil Moisture Levels - July 9, 2011 @ 19:30

Optimal Soil Moisture Level Measured

That evening, with our new soil moisture meter in hand, I made measurement at each plant grouping, at depths of one, two, and three inches. Based on the meters literature, the different plants the optimum moisture content number should be between 2 and 4. My reading were much, much higher. Oopps. With this information I created the following plots. Okay, granted they might be a little difficult to understand, so let me help. On the right side the graph are depths which the measurements were taken. On the bottom are the numbers 1 through 5, representing the five plant grouping (1 - Tomatoes, 2 - Peppers, 3 - Cucumbers, 4 - Zucchini, and 5 - Beans). Finally, the soil moisture is represented a multiple colored layers, coming out of the page toward the reader. Of the two graphs to the right, the top graph represents current soil moisture conditions, while the lower graph represents optimal soil moisture conditions. It is my goal to make the top graph look like the lower.

Soaking Up The Sun

Zucchini

Watering our plants last night I noticed that not only are the tomato and zucchini plants thriving, but several vegetables are starting to develop.  Excitedly, this afternoon I set out, with camera in hand, to take a few pictures our our new veggie sprouts to share with everyone.

Cucumber

Tomato

I have to say, that having the bed this high is great! It makes weeding a breeze and is awesome for making these kinds of observations. I think that when the time comes to harvest our vegetables, it will be really nice.

A New Beginning

Last week we took a quick trip over to our local Home Depot, and there we picked up one large, and three medium sized pots, two bags of organic potting soils, and several starter plants. I had every intention of starting our garden this year from seeds, but since we felt that were getting such a late start, and the varieties available to us were those we had already intended on planting this year...why not. So this year we bought a total of seven starters, of which there are three tomato plants (Roma, Yellow Pear, and Beefsteak), three pepper plants (Sweet Red and Yellow Bells and an Anaheim Chili), two Burpless Hybrid cucumbers, and a Black Beauty zucchini squash.

Retuning home from the store, I was extremely eager to get started planting our garden. However, before I could get started my father-in-law (who we are temporarily living with) stopped me and offered the use of one of his planters. He mentioned that he too had ever intention of planting a garden this year, but life just managed to get in the way. He also added that while clearing out the backyard, we had come across a couple back of compost, which we were welcomed to use. So without hesitation, I gathered up a couple shovels and a steel rake, and began turning the soil. Our daughter helped to supervise my work. Once I had dug down about two feet, I layered in the bags of potting soil and compost, and then turning the soil once more to blend. I really liked the way the soil looked afterwards.

Once I finished with preparing the soil, it was finally time to plant our starters. Our daughter, full of excitement, helped plant every single plant. With each plant the process was we used our hand-shovel and dug a small hole, pulled the tag from the plastic pot, pulled out the starter, messaged the roots a little, placed the plant into the hole, and backfilled the hole. It was a blast planting our garden with our daughter. I do think that she enjoyed, even more than planting, watering the new plants. Although she still isn't quite clear on the concept of keeping the water where the plants need it, still a heck of a lot of fun for all.

Several days later, while at work, a co-worker of mine brought in several trays of starters she had, but could not use this year. What great luck! So, as you might imagine, arriving home with more plants just made our daughter smile. We planted two Pole Bean plants, and a Poblano Chili plant. So far everything seems to be taking. I think the other day, I even noticed some flower buds developing on our tomato plants. Fun, fun, fun!

Oh, Your Still Here?

I can not believe that is has been over a year since my last posting, but then again we have experienced a lot of changes. The biggest change is that we sold our house and moved to southern California. Although bummed to leave behind our garden (and really well conditioned soil), this move has now presented us with a whole new set of conditions to work with. The soil is hard and rocky, the space is even smaller, and I've managed to procrastinate longer than expected. To be completely honest, I was quite sure if I wanted to try growing vegetables this year. However, I noticed that over the past year, I have periodically daydreamed about starting another garden, wondering how I would battle the soil, decide what to plant, how to deal with new pests and weather conditions. So...what's my grand plan? I am going to try growing four to five different vegetables in large pots. Currently, I'm leaning towards, tomatoes (cherry or pear and beefsteak), peas (my daughters favorite), cucumber, bell peppers, and maybe some herbs or onions. Okay, ready...and...break.

Invasion of the Body Snatchers?

I'm not sure if we should be concerned about the giant pod we found in the garden, and call Dr. Bennell, or just check the neighborhood for an unlocked car door to share the wealth. This giant zucchini weighs in at 6.7 pounds, is 17 inches long, and at its base the circumference is 14.5 inches. Good thing we found Whole Foods recipe for chocolate zucchini muffins.

Dude, Where's My Peppers

Ding! Ding! School is session folks.

Okay, it has been about four months since we planted the seeds for our Poblano plants. In that time we have watched the plant grow, flower, and produced fruit. All seemed right. The rounded, berry-like fruit, changing from bright green to yellow, to orange. Unfortunately though, for the past few weeks now, we've watched as the peppers growth has stalled, remaining olive in size and orange. Up again against the wall of my understanding, I checked the back of the seed packet for the estimated time to harvest, 80 days. Well we blown right past period!

What is going on with these peppers? Have I been watering them to much? Is it a lack of nutrients in the soil? These questions have been lodged in the back of my brain for weeks now. Thinking that the solution might be linked to the need to pinch off the orange peppers, triggering the plant to develop larger, traditional looking Poblano peppers, I took to the garden this morning.

Kneeling down next to the plant, I picked off the first pepper. Pinching it between my fingers, I watched as the skin broken exposing the juice and seeds. Knowing that my next action my be a regret, I put the pepper to my tongue and waited for the heat from capsaicin to spread throughout my mouth. But, I hadn't expected it to taste sweet. Tempting fate, I popped the whole pepper in my mouth and bit down..still sweet, very much like a tomato! Trying a few more, I conclude that the joke was on us. Apparently, the folks at Ferris Morse accidently put orange pear tomatoes seeds in the wrong packet.

We laughed at ourselves, and agreed to try different seeds next year.

Crazy August Maize

In celebration of my beautiful wife's birthday, I

harvested ourentire crop of corn. All told we ended up with about two dozen ears. The funny part of it all is that the majority of the ears average about four-inches long, or if longer would only have a dozen kernels on the cob. My wife thought they looked like toothless old men.

Albeit slightly freaky looking, they tasted great. Nothing like fresh sweet corn on a summer afternoon. As you can see, our little girl was not being shy about how much she liked them.

Chomp, Chomp, Goes The Preservation Bug

Still bit by the preservation we decided to harvest the majority of our basil. As we removed the stems, the intensity of the aromatics filling the house was amazing, and for some reason we developed the strongest craving for a plate of Thai Basil Fried Rice. Going a little old-school with our drying method, our leaves spent the next couple days on a couple of cookie sheets, drying in the sun.

As we learned with our black beans, what appeared to be vast cache, has dwindled throughout the day into a nice tindy amount. After crushing the leaves by hand, we ended up with about a cup and a half, which we placed into an air-tight jar. Now, I can't wait to make some marinara sauce.

Ay Ya Ya!

Well folks, I think the canning bug may have bit us. Aside from running through our normal morning routine, I found myself out in the garden picking our first (looks like more to come) wave of beautiful fire engine red tomatoes. I would estimate our garden has provided us with about twenty to thirty cherry and beefsteak tomatoes, of which the largest was comparable to a large fig. All the same, they are all delicious. After treating myself to one while picking the rest, enjoying the refreshing burst of flavor a sweetness, I snuck just one more. Yum.

Into the kitchen, washing our cache of garden delights, we began making our own salsa. An idea, my wife had after visiting our dear friends in Minnesota (congratulations by the way). So, into a blend went all of our tomatoes, plus a few full size beefsteaks, plus...ready for this..

- three jalapenos, plus half the seeds of one;

- eight cloves of garlic;

- one lime and half a lemon, freshly squeezed;

- about half a cup of fresh cilantro;

- about one to two tablespoons of red pepper

flakes;

- about half as much cumin;

- one yellow onion; and

- half of a red onion.

Unlike last time, we are slightly more prepared. This time we bought a canning kit which included a magnetic lid retriever (cool!), and large mouth funnel (even cooler!), and a pair of jar tongs (the coolest bomb diggity tool ever!). Now I will never have to don that blue silicon glove, moving the jars in and out of that scalding water. Oh sure it's rated to five-hundred degrees, but the real questions is, for how long can it be at that temperature before people start calling you lefty? Answer... not as long as you think. So, with our jars filled, ten of them to be exact, we sent them all off for a day at the spa. Forty-five minutes later, ding, everybody out of the pool. Then we waited...pop!, waited some more followed by seven more pop! I regret to inform you that three of our little spicy salsa soldiers didn't pop!, never fear, into the chill chest to be gobbled up later, yum-yum.

Today also marked a major change in our garden. We have decided that due to the continued drop in production, it is time to say goodbye to our pea and cucumber plants. I spent a short time in the garden this evening, cutting out those plants, as well as some of the other leaves and dead growths. I was also able to utilize some of the trellises from the cucumbers to shore up one of our tomato plants, which turned out to be a late bloomer; some of our corn stalks; and our pepper plants. The weather was pleasant, and the mosquito's stayed away, so it made a nice end to our day.

We Are All Ears

For the first time this season we have CORN! They made an amazing treat tonight. As we enjoyed our sweet ears of corn, which didn't need anything on them, we remarked that we can't ever remember having corn this fresh. Now we can't wait for the rest to mature.

As for the rest of vegetables, tonight we pulled out some real prize winning cucumbers and zucchini (check out the six-inch ruler at the bottom of the picture). Lucy!, looks like we got some more preserving to do!

Ba-Ba Black Bean

The other night, I decided that it was time to harvest all of our black bean pods. After picking and placing the pods into a large kitchen mixing bowl, and grabbed one of our left over mason jars, and sat down next to my wife on our couch. As we began threshing, or shelling each pod, our daughter decided she wanted to help. Setting herself up on the arm of the couch, she bean copying our actions. Taking a pod from the bowl, pinching the bottom end, and pulling the string toward the top of the pod, she successfully unzipped the seam. Slitting each unzipped pod open with her tiny fingers popped each bean from its birth, depositing it into the jar. By the end we had shelled enough beans to fill the jar three quarts of the way full. What a fun way to spend time with my family.

Over the next few days we dried the beans in the sun. We found it so entertaining that by the end the beans had reduced to fill only about a quarter of the jar. This has really given us an appreciation for the vast number of bean pods required to yield enough beans to bill any of the bags we can purchase at the store.

We're Just Pickled Pink

We did it!

With an abundance of cucumbers loitering in the kitchen we decided to try our hand at pickling and canning. Specifically we we choose to try our hand at making sweet pickle relish, and bread and butter pickles. We following the recipes to the letter, and although we did not have all of the recommend tools, we made it work. It was so satisfying to hear each lid "pop" as the jars cooled from their stint in the bath of boiling water. From our canning adventure we learned that process is very easy, a bit time intensive, very Hot and Humid, and even therapeutic. We can't wait to try our preserves, but frankly, we found ourselves a bit cucumber/pickled out.

"Hotter Than A Sinner In Church"

Summer has finally decided the let us all know that it is here. While daytime temperatures are soaring upward, threatening to break the century mark, evening temperatures are...well they're not doing much of anything to help cool us down. Forecast for the rest of the week is promising, with the onset of a delta breeze and subsequent cooler temperatures. I know I will enjoy it, and so will our garden.

This afternoon, needing a little time to unwind from the day, I sent myself out into the garden. I started, as usual, with the corn. Most of the stalks are well over 6 feet tall now, and have developed tassels. Some even appear to be developing ears. We are really looking forward to having some fresh corn this summer, and if our daughter like fresh peas, I think fresh corn is just going to blow her hair back!

Working my way around the garden, giving each section of vegetables a long soak of water, I was tickled to find that we had four cucumbers ready for harvest. Three of which are the perfect size for pickling, and other...well let's just say it's not going to last that long in our kitchen.

The Jolly Green Giant (aka zucchini plants) have managed to provide us with yet two more zucchini, and looks like there are at least half a dozen more on the way. I think this year we've already harvested at least two dozen zucchini. Last week we even shared some with our next door neighbor as a "thank you" for watering our garden while we traveled back to Iowa, and one of my wife's friends. I though of her as our very own Postage Stamp Garden Ambassador. For her first time in this position, I think she did very well. So well in fact, our neighbor came out into his yard, poked his head over the fence and offered to share his bumper crop of plums. SCORE! Last year when I mended the fence between our two homes, I made a sampling of the fruit (yes, I had permission). They are very good plums. I'll have to figure out a way to preserve them too.

The pea plants are still chugging away, providing our daughter with at least half a dozen pea pods every other day. I have never seen her go that crazy about a particular food with the exception of her milk. Our sweet baby girl is so funny when it comes to milk, or as we like to refers to is as the white nectar of the Gods! One would think the world is running out of the white stuff, with the way she pounds it down. And don't fool yourself, she know whole, from 2%, from skim, and as we have learned if it ain't at least 2%, don't even bring it to the table. With that all said (and having diverged from tell you ll about the garden) she is staring to ask for water more often as she's growing, but if those "milk does a body good" commercials have any truth to them at all...I'm going to be a very...very...very busy daddy, putting the fear into the hearts of all those poor boys who come around.

The tomato plants have a few green fruits developing on them, and so many more flowers lying in wait. Maybe the summer heat will help move things along. Similarly, our jalapeno and poblano pepper plants have produced one or two fruits, and a mess more flowers, but nothing to set our tongues on fire yet.

The beets are about two-inches in diameter now. The white onions are between a nickel and quarter in size. The two basil plants are enjoying their new digs, after being freed from their pots. Our Kentucky green bean finally realized that is was time to start growing, along with the brussel sprouts. We have one baby dixie summer squash growing, and probably two dozen butternut squashes growing on the vines. Which, by the way the butternut squash plants are really trying to give our zucchini plants a run for the title of "largest postage stamp garden plant of 2010". The vines are running everywhere, and anywhere there is space.

Another surprising development has been our black bean bushes. For the longest time these plants have had the smallest purple flowers on them, but no beans, that is until today. The summer heat had wilted the plant slightly, and looking inside I would four or five dozen, two to three inch green bean pods. Looks like they have a way to go yet, but I thought it was promising.

What a great day. Amazing what a trip to the garden can do for you.

More Peas Please

Just a quick note, while weeding the garden this afternoon, I harvested four ripe pea pods. I brought them inside and split them open. Our daughter came up to me, to investigate, and exclaimed "Peas!". I ask, "Do you want some?" Eyeing the small dull green balls in the palm of my hand, she quickly grabbed two of them and tentatively place them to her lips, then looked at my for my reaction. "It's okay sweetie, eat'em" I told her. At that point they quickly disappeared into her mouth. Suddenly her eye light up, and she came back over to me for more. Today we learned that our daughter like fresh pea from the garden. (sigh...) Life is good.

Make Sure To Stop & Smell The Blossoms

Excited as to what new developments I might find, I made it a priority to walk through our garden this morning. Honestly, I was very curious if some of our zucchini were ready to be harvested, alas there are not. Instead I found one of the squash flowers open, which I can't ever remember seeing before; they've always been closed. Neat!

Zucchini Blossom

Dixie Summer Squash Blossom

Earlier last week, I transplanted both of our dixie summer squash plants, which were

inevitably going to be over taken by the Jolly Green Giant. I decided to move

them into the radishes old spot. After replanting them, I trimmed back the larger of the two, and snipped off its first blossom, hoping that would help. The days following were looking a little sketchy, with the leaves looking all droopy, but this morning we have a new blossom. I think there is hope yet.

Cucumber Blossom

Also flowering for the first time are our cucumber plants, actually just one of them. I'm sure that more are soon to follow. I'm looking forward to the possibility of making our own pickles from the cucumbers, I hope will coming soon. Pickling is something we've never done before, but sounds like something we can figure out. I sure like most things, you learn by doing.

New Trellis

Lastly, I wanted to showcase the pea trellis my daughter helped me construct with some left over pvc pipe, chicken wire, and zip-ties. The original trellis (which still remains) was quickly overgrown by the series of pea plants surrounding it. So, one morning I decided to construct an additional trellis, but things being the way that they are, did not want to spend much (if any) money to do so. Well, lucky for us, I had spent many afternoons

repairing the sprinklers along our driveway...oopps, and had about 12 feet of pvc pipe on hand. The chicken wire meshing has been hanging around our house, almost since we bought the place. I had used some of it to build my own dirt sieve. With MacGyver like mad skills (just kidding, I didn't use any duct tape) we constructed this simple "H" frame trellis. Very simple, works, and I like it.

One Zuchini, Two Zuchini, Three Zunchini, more...

The weather is finally warming after a very prolonged spring. Never would we have thought that the local Sierra-Nevada ski resorts would re-open over the memorial day weekend. Personally we're not thrilled with the onset of the summer heat, but it's doing great things to our garden. Most noticeably our zucchini plant has transformed into the Jolly Green Giant, overshadowing many of its neighbors. A couple of nights ago while our daughter and I were watering the garden (apparently daddy looked thirsty too), I noticed that we had several beautiful yellow-orange blossoms flowering under the massive broad deep green leaves of our jolly green giant. Two nights later, to my surprise we had 3 to 4 inch long squash's. I think tomorrow they will be ready for the plucking. Now, what to do with them? Everything I've read and everything I've heard, suggest that zucchini plants produce quickly and throughout much of the growing season. In other words get ready for some zucchini.

Last night while surfing the internet,

I came across the Nature's Harmony Farm (out of Elbert Georgia) blog. The sites' author states that he/she loves "the chapter in Animals, Vegetable, Miracle that talks about

how country people never lock their car door unless it's zucchini season for fear that someone might put a bag

of excess zucchini in your front seat!"

Too funny!

Other than the jolly green giant, ourpeas plants are doing well, treating us to our first fresh...off the vine... pea pod. Eew-wee, was it sweet. Our cucumbers are starting to kick it up a notch; the corn in way beyond knee high (by the fourth of July); and the tomatoes and pepers are give our black bean bush a run for its money. This is awesome!