My Floating Island Raised Bed

I was excited when I won the opportunity to have a Floating Island Raised Bed. When I picked it up, I became more intrigued than excited. Would this really work? And what in the heck kind of oddball material is it made out of ? I still don’t know the answer to the second question. But to the first, the answer is a resounding YES. We had a bit of a late start putting plants into the little quarter-of-a-pie shaped raised bed, but once we put the starts of basil, sunflower, and seeds of more sunflowers, they took OFF. They got bigger and healthier than I’ve ever seen in my gardening experience. We tucked the bed into an ugly corner of our yard and once the plants got nice, big, and green, the visual was much improved. I’ve attached some pictures of the bed and plants. I’ve enjoyed the ease of the raised bed and of watching it morph from a funny looking chunk of plastic into a nice green food machine.

Update on garden!

So this is my second blog about my above ground garden. All is doing very well! I have gotten to enjoy an Italian white eggplant already, and my yellow bell pepper is coming right along! I was concerned about all the rain that we got a couple weeks ago because my garden is below the roof of a shed and water was literally pooling inside of it, but it drained it out and is thriving! My tomato plant is getting very big, and my zucchini has a beautiful orange flower. I ought to take some pictures.. I’ll work on that! So far I am very content with my garden, and love every single day of seeing it grow. Cheers to gardening!

Speaking of Downsizing…

I know it’s totally the wrong time of year to move strawberries, but nevertheless, here I am. I am moving some of my garden beds around and have dug up a bunch of June-bearing plants (variety is ‘Honeyloe’). They need to get in the ground ASAP. Please shoot me an email if you can take them off my hands quickly.

UPDATE: My dug-up plants found a home with a friend and some of her friends, but if you’re desperate for strawberries, let me know. I have 2 more people lined up to take some, but I have a feeling I’ll still have some extras.

Looking Ahead

I know that there is still probably enough time to get a quick lettuce or spinach crop in, but it feels like the end of the season to me. Most likely, it’s because I am trying to fit in the monumental task of shuffling my garden beds to accomodate a new, smaller version of my garden for next year. I want to get the move done now, so in the spring, I can stroll blithely out to my garden and just plant away.

In light of that, I have been compiling a mental list of things I learned this year, and before they evaporate from my brain, I thought I’d get them down here:

Next year, I will:

• put only one tomato in a tomato cage (ok…maybe two, but definitely NOT three)
• plant only cherry tomatoes
• grow ‘blue lake’ green beans again
• remember to use legume innoculant on peas and green beans
• thin early and brutally
• put out wasp traps in May, and replenish them all summer
• remember that squash, zuchini and pumpkin plants get huge
• cut back the pumpkin plants when they even hint at exceeding their bounds (that is, if I grow them again)
• try birdhouse gourds again

Next year, I won’t:

• start anything from seed
• plant corn
• plant more than 3 zuchini or squash seeds
• let the volunteer sunflowers grow in the middle of my (soon-to-be) strawberry bed
• forget to harvest my herbs

Side note: just how late can you start lettuce, carrots and spinach seeds?

Of Pests and Parasites

I may just have to stop reading my gardening literature. Twice in the last few weeks, I have read about a garden problem and then stumbled across it in my own plot just days later.

It started with the fall issue of Zone 4 magazine, where I read an article about raspberries. The berry expert profiled in the article mentioned that yellowjackets can be quite troublesome in raspberry patches, burrowing into the fruit and sucking it dry. “Note to self,” I thought, since my raspberries are coming along nicely and should produce well next year. I filed the tidbit away for future use. Not two days later, I wandered out to my strawberry patch, to find it literally buzzing with yellowjackets, sucking the life out of my STRAWBERRIES!! Ugh. I bought a trap, which has since accumulated quite a collection of corpses. But not before they laid waste to just about every beautiful berry on the plants. Damn, damn, damn!

A few days later, I was perusing my “Weeds of the West” reference book, trying to figure out if what was growing in one of my perennial beds was yarrow (it was common tansy). While flipping through the book, I came across a yucky-looking weed called Dodder. It looks like thin yakisoba noodles, draped all over the host plant. “Ick,” I thought, and quickly turned the page. This weekend, while weeding my garden with the help of my sister and her husband, we discovered the nasty stuff draped all over my corn! I was so mad….like irrationally mad. This weed is a parasitic annual, which explains why my corn had been looking a little iffy. We pulled it out and stuffed it in a garbage can, but I haven’t had the chance to go back out to inspect the damage. Here’s the thing though…further research this evening shows that corn is supposed to be resistant to dodder. Something’s not adding up. Anyone have any ideas? My next step is to go pull out all my corn, just as it’s setting ears….

Seed Saving Workshop: August 22, 2009

It’s about time to leave pea pods on their vines (so the seeds fully mature) and a few biennial carrots in the ground (until next year for them to flower). The Basics of Seed Saving Workshop is also just around the corner at the Missoula Urban Demonstration site. The cost is $10 for members and $20 for non-members–well worth picking up the skills you’ll need Peak Oil or when your peaking interest in hybrid seeds plunges. The workshop is scheduled for August 22 and lasts from 1-3 PM. Think of it this way–once you’ve harvested a sweet crop of seeds, you’ll be able to trade with other Missoulians at the Seed Saver Swap in late October (Date & Time TBA).

 

Another workshop that we highly recommend is the canning how-to on September 11.

 

Here’s how MUD describes the workshop: Rumor has it that last April Burpee’s sold out of all its seeds and had to put thousands of orders on backorder. Don’t let this happen to you! Yvonne will teach you how to collect and store your precious heirlooms for next season, and tell you which seeds are hybrids and which are sterile. Also, keep your eyes open for a Seed Saver Swap in late October! 

Filling a void (the sharecrop and fall planting)

Earlier this week a new friend, Marco, and I began a contemporary voyage into (the once abused term) ’sharecropping.’  At two households that have, for all practical purposes, been in fallow for years (visual of one), the lords of the land are letting us fill the void by weeding or tilling, llama manuring or composting, and planting this week.

I’ll provide an updated photo showing the progression tomorrow.

Our goal is to return this ground to a more holy state–not that we’re improving on nature’s inclinations–what I mean is more directed at the ecstatic skin of the Earth, the soil. As Franco put it importantly, “we are growing the soil, not the plants.” Astrologically, Leo (July 23-August 23) is the best time to work the soil.

Our plan is to work a bit with the moon cycle, grow some species of the root (radish, beet, carrot) because today was the first day of the full moon. [To be full-fledged biodynamic guys, we would incorporate many other techniques, but I feel like especially at this late juncture, we are making an effort to become connected to the seasons & intuitively (suprisingly) timing our work together. We'll expand our repertoire next year.] It’s really an experiment and even with the infinite powers of natural cycles, I’m keeping my fingers crossed that we can pull of this late season dance. If you’d like to bow to yer neighbor and do see do, we’re willing to sell directly to you. Let me know if yer interested and I’ll get back to you in approximately 48-70 days letting you have a pick of the roots, basil and cucumber.

Has anyone tried garden cover crops before and have advice regarding winter wheat/rye or tritacale? Would anyone like to give it a go fer the first time and buy bulk with us? The plan is to plant whatever we order in September.

This crop serves such a dual purpose–one leg of which belongs to a hairy homebrewer. I’m pondering using a bit of the grain in an ale this spring with hops grown by Lifeline Farm. It could be a loco local beer. We’re also going to be gleaning the neighborhood of its apples, making cider (hard and soft), applesauce, jam and pie. Let me know if you’d like to be a part of any or all of this process. By the way, if you’re a member of MUD you can vie for access to two cider presses in these, the Apple Days.

Peas, BBH

the economy of growing your own food

In an effort to not be redundant and post this in a third spot, I am going to just invite you all over to read my recent post at The Hip Homemaker on how I have tried to be economical in creating my first year garden… See you over there!

Onion

A Little Payoff and Some Meandering

Depsite one of the most persistent stomach bugs I’ve had the misfortune to encounter, I did manage to wander out to the garden for a few minutes this weekend to hunt for the zuchinis that I knew would be out there. Sure ’nuff, I nabbed 4 good-sized beauties plus a couple of summer squash. Last year, I started both of these veggies indoors, and didn’t have much luck with the summer squash. This year, I threw ‘em right in the ground and they are doing quite well.

Other updates: I have some green tomatoes but not a ton. I was so excited to get eggplant in the ground AND to see 4 or 5 blossoms, but I don’t think they’re going to do anything. The plants are looking a little yellow and wilty. I’ve been having a really hard time thinning my carrots…I just hate pulling out plants and tossing them. I get tough with them every few days though, and they’re starting to actually look like carrots when I thin them now.

I was so excited to have a bunch of volunteer sunflowers from last year, but it turns out they have invited along a big, fat infestation of aphids. I’ve tried not to be too freaked out about it…the ladybugs are plentiful. Unfortunately, so are the ants. I’ve picked off a few of the worst infested leaves, but have left the ladybugs to their work. They’ve always been my favorite bug…actually the only one I like. Except for worms. And bees.

Seed Saving–first item of business, the peas.

If your once green peas are looking bloated and showing signs of late season garden rust, they probably look like mine. Peas are definitely early risers and early sleepers. Is anyone else’s peas in the mood for castration yet?

Harvesting a bucket of woody, decaying pea pods made me question whether stir-frying the last crop was worth it…should I just collect the remaining pods and revive the innards next year?

Once I passed through the three stages of pea-related grief, I asked a fellow farmer about techniques for saving pea seeds for 2010 and did a search on google. Each query brought me one step forward and two steps back, because the appropriate pea seed saving method is to wait until the pods have become organisms akin to old men of the Florida coast. It’s best to wait for the pods to reach full maturity on the plant. Unfortunately I didn’t research this before the bucket harvest.

This site provides some information on the process including this–”Allow pods to dry brown before harvesting, about four weeks after eating stage. If frost threatens, pull entire plant, root first, and hang in cool, dry location until pods are brown.”

Lucky for Missoulians who have already picked the remaining pod-ies, there’s this advice from the Daughter of the Soil (a credible moniker, no?)–”If the peas are no longer receiving moisture from the plant then there’s no particular reason to leave them on the plant, as far as I can see.” My plan is to wait until the little peas are rattling around in their graves–then I’ll assume they’re ready for their next life in the garden!

the fruits of my labor

I am so excited to see the harvest coming in this week.  It really is a snowball effect.  It starts with one little turnip, a couple of cucumbers and then suddenly it is madly out of control.

This week I pulled up all of my turnips and prepped them for a potato turnip gratin I will bake for a dinner party Tuesday night.  I also harvested 15 good-sized pickling cucs, my first yellow squash and of course a bowl full of salad greens.  My broccoli is getting really close and the blooms on the cantelope, zucchini and yellow squash tell me that they are not far behind.  A few tomatoes are starting to turn from green to various shades of yellow and red.  And I am already designing next year’s garden in my head, doubling my beds and planning the placement better for rotation.

Here are a few pictures of the garden this week:

Yellow Squash

Cucumbers

Broccoli

Lettuce

Yellow Squash Blossom

Sweet Peppers

You can see a few more shots in my Flickr photostream...

Watering Follow-up

I was asked to provide more details of my soaker-system setup, and better pics. The pics will be added to this post this weekend, but in case anyone was really waiting for this info, here it is:

I got my inspiration at the Mr. Drip website. Laugh if you will, but there are some good graphics of different systems. I based mine on the Split-T system (scroll down on the page link above and you’ll see the pic labeled ‘For Rows and Gardens.’ Then I just went to Home Depot and cobbled together whatever I could find.

 Here’s an illustration of my gardens and soaker system. This is not to scale, and under no circumstances did I do this at work. You’ll see for the big bed, I assembled one long pipeline of shorter threaded pieces interspersed with threaded Ts, which I fitted with a connector that I then shoved the hose onto. It wasn’t easy, and my wrists were sore for days. For the most part, all of them are working fine. I had one piece of hose that split every day…not sure if the connector was too big or what. I finally gave up on continually trimming past the split, and just wrapped the end of the soaker in duct tape and shoved it right into the connector. I’m nothing if not…well…lazy.

For the smaller beds, I just wound soakers around them, and connected them to either a hose, or a T-connection fashioned from the same pipe-and-connector assembly.

I bought a basic timer for about $40 at Lowes, and ran a 4-valve manifold off of that. I have 3 garden hoses connected, and an extra valve to fill up buckets or rinse stuff off. My spigot post looks a bit like some kind of octopus, but we are going to relocate it to the back of the garden this fall, so it should be a bit tidier.

I will take more detailed photos of the individual pieces this weekend, and track down the brands of the stuff I used.

If y’all have suggestions for brands/equipment you’ve used, I would love to hear them!

Finally have my raised garden planted!

Hello! Due to not having internet at my apartment all week I am just finally getting around to blogging about the awesome raised garden that I won! So I went out and got some soil and had to displace all the daddy long leg spiders who had taken residence in the container. I planted a zucchini squash in the top tier of the container so that it can have room to grow out of the container. On the bottom (from left to right) I planted a white eggplant, a yellow pepper, carrots in front, and a tomato plant. I am very excited to see my plants grroooww!! The whole garden is located out in a sunny area behind my apartment. It should get enough light there and won’t be drowned by the automatic sprinklers either. I don’t know how well the tomato will do since it was in a large pot with four other plants and now it has to get used to a new situation, but I will keep you all updated!! Thanks again MasterGardens and 1,000 New gardens! I will get back when there is more to tell!
-Andrea

The Livin’ is Easy

I had a vision of gardening this year, and it didn’t involve dragging the hose around, or cursing at the oscillating sprinkler that would stick on one side or the other if the water pressure changed. I spent most of January researching drip setups, but only got my setup completed a couple of weeks ago before we headed out of town. I have to say that I was shocked it worked. It’s composed of soaker hoses, threaded pipe that I think is supposed to be used for ‘real’ sprinkler systems, and some threaded PVC connectors. I also got a timer. I have a bunch of soakers coming off a main line in the big bed, a looped 50′ soaker in my raspberry/squash patch, and a split 75-footer covering two 7×7 beds. It goes off every day at 8 am, after our lawn sprinklers have run, and we’re all done with our morning showers. I have to say I’m feeling bit smug about my garden this year, and that surely means something horrible is about to happen. Just don’t tell the deer what they’re missing.

Anyone else got any soaker hose or timer success stories to share?

 

Note: I got hoses from both Home Depot and Lowe’s, and the ones from Lowes are better. Anyone know where you can buy bulk soaker hose, other than online?

Cooking Workshop with Pearl Cash of the Pearl Cafe!

So you’ve seen the cucumber plants extending and the spinach starts are making a lot of noise in the green forest at the far end of the garden…you’ve proven yourself in the fields…now it may be time to get together with other high-spirited harvesters and get some more ideas about how to turn yer bounty into something new and tasty.

The Missoula Demonstration Project is putting on a great event next Saturday, July 18th at 11 PM. Here’s how it’s advertised–Learn how to choose the best seasonal ingredients and cook intuitively with Pearl Cash, owner/chef of the Pearl Café on East Front Street. It’s at The Senior’s Center at 705 S Higgins Avenue. Register ahead to guarantee your space by calling the MUD office 721-7513. $10 members/ $20 non-members.

I seriously hope to see you there!