buffalo wings recipe: Gardening

Showing posts with label Gardening. Show all posts

Gardening Journal: Week of June 27th, 2011

Can you guess what this is? If you said Celery you would have guessed currectly. Can you see what we did here? Just sliced the bottom off some organic celery and submerged the bottom in water with toothpicks. In no time flat this celery started to re-grow itself. Amazing!!! This would be a great project to do with your children.

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Gardening Journal: Week of June 20th, 2011

Really......my hubby should type up these Gardening Journals, he is the Organic Gardening guru at our house. He does all the work and I take all the credit!!! ;-). The planting season in our 'neck of the woods" starts in February but our garden went in sometime in March.

What is the best thing to make with your new Purple Potato Harvest?

Pretty Purple Potato French Fries of course! I sound like Spongebob with his Pretty Patty's you say? These potatoes will not dye your tongue or anything else purple!!! ;-). In fact, according to an article over at Rodale, these potatoes have more than just good looks. These pretty potatoes are chuck full of "disease smashing antioxidants". In the article written by Leah Zerbe over at Rodale, "Researchers found that people who eat pigmented potatoes boast lower levels of oxidative stress and inflammation, factors linked to chronic disease, when compared to eaters of white potatoes." So there you have it, if you grow potatoes, you should consider the pigmented variety! My son assures you that if you cook the french fries the Alton Brown way, they will taste just like McDonalds French Fries without the junk. I'm so proud of my kids for knowing this stuff at such a young age!!!

Here is our latest harvest. I added a few onions but they are really not quite ready yet. I am trying to use a harvest photo to replace the one that is a "canned" photo through blogger that I currently use. What do you think of this one? Can I lighten it up and try and use this?

Tuesday Garden Party hosted by an Oregon Cottage

Garden Tuesday hosted by Sidewalk Shoes

Wordful Wednesday hosted by Parenting by Dummies

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Gardening Journal: Week of January 24th 2012

It is a pretty uneventuful gardening week here at the homestead. Just playing the waiting game really. We are makeing sure the lights are turned on every day, off every night. Making sure they are watered. All I have to share this week is growth progress on our plants. This spring we are growing: Onions, peppers, tomatoes, cabbage, lettuce and cucumbers.Wanna see the babies? OK here they are.

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Garden Journal: Week of January 16, 2012

We just started our vegetable garden this past week (indoors). Now why in the world would we do such a thing? Erect an ugly buffet table in our beautiful sunroom with all the trays, and equipment? Well for a few reasons. When the outside soil finally warms up enough to plant the first vegetables we will be planting big established plants. That translates to a head start to harvest. It is also cheaper to start your own garden, especially organic, rather than purchase the established plants. In our tiny neck of the woods you can't even purchase established organic vegetable plants. We re-use the same trays every year and purchase the organic seeds and organic starter soil. Another good reason to start early is how hot it got last summer in our area. Lots of tomato growers in our area told stories of how the tomato plans stopped producing in the hight of the heat of this past summer.

My all time favorite thing to grow is onions. Its the garden gift that keeps on givng. I use onions in everhting. Last years crip of sweet onions I diced and froze in cup sized portions. I have been using them ever since for almost every dinner and pot of soup I have made since last summer. I only recently just ran out and am so sad! This year, double the onions!!!!! I would like to get more tomatoes. Less horn worms attacking them. Going to give the squashes a break this year. Last year those darn squash bugs were too many to battle. I am going to do so reading and share what I learn here our progress as we muddle out way though beginning organic vegetable gardening.

So are we ready for some pictures???

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Gardening Journal: August 9th, 2011

I know I mentioned this before but we are officially getting ready to directly plant some seeds in our garden for the fall. On the list is sugar snap peas, spinach, turnips, radish, red beets, and broccoli. I need varieties that are bug resistant because I'm so fed up with bugs this year. Despite the valiant effort of my hubby they bugs got the best of those squash plants are have now moved onto the tomato plants. I was speaking to a local master gardener and he told me to move the location of our garden. Umm, can't do that. LOL. I am almost wondering if all these issues mean giving gardening a break.

This is what I did with all those Jalapenos.

There is another harvest ready to be picked.

This extremely large watermelon makes me happy

in the midst of all our other problems.

It was not as red as some store bought watermelons

but every bit as sweet.

And the two yellow squash that lived despite the constant attack

The Sweet Potatoes are looking great.

Vine Borer's got the Zucchini and the plant is not totally gone

And so they (squash bugs) moved onto the tomatoes.

Can you find it on that tomato?

I will be linking this post to:

Tuesday Garden Party

Garden Tuesday

Bloomin' Tuesday

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Gardening Journal: August 2nd, 2011

Battle of the Bug

Caterpillars, Beetles and Bugs....Oh my!

Have I mentioned to you lately how much bugs give me the creepy crawlies? I accidentally touched that horned tomato worm from last week with my fingers and had to jump up and down yelling gross, gross gross. LOL.

It is really a challenge to be an Organic Gardener. I can totally see why Farmers for a profit turn to chemicals. You plant your garden and nurture your plants with such high hopes only for them to be squashed, by a squash bug no less. The first year of gardening is blissful and fruits of your labor are abundant. At least it was in our experience. This was before the bugs knew you were growing a paradise in their honor. It is so disheartening to see those dang bugs sucking the life out of your beautiful plants.

Caterpillars are easy, BT works gorgeously and is safe to use. Spray weekly and this should do just fine. We did not spray BT early on in the season, instead we had row covers. Those not covered (the squash plants) were invaded by the vine borers. A timely vacation prevented us from fighting back. Fine, if at first you don't succeed, try try again. Right? We planted new squash/zucchini plants. Time of the year is too hot for the vine borer to be very active so enter stage right......those darn Squash beetles.

Plan of Action:

You really have to inspect your plants. These crafty little Beetles lay the eggs under the leaves and you never realize you have a problem until it is really out of hand. I should point out that Squash beetle lay reddish brown eggs in groups on the leaves. The vine borer will lay individual eggs of the same color on the stem. First thing we did was remove the mulch. The mound of mulch provided a safe place for the adult bugs to hide.

Now that we have squash bugs trying to invade, you can find us every weekend morning and every weekday evening laying beside the raised beds inspecting the plants with a bucket of hot sudsy water. We diligently scrape off any eggs that can be found and squash any beetles that can be caught with pliers....LOL. Gross I know. But it is an all out battle. There really is no great safe preventative chemical product like BT for the Squash Beetle. These beetles can fly so going to the dollar store and getting your kids some nets and allowing them to help catch the flyers is also a fun idea. Have them plunge what they catch in the sudsy water. Last night my dear sweet hubby sprinkled Diatomaceous Earth on and around the plants. The jagged nature of this product is supposed to puncture and injure the bugs. This morning we found no new eggs or bugs. YAY!

The adult Squash bug looks like a stink bug only longer. The adult vine borer looks like a red wasp. It might scare you, go ahead and catch them with your net anyway.

In summary, next year I think I will try and find a resistant plant to use for our cucumbers and squash plants.

See how beautiful and healthy they look?

Remember how they looked last week?

Even with what we have been going through with the

squash bug, there are still lots of fruits on the vine.

The white powder is DE.

Sweet Potato Bed seems to be doing Nicely

First Arrow: overgrown Tomato Plants.

Second Arrow: Overgrown Water mellon Plants

Third: Water mellon

Next year I swear, those tomato plants will be no more than 2 per raised bed. I NEED to be able to get inside the plant to harvest. At this point, that is not possible. It is just too dense.

I think the vines will ultimately grow over like this regardless of what you do. Maybe better spacing next year for this too.

No pictures of the jalapenos but I assure you, they continue to be the mega producers of the year. We continue to get a GIANT bowl full a week.

I will be linking this post to:

Wordful Wednesday parenting by dummies

Wordless Wednesday @ 5 minutes for mom

Wordless Wednesday @ Proverbs 31 Mommy

Works for me Wednesday

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Gardening Journal: Week of July 26th, 2011

As a refresher, this is what they looked like last time I spoke to you.

This is what the Zucchini/Squash plants look like now.

Still no fruit. :-( I was told its too hot to pollinate.

One of the original plants we put in the ground. See how small.

A lesson in good composted soil.

Not quite the barrel full we had last year, but still fun.

Poor little Cilantro.

I waited so long to get a good plant in

only for the squash to hog up all the space.

Sweet Potatoes are now planted in the potato bed.

Last year tomatoes were in this bed which is probably why

our Yukon Golds did not grow so much.

We'll see how this goes.

Peppers have been invaded by horned tomato worm.

Odd they have not touched the tomatoes.

Still lots of peppers on there tho.

These Jalapenos are growing after we harvested a HUGE bowl full

just two days earlier. This is the year of the pepper.

Messy overgrown tomato plants

Next year I'd like to keep it two plants per bed.

and a climbing fence like the climbing vine bed.

So neat how long they hold on considering their weight.

Crop Dusting victimizing our Cucumbers

I will be linking this post to:

Wordful Wednesday parenting by dummies

Wordless Wednesday @ 5 minutes for mom

Wordless Wednesday @ Proverbs 31 Mommy

Works for me Wednesday

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Gardening Journal: July 12, 2011

Well......all of the honey dew mellon vines are dead now. We have no idea why or what went wrong. None of the other vines seem to be sickly. I can't see any sort of bug infestation. I mean, there are bugs. There are always bugs. I just don't see any signs that this was the cause. Just odd. One rather large Honey Dew Mellon hangs from the dying vine. All of the other vines are doing well.

We did some planting this week. The purchased Sweet Potato plants went in the potato raised bed. If we had the forethought, we would have made our own sweet potato plants and rooted them. Head on over to Home Joys and see how she does it. We also planted a Rosemary bush and a Cilantro plant (my two favorite herbs). The Zucchini from last week is doing awesome. The yellow squash does not look quite as well as the zucchini though. Oh how I hope it pulls though. We harvested our first bunch of Red Tomatoes just today in fact. Jalapeno's are being harvested by the bushel full. My husband continues to work on and improve the soaker hoses. The tomatoes are growing all over the place in a sloppy mess. Next year the hubs declares that we will grow them on something similar to the climbing beds.

Horned Worm? Found it on the Bell Peppers!

It is now a bug experiment for the kids.

This is only a few of the massive amounts of Jalapeno's being harvested.

Jalapeno's anyone?

Finally, RED ToMaToEs!!

I LOVE my cucumbers!

Newly planted bed.

Bottom Right Cilantro

Bottom Left: Yellow Squash

Middle: Zucchini

Top Left: Rosemary

Newly planted Sweet Potatoes

Behold, the only Honey Dew

Funny how this watermelon has grew enough to sit it's

little tooshie down on the ground now.

See the new one just to the right?

I will be linking this post to:

Wordful Wednesday parenting by dummies

Wordless Wednesday @ 5 minutes for mom

Wordless Wednesday @ Proverbs 31 Mommy

Works for me Wednesday

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Gardening Journal: July 5th, 2011

So we were cleaning out the dead wasteland of wilted vines from the climbing beds and feeling really sad and sorry for ourselves. For a moment I had to walk away, we had such high hopes. Suddenly, we noticed it. A CUCUMBER! Hidden in among the watermelons. Yay, I had thought they all died. Mostly the loss was Honey Dew Melon vines but there is still one that survived. Yay! I'm not feeling quite so bad after all.

Using mostly garden picked items, this week we enjoyed Parsley Potatoes from our potato harvest, Purple Cabbage Cole Slaw from all those purple cabbages, and Greek Salad from onions, grape tomatoes and that cucumber. All we needed to add was feta and olives. Jalapeno's are getting ready so I see Salsa in our future. There are TONS of tomatoes on the vines but right now only the grape tomatoes are getting red.

This week we will start Celery, Broccoli, Cauliflower and Lettuce in the nursery to be planted end of Summer. Lucky for us, we have seed pods from the Broccoli that bolted. ;-D We also have plans of re-planting some potatoes.

In case you were wondering what happened to our Cauliflower, we messed up. Apparently we were supposed to fold in the leaves or something like that? Anyway, I was only half listening when hubs told me. I'm sure he will do better next time! :-)

Harvested those Bell Peppers

Hubs wanted to tie up the plant so they had to be removed.

I sliced most of them and put them in the freezer for stir fry.

Put in new watering soaker hoses.

Part of the problem is that the old hose had a leak

and not all plants were getting watered properly.

New Zucchini. I'm a die hard, I know it. LOL

New Yellow Squash plant.

Both are planted in the old onion bed now

instead of directly in the ground.

I wish a photo could show you just how man of these

Jalapeno's are on this bush. TONS of them.

The very large empty space on the climbing trellis

as a result of removing the dead vines.

A cucumber! Those leaves are watermelon plant leaves

which is why we could not immediately see it.

Yay! Im so happy to have cucumbers still.

I will be linking this post to:

Wordful Wednesday parenting by dummies

Wordless Wednesday @ 5 minutes for mom

Wordless Wednesday @ Proverbs 31 Mommy

Works for me Wednesday

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Gardening Journal: June 28th, 2011

The Good, the Bad and the Ugly edition.

I have been away from my garden for two weeks. My brother offered to do some maintenance for us while we were gone. He harvested the potatoes and the onions and put them to up to store. Even with a visitor taking care of our garden, there was still an incredible loss.

The Bad

First the bad news. ALL of my yellow squash and zucchini plants died. :-(

They look as if they simply were not watered.

Also lost but not pictured was a cucumber vine and all of our Snap Pea bushes. ;-(

If you look at the picture above, you will see the one and only zucchini

that grew but never made it.

I suppose I was arrogant to think that I would be enjoying zucchini in abundance this year.

The broccoli was also not maintained and ended up bolting.

This is only our second year gardening so next year, a watering timer is in order.

The Good

and a bit of the good news....

I for one was surprised to see a bell pepper harvested.

There were tons of onions, it was a good year for onions

We were not quite so happy with the potato harvest.

We yielded much more last year when we just plopped the plants

in the hard un-tilled ground.

Maybe potatoes do not like to be babied with that rich awesome soil

we have in the raised beds?

My hubs told me that the mellons would hang off the back

and drop when ripe, but I just thought that would be way too heavy.

Can't possibly be true.

Well lookey here!

More Bell Peppers, leaving these on till they red this time.

Honey Dew Mellons

I returned home to TONS of Jalapeno's.

I suppose I will have to learn how to put these up.

Tomatoes are getting red.

If I time this right, I can get tons of salsa made and put up.

The Ugly...

My brother tells me that a bunny family tried to move in under the pepper plants. Our two cats and the dog each took turns killing them off until they were all gone. My brother tells me that it was an awful mess and was so sad about it. I don't know how to think. It just feels like they should have sensed that it was dangerous in our yard.

I will be linking this post to:

Wordful Wednesday parenting by dummies

Wordless Wednesday @ 5 minutes for mom

Wordless Wednesday @ Proverbs 31 Mommy

Works for me Wednesday

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